The Senate began debate of the 2016 defense authorization bill Wednesday noting that both parties agree on most major issues of the bill. But it still could fail based on a deep disagreement between the parties over how the Pentagon is funded.
“But for this budgetary issue, Senator Reed and I would be voting on this,” said Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., referring to Senate Armed Services Ranking Member Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I.’s opposition to placing $38 billion in the Defense Department’s base spending request into a one-year war funding account known as overseas contingency operations.
The account has been used to fund contingency operations since the war in Afghanistan to make up for unforeseen operational expenses in the war on terrorism. But in recent years, it has been used to pay for highly questionable items. For example, last year’s contingency account funded a drug interdiction program in South America and a snow plow.
Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said he is not a fan of using the account either to fund operations, but called it the “most we could do in the [authorization bill] to recognize the need for a broader fiscal agreement without denying funding for our military right now.”
The bill will include a provision that would allow the military to shift some of that $38 billion from the one-year war funding account to its base budget, which can be multi-year and allows for more spending flexibility, if offsets are found and approved by Congress.
The White House has already said it will veto the bill.
On other major issues, such as the closure of the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the two parties were largely in agreement. Prior to sending the bill to the full floor, the committee voted 19-7 supporting a measure allowing President Obama to move forward on the closure of the facility, as long as he submits a plan for its closure, including what to do with the detainees inside, and that Congress approves that plan.
The bill authorizes major weapons systems and prevents the retirement of others, such as keeping the Air Force’s fleet of A-10 attack aircraft, which the Air Force has sought to phase out to take its maintainers and transition them to the F-35 joint strike fighter.
The parties are also in agreement on the major goals of bringing acquisition reform to the Pentagon, a move McCain called critical to addressing a broken system that is a “clear and present danger to the national security of the United States.”
The bill will undergo several days of debate and is expected to wrap up next week.
