Congress working on $901B defense policy bill
'Must-pass' legislation includes raise for troops
By: Patricia Zengerie
and Julia Harte
Reuters
WASHINGTON - Lawmakers on December 7 [2025] unveiled an annual defense policy bill authorizing a record $901 billion in national security spending next year, [2026] Trump's request and provides $400 million in military assistance to Ukraine.
.....
The sweeping 2,000-page bill includes a 4% raise for enlisted troops but excludes a bipartisan effort to spur housing constructions that some lawmakers had hoped to include in the final bill.
..... House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, said in a statement that the legislation would advance Trump's agenda by "ending woke ideology at the Pentagon, securing the border, revitalizing the defense industrial base, and restoring the warrior ethos."
..... The measure is a compromise between versions of the National Defense Authorization Act passed earlier this year [2025] by the Senate and House of Representatives, both controlled by Trump's fellow Republicans.
..... Trump in may [2025] asked Congress for a national defense budget of $892.6 billion for fiscal year 2026, flat compared to 2025 spending. That includes funding for the Department of War,as well as other agencies and programs involved with security and defense.
..... The House bill set spending at the level, but the Senate had authorized $925 billion. The NDAA authorizes Pentagon programs, but does not fund them. Congress must separates pass funding in a spending bill for the fiscal year ending in September 2026.
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In addition to the typical NDSAA provision on purchases of military equipment and boosting competitiveness with revivals such as China and Russia, this year's [2025] bill focus on cutting programs reviled by Trump such as diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, and deploying troops to the United States-Mexico border to intercept undocumented immigrants and drugs.
..... It also repeals tow resolutions authorizing the sue of military force in Iraq in 1991 and 2002.
..... Considered "must-pass" legislation, the massive NDAA is one of a few major pieces of legislation that Congress passed every year, and lawmakers take pride in having passed it annually for more than six decades.
..... The bill typically emerges after Republican and Democratic lawmakers negotiate for weeks behind closed doors. But the process this year [2025] was much more partisan than usual.
..... Some Democrats had threatened to stall the measure over Trump's use of the military in cities, until Senator Roger wicker, R- Mississippi, chair of the Armed Services Committee, agreed to hold a
hearing on the issue.
..... Earlier this year [2025] Republicans defeated Democratic efforts to block the deployment of the military to American cities and to bar the conversion of a luxury jet given by Qatar to serve as Air Force One.