The $858 billion legislation, directing more military aid for Ukraine and Taiwan, now heads to President Biden for his signature.
The Senate on Thursday voted to approve the annual defense policy bill, sending the $858 billion legislation to President Biden for his signature, though it remains unclear how many of the new initiatives it contains will be funded.
The bill, which passed by a vote of 83 to 11, directs how federal dollars can be spent on the Pentagon, the U.S. military and related programs. This year, it includes an expansion of funds for helping Ukraine fight off a protracted Russian invasion, a new program to supply Taiwan with unprecedented levels of security assistance, a pay raise for service members and measures to address rising costs due to inflation.
But with the two parties locked in a face-off over how to fund the federal government, it remains unclear exactly how much of the defense bill — which tops out at $45 billion more than the Biden administration wanted to spend on such initiatives next year — will be underwritten. Though the Senate is expected on Thursday to pass a measure to continue funding the government through next week, mirroring the House’s action and narrowly avoiding a shutdown, a deal on an omnibus spending measure to carry through 2023 remains incomplete.
The defense bill, which passed in the House last week by a vote of 350 to 80, came together after a series of high-stakes negotiations this fall, resulting in the Biden administration giving ground to Republicans on some key initiatives — including the Pentagon’s politically divisive mandate, issued in August 2021, that all military personnel be vaccinated against the coronavirus.
Democrats were forced to capitulate to GOP demands to curtail the vaccine mandate after a large segment of the party threatened to withhold their support for the legislation otherwise. Republican leaders who cheered the deal to strike the mandate have since pledged to seek retribution for its existence, demanding reinstatement for service members discharged for refusing to take the vaccine, and warning they will investigate President Biden and his advisers for having ever instituted the requirement.
