The House of Representatives is scheduled to vote Friday on a major bill outlining U.S. defense policy for the next fiscal year.
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) is a mandatory annual bill that sets certain priorities for the Departments of Defense and Energy. This year’s bill authorizes $895.2 billion in military spending, an increase of $9 billion from fiscal year 2024.
A major focus of this year’s NDAA was improving the quality of life for service members, something that members of the Armed Services Committee found severely lacking in after months of studying the issue.
The bill also includes a provision that would block Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin from establishing any diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) committees or groups for schools that receive Department of Defense funding.
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This year’s NDAA is aimed at improving the quality of life for our service members. (U.S. Army)
On the hardware side, the NDAA would mandate the establishment of a drone force within the Army to help the military keep up with rapid advances in technological warfare.
But efforts to improve the quality of life for military families are a cornerstone of this year’s bill, Reps. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) and Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pennsylvania) told Fox News Digital this week.
“I heard from my spouse…” [in] “In high-cost areas, they have no choice but to turn to food banks,” Bacon told Fox News Digital about the committee’s months of interviews with people whose partners are in the military.
He said military parents stationed in areas with high costs of living, such as Washington, D.C., and parts of California, often have to pay more to live in areas that are safe and have good schools.
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Rep. Chrissy Houlahan was one of two lawmakers who spoke to Fox News Digital about the upcoming NDAA vote. (Getty Images)
“So these people are making sacrifices for their families, but they’re sacrificing putting food on the table,” Bacon said. “A lot of families are struggling.”
“For our younger recruits in particular, this significant pay increase will be life-changing and we hope it will motivate them to join or remain in the military,” Mr Houlahan said.
She said of other issues the bill seeks to solve for military members, “You may have a family, you may have a spouse, you may be concerned about issues like child care, you want to make sure you have a good roof over your head that’s quality constructed, you want to make sure you can afford housing in your community, all of those things.”
The bill would allow a 19.5 percent pay increase for junior soldiers and a 4.5 percent pay increase for other soldiers.
Funding would also be approved for the construction of new military housing and the renovation of existing units.
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“The people who work at fast food restaurants make more than our junior soldiers,” said Rep. Don Bacon. (Getty Images)
“These people who work at fast food restaurants make more than our junior soldiers,” Bacon said.
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But they expressed caution about the breadth of changes that have been proposed to the bill in recent days, amid concern that amendments on sensitive issues related to the culture wars could jeopardize the bill’s bipartisan passage.
“I’m not concerned, but I am frustrated … we’re going through the exact same thing again as we did last year,” Houlahan said. “We don’t have much time. We solved this last year, so I don’t understand why we have to go through the same scenario again.”
“They’re going to introduce their own poison pill, which they’re not going to support anyway, and that will cost them Democratic support, which is absolutely necessary, but ultimately, by the time it gets through the Senate, we’ll have a good bill,” Bacon said.
