House passes nearly $900 billion defense bill

The House of Representatives passed the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act on Wednesday afternoon, setting the priorities for the Department of Defense in the coming year in a 281-140 vote.

Sixteen Republicans voted against the package.

What does the NDAA do? While the bill doesn’t have budget authority on its own, it lays the groundwork for the expenses Congress will pass later in its appropriations bills. This year’s NDAA proposes a roughly $900 billion budget for fiscal year 2025. According to the Department of Defense, the United States allotted $816.7 billion in 2023, making this year’s NDAA an increase of roughly 10% in expenditures over a two-year period. This year’s provisions include a pay raise of at least 4.5% for military employees.

The NDAA is one of the most reliable pieces of legislation passed by Congress, having become law for more than 60 consecutive years. That reliability has made the NDAA a magnet for other, unrelated party-line priorities that stand little chance of becoming law on their own.

This year, the NDAA contained provisions that would prevent the military’s health program, TRICARE, from providing coverage for puberty blockers and other so-called transgender medications and procedures for minors.

Why didn’t this year’s NDAA receive more Republican support? Some of the most conservative members of the House GOP have said the bill doesn’t go far enough to advance Republican priorities.

Back in June, the House passed a substantially more conservative version of the bill, but many of those additions didn't survive the Senate where Democrats hold a majority. Wednesday’s vote rolled those Senate changes into the bill.

Earlier this week, Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, told WORLD he intended to vote against the measure, citing a desire to see more language that would restrict military policies on diversity equity and inclusion measures (DEI) that Republicans have long criticized as inefficient and corrosive to government effectiveness.

The NDAA must now head to the Senate where Democrats control a majority and where it is expected to pass. It will then advance to President Joe Biden’s desk for signature.

Dig deeper: Listen to this week’s Washington Wednesday on the NDAA and what lawmakers were saying in the lead-up to its passage on Wednesday afternoon.