網頁

2017年12月21日 星期四

Overnight Defense: Congress passes spending bill to avoid shutdown | $4.6B for missile defense, repairing Navy ships | Court rejects request to halt transgender recruiting

 
 
View in your browser
 
The Hill Defense
Facebook   Twitter   LinkedIn   Email
 

THE TOPLINE: The House and Senate passed a short-term spending bill to end the year and avoid a government shutdown, one day before the deadline.

Jordain Carney on the Senate vote, which sent the bill to President Trump's desk:

The Senate approved a stopgap spending bill on Thursday night, ensuring there will be no shutdown days before Christmas and essentially completing a frenetic year on Capitol Hill -- and the first under President Trump.

Senators voted 66-32 to approve the roughly four-week continuing resolution (CR), which funds the government through Jan. 19, hours after it passed the House.

It concludes a successful week for Republicans, who on Wednesday finished work on a sweeping tax-cut bill that marked the first major legislative win for Trump.

There were some hiccups along the way with the spending bill, but GOP leaders shepherded the legislation through both chambers on Thursday in part by arguing that it did not make sense to step on the party's successful message on taxes.

Defense hawks had pressed for more funding for the Pentagon. They wanted a deal that increased the spending ceilings for defense, and that would prevent automatic spending cuts scheduled to start at the end of next month without a new measure for the year.

Meanwhile, a coalition of progressive Democrats bucked the bill because lawmakers failed to get a deal on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program by the end of the year.

Read more on the Senate vote here. And The Hill's Melanie Zanona and Cristina Marcos have the details on the House vote.

 

The stopgap spending measure includes slightly more than $4.6 billion for missile defense programs and repairs to Navy destroyers damaged in collisions this summer.

The extra dollars are likely to placate defense hawks that pushed for a full-year Pentagon funding bill in the measure, a plan that was dropped after the Senate made it clear they wouldn't support such legislation.

The continuing resolution (CR) includes about $2.4 billion for missile defense procurement, $1.3 billion for research and development, and $43 million for operations and maintenance.

In addition, $200 million is set aside to build a missile interceptor field in Alaska.

The measure also includes $674 million to repair the USS Fitzgerald and USS John McCain.

Read about that here.

 

COURT DENIES TRUMP ATTEMPT TO HALT TRANSGENDER MILITARY ENLISTMENT: A three-judge panel on a federal appeals court ruled Thursday against the Trump administration's efforts to delay accepting transgender recruits into the military.

A two-paragraph order said Judges Diana Gribbon Motz, Albert Diaz and Pamela Harris on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Virginia are denying the administration's request to delay the Jan. 1 deadline, without further explanation.

The decision sets up the case for a potential appeal to the Supreme Court.

The Pentagon is set to begin accepting transgender troops into the military Jan. 1 after court orders required it adhere to the date. That date was planned before President Trump announced he would ban transgender people from serving.

Trump announced the ban on Twitter in July and followed through with a memo in August.

Read the rest here

 

PENTAGON ACCUSES RUSSIANS OF INTENTIONALLY VIOLATING SYRIA CONFLICT AGREEMENT: The Defense Department is accusing Russia of intentionally violating an agreement meant to avoid military accidents in the skies over Syria following an incident last week involving U.S. and Russian fighter jets.

"Russia is failing to genuinely de-conflict airspace in Syria. Some of these incidents are not mistakes," Pentagon chief spokeswoman Dana White told CNN on Thursday.

"We are working to address this issue at the highest levels."

Two U.S. F-22 fighter jets last week intercepted two Russian Su-25 attack jets and fired warning flares after the Russian aircraft flew east of the Euphrates River. The river has been designated as a deconfliction line as it separates Russian and U.S.-led coalition forces operating in the country.

Russian and U.S. military officials agreed last month to fly on opposite sides of a 45-mile portion of the river in an effort to prevent in air collisions, but the Russians have violated the agreement half a dozen times, according to U.S. commanders.

Read more on that here

 

PENTAGON NOMINEE WITHDRAWS AFTER COMMENTS ON GUN CONTROL: President Trump's nominee to be the Pentagon's health chief has withdrawn from consideration after a Senate panel stalled his confirmation over comments on gun control.

"I am sorry not to be able to assist Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, whom I deeply respect, in building the best and most efficient military health-care system possible," Dean Winslow wrote in an op-ed in The Washington Post announcing his withdrawal.

"I have the credentials to help, including 35 years of experience in the Air Force (including four deployments to Iraq and two to Afghanistan after 9/11), in military and academic medicine, and in private practice, public hospitals, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the pharmaceutical and diagnostics industries and public health. But unfortunately, I do not possess one credential the committee wanted to see: I do not support the unrestricted ownership of semiautomatic assault weapons by civilians."

The Hill's Rebecca Kheel has the rest here.

 

ICYMI:

-- The Hill: Pentagon's new defense strategy won't mention climate change

-- The Hill: Trump visits US troops at Walter Reed

-- The Hill: Lawmakers approve four Pentagon assistant secretaries

-- The Hill: Pentagon names Senate staffer to lead major office restructuring

-- The Hill: Mattis visits troops at Guantanamo: report

-- The Hill: Lawmakers to Saudi, UAE ambassadors: Lift Yemen blockade immediately

-- The Hill: Opinion: Is America still a champion of democracy in the Trump era?

-- The Hill: Opinion: America needs Qatar's Al Udeid Air Base to fight the war on terrorism

-- The Hill: Opinion: This past year Trump's actions showed a profound misunderstanding of Islam

-- Defense News: Trump administration shelves plans to survey US defense firms

 
 

Please send tips and comments to Rebecca Kheel, rkheel@thehill.com, and Ellen Mitchell, emitchell@thehill.com.

Follow us on Twitter: @thehill@Rebecca_H_K@EllenMitchell23

 
 
 
 
  Facebook   Twitter   LinkedIn   Email  
 
Did a friend forward you this email?
Sign up for Defense Newsletters  
 
 
 
 
 
THE HILL
 
Privacy Policy  |  Manage Subscriptions  |  Unsubscribe  |  Email to a friend  |  Sign Up for Other Newsletters
 
The Hill 1625 K Street, NW 9th Floor, Washington DC 20006
©2016 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.
 
 

沒有留言:

張貼留言