House passes annual defense bill
WASHINGTON — The House passed an annual defense bill Thursday that averts significant cuts to military spending and gives soldiers a 1.6 percent pay raise.
The bill, which outlines defense programs for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, funds a few construction projects at Fort Drum requested by the Army and leaves open the possibility that other Fort Drum projects and initiatives endorsed by Rep. William L. Owens, D-Plattsburgh, will avert a ban on earmarks.
Although several provisions in the bill sparked partisan debate — and the White House threatened a veto over a few measures — it passed with bipartisan support. Mr. Owens voted for the $690 billion bill, as he did a few weeks ago in the House Armed Services Committee.
The final vote was 322-96, although just five more Democrats — 95 — voted for it than against it.
The bill reflects the House GOP leadership's reluctance to cut defense spending, even as it supports deep cuts in most domestic programs. But lawmakers also took some money-saving measures that had failed to gain hold in prior years, including raising some out-of-pocket costs for health insurance for working-age retirees for the first time since the mid 1990s.
The chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Rep. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon, pointed in a news release to lawmakers' efforts to trim funding in some areas and direct funding to higher priorities, although that approach has attracted criticism from some watchdogs for moving money around rather than saving it.
"With the tough fiscal times facing our country, the bill treats every taxpayer dollar as precious," Mr. McKeon said. "Sound fiscal stewardship is essential to protecting our national security. We address the breathtaking size and scope of our national security challenges by providing for the common defense in an efficient, fiscally responsible manner."
The 1.6 percent raise matches the Obama administration's request.
The ranking Democrat on the committee, Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., found praise for the bill, although he has criticized some provisions.
"Overall, this bill prioritizes our troops deployed in Afghanistan, Iraq and around the world by ensuring that they have the tools and resources they need to do their job and protect national security. It also provides our troops and their families with the benefits and support that they deserve," Mr. Smith said in a news release.
Several provisions set up a clash with the Democratic-led Senate, including a new prohibition on trying terrorism defendants in federal courts; they would have to face military tribunals, a move the Obama administration opposes. The House-passed version also makes changes in the process for implementing the open eligibility of gays and lesbians for military service and prohibits gay marriages at military installations.
The House bill also preserves an alternative engine for the F-35 fighter, which the Pentagon and the White House strongly oppose as a waste of money. The GOP proposal lets the contractor pay for development but the Obama administration has threatened a veto nonetheless if it appears in the final bill.
The administration's projects at Fort Drum, totaling $33.7 million, include a new chapel, an ammunition supply point, an "alert holding area" to prepare equipment for deployment, a medical clinic and improvements to a dental clinic.
In addition to those projects, Mr. Owens steered through the committee provisions that could lead to funding for other projects at Fort Drum as well as $500,000 for military-community health partnerships such as the Fort Drum Regional Health Planning Organization. The organization would have to compete for the money, but it would be an obvious candidate, and the decision is up to Army Secretary John M. McHugh, who helped create the organization through earmarks when he was in Congress.
Mr. Owens secured $10 million for ground and utility improvements at Army installations, intended for Fort Drum but not mentioning the post.
The House approach to projects at installations has raised some eyebrows because lawmakers clearly are looking for ways around a ban on hometown projects known as earmarks. The committee dipped into "unobligated balances" from other accounts to pay for a host of priorities and used an "enhancement fund" to set aside authorizations for such projects.
Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., persuaded lawmakers to cut funding for parts of the "enhancement fund" that were not already obligated in the bill; he also called for a requirement that the Defense Department make public any communication from lawmakers on behalf of specific projects proposed to be paid through the fund.
The chairman of the House committee, Mr. McKeon, secured $115 million for a water treatment plant at Fort Irwin in his district but his office noted the project also was in President Barack Obama's budget request.
The House committee's tactics were "squirrelly," said Winslow Wheeler, a policy analyst at the Center for Defense Information, a Washington, D.C., think tank.
"What the HASC is doing, just like the others, is increasing spending while not appearing to," Mr. Wheeler said. He said he was particularly struck that each of the military services had the same percentage of "unobligated balances" relative to the president's budget request.
The House rejected amendments to reduce civilian employment at the Defense Department by 1 percent annually for five years; to set a time frame and plan for withdrawal from Afghanistan; to cut the size of the uniformed services by 10,000 a year annually for five years, and to allow manufacturers to describe the effect on domestic employment in their bids for defense contracts.
Action now moves to the Senate Armed Services Committee, which has not announced the timetable for closed-door consideration of its bill. Sen. Kirsten E. Gillibrand, D-N.Y., is a member of that committee.
