President Obama and Democrats have urged to lift spending caps for both defense and domestic spending, while Republicans oppose their decision, implying the focus must remain on defense only.
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Democrats say the GOP is using the bill to stop implementation of the deal.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who once called the use of emergency war funding to skirt the cap a “gimmick”, said Tuesday it was crucial to pass the defense bill due to increasing conflict and uncertainty around the world.
Carter said he had a number of objections to the compromise bill unveiled on Tuesday.
“I certainly do not want to shut the government down, but my much greater concern is that we are not reducing spending when we have an $18 trillion national debt”, Duncan said.
Republicans control majorities in the House and Senate, but Pelosi may matter most in the budget talks.
“This was a mistake, and it’s why people are so frustrated with Washington”.
With its authorization of funds for key weapons systems, the measure would benefit top defense contractors Boeing Co., Lockheed Martin Corp., SpaceX and Northrop Grumman Corp.
Asked about the criticism, McConnell demurred.
The changes would demote the department’s central Acquisition, Technology and Logistics office to an advisory role for a few new projects that start after fiscal 2017 begins.
In the bill, members authorize $515 billion in spending for national defense and an added $89.2 billion for the Pentagon’s war chest, known as the Overseas Contingency Operations, or OCO, account, for a total of $604.2 billion, according to the also calls on the White House to send Congress a plan on how it plans to close the facility and handle future detainees. The legislation as it now stands includes the same restrictions on transferring prisoners out of Guantanamo that have existed since 2009, as well as an outright ban on moving detainees to countries like Libya, Syria, Somalia and Yemen. Obama announced in March that he would slow the troop withdrawal and maintain 9,800 through the end of this year in Afghanistan where the Taliban this week captured a strategic northern city. It also provides arms to Kurds and other Sunni groups in Iraq.
Rep. Mac Thornberry of Texas, the Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, returned the criticism.
The legislation finances the government through December 11, providing 10 weeks to negotiate a more wide-ranging budget deal that would carry past the 2016 presidential election. “If the president got this bill, he’d veto it”.
Debate on the bill on the House floor Thursday focused on the bill’s funding mechanism.
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No vote has yet been scheduled in the Senate.
