The United States House of Representatives voted on Wednesday afternoon (December 11th) on the Senate version of the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), also known as the National Defense Budget Act. This is considered a crucial bill, with both parties voting on approximately $895 billion in defense-related budgets.
The House is attempting to push the passage of this top-priority bill through Congress later this month before the congressional term expires and lawmakers leave Washington on January 3rd.
According to the legislation introduced by the Senate and the congressional leadership of both parties last week, the text spans over 1,800 pages and controls a budget totaling $895.2 billion. This budget figure is a compromise between both parties, falling below the budget ceiling set by the Fiscal Responsibility Act.
The bill includes a 14.5% pay raise for soldiers, cutting $4 billion in funding for “non-compliant” projects, and prohibiting the Department of Defense from contracting with advertising agencies that blacklist conservative media.
House Speaker and Republican Representative Mike Johnson said, “The safety of the American people is of utmost importance, and this bill ensures that our military has the necessary resources and capabilities to maintain the strongest force in the world.”
However, some Democratic lawmakers are not satisfied with certain provisions in the bill, such as prohibiting the military health plan TRICARE from providing transgender medical care for military personnel’s transgender children, banning the promotion of critical race theory in the military and military academies, and restricting diversity, equality, and inclusion programs within the military.
“We remain determined to counter the increasingly antagonistic threats from communist China, Russia, and Iran, and this legislation provides our military with the tools needed to deter our enemies,” Johnson said in a statement. “The legislation includes provisions passed by the House to restore our focus on military lethality and permanently prohibit transgender medical treatment for minors and combat anti-Semitism, ending the radical woke ideology imposed on our military.”
House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries stated that he would not instruct Democratic lawmakers on how to vote on the measures reauthorizing Pentagon expenditures submitted in the afternoon.
“We will not criticize the National Defense Authorization Act. It is a bill that should be analyzed by members, and it should be up to them to decide what is the right course of action,” Jeffries told reporters at the Capitol.
“There are many positive things in the National Defense Authorization Act negotiated in a bipartisan manner, but there are also some troubling provisions,” he said.
Jeffries declined to disclose how he personally would vote on the National Defense Authorization Act.
“I am still evaluating the four aspects of the National Defense Authorization Act, and I will make a decision before the deliberations submitted later today,” he added.