By Thérèse Boudreaux | The Center Square
(Worthy News) – The U.S. House is set to vote on a compromise version of the National Defense Authorization Act which authorizes nearly $900 billion to support U.S. military service members, infrastructure, and defense capabilities during the 2025 fiscal year.
The 1,813-page document released Saturday by the Senate and House Armed Services Committees outlines U.S. defense policy priorities and their costs for 2025. Most of the proposed funds, $849.9 billion out of the $895.2 billion topline, would go to programs within the Department of Defense.
Though the result of a bipartisan compromise, some provisions remain a point of contention, including a Republican addition that would prohibit the military’s health program from covering any gender dysphoria treatments on minors that could “result in sterilization.”
Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Committee Adam Smith, D-Wash., has urged House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to “abandon” the provision and allow the House to bring forward a bill that “doesn’t attack the transgender community.”
Johnson has argued that the current NDAA will “restore our focus on military lethality and to end the radical woke ideology being imposed on our military.”
If the legislation passes, junior enlisted service members would receive a historic 14.5% pay raise and all other service members a 4.5% basic pay raise.
The NDAA plan would also address multiple quality of life issues for service members, highlighted in a September report from the Government Accountability Office that revealed unsanitary and rundown living conditions for military personnel.
It authorizes $2.7 billion to improve housing conditions, build more housing, and increase oversight. It also increases healthcare access and childcare services for military members by cutting red tape and approving $176 million for the construction of new childcare centers and $110 million for the construction of new schools.
“Funding our military is one of Congress’ most important responsibilities,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Majority Chairman, Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said on X. “Our brave men and women in uniform and their spouses allow us to enjoy the freedoms we have today. They deserve every benefit in this bill.”
The legislation authorizes hundreds of billions in defense-related infrastructure and technology investments, including approximately $17.5 billion for military base or industrial construction projects; $33.5 billion to build seven battle force ships; and more than $161 billion for innovation and technology research and related programs.
Nearly $16 billion would go to the Pacific Deterrence Initiative, funding new technologies like hypersonic weapons and AI to deter the Chinese Communist Party and mitigate espionage and cybersecurity risks.
Anti-terrorism initiatives in the Middle East and overseas U.S. military construction projects countering North Korea and Russia would also receive funding, as well as a U.S.-Israel missile defense program and the Taiwan Security Cooperation Initiative.
“We remain determined to confront increasingly hostile threats from Communist China, Russia, and Iran, and this legislation provides our military with the tools they need to deter our enemies,” Johnson said in a statement. “The safety and security of the American people is top priority, and this bill ensures our military has the resources and capabilities needed to remain the most powerful force in the world.”
U.S. border security receives a relatively small portion of funds from the NDAA, with $90 million authorized for the construction of a new command and control facility at the U.S.-Mexico border and a $10 million increase in funding for the DOD’s counternarcotics activities.
The House Rules Committee is set to vote Monday afternoon on advancing the measure to the House floor, where it can pass with a majority vote. The Senate must vote on it by the end of the month for it to take effect.
Copyright 1999-2026 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
More Worthy News
Hungary’s new center-right government has pledged to restore the church status of the Hungarian Evangelical Fellowship (MET), headed by 74-year-old Pastor Gábor Iványi, a longtime critic — and former ally — of ex-Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
The Trump administration is widening its campaign against waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government after investigators reportedly uncovered sweeping schemes involving Medicaid-funded home health businesses, food benefit theft, student visa exploitation, and immigration fraud across the United States.
The Supreme Court on Thursday allowed continued access to the abortion pill mifepristone by telehealth and mail, temporarily blocking a lower court ruling that would have restored in-person dispensing requirements and limited the drug’s reach into states with abortion restrictions.
President Trump’s proposed Golden Dome missile shield could cost as much as $1.2 trillion over 20 years, according to a new Congressional Budget Office study that offers one of the most detailed public estimates yet of the ambitious national missile-defense project.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe held rare high-level talks with Cuban officials Thursday as protests erupted across Havana over the island’s worst rolling blackouts in decades, intensifying pressure on Cuba’s communist government amid President Donald Trump’s hard-line energy blockade.
Chinese President Xi Jinping warned President Donald Trump on Thursday that any mishandling of Taiwan could push the United States and China toward “clashes and even conflicts,” injecting a sharp geopolitical warning into a summit both leaders had hoped would steady relations between the world’s two largest economies.
The Pentagon has abruptly canceled the deployment of a U.S. armored brigade to Poland, marking another significant step in President Donald Trump’s effort to reduce America’s military footprint in Europe and shift greater responsibility for the continent’s defense onto NATO allies, according to the Wall Street Journal.