Congress passed the annual defense policy bill on Wednesday, sending the latest authorization for how the Defense Department can spend its $901 billion budget to the president’s desk.
The National Defense Authorization Act passed with broad bipartisan support in a vote of 77-20. The legislation is touted as a massive step forward for the modernization of the department.
Usually the annual text focuses on areas outside the traditional political maneuvering, but this year it put pressure directly on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
“This legislation reforms decades of bureaucratic inefficiency,” Sen. Roger Wicker, Mississippi Republican and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said on the floor of the Senate just before the law advanced. “We’re about to pass, and the president is about to enthusiastically sign, the most sweeping upgrades to DOD’s business practices in 60 years.”
Lawmakers negotiated between the two chambers of Congress to cover major reforms to the purchasing process, military modernization, nuclear testing and even President Trump’s Golden Dome. Leadership in the House and Senate Armed Services committees negotiated and finished the bulk of the legislation before the Thanksgiving holiday.
The bill increased the amount of spending allowed by the Defense Department by $8 billion above previous spending limits, but also focused on trying to get new companies into the defense industry.
“It allows more small, independent companies to be able to come in,” Sen. Markwayne Mullin, Oklahoma Republican, told The Washington Times. “It allows a lot of the bureaucracy to go away.”
Mr. Mullin said the language in the bill is meant to offer smaller businesses more opportunities, similar to previous years focused on introducing more businesses owned by veterans and minority groups. He sees a risk if the larger defense companies, known as primes, simply acquire their competition.
“We did a little bit of safety precautions to keep the primes from gobbling them up,” Mr. Mullin said. “They get a little bit more competitive with the primes, then get acquired. The primes gobble them up, and then we go right back to the same position we’re in.”
Sen. Angus King, an independent from Maine who caucuses with Democrats, said those efforts should see dividends.
“It’s a strong bill, and modernization is a really high priority,” Mr. King said. “We’ve been late on hypersonics, we’ve been late on directed energy, and we’ve got to get going.”
A portion of the bill that both chambers of Congress originally agreed to was stripped out. It’s called right to repair. Many defense industry companies that work directly with the military and Congress to meet the department’s requirements for new systems legally bar anyone but the company’s employees to conduct diagnostics, make repairs or manufacture parts to fix equipment, including service members operating those systems. Right to repair would place a legal prohibition on similar terms and conditions in the future.
Originally authored by Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Massachusetts Democrat, and Tim Sheehy, Montana Republican, the language is no longer part of the bill.
“The defense industry lobbyists managed to get to someone behind closed doors and blocked a bill that had virtually unanimous support out in public,” Ms. Warren told The Times. “The defense industry lobbyists made it pretty clear that they believe nothing becomes law in the United States without their sign-off.”
Right to repair originally had the support of Mr. Hegseth and Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, who committed publicly to supporting the change during his confirmation hearing.
He previously called the contracts limiting soldiers’ ability to fix their equipment “sinful” and placed emphasis on in-house, rapid manufacturing capabilities for unique military parts.
The NDAA wasn’t exclusively focused on new technology or the ebb and flow of contracting dollars.
Congress also flexed its muscle for troop numbers and command posts in Europe, a bipartisan hedge against Mr. Hegseth and President Trump’s public comments of a possible drawdown in the region.
The Republican committee leaders have publicly disagreed with the president on drawdowns abroad, such moves would foment doubt from allies and strengthen Russia and China’s posture.
This year’s text also included a condition that would have withheld a substantial amount of funding for Mr. Hegseth’s travel budget until unedited videos of airstrikes in the Caribbean were released to Congress.
The personal squeeze by Congress on Mr. Hegseth’s purse strings found purchase, as the secretary on Wednesday will provide the House and Senate Armed Services committees with the bombing video.
The debate over how the military is used abroad extended to repeals of previous congressional action in the bill as well. The NDAA for 2026 repealed the two previous Authorizations for the Use of Military Force, from 1991 and 2002, that were Congress’ approval to engage in the Gulf War and the Iraq War.
Congress did not remove the 2001 authorization, approved just after the Sept. 11 terror attacks and used by multiple administrations to justify military actions.
