The Senate plans to approve the fiscal 2019 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which contains major policy provisions for active nuclear weapons programs and Cold-War waste cleanup at the Department of Energy, before it leaves Washington for a brief summer recess next week, according to a spokesperson for Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).
At deadline Tuesday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, the Senate still had a procedural hurdle to clear — a vote to limit debate on the bill — before it could actually vote on the unified version of the massive defense-policy bill. Nevertheless, McConnell’s spokesperson said “[w]e will clear the conference report by the end of the week.”
Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee in the absence of the seriously ill Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), told Defense Daily he expects a vote Thursday on the conference report.
The House last week approved the report, which outlines and explains the final legislative language on which the two chambers settled after producing different versions of the bill this spring. Among other things, the NDAA sets policies and 2019 funding ceilings for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the majority of the budget for Cold War nuclear-weapons-cleanup managed by DOE’s Office of Environmental Management. A subsequent appropriations bill will provide the actual 2019 funds.
The 2019 NDAA authorizes some $15 billion for the NNSA, including $65 million to begin developing a lower-yield version of the W76 submarine-launched ballistic-missile warhead. Appropriators in both chambers have already agreed to provide $65 million for the weapon in the budget year beginning Oct. 1.
Meanwhile, the 2019 NDAA allows more than $5.5 billion for the single largest spending line for the Environmental Management office, defense environmental cleanup. That meets the White House’s request for the budget year that begins Oct. 1.
