Brian Bradley and Valerie Insinna
NS&D Monitor
6/19/2015
The Senate passed its version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2016 yesterday, voting 71-25 to send the $612 billion legislation to conference after this week senators did not consider any amendments related to the nuclear enterprise. The 74 percent affirmative vote is above the veto-proof majority of 67 percent, and blocks President Barack Obama from taking any such action. The Obama Administration has repeatedly threatened vetoes throughout the Congressional budget process, expressing frustration that GOP lawmakers are inflating the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) account to circumvent the discretionary spending caps established by the Budget Control Act (BCA). The bill would meet Obama’s FY 2016 budget request, but also would move $38 billion from the proposed base funding amount into the OCO account. The OCO account—which senators proposed to contain $90 billion in FY 2016—is not subject to BCA spending limits.
After passing the NDAA, however, senators voted 50-45 to block the defense spending bill for FY 2016 from coming to the Senate floor. The motion to consider the appropriations bill needs the support of 60 senators to pass. Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.) was the only Democrat who voted in favor of the motion, while Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) voted against it so that the bill could be reconsidered by the chamber at a later date.
10 Nuclear Weapon Amendments Proposed Since June 2
According to Council for a Livable World, 10 nuclear weapon-related amendments were proposed during Senate floor debate of the bill, which started June 2. The Senate on June 9 adopted an amendment submitted by Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) that expresses a “sense of Senate” on the importance of the Force Improvement Program (FIP), noting that the Air Force plans to spend more than $200 million on the FIP in FY 2015 and that the service requested $130 million for the program for FY 2016. That amendment also states the Air Force should “support long-term investments” in the nuclear enterprise to sustain FIP progress and that the service should regularly inform Congress on the program’s progress.
Feinstein Blocks Nonproliferation Amendment
During NDAA Senate floor debate last week, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) blocked an amendment proposed by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) that would have prevented the Obama Administration from moving forward with its April-announced plan to accelerate dismantlement of retired nuclear weapons by 20 percent. Using a procedural move, Feinstein rebuffed Cotton’s amendment that proposed limiting retired warhead dismantlement funding to $50 million per year for the next five fiscal years. Feinstein, Ranking Member on the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee, objected to entering the amendment into the act’s voting queue.
GAO Report Would Examine NNSA Program Mgmt.
The bill would also require the Government Accountability Office to prepare a new report examining, among other things, NNSA program management procedures and performance of associated government and contractor personnel. “A number of NNSA programs and projects have suffered significant delays and cost overruns or other forms of mismanagement that raise questions about how these managers interact, coordinate, and are held accountable,” states the committee report released when the bill cleared the Senate Armed Services Committee. The Senate bill would also direct NNSA to establish a new “responsive capabilities program” to help the agency be more flexible to respond to future uncertainties not addressed by existing life extension programs, according to the committee report.
DOE Would Be Required to Assess Emergency Preparedness
Additionally, the bill would require DOE to include in award fee determinations performed in even-numbered years an assessment of emergency preparedness as part of award fee evaluations for the Energy Department’s set of M&O contractors, according to the report language. On nonproliferation, the bill would require NNSA to prepare an analysis on downblending plutonium as opposed to using the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility, as several studies have pointed out downblending as a significantly cheaper option for surplus plutonium disposition.
