Culture wars: Here are the major fights brewing over the defense spending bill

Lawmakers are bracing for a series of battles as they take up the mammoth annual defense policy bill this week, from the Pentagon’s abortion policy to diversity programs and other hot-button culture war topics. 

House lawmakers Wednesday will begin to hash out its version of the legislation, known as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), after the House Armed Services Committee last month voted it out of committee 58-1. 

The Senate Armed Services Committee had similar bipartisan support with a 24-1 vote.  

Even with the nearly unanimous bipartisan votes, lawmakers and observers are expecting some fireworks on the House floor, as more than 1,500 amendments have been submitted for the bill. 

Far-right GOP lawmakers are gunning to use floor amendments to tank Pentagon policies on diversity, climate change and other initiatives they claim distract the military from its national security goals.  

Though not every initiative will get a vote — the GOP-led House Rules Committee on Tuesday will decide how many of the proposed amendments make it to the floor — several hundred are sure to make it through.  

And some Democrats, including House Armed Services Committee ranking member Adam Smith (Wash.), have already expressed their worries over “extreme right-wing amendments” making it into the bill. 

Due to Republicans’ thin majority in the House, however, GOP leaders must strike a balance between their far-right colleagues and the Democratic-led Senate for the bill to eventually become law.  

Here are the key fights ahead: 

Abortion policy

Conservatives want to end a post-Roe Defense Department policy covering travel expenses for service members and their dependents who seek out-of-state abortions because the procedure is banned in their state. 

The topic has become all the more contentious in the past several months as Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) has kept hundreds of Pentagon officials from being confirmed due to his opposition to the policy.  

While the House Armed Services Committee didn’t touch the issue when marking up the bill last month, amendments on the topic are expected to make it to a floor debate.

Among them is one offered by Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas), whose initiative would stop the Pentagon “from paying or reimbursing expenses relating to abortion services,” effectively rolling back the travel policy. Jackson’s proposal has more than 60 co-sponsors. 

But Democrats have warned these initiatives, should they make it into the House NDAA, would effectively tank the bill.

Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.), a retired Navy sailor, has put forward a rebuttal to Jackson’s amendment that has 18 co-sponsors.  Her amendment would establish leave policies in law and prevent “any adverse action for requesting or taking leave in relation to abortion care.” 

Transgender medical care 

Transgender service members have experienced a whiplash in policy over the past two administrations, beginning six years ago when then-President Trump banned such individuals from serving in the armed forces. 

President Biden quickly revoked the ban upon entering office, but GOP lawmakers are now threatening to curtail benefits for transgender troops using the NDAA. 

Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.) has the backing of seven of his colleagues with an amendment to prohibit TRICARE, the health care program for active-duty service members, from covering “sex reassignment surgeries and gender hormone treatments for transgender individuals.” 

Other amendments, including one from Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), look to prevent hormone therapy and surgeries for those seeking to transition while in the service. 

Outside of medical coverage, Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) also targeted transgender individuals in an initiative that would require biological women who identify as men to register with the Selective Service should the United States have another military draft.  

The current U.S. policy stipulates that all biological males are required to register with Selective Service, regardless of how they identify their gender. 

Ukraine funding 

The House NDAA saw an explosion of amendments related to the war in Ukraine, calling for everything from more oversight to curtailing funding and certain weapons for the embattled country. 

One from Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) would establish a Special Inspector General for Ukraine Assistance Office charged with overseeing all U.S. assistance for Ukraine, with quarterly reports to be submitted to Congress. 

A slew of more extreme initiatives put forward by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) would entirely halt Ukraine funding until a diplomatic solution to the war is reached, cut $300 million in aid to the country and prohibit giving long-range missiles and F-16 fighter jets to Kyiv.  

While some of those amendments will never make it to the floor, one that will — proposed by Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.) — would stop the transfer of cluster bombs to Ukraine, which the Biden administration announced last week. 

The initiative has 15 co-sponsors, including Gaetz, who Monday argued “children will be left without limbs and without parents because of this decision if we do not work together in a bipartisan fashion to stop it.”  

Climate change 

The Republican-led House Armed Services Committee already pushed through several initiatives to blunt efforts to combat climate change, but some lawmakers hope to go further. 

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) wants to terminate Pentagon contracts for electric nontactical vehicles, proposing an initiative to “prevent prioritizing climate politics over national security.” Rep. Andy Ogles (R-Tenn.) hopes to prohibit federal funds from supporting various environmental trust funds. 

Democrat lawmakers pushed back with their own amendments. 

Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif), wants to have the Office of the Director of National Intelligence submit a report to Congress every four years on the national security and economic implications of climate change.  

And Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Texas) hopes to direct the Defense Department to establish a Center of Excellence for Innovation in Energy Security and Climate Resilience for Military Installations. 

DEI programs  

Republicans have already succeeded in inserting GOP-penned language into the House NDAA that would repeal or alter several Biden-era personnel initiatives, including axing the Pentagon’s chief diversity officer role, halting funding for drag shows at military installations and limiting or reversing punishments for troops who refused to take the COVID-19 vaccine. 

GOP lawmakers are now seeking to further target diversity and anti-extremism policies — passed in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection — that they claim hurt military recruitment by alienating potential troops.   

Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) hopes to ensure that no U.S. diplomatic or consular post flies any flag other than the American flag, a rule aimed at excluding the pride flag from being flown at such locations.  

“We don’t need to be flying the pride flag. It’s meant to divide. It’s not meant to heal and unite,” Davidson argued during the House Rules Committee meeting. 

Others on the right want to strip an affirmative action carveout for military academies in the Supreme Court’s decision last month to end race-based affirmative action in higher education. 

Leaders of the New Democrat Coalition, a group representing nearly 100 center-left Democrats, earlier Tuesday called on Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to reject the “extreme elements” of his party.