Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 7, 2023 / 17:30 pm
The House and Senate reached a compromise version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) on Thursday in which they dropped House amendments banning military spending on abortion and sex change surgeries.
A draft of the compromise version, released by the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday, revealed the House backed off from both the abortion and transgender amendments that were passed in July.
The abortion amendment, which was filed by Texas Republican Rep. Ronny Jackson, would have mandated that the U.S. military stop its program of granting service members paid leave and paying for travel expenses to obtain abortions. The amendment banning military spending on transgender hormonal treatments and surgeries was filed by Montana Republican Rep. Matthew Rosendale. Both passed in narrow, near party-line votes.
The NDAA is an annual “must-pass” spending package that sets the military’s budget for the next year. While the package has typically passed in bipartisan votes in previous years, several controversial military policies, including the abortion and transgender surgery spending, have made the NDAA’s passage a more hotly debated topic.