A last-minute compromise produced a truce, but lawmakers said the fight’s not over.
The package includes $519 million for military construction projects in Washington State with nearly $300 million of that targeted for Joint Base Lewis-McChord.
The money going to the local base would pay for $82 million worth of improvements to Army aviation facilities, $21 million for a new Special Forces training site and $56 million to replace the dated headquarters of the 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, one of the base’s three Stryker combat brigades.
The Army has spent $1.7 billion building up Lewis-McChord over the past 10 years, and the money in the defense bill suggests the improvements will continue despite tough talk of cutting budgets on Capitol Hill.
“We’d love to count on it,” said Lewis-McChord garrison Chief of Staff Tom Knight, referring to the $296 million in the defense bill. “That’s what we’re anticipating.”
The Senate voted 86-13 for the measure and will send it to President Barack Obama for his signature. The bill would authorize money for military personnel, weapons systems, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and national security programs in the Energy Department for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1. The legislation is $27 billion less than Obama wanted and $43 billion less than Congress gave the Pentagon this year, a reflection of deficit-driven federal budgets, the end of the Iraq war and the drawdown in Afghanistan.
In a rare show of bipartisanship, the House voted 283-136 for the measure Wednesday. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the senior Republican on the Armed Services Committee, said Thursday the cooperation was a “little ray of sunshine” in a divided Washington.
His comment belied a fierce struggle over provisions on suspected terrorists that have pitted the White House against Congress, divided Republicans and Democrats and drawn the wrath of civil rights groups. The White House initially threatened to veto the legislation but dropped that warning late Wednesday, saying last-minute congressional changes no longer challenge the president’s ability to prosecute the war on terror.
Two provisions have created the most controversy.
One would require military custody for foreign terrorist suspects linked to al-Qaida or its affiliates and involved in plotting or attacking the United States. The suspects could be transferred to civilian custody for trial, and the president would have final say on determining how the transfer would occur. Under pressure from Obama and his national security team, lawmakers added language that says nothing in the bill may be “construed to affect the existing criminal enforcement and national security authorities of the Federal Bureau of Investigation or any other domestic law enforcement agency with regard to a covered person, regardless whether such covered person is held in military custody.”
The attorney general, in consultation with the defense secretary, would decide whether to try the individual in federal court or by military tribunal. The president could waive the entire requirement based on national security.
The second provision would deny suspected terrorists, including U.S. citizens seized within the nation’s borders, the right to trial and subject them to indefinite detention. It reaffirms the post-Sept. 11 authorization for the use of military force that allows indefinite detention of enemy combatants.
