Budget/Appropriations

The chamber passed an amendment that requires reports from the Obama administration on the effects of sequestration.

Lockheed Martin CEO Bob Stevens is pushing the White House to spell out how automatic cuts would affect the defense industry.

The administration says it is not yet planning for sequestration, instead urging Congress to find a solution to avoid cuts.

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) is out with a new video in his latest attempt to criticize Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) over the automatic cuts to defense due to sequestration.

In the video, set to a sad, melodic piano riff, McKeon says that House Republicans have offered plans to stop sequestration, “but the president maintains a veto threat over them and Harry Reid continues to block them in the Senate.”

The White House is challenging Congress to prevent the automatic spending cuts that are looming for the Pentagon. 

A House-proposed plan for a new missile defense system along the Eastern seaboard will be a major sticking point when House and Senate negotiators meet to hammer out a final version of the Pentagon's fiscal 2013 spending plan. 

“The goalposts are continually being moved,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Tuesday.

If the Pentagon is forced to include war funds to a raft of automatic budget cuts set for next year, it could cripple a number of key Pentagon accounts already slated for massive reductions over the next decade. 

A top Senate Democrat on Tuesday challenged Mitt Romney to explain how he would deliver on promises to bolster defense spending while limiting tax increases. 

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House Republicans want President Obama to explain why war funding was included in the automatic spending cuts facing the Pentagon.