Budget/Appropriations

The Pentagon will have to work a little harder if it wants to eventually run its tanks, ships and planes on something other than fossil fuels, thanks to defense lawmakers in the Senate. 

The Senate Armed Services Committee did not change a Pentagon plan to retire the Global Hawk Block 30 drones, upholding one of the more contentious budget-cutting decisions the Pentagon made.

The Senate panel’s decision to leave the Northrop Grumman drone terminated in its version of the Defense authorization bill puts the committee at odds with the House, which retained funding for the Global Hawk drone in the Defense bill that passed last week.

The upper chamber was reacting to a tribal court sentencing to prison a doctor who helped find Osama bin Laden

The Senate bill authorizes about $4 billion less than House legislation, setting up a fight in conference. 

The topline: Defense and foreign aid spending will take center stage Thursday, when members of the Senate Armed Services and Appropriations committees mark up the fiscal 2013 spending bills for both the Pentagon and State Department. Defense lawmakers have spent most of the week behind closed doors, putting the final touches on their version of the DOD budget bill. 

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) did shed a little light into the ongoing deliberations when she opened the Senate Committee's Readiness subpanel to the public. McCaskill opened the hearing as a way to protest the traditional Senate practice of marking up the defense bill in private. But in the end, aside from announcing $200 million in cuts to operations and maintenance, McCaskill's subcommittee disclosed very little about their markup. 

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The Topline: With the House wrapping up work on its version of the Pentagon's budget bill for fiscal 2013, it's now the Senate's turn to take a crack at the multibillion-dollar defense spending package. The Senate Armed Services subcommittees will start hammering away at their drafts of the legislation on Tuesday. The full committee will begin its marathon markup session on Thursday, with a final bill expected by Friday. Here's a few of the hot button issues we'll be tracking ...

Shields up: One issue that could ruffle a few feathers on the Senate side is House lawmakers' decision to finance a new missile defense shield for the Eastern seaboard. Members of the House Armed Services Committee want an East Coast missile shield up and running by the end of 2015. To get there, House members plunked down $100 million for the system in its version of the fiscal '13 defense bill. Reps. Michael Turner (R-Ohio) and Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) claim the missile shield will make sure U.S. borders are protected against missile threats from Iran and elsewhere. But in the Democrat-controlled Senate, GOP members could have to shield the missile shield from the budget axe.
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Chinese officials Monday said they were “firmly opposed” to an amendment requiring the sale of 66 fighter jets to Taiwan.

Earnhardt challenged Rep. Jack Kingston to attend a NASCAR race after sponsoring a provision to end military sponsorship of sports.

The Senate will get its chance next week to tackle the Defense authorization bill after the House passed its $643 billion version of the bill on Friday.

The Senate Armed Services Committee is holding its subcommittee and full committee markups of the bill, which will get under way on Tuesday and could stretch until Friday.

Unlike the House, all of the markups in the upper chamber are closed to the public, except for one: the Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support is open Tuesday.

The Topline: The defense authorization bill is set to pass the House on Friday, but not before an often-bumpy ride on the House floor Thursday. A measure proposed by Democrats to accelerate withdrawal from Afghanistan was rejected by the House Rules Committee late Wednesday, prompting its author, Rep. James McGovern (D-Mass.), to launch a protest in the committee and force roll-call votes on about 85 rejected amendments.

The protest continued on the floor Thursday during debate on the rule, where Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) both criticized Republican leadership.