WASHINGTON — The House passed the fiscal 2026 defense policy authorization bill, setting up passage in the Senate before Congress goes on holiday break.
Lawmakers voted 312-112 to advance the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which authorizes $900.6 billion in defense funds, or about $8 billion more than the White House’s request.
Leadership from the House and Senate Armed Services Committees introduced the final, compromise version of the bill on Sunday.
Acquisition reform was the cornerstone of the NDAA this year, with both committees coming up with plans centered around speeding up the process and making it easier for new entrants to do business with the Defense Department.
In the end, the final language combined elements from both proposals, including the Senate’s bid to centralize management of weapons programs under broader “portfolio acquisition executives” instead of the current program executive officer-led model and the House’s push to reform the requirements process.
According to a fact sheet released by the HASC majority, the NDAA procurement plan includes $26 billion for shipbuilding, $38 billion for aircraft and $4 billion for ground vehicles and $25 billion for munitions. However, it is congressional appropriators that hold the power of the purse — meaning that all of the funding recommendations laid out in the NDAA are nonbinding.
Policy changes in the NDAA, however, are backed with the force of law, and this version of the bill includes some changes that could have impacts on major weapons programs.
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For example, the bill includes provisions aimed at preventing the cancelation of the Air Force’s E-7 Wedgetail program. It also slows some of the service’s planned retirements, including stopping the service from mothballing all of its A-10s and preventing any F-15E divestments for the year. For the Army, it includes language greenlighting a multi-year buy of the UH-60 Black Hawk in FY27 onward, as well as authorizing early production for the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) program.