The piece of legislation has nothing to do with Foreign Aid for Israel and Ukraine…
(The bill would provide for some military funding for Israel and Ukraine separate from the direct Foreign Aid Bills )
It IS a move by members of Congress to by-pass the House Republicans RughtWingNuts who do NOT want ANY spending bills that do NOT have steep cuts…(This IS basically a ‘clean bill’ stripped of GOP poison pill amendments )
The bill goes back to the House ….
If Democrats vote en mass for the Senate bill?
There will probably be enough Republicans to join in getting passage ….
The Senate on Wednesday overwhelmingly passed an $886 billion defense bill that would set Pentagon policy and provide a 5.2 percent pay raise for military personnel, defying the demands of Republicans who failed to attach a raft of deeply partisan restrictions on abortion, transgender care and diversity initiatives.
The vote was 87 to 13 to approve the legislation, which would expand the Defense Department’s ability to compete with China and Russia in hypersonic and nuclear weapons. It would also direct hundreds of millions of dollars in military assistance to Ukraine and Israel.
The Ukraine and Israel programs authorized by the bill are distinct from a $111 billion spending bill to send additional weapons to those countries, among other expenditures, that is currently stalled in Congress.
The defense bill would also extend into 2025 a program that allows the intelligence community to conduct warrantless surveillance of foreign individuals outside the United States. The program has come under fire because of how the F.B.I. has handled the private messages of Americans.
The House is expected to vote on the legislation on Thursday under fast-track procedures that offer opponents fewer chances to scuttle it, but that require a two-thirds majority for passage. Leaders expect that it will pass with support from a coalition of Republicans and Democrats.
Republican and Democratic leaders in the Senate have championed the bill as a fair compromise that prioritizes competition with adversaries and demonstrates support for allies….
…..
Among the provisions dropped from the final compromise was a measure to revoke a policy of providing paid time off and transportation reimbursement for service members who must travel to obtain an abortion or other forms of reproductive health care. The Pentagon implemented the policy after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade, creating a patchwork of abortion laws across the country.
Senator Tommy Tuberville, Republican of Alabama, spent most of this year blocking military promotions in protest before dropping most of his blockade last week.
Proposals that Republicans pushed through the House to ban transgender health care, diversity training officers and drag shows were also jettisoned from the final bill….