With Trump not engaged, it fell to Pentagon officials, a handful of senior White House aides, the leaders of Congress and the vice president holed up in a secure bunker to manage the chaos.
The House defied a veto threat from President Donald Trump on Tuesday and approved a $740.5 billion defense policy bill that Trump opposes because it doesn’t repeal a prized liability shield for social media firms.
As Congress readies a stopgap spending measure this week, the defense industry is girding for a long-term funding patch that could delay both new procurement programs and needed fiscal certainty into next year.
Eighty defense industry executives have written to top congressional leaders to ask for emergency appropriations to reimburse defense contractors’ coronavirus-related costs.
Pentagon leaders need “around $10 billion” in the next pandemic aid package to cover defense contractors’ coronavirus-related costs. But it’s unclear how the hefty funding handout will square with Republican skepticism of new deficit spending.
Taking the offensive after her narrow primary win, Democratic Senate nominee Amy McGrath challenged Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to disclose what he knows about intelligence assessments suggesting Russia offered bounties for killing U.S. troops in Afghanistan.