The United States Capitol in Washington, DC, USA, on Friday, December 18, 2020.
Sarah Silbiger | Bloomberg | Getty Images
WASHINGTON – The House was scheduled to vote Monday on whether or not to override President Donald Trump’s veto on an annual defense spending bill.
An oppression would count as a twofold rebuke to the Republican president in the last days of his administration.
The House, led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., Will meet at 2:00 p.m. ET. The vote to lift Trump’s rejection of the massive defense bill, which allows revenue of $ 740 billion in spending and outlines Pentagon policies, is expected around 5:00 p.m. If the measure is passed, the transfer measure will go to the Senate.
Senate leader Mitch McConnell has said his house would vote on Tuesday to lift the veto.
The bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act 2021, was passed by the House of Representatives on Dec. 8 with the support of more than three-quarters of the chamber. A large majority of the GOP-controlled Senate also passed the bill, giving both houses a higher share of yes votes than the two-thirds it took to defeat a presidential veto.
The sweeping defense bill is typically passed with strong bipartisan support and veto majorities in funding the US national security portfolio. It has been legally signed for nearly six consecutive decades.
At the very least, passage of the bill secures soldiers’ pay increases and keeps vital defense modernization programs active.
Trump offered a variety of reasons to oppose this year’s 4,517-page NDAA, calling the bill both for what it contains and for what it lacks.
The president has demanded that the bill include protection for social media companies under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects them from liability for what users say on their platforms. Trump, who has used Twitter extensively during his presidency, has long accused the media of bias.
In his veto of Congress, Trump wrote that the NDAA “has not made meaningful changes to section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.” He called on Congress to withdraw the measure.
The president has previously said the measure posed a serious threat to US national security and the integrity of the election, but gave no further explanatory details.
Trump ally Senator Lindsey Graham, RS.C., wrote on Twitter that he would not vote to override the president’s veto. Graham did not vote for the bill the first time.
Graham, who chairs the Senate Judicial Committee, passed legislation on December 15 that would end Article 230 protection on January 1, 2023.