WASHINGTON — President Obama will issue a rare veto of a defense policy bill Thursday in a showdown with Congress over broader spending levels, the White House said.
The veto of the National Defense Authorization Act is an extraordinary use of one of the president's most powerful executive tools. While the White House had problems with some of the bill's provisions, Obama's main objection is that the bill uses a budget gimmick to increase defense spending without increasing domestic spending first. The president wants Congress to lift the automatic budget caps known as sequestration included in a 2011 budget agreement.
That, congressional Republicans said, is an unprecedented and irresponsible use of the veto power.
"The president has vowed to veto it. Why? Because he wants to stop and spend more money on his domestic agenda," House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Wednesday. "It's time to put our troops first, time to stop playing political games."
Since Congress started passing annual defense policy bills in 1961, they've been vetoed four times by Presidents Carter, Reagan, Clinton and George W. Bush. Each time, it was for a specific policy reason: a nuclear aircraft carrier for Carter, missile defense for Reagan and Clinton, and Iraq policy for Bush.
The 2016 bill passed with large bipartisan majorities: 270-156 in the House and 70-27 in the Senate. The House would need 20 additional votes to override the veto.
Republicans complain that if they can't do that, important defense programs and reforms will be delayed. And they say there's no way to tailor the bill to get the president to sign it, because Obama is insisting on a broader spending accord first — and that may not happen until the current short-term spending bill runs out Dec. 12.
