Review - S 2572 Introduced – FY 2026 DOD Spending

Back in July Sen McConnel (R,KY) introduced S 2572, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2026. The Senate Appropriations Committee published their Report on the bill at the same time. There is no cybersecurity mention in the bill. While there are 109 separate mentions of the term ‘cyber’ in the Committee Report, only four of those mention cybersecurity issues of interest here.

The House version of the bill , HR 4016, was introduced in June and passed in the House  by a mainly party-line vote of 221 to 209. This bill is similar to S 4921, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2025, that was introduced by Sen Tester (D,MT) in August 2024. No action was taken on that bill (or it’s House counterpart – HR 8774) in Senate the 118^th Congress.

Moving Forward

Yesterday, the Senate began the process of considering HR 4016, the House version of this bill. No amendments have been offered as of yet (it is still too early in the process), but one of the first will be from McConnel offering the language from this bill (probably updated some) as substitute language. There will be some level of bipartisan support for that substitute (where there would be none for the House language), almost certainly enough for the bill to pass. There has been some reporting that this will be turned into another multi-bus bill, with perhaps LLH and THUD bills included in this substitute language. Bipartisan support is expected.

For more information, including description of significant cybersecurity discussions in Committee Report, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/s-2572-introduced-fy-2026-dod-spending - subscription required.

Review – HR 4016 Passed in House – FY 2026 DOD Spending

Late Thursday (actually just after midnight Friday morning) the House completed their consideration of HR 4016, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2026, passing the bill by a mainly party-line vote of 221 to 209.  The bill now goes to the Senate where, under historical circumstances, the Senate will begin consideration of the bill by offering the language from the as of yet unintroduced Senate version of the bill as ‘substitute language’.

Moving Forward

Practically speaking, the Senate is not going to take up HR 4016 until the Senate Appropriations Committee completes their work on their version of the bill. That legislation is not currently on the Committee’s schedule.

 

For more information on the amendments considered, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/hr-4016-passed-in-house-fy-2026-dod - subscription required.

DOD Spending Rule Still Stalled – 7-16-25

Today the House resumed consideration of H Res 580, a rule for consideration of four bills this week, including HR 4016, the FY 2026 DOD spending bill. Yesterday, the vote for this resolution failed by a vote of 196 to 223, with 12 Republicans voting against the rule because of concerns about the cryptocurrency provisions in the other three bills covered in the rule. Supposedly a deal had been worked out to get most of the 12 Republicans voting nay to change their vote during a reconsideration motion. The reconsidered vote on H Res 580 started at 1:18 pm EDT today, and as of 10:45 this evening the vote was still running. The House leadership still does not have enough votes to pass the resolution.

While the conservative revolt is about the cryptocurrency bills, it is holding up consideration of HR 4016. If a successful resolution cannot be reached, the Rules Committee could craft a new rule that only deals with the spending bill, or another combination of bills along with the DOD spending bill. But, while this legislative fiasco is not a direct reflection on the spending bill, it does continue to call into question the ability of the majority party to govern in the House. That does not bode well for attempts to get spending bills to the President before the end of September.

DOD Spending Bill Rule Blocked – 7-15-25

This afternoon the House took up H Res 580, the House Rule for the consideration of four bills this week, including HR 4016, FY 2026 DOD spending bill. After just a bit less than an hour of debate on the procedural resolution, the House rejected the bill by a vote of 196 to 223. TheHill.com is reporting that the twelve Republicans that voted against the resolution were voting against the other three bills covered in the Rule because those cryptocurrency related bills might have allowed the federal government to establish “a central bank digital currency” (CBDC). The President has reportedly worked out a deal to allow for the Rule to pass in a reconsideration vote tomorrow.

Review – Committee Hearings – Week of 7-13-25

With both the House and Senate back in Washington this week, there is a moderately busy hearing schedule. Spending bills will be cranked out in both bodies with another spending vote in the House. There is also a UAS threat briefing in the House and a nomination hearing of interest in the Senate.

UAS Threats

On Tuesday, the Subcommittee on Transportation and Maritime Security of the House Homeland Security Committee will hold a hearing on “Surveillance, Sabotage, and Strikes: Industry Perspectives on How Drone Warfare Abroad Is Transforming Threats at Home”.

Transportation Nomination Hearing

 On Wednesday the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee will hold a hearing on “Nominations Hearing for Modal Administrators of the Department of Transportation”.

On the Floor

The House is scheduled to take up the following bills of interest here under the suspension of the rules process today:

HR 1709 – Understanding Cybersecurity of Mobile Networks Act.

HR 1766 – NTIA Policy and Cybersecurity Coordination Act

The House Rules Committee is meeting today to craft the rule for four bills to be considered under regular order this week including HR 4016, the FY 2026 DOD spending bill.

 

 

For more information on these hearings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/committee-hearings-week-of-7-13-25 - subscription required.

House Continues Consideration of Spending Bills – 6-27-24

The House today continued consideration of spending bills under the provisions of H Res 1316. The House continued work on HR 8771, the FY 2025 State Department spending bill and began considering HR 8774, the FY 2025 DOD spending bill. The House did not complete action on either bill.

State Spending Bill

The House worked through amendment #75 today. This was the last amendment to be considered. All that remains at this point is a final vote on the bill. That is expected tomorrow.

DOD Spending Bill

The House worked through amendment #140 (out of 193 approved by the rule). They also approved five sets of en bloc amendments, each bloc approved by voice votes. The three amendments I briefly described as being of interest here in this morning’s post were all approved in separate en bloc amendments.

Moving Forward

The House still plans on completing work on all three bills tomorrow. It certainly looks like they should be able to get to final votes. The only thing that could delay final consideration is if the leadership is unsure whether they will have the votes to pass the bill, and with the current limited majority that is far from guaranteed. Rather than risk the embarrassment of any of the bills being rejected, the Speaker is likely to ‘postpone’ a final vote on one or more of the bills until further deals can be made.

House to Consider HR 8774 – FY 2025 DOD Spending

The House is scheduled to begin consideration of HR 8774, the FY 2025 DOD spending bill, today. It will be considered under the same rule (H Res 1316) that was approved yesterday for the consideration of HR 8752 (DHS spending) and HR 8771 (State Dept spending). That rule provides for the consideration of 193 potential amendments, more than were allotted for the other two bills combined.

Those amendments include all three of the ones that I briefly mentioned on Monday. They are:

70. James (R,MI): Offsets $12 million from Defense-Wide Operations and Management for Defense-Wide RDTE, Cyber Security Research for establishing a Connected Vehicle Cybersecurity Center. (10 minutes)

158. Strong (R,AL), Sewell (AL): Increases Army RDT&E (H. Rept. 118-557: Line 16, Air and Missile Defense Technology, PE 0602150A) by $5,000,000 for Automated Software Weakness and Vulnerability Discovery for Binary Code. (10 minutes)

191. Wilson (R,SC), Kiggans (VA): Increases and decreases defense-wide RDT&E by $6,000,000 for Cyber Talent & Curriculum Development/ Platform & Critical Infrastructure Defense Cybersecurity Research. (10 minutes)

There are more relatively non-controversial amendments to be considered with the DOD bill; many increasing spending that would affect jobs in the sponsor’s district. I would expect to see more of these amendments being considered during en bloc considerations.

Interestingly, the DHS spending bill is not listed on today’s schedule for consideration. It could still finish up tomorrow morning before they complete work on the DOD spending bill.

Review - HR 8774 Reported in House – FY 2025 DOD Spending

Last week the House Appropriations Committee published their report for HR 8774, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2025 and the reported version of the text of the bill. There are limited mentions of cybersecurity in the bill (none of interest here) and no mentions of chemical issues beyond continued spending for the destruction of chemical munitions. There are discussions of both topics in the Report.

The House Rules Committee is scheduled to meet on Tuesday to formulate the rule for the consideration of three spending bills, including HR 8774. There have been 401 amendments submitted to the Rules Committee to date for consideration in the debate on the DHS spending bill; three cybersecurity amendments of possible interest here. The bill is scheduled to be considered by the Full House this coming week.

Moving Forward

This is another partisan spending bill that will receive little or no support from Democrats. The Republicans will have to pass the rule for the consideration of this bill in the House Rules Committee and then maintain party discipline on the floor for the legislation to pass.

As with all spending bills, the language of this bill will never make it in the Senate. Even when the two bodies are ideologically closer, the Senate will consider their own version of the bill (not yet crafted by the Senate Appropriations Committee) as substitute language for HR 8774. Theoretically, a conference committee will work out the differences between the two versions of the bill. What is more likely is that in the last week of September, a continuing resolution will keep the current spending levels for sometime into the future. The big question is how far into the future, and who will write the final bill, it could be next year with a Republican Congress and a Trump Administration. If the Democrats win in November, it will be a lame duck congress that writes the bill in December.

 

For more details about the provisions of this bill, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/hr-8774-reported - subscription required.

Bills Introduced – 6-17-24

Yesterday, with just the Senate in session, there were 13 bills introduced. Three of those bills will receive some attention in this blog:

HR 8772 Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, 2025 Valadao, David G. [Rep.-R-CA-22]

HR 8773 Making appropriations for financial services and general government for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2025, and for other purposes. Joyce, David P. [Rep.-R-OH-14] 

HR 8774 Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2025 Calvert, Ken [Rep.-R-CA-41] 

It is unusual for the House to allow introduction of bills when the body is not in session, the most frequent exceptions to that rule are spending bills.

I do not typically find much to cover in the Legislative Branch or FinServices spending bills, but oddities to arise from time to time in the amendment process.

House to Try a Third Time to Take-up HR 4365

Yesterday, the House Rules Committee met again to draft a rule for the consideration of HR 4365, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2024. This bill was originally scheduled to be considered last week (no action taken) and re-scheduled for earlier this week (rule for consideration failed). The rule crafted last night appears to be a duplicate (as far as H 4565 is concerned) of the rule that failed earlier this week. The four amendments that I discussed earlier [removed from paywall] remain on the list of amendments to be proposed on the floor. Debate on the rule is expected to start shortly after 9:00 am EDT with vote on rule at about 10:30.

House Rejects Rule for HR 4365 – FY 2024 DOD Spending

This afternoon, the House took up H Res 680, the Rule for the consideration of HR 4365, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2024, and HR 1435, the Preserving Choice in Vehicle Purchases Act. The resolution failed by a vote of 212 to 214. Five Republicans vote Nay as did all of Democrats voting this afternoon. Seven representatives did not vote; four Republicans and three Democrats.

If all four of the missing Republicans voted for the resolution and none of the Democrats voted (they would have all been ‘no’ votes) it would have ended in a tie vote. There is some question about whether or not Rep Luna (R,FL), one of the four absent Republicans, would have voted ‘Aye’ on the resolution.

The House Rules Committee could produce another rule, but absent changes to HR 4365, there is unlikely to be changes in the votes for the rule.

Review - House to Consider HR 4365 – FY 2024 DOD Spending

Last night the House Rules Committee completed their development of a rule for the consideration of HR 4365 [removed from paywall], the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2024. They provided a structured rule (limited debate of specifically approved amendments) with 184 amendments approved for consideration. These include two cybersecurity related amendments and two chemical related amendments.

Moving Forward

The House is scheduled to begin consideration of HR 4365 today. There is a possibility that the Rules Committee will meet again this afternoon to consider additional amendments that may be added for consideration tomorrow. It is unlikely that there will be significant support for this bill by Democrats. It currently looks like there will be sufficient Republican support to pass the bill.

Commentary

While this bill in its current form has little chance of consideration, much less passage, in the Senate (and that will only get worse after the partisan amendment process we will see in the House this week), there was never any chance that the Senate would actually take up the House language. The first thing the Senate will do is substitute the language from S 2587 for the House language and amend things from there. The heavy lifting of getting language that can pass in both the House and Senate will be accomplished in a conference committee. That process will not be completed by the September 30^th deadline to keep the military funded. A continuing resolution will be necessary.

 

For more details about the amendments of interest here, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/house-to-consider-hr-4365 - subscription required.

Review - HR 8236 Introduced – FY 2023 DOD Spending

Last week Rep McCollum introduced HR 8236, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2023. The Appropriations has already marked-up the bill and have published their Report on the Legislation. This bill may make it to the floor of the House next month, but it is unlikely (based upon recent history) to be considered in the Senate. The report will be made part of the supporting documentation for the final spending bill passed later this year that includes coverage of DOD spending.

There is language in the bill addressing cyberoperations by various agencies within the Department, but nothing of particular interest to the control system cybersecurity community. There is one mention of note in §8140 of the bill. That section provides special authorization for DOD to reprogram cyber program funding to support new and or expanded operations by the United States Cyber Command.

There are numerous references in the Report about cybersecurity operations within the Department and in support of cybersecurity efforts in the larger government. There are also provisions that address increasing the cybersecurity workforce of the Department that would also impact the greater cybersecurity workforce pool for government and civilian operations.

For more details about specific provisions within the bill, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/hr-8236-introduced - subscription required.

Spending Bill Hearings Added

This morning, shortly after I published my post on Committee Hearings for this week, the House Appropriations Committee announced two additional spending bill hearings:

Wednesday – DOD – House – Defense Subcommittee, and

Thursday – DHS – House – Homeland Security Subcommittee

Review - HR 4432 Introduced – FY 2022 DOD Spending

Last month, Rep McCollum (D,MN) introduced HR 4432, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2022. This bill was marked up by the House Appropriations Committee prior to introduction, as is normal for spending bills. The Committee Report on the bill is available. There is one cyber operations mention of interest in the bill. There are also three cyber-workforce mentions and two cyber-earmarks in the Report.

While there is a chance that the House will take-up HR 4432 before September 30^th, it is highly unlikely to make it through the Senate. Thus, we are most likely to see yet another Continuing Resolution with some sort of omnibus spending bill(s) closer to the end of the calendar year. Typically, the Committee Reports for each of the spending bills in each chamber are made to apply to the final bill. This means that the three ‘Cyber Work Force’ comments will remain in effect. The earmarks I am not so sure about.

 

For further details about the mentions briefly described above, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/hr-4432-introduced - subscription required.

HR 7617 Reported in House – FY2021 DOD Spending

Earlier this month the House Appropriations Committee published their marked-up version of HR 7617, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2021, and their Report on the bill. There is only one specific cyber mention in the bill, but there are a number of mentions of cyber related topics in the report; none specifically addressing control system security issues.

Cyber in HR 7617

While cyber operations are becoming a bigger part of overall military operations there is only one mention of the term ‘cyber’ in HR 7617. In §8125(a)(7) ‘Defensive Cyber Operations Army’ are mentioned as a potential target for funding for software development funds under the Research, Development, Test and Evaluation spending authorization.

Cyber Training

Various training initiatives are addressed in the Committee Report. Most of the mentions include a requirement to report back to the Committee on the progress of the related program. These mentions include:

• Pgs 10-11 - Civilian cyber workforce,

• Pg 32 - Cybersecurity professionals,

• Pg 320 - Cyber education collaboratives, and

• Pg 322 - Women and minorities in stem pipeline.

There are three rather vanilla mentions of cybersecurity processes in the Report. They include:

• Pg 113 - Standards and protocols on countering cybersecurity incidents,

• Pg 113 - Zero trust architecture, and

• Pg 318 - Distributed ledger technology research and development.

There is only one place in the Report where specific funding is mentioned in relation to cybersecurity processes, on page 325, under Arsenal Security. It states:

“The Committee believes that maintaining security, including threats from cyber-attacks, data piracy, and other technological risks, of Department of Defense arsenals is essential. The Committee directs that of the funds included under Industrial Operations, $3,500,000 is to implement efforts to combat these types of threats.”

Moving Forward

This bill will be used as the base for the second minibus spending bill in the House. The House Rules Committee will meet on Tuesday to set the rule for the consideration of the bill on the floor of the House, to include a list of which amendments will be authorized to be submitted from the floor. There have been 110 amendments for this portion of the bill submitted to the Rules Committee.

At this point it is not yet clear that the Democrats have the votes to pass the second minibus. They certainly have a majority in the House, but it is potential ‘no votes’ from the progressive wing of the party that could disable this bill. The problem is not the DOD portion of the bill, but rather a failure to ‘adequately sanction’ ICS and CBP in the DHS portion of the bill that would be the reason for the ‘Nays’.

The Rules Committee meeting has already been delayed one-day to add time to resolve this issue. Pelosi is aware that the Party needs support of the recently elected moderates that allowed the Democrats to take control of the House, so the DHS provisions cannot be too extreme. The Progressives, on the other hand, need to have strong punitive measures in the bill to appease their supporters.

The easy solution is to follow the example of last year, leave the DHS spending bill on the Committee floor and not consider it on the floor of the House. The resolution would then be left to the conference committee that would essentially craft a compromise spending omnibus spending bill before year end. And yes, an omnibus bill is almost a foregone conclusion; the Senate has not yet even been able to craft a single spending bill in Committee and the ‘August Recess’ is fast approaching (though, to be sure that recess may still be a victim of the COVID-19 disruption).

Bills Introduced – 7-16-20

Yesterday with both the House and Senate meeting in pro forma session there were 60 bills introduced. Of those three may receive additional coverage in this blog:

HR 7616 Making appropriations for the Departments of Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development, and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2021, and for other purposes. Rep. Price, David E. [D-NC-4]

HR 7617 Making appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2021, and for other purposes. Rep. Visclosky, Peter J. [D-IN-1]

HR 7667 Making appropriations for the Departments of Commerce and Justice, Science, and Related Agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2021, and for other purposes. Rep. Serrano, Jose E. [D-NY-15]

Bills Introduced – 10-29-19

Yesterday with both the House and Senate in session there were 36 bills introduced. Of those bills, two may receive additional coverage in this blog:

S 2730 A bill to establish and ensure an inclusive transparent Drone Advisory Committee. Sen. Peters, Gary C. [D-MI]

S 2731 An original bill to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2020 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy, and for other purposes. Sen. Inhofe, James M. [R-OK] 

I will only be covering S 2730 if the advisory committee is specifically authorized to address counter-drone activities.

S 2474 Introduced – FY 2020 DOD Spending

Last week Sen. Shelby (R,AL) introduced S 2474, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2020. The bill was reported favorably by the Senate Appropriations Committee. There are no significant mentions of cybersecurity within the bill, but the Committee does include mentions of a number of cybersecurity programs within their Report.

Cybersecurity Training

The need to ensure an adequate supply of cybersecurity expertise continues to concern the Committee. On pages 226-7 the Committee outlines spending on three initiatives to address this concern:

• $12 million increase in funding for the National Centers for Academic Excellence Cyber Defense program;

• $25 million for a workforce development pilot program that would offer certificate-based courses through the Centers for Academic Excellence in cybersecurity and artificial intelligence; and

• $10 million for Department of Defense Cyber Institutes to award scholarships, student and research support, and a K–12 cyber education program

On page 229 the Committee expresses its disappointment with “continued weaknesses in the Department of Defense’s cyber posture, to include challenges in the recruitment and retention of qualified cyber talent”. The Committee would allocate $1.5 million “to develop a program that identifies university partners and a structure to award scholarships to build a certified cyber defense workforce.”

Control System Security

Industrial control system security gets special mention in the Committee Report. On page 228 the Report notes that: “the Committee recommends $10,000,000 for industrial control systems cyber security solutions for key Department of Defense installations critical to homeland defense and overseas operations, with special emphasis on the Cheyenne Mountain Complex.

Counter UAS Research

With the unmanned aircraft system threat reaching public notice through the reported attack on Saudi oil targets, the Committee presciently addressed the issue on page 212. They note that “countering UAS operations presents a special series of unmet communications, command and control, cyber, and computation and intelligence challenges at the tactical edge.” The Committee encourages the Air

Force Research Laboratory Information Directorate to “to continue research and development into the detection and countering of UAS using advanced technologies to facilitate geo-location detection, determine individual and swarm behavior, dissect swarms to identify critical nodes, situational awareness, and mission intent.”

While this research is directed at DOD tactical concerns, the lessons learned and at least some of the techniques, tactics and equipment will find use in domestic counter UAS operations once Congress deals with the legal issues related to those operations.

Moving Forward

This bill does not look like it will make it to the floor of the Senate as a stand-alone bill. The language will almost certainly show up as proposed amendment to HR 2740 when (IF) it is considered on the floor of the Senate.

Bills Introduced – 09-12-19

Yesterday with both the House and Senate in session, there were 52 bills introduced. Of those, four will likely receive additional attention in this blog:

HR 4306 To require the Administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration to conduct an evaluation of the safety, security, and environmental risks of transporting liquefied natural gas by rail, and for other purposes. Rep. DeFazio, Peter A. [D-OR-4]

S 2469 A bill to amend title 49, United States Code, to require the use of advanced leak detection technology for pipelines, and for other purposes. Sen. Udall, Tom [D-NM]

S 2470 An original bill making appropriations for energy and water development and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2020, and for other purposes. Sen. Alexander, Lamar [R-TN]

S 2474 An original bill making appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2020, and for other purposes. Sen. Shelby, Richard C. [R-AL]

DeFazio has been fighting a PHMSA special permit for shipping LNG by rail for a couple of months now. This appears to be the latest salvo.

Two of the three spending bills that were scheduled for this week were adopted in the Senate Appropriations Committee. The failure of the Committee to vote on the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies bill reflects the continuing problem the Congress is having with spending bills.

This is going to have an impact on how the Senate deals with the first House spending minibus (HR 2740) that passed in the House in June. Since that minibus included all three of the spending bills mentioned above, the Senate will not be able to take up HR 2740 and substitute language from their three bills (only two have been published). They can either substitute language from the two bills that were adopted by Committee and try to just amend the House language on the LHHE portion of the bill, or just wait until the Committee can reach an internal compromise that would allow the introduction of the Senate LHHE bill. I suspect the later will be the case. If this cannot be accomplished in the next week or so, we have no real chance of seeing spending bills sent to the President and will have to wait for a continuing resolution and an omnibus bill later in the year. Not looking forward to this, haven’t been all year.