Senate passes defense spending bill with 4.1 percent raise
The Senate on Thursday voted overwhelmingly to pass the fiscal 2003 Defense Department appropriations bill. The bill includes a 4.1 percent pay raise for uniformed service members in 2003.
The measure passed by a vote of 95-3, with Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., Russ Feingold, D-Wis., and George Voinovich, R-Ohio, voting against it.
The bill would provide $355.4 billion, an increase of $35 billion from fiscal 2002 and slightly more than the fiscal 2003 House bill.
The bill provides funds for a number of functional areas, including: military personnel; operation and maintenance; procurement; and research, development, test and evaluation. The measure provides $11.5 billion less than the Bush administration requested, largely by refusing to create a $10 billion contingency fund that the administration could control.
In a statement, the Office of Management and Budget said that while the administration had "major concerns" about this aspect of the bill, it urged passage of the bill to advance it to conference with the House. The House bill does not include the contingency fund, either.
Senators backed an amendment to the bill offered by Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., that would bar U.S. companies that move to offshore tax havens from receiving defense contracts.
Senators also approved an amendment backed by Sens. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, and Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., to limit the use of government purchase cards by members of the military. Investigators have found evidence of misuse of such cards.
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