Congress is considering the NDAA this week, and—as always—lawmakers will try to use the annual defense authorization bill as a vehicle for their priorities, given the NDAA is one of the only must-pass pieces of legislation.
House lawmakers submitted 1,100+ amendments to the NDAA. The rules committee met yesterday to decide which ones will be considered on the floor this week. Here’s what’s in, and what’s out.
Up for debate: The House will consider the following space-related amendments, each getting 10 minutes of debate on the floor:
- An order for defense officials to consider whether commercial or state-run spaceports could be added to DoD’s launch infrastructure.
- A proposal that would require US Space Command to use satellites to track fentanyl trafficking, in partnership with the Department of Homeland Security and the Drug Enforcement Administration.
- A call for a report on activities in the upper atmosphere and near-space environment, including intel missions by other nations.
Left out: Several proposed amendments, however, didn’t make the cut to be debated on the floor, including:
- An amendment from four Virginia Democrats to prevent the Space Shuttle Discovery—now based at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum branch nearby DC—from being transferred to Texas.
- The addition of the ORBITS Act, which directs the government to clean up debris in space. The bill has unanimously passed the Senate multiple times.
- A proposal calling for an independent study concerning which national security space missions should fall under the Space Force.
- An amendment to review the plan to modernize GPS.
- A statement of support for cooperation between the US and Israel in orbit, on civil and national security priorities.
- The establishment of a program under which the Space Force’s chief of space operations can award $2.5B in direct loans, to support companies using GEO sats for collecting continuous Earth imagery.
- An amendment that would direct NASA to stand up a research center for cislunar and interplanetary missions.
