New spending deal largely ducks border controversy, preserves DOD's reprogramming authority

By Tony Bertuca / December 16, 2019 at 6:16 PM
Congress is poised to vote on a $1.37 trillion appropriations deal this week for fiscal year 2020 that jettisons Democrats' earlier efforts to restrict the Pentagon's ability to reprogram funding, a measure intended to deter President Trump from again unilaterally transferring money meant for military construction and other defense priorities to build barriers on the U.S.-Mexico border. If the bill is passed, Trump will get $1.4 billion for border barriers in FY-20, not the $8.6 billion he had sought, some...

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