Congress braces for painful veto clash with Trump on defense bill

“It seems to me what he’s doing is waiting until the 23rd,” Senate Armed Services Chair Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) told reporters. “That’s just a suspicion that I have.”

The vote in both the House and Senate hinges on how soon Trump will formally reject the bill. A senior White House official said a veto “might be a little earlier” than the Dec. 23 deadline.

If Trump runs out the clock, it would give the House and Senate just a handful of days in late December to deliver the historic rebuke of his veto. If they fall short, lawmakers could quickly pass the bill in the next Congress, but it would be a humiliating failure after the law has been enacted each year for nearly six decades.

House leaders are discussing bringing members back the week of Dec. 28, but won’t make final plans until Trump formally vetoes the measure, which he has threatened for weeks. The most likely scenario in the Senate, meanwhile, is to hold the vote on Jan. 3, just hours before the new Congress is sworn in.

“You have to find a time when people are going to be here,” Inhofe said. “And the obvious time would be the third because we’re going to be back.”

The House had initially discussed holding their vote on Saturday, Jan. 2, one day earlier than lawmakers already planned to return. But several House aides said voting to override that day, if successful, wouldn’t leave enough time for the Senate to vote the next morning if one senator tried to disrupt the proceedings.

The official veto override would likely need to be handed off to the Senate by Dec. 29 to ensure the upper chamber “can overcome any procedural hurdles,” according to one aide.

Another senior White House official said people have advised the president not to veto the bill, but didn’t elaborate specifically on who has attempted to steer him away from a veto or if Trump would listen.

Inhofe, a top Trump ally, tried to talk Trump out of vetoing the bill in a phone conversation last week. Inhofe said he hasn’t spoken to Trump since then and expects him to nix the bill.

However, waiting until Jan. 3 for the override vote could cause some problems with implementing the annual defense policy bill — potentially holding up certain authorizations, such as bonuses for troops or the start of military construction projects. Many key provisions expire at the end of December each year, making lawmakers eager to finalize legislation before the holidays.

Other members and senior aides have downplayed the implications of holding out until Jan 3 for a vote, saying it would have basically no impact on military operations.

Either way, House leaders would likely need to rely on at least some lawmakers voting by proxy to deliver the two-thirds majority needed to override the veto. It’s unlikely that dozens of retiring or recently defeated lawmakers would make the trip to Washington in the final days of their term, particularly as the pandemic rages. Those votes could be crucial, particularly if some House Republicans refuse to defy Trump on the veto override even after they backed passage of the bill just days ago.

With time running short, congressional leaders have few choices if they can’t override Trump’s veto. House Armed Services Chair Adam Smith (D-Wash.) told reporters last week that lawmakers’ “only option” if an override fails will be to attempt to pass the same defense agreement after President-elect Joe Biden takes office. But Smith and other defense leaders have warned doing so would be procedurally and politically difficult.

It would also be embarrassing for members of Congress to fail to deliver on a bill that raises pay for the troops and is intended to bolster the national defense, particularly after months of fighting Trump over his resistance to renaming military bases that honor Confederate leaders. That provision was ultimately included in the final bill.

Trump has also pushed for lawmakers to use the defense bill to repeal legal protections for social media companies, known as Section 230, but was rebuffed as Republicans and Democrats alike said it fell outside of the Armed Services Committee’s jurisdiction.

Trump, meanwhile, reiterated his veto threat on his favorite social media platform Thursday.

“I will Veto the Defense Bill, which will make China very unhappy. They love it,” Trump tweeted. “Must have Section 230 termination, protect our National Monuments and allow for removal of military from far away, and very unappreciative, lands. Thank you!”

Both the House and Senate passed a compromise defense bill last week with more than enough votes to overcome a veto, including strong support from Republicans. But GOP lawmakers are still wary of crossing Trump and could tank the bill if enough of them switch their votes — though dozens of Republicans would have to do so.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, for instance, said he won’t vote to override Trump’s veto despite supporting the defense bill.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who has backed Trump’s efforts to use the defense bill to repeal Section 230, said he’ll side with the president if he vetoes the measure.

“I’m going to stick with the president and his effort to get something done on 230,” Graham told reporters. “If it takes using the NDAA as leverage, so be it.”

Graham spoke with Trump on Wednesday about the defense bill. The South Carolina Republican, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, has introduced legislation to repeal Section 230 and speculated a vote on the measure “might be enough” to avert a veto showdown, though GOP leaders currently have no plans to hold one.

“He likes my bill to sunset Section 230,” Graham said of Trump. “That might be enough, if we had a vote on that. I don’t know.”

Daniel Lippman and Andrew Desiderio contributed to this report.