📋 Tender Overview
WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.), ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense (SAC-D), issued the following statement after the Senate Appropriations Committee marked up and passed the SAC-D bill out of committee by a vote of 26-3:
Our nation faces critical and pressing national security challenges, from China and Russia to cyberattacks and drone warfare. In the face of those dangers, the Trump administration has focused on fighting culture wars instead of deterring real wars, forcing our military to be funded by its first continuing resolution in its history and dragging their feet with a delayed and error-filled budget process for fiscal year 2026. We cannot prepare for tomorrows battles with yesterdays funding plans.
This administration may not take funding our military seriously, but its clear that the Senate still does. Todays successful markup shows a strong, bipartisan commitment to funding a military that stands with Ukraine and our allies, that deters Chinese and Russian aggression, that modernizes our defense based on lessons were learning in Ukraine, and that better supports our servicemembers and military families. From investing in shipbuilding to expanding our munitions production capacity to fill critical shortages, this bill is responsive to what our nations military leaders and combatant commands have directly told us they need.
Im proud to have worked with Chairman McConnell to look to the future and advance a bipartisan defense appropriations bill. I urge my Senate colleagues to swiftly take up and pass our bill to reassert our constitutional authority over the appropriations process and ensure our military is equipped to face the challenges of this decade and beyond. I also encourage them to support the rest of the appropriations process so we can ensure that our nations soft power matches our hard power. If we spend less on diplomacy and development, we will have to spend more on ammunition.
