House Set To Override Trump Veto Of $740 Billion Defense Bill

The House of Representatives are preparing to vote Monday evening on whether to override President Trump’s veto of the $740 billion 2021 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) – which passed both chambers of Congress earlier this month with margins large enough to override the veto.

That said, several lawmakers have suggested in recent days that the override may be in jeopardy if some Republicans change course and back Trump – which risks falling short of the two-thirds majority of votes in the House and Senate to make the bill veto-proof.

“I don’t want to say I’m confident because we are in such a time that I just have no idea right now,” Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) told CNN on Sunday. “But, you know, we passed with a significant amount of votes. There is some flex to lose some people that voted for it that don’t vote to override the veto. That would be a tough one for me to explain, I just don’t know how you do it. Hopefully, we can still get it overridden.”

For the override to fail, dozens of Republicans would need to flip their votes, while some Democrats who previously voted against the defense bill could switch votes.

Trump vetoed the NDAA last week, arguing that it doesn’t make changes to a law which provides liability protections to tech companies (section 203), and authorized the renaming of military bases named after Confederate generals.

On Sunday, President Trump relented and signed the COVID-19 relief and government spending bill, averting a government shutdown starting on Tuesday and preserving pandemic relief measures which were set to lapse on Dec. 31.

Meanwhile, in another Monday vote, House Democrats are set to approve a measure to replace the $600 stimulus payments in the newly enacted pandemic relief law with $2,000 checks demanded by President Trump before he caved and signed the bill.

The bill requires two-thirds support to clear the House, and will undoubtedly fail in the still-GOP-controlled Senate.