President Joe Biden signed the James M. Inhofe National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for the Fiscal Year 2023 into law on Friday. The NDAA signed by Biden includes a 4.6 percent pay increase and the termination of the COVID-19 vaccine requirement for U.S. military service members.
NEWS: @POTUS Signs National Defense Authorization Act Into Law https://t.co/wDUraQc38j
— Department of Defense 🇺🇸 (@DeptofDefense) December 23, 2022
The bill “requires the defense secretary to rescind the mandate that members of the armed forces be vaccinated against COVID-19,” according to the Department of Defense.
“The department will fully comply with the law,” DOD officials said in a statement. “DOD remains committed to the health and safety of the force and to ensuring we are ready to execute our mission at all times.”
Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) reacted to the NDAA becoming law by tweeting, “I am glad President Biden has finally decided to sign the FY2023 National Defense Authorization Act into law with my measure to repeal the COVID vaccine mandate. Our military should be focused on confronting the New Axis of Evil – not woke political mandates.”
I am glad President Biden has finally decided to sign the FY2023 National Defense Authorization Act into law with my measure to repeal the COVID vaccine mandate.⁰
Our military should be focused on confronting the New Axis of Evil – not woke political mandates.— Sen. Marsha Blackburn (@MarshaBlackburn) December 23, 2022
Blackburn added, “Once again, @SenateGOP delivered on our promise to protect servicemembers. Thank you to my colleagues, along with @LeaderMcConnell, @SenJoniErnst and @SASCGOP, for helping us deliver on our commitment to our military.”
Once again, @SenateGOP delivered on our promise to protect servicemembers.
Thank you to my colleagues, along with @LeaderMcConnell @SenJoniErnst and @SASCGOP, for helping us deliver on our commitment to our military.— Sen. Marsha Blackburn (@MarshaBlackburn) December 23, 2022
During past press briefings, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre had called the removal of the COVID-19 vaccine mandate in the NDAA a “mistake” when asked by reporters whether Biden would veto the bill once it arrives on his desk – making the president’s stance on the passage of the bill unclear.
Following the bill’s passage of the House of Representatives on December 7th by a vote of 350-80 – that included the provision to terminate the vaccine mandate – Blackburn called on Biden to sign the bill, writing in an op-ed, “[Biden] should immediately sign the NDAA into law when it arrives at his desk and work to make whole our troops who were the victims of his quest for power.”
While a majority of Tennessee lawmakers – including Senators Blackburn and Bill Hagerty (R-TN), and Representatives Diana Harshbarger (R-TN-01), John Rose (R-TN-06), David Kustoff (R-TN-08), Mark Green (R-TN-07), Chuck Fleischmann (R-TN-03), Scott DesJarlais (R-TN-04), and Jim Cooper (D-TN-05) – supported the NDAA, Representative Steve Cohen (D-TN-09) and Representative Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) voted against the bill.
Cohen voted “nay” on the bill, citing his belief that the bill was “too much,” comparing the funding to “writing blank checks for the Pentagon.”
Meanwhile, Burchett cited that his “nay” vote was due in part to a recent audit of the Pentagon showing that “61% of their funds were unaccountable for,” and the fact that the NDAA does not “reinstate service members who refused to get a COVID vaccine,” among other things.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network.
Photo “Marsha Blackburn” by Sen. Marsha Blackburn. Photo “Joe Biden” by President Joe Biden. Background Photo “U.S. Capitol” by DXR. CC BY-SA 4.0.
