July 20, 2021

Warren Announces Key Priorities for FY 2022 NDAA

Senator Warren is Pushing for Four Bills To Strengthen Ethics, Improve Military Housing, Ensure DoD Is Equipped To Tackle Climate Crisis, and Lower the Cost of Federally-Funded Medical Products

Military Housing Oversight and Service Member Protection Act  | Department of Defense Climate Resiliency and Readiness Act | Department of Defense Ethics and Anti-Corruption Act | Make Taxpayer-Funded Department of Defense Medical Interventions Affordable Act

Washington, D.C. — As the Senate begins negotiations on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), United States Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, today announced key priorities for the Fiscal Year 2022 NDAA. Senator Warren is introducing and pushing for four of her bills to ensure military families have access to safe, on-basing housing, strengthen ethics and transparency at the Department of Defense (DoD), require DoD to adapt necessary infrastructure and operations to tackle the climate crisis, and request a report from DoD describing what steps the agency has taken to utilize its march-in rights to lower the cost of prescription drugs.

“Cracking down on corporate influence, ensuring our military families have adequate housing, confronting the climate crisis head-on, and lowering the costs of federally-funded medical products, including prescription drugs are some of the priorities I’m fighting for in this year’s NDAA. I look forward to working together with my colleagues to get this done.” said Senator Warren. 

Specifically, Senator Warren is calling for provisions of the following bills to be included in the FY 2022 NDAA:

  • The Military Housing Oversight and Service Member Protection Act, which is a comprehensive bicameral bill that would take several steps to ensure servicemembers and military families have access to safe and sanitary housing. The bill would grant the Secretary of Defense clear authority to ensure that privatized military housing providers are meeting the terms of their contracts; give military family tenants greater rights to ensure their homes are safe, clean, and meet all appropriate standards of habitability and providing them with tools to learn about problems with housing providers before they sign a lease; deliver appropriate compensation and medical care to military families who developed medical conditions as a result of unsafe housing; and provide greater transparency and accountability for the 50-year housing contracts each company signs with the DoD. The bill is led in the House by U.S. Representative Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.). 
  • The Department of Defense Climate Resiliency and Readiness Act. The bicameral legislation would require the DoD to adapt its infrastructure and operations to address climate change and improve energy efficiency in order to strengthen military readiness, including a requirement for the United States and overseas installations not supporting combat operations to achieve net zero energy use by 2030. The bill is led in the House by U.S. Representative Veronica Escobar (D-Texas.). 
  • The Department of Defense Ethics and Anti-Corruption Act, which would enforce limits to the influence of contractors on the military, restrict foreign influence on retired senior military officers, and assert greater transparency over contractors and their interaction with the DoD. Senator Warren has long advocated limiting the revolving door and restricting the influence of defense contractors. Most recently she has pushed for and received agreement from President Biden’s DoD nominees, including Secretary Lloyd Austin, to extend their ethics agreements and industry recusals from two years to four years, and to avoid seeking waivers to their ethics agreements.
  • The Make Taxpayer-Funded Department of Defense Medical Interventions Affordable Act, which would require the Department of Defense to provide an update on its compliance with FY2018 NDAA Senate report language requiring the Secretary to use march-in rights to lower the cost of DoD-funded medical products, including drugs and vaccines, when those products are priced more expensively than in certain other countries. 

Senator Warren is a leading voice in efforts to improve the conditions in privatized military housing, ensure DoD is ready and able to combat climate change, and to close the revolving door between giant defense contractors and the Defense Department. She has fought for and secured provisions in the FY20 and FY21 National Defense Authorization Act that would: 

  • Require the Secretary of Defense to create a public complaint database that allows tenants to register complaints and requires the landlords to issue a response.
  • Allow tenants to withhold their monthly housing allowance from landlords that fail to remedy problems with their housing. 
  • Require DoD to develop a climate vulnerability risk assessment tool to measure how the risks associated with climate change impact networks, installations, capabilities, and other DoD assets.
  • Require DoD to estimate the anticipated adverse impacts of climate change to readiness and its financial costs, in its annual budget request, and to include a line item to mitigate these effects in its annual budget request. 
  • Prohibit stock ownership in the 10 largest contractors by senior DoD officials.
  • Require the DoD Comptroller General to report on post-government employment of former DoD officials.
  • Require the DoD to provide annual reports on approval of employment or compensation of retired general or flag officers by foreign governments for Emoluments Clause purposes.
  • Increase transparency by making publicly available certain information about officers serving in general or flag officer grades.

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