UPDATED: 19 JUL 2023 01:50 PM EST
A Pentagon briefing on the Defense Department’s abortion travel policy on Wednesday did little to sway Republicans, dimming hopes of progress on breaking a single senator’s blockade on more than 200 senior military promotions.
Senator Armed Services Committee members who emerged from a closed-door briefing with Pentagon officials were still dug in on the issue as Sen. Tommy Tuberville's (R-Ala.) monthslong blockade of hundreds of military promotions over the policy continues. The Senate is scrambling to both pass its $886 billion Pentagon policy bill before August and also loosen the logjam.
Tuberville said he’d entered “willing to listen” but the sitdown didn’t move him. He said Pentagon briefers did not provide evidence that female service members have complained about a lack of access to reproductive health care in the wake of the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade last year. The new policy pays the travel costs for service members who don't have local access to reproductive health care, including abortions.
“I was going in there with an open mind, to be convinced that this is affecting readiness, and they gave a poor answer — affecting recruiting, very poor answer on that,” Tuberville told reporters. “I was hoping they’d have a stack of papers [related to service members] complaining, but there’s zero.”
Questions are swirling about whether Tuberville could be convinced to drop his hold if the Senate tees up a vote to scrap that policy through the annual defense policy bill.
A day earlier, Tuberville signaled openness that talks with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and the administration could yield a deal. By Wednesday he was noncommittal, saying only that he “liked” a House-passed provision to reverse the abortion travel policy.
“We’re looking at all options on that,” he said. “Let’s wait and see.”
Senate leaders are hoping their defense bill won’t become mired in hyper-partisanship like the competing measure that cleared the House last week largely along party lines. The House version restricted the abortion policy, among other conservative measures.
Similar proposals have been offered by Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and other Republicans in the upper chamber. But if adopted, abortion policy restrictions will complicate the ability of the defense bill to win 60 votes and pass the Senate.
Ernst, following the briefing, charged that the Pentagon policy "has very few guard rails." Armed Services ranking Republican Roger Wicker of Mississippi, meanwhile, complained that the Pentagon did not provide data on how abortion access affects enlistment and readiness.
“Officials from the Department of Defense could not supply that information, which clearly indicates that this policy was entered into for political reasons and not based on the facts, not based on data,” Wicker said. “So I'm very disappointed, though not surprised, at what we are learning today.”
Wicker added that Pentagon officials told senators they would be unable to estimate how many troops are affected by the policy until January.
Many senators believe that a vote to overturn the policy as part of the National Defense Authorization Act is increasingly likely, possibly coupled with Democratic proposals to cement it in law. Party leaders have yet to strike a deal to hold those votes, despite an agreement to vote Wednesday on five separate amendments to begin debate.
"We clearly have to find a path forward, and right now I don't think there's a clear path forward that's going to gain a consensus," said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), who opposes the policy.
“This … is sensitive enough to where I believe that there probably will be some sort of an attempt to address it one way or another. And anytime you have one proposal, that means that you'll probably have more than one proposal offered by either side,” Rounds said. “I think there's a good possibility you may see some public votes on the issue.”
Senate Armed Services Chair Jack Reed (D-R.I) said the briefing offered a “very compelling case” for the legality of the Pentagon policy. The federal government pays for federal inmates and Peace Corps volunteers to travel for reproductive care, and the Pentagon — in cases of rape, incest or the life of the mother is endangered — performs roughly 15 abortions per year.
“Questions about the policy, its legality, etcetera, those questions were fully answered,” Reed told reporters. “Folks should have emerged saying this is a legal policy. Whether they agree with that policy, that is something different.”
On Tuesday, Tuberville said he didn’t “want to hold up” the Pentagon bill over his abortion concerns, but he didn’t rule out the possibility that an amendment vote would move things along. The House-passed language blocking the policy is “pretty strong,” he said.
If Democrats seek to satisfy Tuberville with a simple-majority Senate vote on blocking the abortion policy — which is hardly a given — they would likely be able to defeat it with full attendance. But it could be a close one.
And Tuberville’s been reluctant to take a failed vote as any sign of progress, according to a person familiar with the negotiations who was granted anonymity to speak candidly.
Still, on Tuesday night Tuberville sounded surprisingly receptive to the ongoing talks with the Biden administration.
“I’ve got no timetable. They could nix it today if they wanted to and just go back to the regular policy, and then we could work this out,” Tuberville said. At the suggestion that he could also just release his holds, he blanched: “I’m not the one breaking the law.”
Tuberville’s comments indicated that he could be newly amenable to a solution to resolve the impasse that’s prevented generals and admirals from being confirmed for months.
“We’re going to work this out,” he said. “There’s got to be some give and take here.”
