Trump threatens to veto military bill over Confederate bases, forcing a showdown with Republicans

President Trump formally threatened to veto a $740 billion military spending bill Tuesday hours before the House passed the legislation by a veto-proof majority, heralding a potential showdown between the White House and Congress over a bipartisan effort to rename several Army posts that commemorate Confederate generals.

The president’s threat — and House lawmakers’ response — is a moment of reckoning for Senate Republican leaders, who must now decide whether to allow votes on key bipartisan modifications to their version of the annual defense bill that might incur a similar veto warning, or attempt to tailor their legislation to stay closer in line with Trump’s wishes.

In a statement, the White House listed several provisions of the House’s legislation that the president considers objectionable, chief among them a directive to the Pentagon to rename the 10 bases within a year. While avoiding mention of the Confederacy, White House advisers nevertheless called the order “part of a sustained effort to erase from the history of the Nation those who do not meet an ever-shifting standard of conduct” and an attempt “to rewrite history and to displace the enduring legacy of the American Revolution with an ever-shifting standard of conduct.”

Trump’s move, which had been expected, failed to prevent the Democratic-controlled House from approving its version of the defense bill four hours later, in a vote of 295 to 125. But while the veto threat was focused solely on the House bill, it also presents a challenge for the Republican-controlled Senate, where lawmakers are debating a parallel measure ordering similar changes to bases named for Confederate officials, albeit under a three-year timeline.


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