Modernizing Defense Acquisition and Establishing Peace Through Strength

This week, House Republicans are bringing forward legislation to implement President Trump’s Peace Through Strength agenda and restore our fighting force to greatness, deterring our adversaries and ensuring our national security. This legislation codifies all or parts of 15 of President Trump’s Executive Orders and over 30 legislative provisions requested by the Administration.

The FY26 NDAA specifically focuses on reforming our broken acquisition system. Our current system is slow, inefficient, and doesn’t meet the needs of our warfighters – threatening our security and keeping us stuck in the past. The SPEED Act gets rid of burdensome red tape to streamline the delivery and development of new capabilities that our warfighters desperately need. It establishes the BOOST program to align promising technologies with operational needs, removes regulatory burdens, and speeds up the requirements process for defense acquisition. 

To ensure our warfighters are supported, the legislation includes a 3.8 percent pay raise for all servicemembers, widens access to healthcare and childcare, and improves housing and education. Additionally, the bill works to counter adversaries such as China and enhance U.S. posture in the Indo-Pacific region, strengthen nuclear deterrence and missile defense, and fund Trump priorities such as the Golden Dome, F-47, autonomous systems, and new battle force ships. The bill also fully funds the deployment of troops to the border and authorizes almost $1 billion to combat drug traffickers.

While investing in innovation and streamlining development to ensure our fighting force remains the strongest in the world, the FY26 NDAA also cuts woke programs and wasteful spending to keep our Armed Forces focused on their core mission: keeping our nation safe. Our legislation cuts DEI programs, bans Critical Race Theory, ends ‘Green New Scam’ initiatives, stops affirmative action at service academies, and saves $20 billion with DOGE cuts and reforms.  

As threats to our national security grow more complex, we must make certain our fighting force is ready to meet the challenge, and that means delivering the capabilities our warfighters need when they need them. This legislation does just that.

H.R. 3838, the Streamlining Procurement for Effective Execution and Delivery (SPEED) and National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026, sponsored by Chairman Mike Rogers, strengthens our national defense and the lethality of our fighting force by reforming defense acquisition, improving servicemember quality of life, investing in top defense priorities such as the Golden Dome, securing our border, revitalizing the defense industrial base, supporting our allies, and cutting wasteful spending and radical Left initiatives from our military.

House Republicans won’t stop working to implement President Trump’s Peace Through Strength agenda and ensure our fighting force is capable and ready to meet the challenges of today.
Deterring Illegal Entry and Reentry into the United States

Under the Biden Administration, over 10 million unvetted illegal immigrants entered the United States from over 160 countries, including countries on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list. Furthermore, over 400 illegal aliens on the Terrorist Watch List were encountered at the border during the Biden presidency.

In addition to their disastrous open border policies and resulting historic illegal border crossing numbers, the Biden Administration also failed to prosecute the illegals who defied U.S. immigration law in a timely manner and remove them from our country. This lack of consequences due to Biden’s refusal to enforce our laws provided incentive for migrants to continue entering and reentering the U.S. illegally, knowing most likely they’d be released.

Between January 2021 and January 2024, the Biden Administration prosecuted less than 1,000 illegal entry cases per month, reducing deterrence and undermining our rule of law. Migrants who disregard our immigration laws, particularly more than once, have demonstrated their willingness to break our laws: why wouldn’t they disregard other laws, as well? Over 70 percent of the aliens charged for illegally reentering the U.S. in fiscal year 2023 had criminal records. 

Under current law, migrants face a fine and up to six months' imprisonment for a first illegal entry, a fine and up to two years' imprisonment for a second illegal entry, and a fine and up to two years' imprisonment for illegal reentry. A migrant who illegally reenters after being convicted of a felony or three or more misdemeanors can face up to 10 years in prison, with aliens who illegally reenter after an aggravated felony conviction can face up to 20 years.

We cannot allow illegal immigration to go unpunished or undeterred. House Republicans are bringing legislation to strengthen current law with harsher penalties to better deter criminal migrants from entering the U.S. illegally and provide more resources to prosecute illegals who entered under Biden.

H.R. 3486, the Stop Illegal Entry Act, introduced by Rep. Stephanie Bice, increases penalties for aliens who illegally enter or reenter the United States to discourage migrants from coming to the U.S. illegally and keep criminal aliens that disregard federal immigration law out of American communities.

President Trump has delivered on his promise to shut down the border, with crossings hitting record lows under his leadership; but there is still work to be done to undo the damage of the Biden Administration. This bill ensures migrants think twice before flouting U.S. law and crossing illegally into our country.