Streamlining Procurement for Effective Execution and Delivery & National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026

What is this bill?

• HR 3838, sponsored by Mike Rogers (R-AL-3)

  • co-sponsored by Adam Smith (D-WA-9)

This is the House’s competing version of S 2296, which funds the Departments of Defense and Energy for 2026. The main difference is that this one was curated with bipartisan support…yay.

What makes this bill fascist?

Apparently bipartisan support means letting the other side have a little fascism. You know, as a treat.

Just like with my rundown on S 2296, I’m going to focus just on the fascist sections of this bill. I’ll also refer back to the previous article on S 2296 quite a bit due to similarities or exactly similar wording, so it’s best to have both articles open for easy comparison.

• Section 524 : This section has the most in common with Sec. 547 in S 2296. However, instead of prescribing a “merit-based” system solely for military recruits, Sec 524 would be aimed at all military promotions, demotions, assignments, command selections, and trainings. Once again, I highly recommend reading “How White Privilege Disproves the Lie About a Merit-Based Society” by Dr. Allison Wirtz to understand why “merit-based” is just a racist dog whistle.

• Section 525: This section is a paragraph than bans the use of funds in this bill from being used “…for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.”

• Section 526 : This section bans COVID-19 vaccine mandates for service members & civilian employees of the Department of Defense.

• Section 531: This section appears to be exactly the same as Sec 584 of S 2296, which would require public high schools to allow no fewer than four military recruitment events per school year. As to why this is fascist, check out the write-up in S 2296.

• Section 549a: Once again, we have a super quick section. This one bans the use of funds outlined in the bill from being used to endorse Critical Race Theory at military universities, in military training, or military education.

• Section 901: Of all the things to copy word-for-word from S 2296, this is one of the most shocking. In the Senate bill, this is under Sec 920. This would lead to the “elimination of statutory provisions relating to diversity, equity, and inclusion in the Department of Defense.” Please check out the write-up in S 2296 to see all the reports, positions, and initiatives that this section would end.

• Sections 1032-35: Once again, we have a whole section copy pasted from the Senate bill, specifically sections 1021-24. This section bans the use of funds to close Guantanamo Bay, to move detainees of Guantanamo Bay, or to build facilities on the mainland to house current detainees.

• Section 1049: Now this is the one section that is wholly unique to HR 3838 that fits the definition of fascist. This section would ban funds outlined in the bill from being granted to universities “…that allow antisemitic demonstrations.” Universities would have to “…take action to mitigate and prevent further antisemitic demonstrations,” or they would be banned from funds. The thing that makes this fascist is the way that antisemitism has been weaponized by the government & how it has become a catch-all term for any pro-Palestine/anti-genocide protests. Furthermore, pro-Palestine student activists were some of the very first targets of the Trump administration. On top of all of this, the Trump administration used the student protests as an excuse to mold Columbia University to the administration’s will and has turned into a template to use against other university’s. The only thing that this section will do is gift the Trump administration with an extra tool to crack down on free speech, non-white studies, and punish universities that aren’t draconian enough.

• Section 1212-13: This section is very similar to Secs 1255-56 of S 2296. The main difference is funding. Instead of an increase in funding of the US-Israel Anti-Tunnel Cooperative, funding stays the same. For the unmanned aerial systems, HR 3838 would grant a $15m increase rather than a $20m increase.

Which Dems voted for this?

I’m assuming a large number will go along and vote yea for this bill. The bill being co-sponsored by Adam Smith will do a lot. Smith has only voted fascistly once (voting against Al Green’s attempt to impeach Trump) and has otherwise had a spotless record. The anti-trans sections present in S 2296 aren’t present in this bill, but that is probably because a de facto national ban on gender affirming care is in the upcoming HHS funding bill. That aside, this bill is plenty fascist and openly racist. However that didn’t stop 34 of 45 Democratic Senators from passing cloture for the Senate’s version of the bill that was just as racist.

The earliest I expect this bill to get a vote is Wednesday (9/10/25).