Federal Newscast

Senate Armed Services Committee releases NDAA details

The annual legislation would create a new command overseeing military drones and allow for a new under secretary of defense focused on cyber.

Michele Sandiford

June 17, 2026 11:32 am

< a min read

The Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday released the details of a massive defense policy bill that authorizes $1.2 trillion in spending, in support of the Trump administration's request for fiscal 2027. The annual legislation would create a new command overseeing military drones and allow for a new under secretary of defense focused on cyber, as well as an assistant secretary in charge of housing and military travel, among dozens of other provisions. The draft heads to the full Senate for consideration.
(Senate's $1.2 trillion draft NDAA reshapes drone, cyber oversight - Senate Armed Services Committee)

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency continues to face tough questions about its staffing situation. Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) wants to know how CISA’s steep staff cuts have impacted its ability to assist state and local governments with pressing cybersecurity challenges. In a letter to acting CISA Director Nick Andersen, Warner pointed to high turnover and vacancies at both CISA headquarters and across its regional directorates. While he applauded recent hiring efforts by CISA, Warner says staff and budget cuts over the past year left the cyber agency with less experience and institutional knowledge and threaten to erode trust between federal and state leaders.
(CISA regional letter - Sen. Mark Warner’s office)

The Army is cutting thousands of permanent change of station moves in an effort to provide more stability to soldiers and their families. The service plans to reduce scheduled PCS moves by more than 12,000 in fiscal 2026 and another 13,500 in fiscal 2027. The decision to reduce frequent relocations comes as the Pentagon looks to scale back funding for PCS moves. The stabilization retention option allows soldiers to remain at their duty station, while the high school stabilization program allows families to stay at one duty station until their child graduates.
(Army cuts thousands of PCS moves - Army.mil)

The Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency is turning to artificial intelligence to speed up its security clearance background investigations. The agency says AI tools can reduce certain parts of the vetting process from months to hours. DCSA has long been dealing with a persistent backlog of security clearance background investigations, but the department’s recent acquisition reforms that encourage greater use of commercial technology could increase the agency's workload to roughly 43,000 clearance requests each year. The agency plans to use AI for small tasks while keeping human analysts in the loop.
(DCSA turns to AI to speed up security clearance investigations - Defense One Tech Summit )

Heading into the summer fire season, federal wildland firefighters are facing major workforce challenges. A new survey from Grassroots Wildland Firefighters finds that 74% of wildland firefighters have considered quitting in the past 12 months. That’s due to unsustainable workloads, low pay and declining trust in agency leaders. Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, the organization that conducted the survey, says the findings of workforce uncertainty and low morale will put both communities and firefighters at risk.
(2026 survey of federal wildland firefighters - Grassroots Wildland Firefighters)

A proposed non-disclosure agreement could create a “chilling effect” across the federal workforce. The Trump administration says the draft NDA would not restrict or supersede whistleblower protections. But groups like Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and the Project on Government Oversight argue the proposed NDA, as written, is still vague and broad enough to frighten many federal employees into staying silent rather than making important disclosures.
(NDA proposal draws concerns of ‘chilling effect’ on federal employees - Federal News Network)

Homeland Security is getting its big cloud contract off the ground. DHS last week awarded Amazon Web Services a $2.6 billion deal as part of the department’s Cumulus contract. AWS is the first vendor to receive an award under Cumulus. Cumulus is part of DHS’ effort to centralize cloud procurement across the department’s components. But DHS forecast earlier this year that Google Cloud, Microsoft and Oracle would also receive contract awards.
(AWS Cumulus award notice - SAM.gov)

The Trump administration is looking to recruit more tech experts for short stints in government. Agencies are bringing up to a thousand private-sector tech workers on board through a governmentwide initiative called Tech Force. The Defense Department is preparing to launch its own spinoff initiative tentatively called “War Force.” DOD saw more total staff departures than any other agency last year. It lost over 61,000 employees in 2025, about 8% of its total workforce. It also lost about 3,500 IT employees.
(Trump administration builds on Tech Force model to recruit IT workers for short-term jobs - Federal News Network)

The Defense Innovation Unit is making riskier bets on new military equipment as it tries to send commercial products to the field faster. Kedar Pavgi, DIU’s director of commercial strategy and operations, said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other leaders have encouraged the outpost to move more aggressively to replace human troops in the field with technology. The organization is celebrating the first use of a drone boat to rescue downed troops and is planning other projects to support U.S. forces in the Middle East.
(DIU leans into risk to field new tech faster - DIU official at Defense One Tech Summit)

The American Federation of Government Employees is pushing back on a bill that would make major changes at the Department of Veterans Affairs. The Take Care of America’s Veterans Act combines more than 60 VA-related bills and contains a provision that would reclassify VA psychologists into roles that are no longer eligible for collective bargaining, AFGE represents more than 5,000 VA psychologists. It says the bill would strip them of their ability to challenge staffing shortages and scheduling concerns that impact veterans.
(Proposed bill would betray military heroes and workers who care for them, largest VA labor union says - American Federation of Government Employees)