Service leaders have said that the number of troops who requested religious or other exemptions to any of those required vaccines — prior to the COVID pandemic — has been negligible.
The politicization of the COVID-19 vaccine, however, triggered an onslaught of exemption requests from troops. As many as 16,000 religious exemptions have been or are still pending, and only about 190 have been approved. Small numbers of temporary and permanent medical exemptions have also been granted.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said the Defense Department made a rational decision in requiring a vaccine because “vaccines are the way you keep a community safe.” But at the end of the day, the bill needs to have bipartisan support to pass.
“It seems to be very controversial among Republicans in particular. I’m not sure exactly why. Maybe it’s just because the government is telling them that you need to do this,” Hoyer said.
“Obviously,” he added, “the more people you have well at any given time, the better off you are in responding immediately, but there’s substantial sentiment on the other side of the aisle, which we need in the Senate, that believes differently, so we may have to compromise.”
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McCarthy said that while he applauded the end of the mandate, the Biden administration must do more. He said the Biden administration “must correct service records” and not stand in the way of reenlisting any service member discharged for not taking the COVID vaccine.
The defense bill will support up to about $858 billion in spending. Within this topline, the legislation authorizes nearly $817 billion for the Department of Defense and more than $30 billion for national security programs within the Department of Energy.
The bill provides funding that’s about $45 billion above the president’s budget request to address the effects of inflation, provide additional security assistance to Ukraine and accelerate other DoD priorities.
This article originally appeared here.
