House Republicans pushed through a $1.1 trillion military funding bill on Wednesday in a final burst of legislative action before lawmakers left Washington for a recess lasting more than a month. The measure, known as the National Defense Authorization Act, passed 216 to 212 with just six Democrats crossing party lines to support it. The legislation now moves to the Senate, where its path is anything but certain. What is typically a broadly bipartisan exercise has become a sharply partisan one this year, with Republicans hailing the bill as a generational investment in national defense that prioritizes innovation and readiness. Democrats, including reliable military advocates like Rep. Adam Smith of Washington state, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, argued they could not support military spending paired with massive cuts to domestic programs and tax reductions.

On a separate track, House Republicans also advanced a $95 billion budget blueprint that could open the door to more than $70 billion in additional funding for the Iran war. The framework, which passed by a razor-thin vote of 216 to 214, would use a parliamentary maneuver called reconciliation to bypass the Senate’s typical 60-vote threshold, meaning it could potentially pass on a strictly party-line vote. GOP fiscal hardliners bristled at the fact that none of the spending was offset by cuts elsewhere, and other members expressed unease about pouring more money into a conflict that is rapidly escalating and growing increasingly unpopular with the American public.

Speaker Mike Johnson managed to convince enough reluctant members to set aside their concerns and advance the framework, but the timing for Senate action remains unclear. Majority Leader John Thune told reporters on Tuesday that he wanted to prioritize negotiations to extend government funding beyond the midterm elections, with current funding set to lapse at the end of September. Thune said he would try to reach a deal with Democrats, but if those talks fail he could look at repurposing the budget framework to extend government funding along party lines.

The debate over Pentagon spending comes at an especially fraught moment for the Defense Department. Progress toward any resolution to the U.S.-Iran war has completely broken down as both sides continue trading attacks. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth disclosed that the conflict has already cost taxpayers $37.5 billion, and American casualties continue to mount. In recent days, at least four service members were killed, bringing the total U.S. death toll to 18, with nearly 500 others injured. Back home, the economic fallout is becoming harder to ignore, with AAA reporting that the average price for a gallon of gasoline has climbed back above four dollars nationwide.