Joe Gould
Joe Gould was the senior Pentagon reporter for Defense News, covering the intersection of national security policy, politics and the defense industry. He had previously served as Congress reporter.
All Stories By Joe
Republican budget plan will ‘undermine’ US security, warns Biden admin
The Biden administration is portraying plans from Republicans to gut the federal budget as jeopardizing national security.
House defense bill strips Confederate base names, curbs president’s powers in troop deployments
House lawmakers on Tuesday passed their $740.5 billion plan for the annual defense authorization bill, including provisions for a hefty military pay raise next year, new restrictions on the president’s war powers and requirements that the Defense Department rename bases honoring Confederate leaders.
Senate rejects broad limit on military equipment going to police
The Republican-controlled Senate has rejected a bipartisan measure to block the military from giving offensive surplus equipment to state and local U.S. police departments.
House Democrats vote to block funding for nuclear weapons tests
No funding would be available for live nuclear weapons testing under an amendment the House adopted to its version of the annual defense policy bill.
Defense execs press lead lawmakers for COVID reimbursements
Eighty defense industry executives have written to top congressional leaders to ask for emergency appropriations to reimburse defense contractors’ coronavirus-related costs.
Key House Democrats want to lock in New START weapons limits
The chairmen of the House foreign affairs and intelligence committees are pushing a measure meant to extend the last remaining U.S.-Russia arms control agreement amid fears President Donald Trump will let it lapse.
The Pentagon wants a $10B defense industry cash injection. Is Congress listening?
Pentagon leaders need “around $10 billion” in the next pandemic aid package to cover defense contractors’ coronavirus-related costs. But it’s unclear how the hefty funding handout will square with Republican skepticism of new deficit spending.
House panel votes to end 2001, 2002 war authorizations
The House Appropriations Committee approved separate measures to end the 2001 and 2002 war authorizations, which underpin U.S. counterterror operations ― another move by lawmakers to curb President Trump’s war-making powers.
Appropriators to deny DoD budget flexibility in border wall spat
Fired-up House appropriators are expected to vote to reject the Pentagon’s requests for added budget flexibility over the president’s diversion of military funds to build his promised U.S.-Mexico border wall.
House panel isn’t giving defense industry all the COVID aid it wants
The aid falls short of the “lower double-digit billions” Pentagon officials say defense firms will claim.
