OAN Staff Sophia Flores
11:42 AM – Friday, May 15, 2026
The U.S. House of Representatives has voted to reject a bill that sought to slash nearly half a billion dollars from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) budget.
On Friday, the lower chamber shot down the measure to decrease defense spending for NATO by $482 million.
The House rejected the amendment by a wide margin of 333-80, with all 80 votes supporting the amendment coming from Republicans. In total, 127 Republicans joined 205 Democrats and one Independent in opposing the measure.
Its author, Florida Representative Greg Steube (R-Fla.), argued that the United States should not be subsidizing its NATO allies that rely on American protection while failing to meet their own obligations.
“This is the definition of America First. The United States cannot continue carrying the defense burden for allied nations that fail to carry their own weight in the collective defense of each NATO Member,” he stated. “But most importantly, we cannot continue to treat the generosity of the American taxpayer as automatic while our allies treat their obligations as optional.”
Steube later reiterated the point in a post on X, writing that American taxpayers should not be “subsidizing ‘allies’ who expect our protection but won’t show up for us.”
The bill would have transferred nearly half a billion dollars from the NATO Security Investment Program to military construction projects on U.S. bases.
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