Senate passes defense bill that will raise troop pay and aims to counter China's power

The Senate has passed a defense bill that authorizes significant pay raises for junior enlisted service members and boosts overall military spending to $895 billion. It also strips coverage of transgender medical treatments for children of military members. The annual defense authorization bill usually gains strong bipartisan support and hasn't failed to pass Congress in nearly six decades. But the Pentagon policy measure in recent years has become a battleground for cultural issues. Republicans this year sought to tack on priorities for social conservatives to the legislation. Still, all but a handful of Senate Democrats — as well as nearly all Republicans — voted Wednesday for the bill’s final passage, sending the legislation to President Joe Biden.