Washington, DC - United States Representatives Jimmy Panetta (CA-19) announced that he had secured several defense priorities for California's 19^th Congressional District in the FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The bill was signed by the President into law yesterday.

The FY2026 NDAA includes several key pieces of legislation championed by Rep. Panetta, including language that supports the district's military families and installations, and boost innovation and technological development.

"California's 19^th Congressional District has long been a defense hub, leading critical work in research, naval and maritime innovation, foreign language training, and so much more," said Rep. Panetta. "I'm proud that this year's NDAA included so many of our priorities to ensure our local installations and military families remain supported and ready to address any threats to our homeland. By expanding benefits for servicemembers, which includes a pay raise, and making sure America can maintain its technological edge, we're investing in the personal and familial security of our military men and women and the long-term security of our nation."

Congressman Panetta's Legislation Included in Final Passage:

Improving housing, food security, and basic needs.

• Improvements to basic allowance for housing. Develops clear documentation explaining BAH rates, and increases reviews/updates to once per year; assesses the adequacy of BAH for military housing areas (MHAs) and directs the Pentagon to conduct a pilot program in an area with fifteen MHAs to evaluate BAH rates using an AI-generated rate model.
• Improvements to DoD Housing Requirements and Market Analysis. Creates an increase in BAH rates by expanding the population count used towards overall cost of living by including civilian employees and defense contractors, not just military personnel.
• Modifications to calculation of basic allowance for subsistence (BAS) for enlisted members. Increases the rates of BAS to cover a "liberal food plan" for the average male in the United States.
• Improvements to basic allowance for housing. Assesses the adequacy of current Military Housing Areas (MHAs) calculations used to calculate COLA, including a review of the commuting times and distances of servicemembers and the overall affordability of housing in specific MHAs. The review will focus on high-cost areas in California to determine if BAH compensation is adequate per the MHA.
• Increase in BAH for Enlisted in Impacted Areas. Provides temporary increase to BAH for enlisted servicemembers to areas designated as potential for major disasters or in areas dense with military personnel.

Preserving foreign language training and enhancing education.

• Language incentive pay for civil service employees. Authorizes special monetary incentives to acquire or retain proficiency in foreign languages to civil service employees who serve in domestic positions.
• Promoting reutilization of language skills in the Foreign Service. Increases incentives for learning and retaining foreign language skills among the foreign service, promoting the Defense Language Institute's foreign language training.
• Report on Maintaining Critical Language Proficiency. Directs the Secretary of Defense to provide a report on how the Pentagon plans to maintain critical language proficiency for servicemembers and programs that partner with colleges and universities to enhance the pool of skilled future Defense Department personnel.
• Inclusion of Space Force education programs in definitions regarding professional military education.

Improving recruitment and retention.

• Sec. 531. Recruiter access to secondary schools. Requires improved military recruiter access to secondary schools and institutions of higher education by increasing on-campus access, establishing timely response requirements for recruiter requests, and expanding the student information that schools provide to the Department of Defense for recruiting purposes.
• Medical accession standards for members of the armed forces. Makes available the medical accession standards to applicants for military service to limit disqualifications for medical purposes, and create a review and waiver process for medical disqualifications.

Addressing readiness gaps.

• Critical infrastructure compatibility tabletop exercise. Directs a tabletop exercise designed to assess the resiliency of military installations and their surrounding communal capabilities to collaboratively respond to weather disasters or adversarial attacks.
• Guidance for military construction projects for innovation, research, development, test, and evaluation. Requires the Department of Defense to issue clear guidance for implementing military construction projects related to innovation and research, design, testing, and evaluation (RDT&E).

Key Highlights in the FY26 NDAA

Pay

• Authorizes a 3.8% pay raise for all military personnel.
• Increases oversight of food programs across the Services and of the Basic Allowance for Subsistence to ensure funds are used to provide food for service members.
• Requires a pay and benefits education campaign for service members and their families.
• Expands access to food on military installations by granting the Services authorities to conduct pilot programs to reform their food programs.
• Reaffirms the prohibition on privatization of the military commissary system.

Civilian Personnel

• Strengthens safeguards against arbitrary or ad hoc reductions of the civilian workforce by requiring DoD to fully justify major reductions with a standardized analysis; provide clear guidance on reductions in force that considers lethality, readiness, operational effectiveness, stress on the military force, and fully burdened costs; and notify Congress of significant reductions.
• Protects public shipyard workers from the federal hiring freeze as well as a reduction in force.
• Protects childcare workers and DODEA personnel from arbitrary reductions in force.
• Fixes pay limitations that severely disadvantage federal maritime employment.

Housing

• Requires an analysis of alternative methods for calculating the Basic Allowance for Housing (BAH) to better reflect market trends.
  Increases transparency of the calculation of the BAH to include how the rates are determined.

Education and Childcare

• Authorizes $50 million for the purpose of aiding local educational agencies with military dependent students, and $20 million for local educational agencies eligible to receive payment for children with severe disabilities.
• Requires an annual review of the fee assistance program rate cap for eligible community-based childcare providers.
• Extends the Child Care In Your Home Pilot Program until December 31, 2029.

Healthcare

• Establishes a military-civilian medical surge program in support of the National Disaster Medical System.
• Codifies the Individual Longitudinal Exposure Record (ILER), which serves as a central repository of occupational and environmental exposure data.
• Expands mental health services to meet the unique needs of the Cyber Mission Force.
• Prohibits the DoD from reducing military medical personnel.

Infrastructure

• Authorizes more than $19.7 billion for military construction projects.
• $1.5 billion for new construction of quality-of-life infrastructure including barracks, dormitories, government-owned family housing, and child development centers.
• $254 million in design funds to expedite future new construction of barracks and child development centers.

The full text of the FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act can be found here.

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