Chairman Ken Calvert (R-CA) (L) and full committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-OK) (R) appear at a House Appropriations Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on April 17, 2024 in Washington, DC. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Charles Q. Brown, Jr., and Department of Defense Comptroller Michael McCord are on Capitol Hill to present the 2025 budget request for the Defense Department. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
In its fiscal 2024 defense spending bill, the House Appropriations Committee is recommending the allocation of just over $1 billion to create a “hedge portfolio” of emerging…