The House Armed Services Committee voted 29-27 along party lines Thursday night to codify President Trump’s effort to rename the Department of Defense as the Department of War, folding the change into the fiscal 2027 National Defense Authorization Act.
Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX), a close Trump ally, sponsored the amendment. The full NDAA cleared the committee 44-12 shortly before midnight after more than 14 hours of debate and roughly 900 amendments.
Trump first moved to make the change last September through executive action, arguing the title “Department of War” better reflects a military built to fight and win. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has since adopted the title “Secretary of War” informally, though the department’s legal name has remained unchanged pending congressional approval.
Hegseth posted on social media early Friday morning: “The Department of War will officially be restored soon.”
The full House is expected to take up the NDAA before the July recess. The Senate Armed Services Committee plans its own markup next week. The name change faces a harder road in the upper chamber, where Democrats would need to supply votes for the legislation to clear.
Opponents have flagged costs. The Congressional Budget Office estimated a government-wide renaming effort, covering signs, letterheads, and federal systems, could run as much as $125 million.
Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-AL) praised the bill after it cleared, saying the legislation would “strengthen American deterrence and provide service members with the resources needed to defend the country.” The FY27 NDAA, Rogers said, “reflects months of oversight, hearings, member engagement, and collaboration to ensure the U.S. military remains the most capable and lethal fighting force in the world.”
The broader defense bill endorsed $1.15 trillion for defense programs. President Trump has separately requested $350 billion more through a reconciliation measure, which would bring the total proposed defense investment to $1.5 trillion, the largest in U.S. history.
The change, if signed into law, would be the first official renaming of the department since 1947, when Congress replaced the original “Department of War” with “Department of Defense” as part of a post-World War II military reorganization.
