My friend and old colleague Andy Bishop pointed out that while Senator Kennedy’s attempt to insert the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act into the Senate version of the Defense Authorization Act failed, Representative Brad Sherman was successful in introducing an amendment to include it in the house version which has passed. Sherman’s amendment was included in a large batch of amendments that appear unrelated to defense.
Because the House and Senate versions of the Defense Authorization Act are different, a conference committee will be convened to reconcile the differences. The final version must be pass both the House and Senate and then be signed by the president before it becomes law.
I speculate that the Sherman amendment gets dropped in the Conference because it is apparent that the issues are not straightforward. I still think the House will take up this legislation, perhaps even before the election.