The United States House of Representatives on Tuesday rejected the ROTOR Act, dealing a significant setback to bipartisan air safety legislation and casting fresh uncertainty over the measure’s path forward. Lawmakers voted 264 to 133 against the bill, a margin that reflected majority support but fell short of the two-thirds threshold required under the fast-track suspension procedure used to bring it to the floor. More than 130 Republicans opposed the measure, dooming its chances despite unified Democratic backing and support from a sizable bloc of GOP members. The outcome marked a striking reversal from December, when the United States Senate unanimously approved the legislation, S. 2503, without controversy. What had once appeared to be a straightforward aviation safety reform endorsed across party lines instead became entangled in intercommittee tensions, Pentagon objections and internal Republican divisions. Supporters described the vote as a procedural failure rather than a rejection on the merits, but the inability to clear the expedited threshold underscored the political and policy headwinds the bill now faces in the House, where competing legislative visions and national security concerns have complicated its prospects.

Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz sought to frame the vote as a temporary delay rather than a fatal blow. “We came within a couple of votes,” he told reporters, expressing confidence that the measure would ultimately prevail. Cruz emphasized that an overwhelming majority of House members had supported the ROTOR Act and argued that the bipartisan coalition behind it remained intact. His optimism reflected the bill’s broad Senate backing and months of advocacy by aviation safety groups and victims’ families. Still, the House defeat illustrated the institutional reality that bicameral consensus does not guarantee smooth passage, particularly when jurisdictional disputes arise. The fast-track procedure required a supermajority precisely because it limited floor debate and amendments, a mechanism often used for broadly noncontroversial measures. In this case, however, dissenting Republicans objected to both substance and process, contending that the bill’s requirements could impose new burdens on certain segments of the aviation community. Cruz and other backers signaled they would continue pressing House leaders to schedule another vote, potentially under rules requiring only a simple majority, though doing so would require leadership buy-in and additional floor time.

At the center of the House resistance was Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chair Sam Graves, who has advanced a competing bipartisan proposal in response to the January 2025 crash near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport that killed 67 people. Graves did not publicly whip votes against the ROTOR Act, but his opposition and alternative framework gave skeptical Republicans a policy rationale for rejecting the Senate bill. After the vote, Graves told reporters he did not view the outcome as tanking the legislation but rather as an opportunity to incorporate additional House input. “Still got work to do,” he said, indicating that his panel would move ahead with marking up his own proposal, known as the ALERT Act. Graves, himself a pilot, has argued that mandating Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast In (ADS-B In) technology for aircraft operating in congested airspace could burden general aviation operators, including private and small commercial pilots. His proposal seeks to address safety concerns raised by the crash while modifying or delaying certain requirements that he and allies contend may be overly prescriptive. The emergence of dueling bipartisan bills illustrates how shared goals—improving aviation safety—can diverge over implementation details and regulatory scope.

The ROTOR Act would require aircraft flying in busy airspace nationwide to install ADS-B In, a technology designed to enhance pilots’ real-time awareness of nearby aircraft positions and reduce the risk of midair collisions. The system builds on ADS-B Out, which already transmits an aircraft’s location, by enabling cockpit displays that receive and present data from surrounding traffic. Proponents argue that broader deployment of ADS-B In would close a critical safety gap, particularly in high-density corridors around major metropolitan airports. The legislation has drawn support from labor groups, aviation safety advocates and families of those killed in recent crashes. It is also backed by National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy, who has repeatedly recommended wider adoption of the technology. However, the United States Department of Defense reversed its prior support on the eve of the House vote, warning that the mandate could create “significant unresolved budgetary burdens and operational security risks affecting national defense activities.” That late-breaking shift gave additional cover to opponents concerned about the bill’s impact on military aviation and sensitive missions. House GOP leaders privately signaled to members that allowing the bill to fail might create space to resolve those concerns, even as they stopped short of mounting a formal whip operation against it.

The vote split Republican leadership. House Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise both voted against the measure, aligning with committee chairs who favored revisiting the approach. By contrast, the ranking Democrats on the Transportation and Armed Services committees supported the bill, underscoring the cross-party alliances that had initially propelled it. Armed Services Chair Mike Rogers did not publicly campaign against the ROTOR Act but shared jurisdictional interests tied to military aviation and defense readiness. A preliminary staff analysis from the NTSB, shared with Congress, further complicated matters by concluding that a key provision of the ALERT Act would not implement the agency’s ADS-B In recommendation and warning that it “would seriously harm our efforts to implement ADS B In at FAA.” Homendy said her agency had not been consulted by the Transportation and Armed Services committees before the ALERT Act text was released, highlighting tensions between safety regulators and lawmakers drafting alternative legislation. The disagreement reflects a broader policy debate: whether incremental reforms suffice or whether a nationwide mandate is necessary to standardize cockpit awareness tools.

For victims’ families, the parliamentary nuances offered little comfort. In a joint statement, relatives of those killed in the January crash said they were “devastated” by the vote and insisted the legislation “was not defeated on its merits” but by last-minute objections built on what they described as misleading technical claims and the Pentagon’s reversal. They urged House leadership to bring the ROTOR Act back to the floor under a simple majority threshold and vowed to continue pressing lawmakers. Rep. Don Beyer, whose district includes communities near Reagan National Airport and who supports the ROTOR Act, said he was heartbroken by the outcome, suggesting that Democratic absences caused by a historic New England blizzard may have narrowed the margin. “On a normal day,” he said, the bill would have passed. Whether supporters can secure another vote—or whether the House will instead advance Graves’s ALERT Act—remains uncertain. What is clear is that aviation safety reform, once buoyed by unanimous Senate approval, now faces a more complex and contested journey through the House, shaped by interbranch negotiations, defense concerns and the persistent advocacy of families determined to see change enacted.