[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 134 (Thursday, December 7, 2006)]
[House]
[Pages H8919-H8922]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




REQUIRING SECRETARY OF DEFENSE TO SUBMIT ANNUAL REPORT ON CONGRESSIONAL 
                              INITIATIVES

  Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 6375) to amend title 10, United States Code, to require the 
Secretary of Defense to submit to Congress an annual report and to 
provide notice to the public on congressional initiatives in funds 
authorized or made available to the Department of Defense.
  The Clerk read as follows:

                               H.R. 6375

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. ANNUAL REPORT TO CONGRESS AND NOTICE TO PUBLIC ON 
                   CONGRESSIONAL INITIATIVES IN FUNDS AUTHORIZED 
                   OR MADE AVAILABLE TO DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE.

       (a) In General.--
       (1) Identification of congressional initiatives.--Chapter 
     23 of title 10, United States Code, is amended by adding at 
     the end the following new section:

     ``Sec. 490. Congressional initiatives in funds authorized or 
       made available to Department of Defense: annual report to 
       Congress; notice to public

       ``(a) Annual Report and Public Notice Required.--Not later 
     than 90 days after the close of each fiscal year, the 
     Secretary of Defense shall submit to Congress a report on 
     congressional initiatives applicable to funds authorized or 
     made available for the Department of Defense for that fiscal 
     year. Upon being submitted to Congress, each such report 
     shall be posted on a publicly available Internet website of 
     the Department of Defense.
       ``(b) Content.-- Each report under subsection (a) shall 
     include, for each congressional initiative applicable to 
     funds that were authorized or made available to the 
     Department of Defense for the fiscal year covered by the 
     report, the following:
       ``(1) A description of each such congressional initiative, 
     including--
       ``(A) the geographic location (by city, State, country, and 
     congressional district, if relevant) in which the funds 
     covered by such congressional initiative are to be used;
       ``(B) the purpose of such congressional initiative (if 
     known); and
       ``(C) the recipient of the funding covered by such 
     congressional initiative.
       ``(2) For each such congressional initiative, an assessment 
     of the utility of the congressional initiative in meeting the 
     goals of the Department, set forth using a rating system as 
     follows:
       ``(A) A rating of `A' for a congressional initiative that 
     directly advances the primary goals of the Department or an 
     agency, element, or component of the Department.
       ``(B) A rating of `B' for a congressional initiative that 
     advances many of the primary goals of the Department or an 
     agency, element, or component of the Department.
       ``(C) A rating of `C' for a congressional initiative that 
     may advance some of the primary goals of the Department or an 
     agency, element, or component of the Department.
       ``(D) A rating of `D' for a congressional initiative that 
     cannot be demonstrated as being cost-effective in advancing 
     the primary goals of the Department or any agency, element, 
     or component of the Department.
       ``(E) A rating of `F' for a congressional initiative that 
     distracts from or otherwise impedes that capacity of the 
     Department to meet the primary goals of the Department.
       ``(c) Congressional Initiative Defined.--In this section, 
     the term `congressional initiative' means a provision of law, 
     or a directive contained within a joint explanatory statement 
     or report accompanying a conference report or bill (as 
     applicable), that specifies--
       ``(1) the identity of an entity or project, including a 
     defense system, for which funds are authorized or made 
     available in that law (or conference report or bill) and that 
     was not requested by the President in a budget submission to 
     Congress; and
       ``(2) the amounts of the funds so authorized or made 
     available.''.
       (2) Clerical amendment.--The table of sections at the 
     beginning of such chapter is amended by adding at the end the 
     following new item:

``490.  Congressional initiatives in funds authorized or made available 
              to Department of Defense: annual report to Congress; 
              notice to public.''.

       (b) Effective Date.--Section 490 of title 10, United States 
     Code, as added by subsection (a), shall apply with respect to 
     funds made available to the Department of Defense for each 
     fiscal year after fiscal year 2006.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Hunter) and the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton) 
each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California.


                             General Leave

  Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks 
on the legislation under consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from California?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Speaker, I would also ask that after I make my 
opening remarks, I be allowed to yield the balance of my time to the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Souder), the sponsor of this bill, and I 
ask unanimous consent that he be allowed to control the time for 
purposes of debate.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from California?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Speaker, this legislation is legislation a number of 
Members have asked to bring to the floor in both bodies to illuminate 
to the world what they call congressional initiatives.
  Mr. Speaker, as the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, let me 
give you my take as one Member of this very important body on 
congressional initiatives that are sometimes pejoratively called 
earmarks.
  The Constitution of the United States charges the United States 
Congress, not the President, not the Pentagon, not a general, not some 
under secretary, charges us with raising and equipping the forces of 
the United States of America, the Armed Forces, the armies and the 
navies that the Constitution refers to; and, of course, by implication 
the United States Marine Corps and the United States Air Force.
  It is our job to build this budget, not just to work around the 
fringes of the defense budget, it is our job to build this budget from 
the ground up. From my perspective the recommendation that comes over 
from the President is just that: It is a recommendation. It is not 
charged by the Constitution. It is

[[Page H8920]]

not mandated by the Constitution. It is our job to build the defense 
budget of the United States.
  Let me just say, Mr. Speaker, we do that. I think we do that very 
effectively. I think this great bill, this $532 billion defense bill, 
is a reflection of that. It was put together by my committee, the Armed 
Services Committee, Democrats and Republicans, and by the gentleman 
from Florida's Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense who do such a 
good job.
  Let me give you one example of what we did, one thing that might 
pejoratively be called earmarks by people who think that somehow what 
the administration sends over is sacrosanct and what we add is somehow 
an illegitimate addition.
  We had the Army and United States Marine Corps come to us this past 
spring after we were putting our budget together after the President's 
recommendation had come over, and they said we are not going to have 
enough money to reset the United States Army and Marine Corps, largely 
because of that tough, harsh theater in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that 
means repairing the tanks, trucks, aircraft and all of the other 
equipment that you need for warfighting. We need wherewithal, the 
additional money to fix that fire engine so it can go back in the 
firehouse and be ready for the next emergency, whether it is the 9/11 
force of this country, the Marine Corps, special operations, United 
States Army, United States Navy, United States Air Force.
  Mr. Young and I in our committees listened to the United States Army 
and to the Marine Corps. We said, come in and you lay out for us 
everything that you need to get our forces ready to fight again so they 
are reset. That ``reset'' is a term of art.
  They gave us a bill, $27.7 billion for the Army, $11.7 for the Marine 
Corps. We looked at the President's budget which only funded a part of 
that; we looked at the supplemental which only funded a part of that, 
and we looked at the balance. We took that balance and we added every 
single dime that was identified by our warfighting leaders as something 
that they needed in combat, and we added that to the President's 
budget. I guess you could call that a $20 billion earmark. That was a 
congressional initiative that exactly described the duty that is 
charged to us by the United States Constitution and how we discharge 
that duty.
  Let me give a few other congressional initiatives. One reason why I 
support this bill, incidentally, and it is fine with me is because I 
put my initiatives on the Internet and if people want to look at them 
and see what we add, that is great.
  Let me tell you some of the initiatives that I added and I asked Mr. 
Young to add in his bill: jammers, jammers that would protect our Armed 
Forces, when they are dismounted, against roadside bombs that are 
electronically triggered from remote areas that were not in the 
administration's budget, we added those. So jammers that protect the 
lives of our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines, we added, 
congressional initiatives.
  Body armor, extra body armor, more Humvees that have the thick armor 
that can repel the fragments from these IEDs, these roadside bombs. We 
put in things that are important for the warfighters of this country.
  Mr. Speaker, I would say that I am here to reaffirm our 
constitutional right, not to do just bits and pieces of the defense 
budget, but to do the entire budget; and what the administration 
recommends is the edges. If they didn't come over with a recommended 
budget, we could build and we are totally equipped to build this budget 
from the ground up. We have the expertise to do it, Democrat and 
Republican, and we could do it from the ground up.
  Having said that, I support this bill which says that the Department 
of Defense is free to comment on their ratings on what congressional 
initiatives have requested and placed into the bill; and from my 
personal perspective, that is fine with me. I put mine on the Internet 
for the world to see.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1315

  Mr. SKELTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I rise in opposition to H.R. 6375. This is not the way to accomplish 
earmark reform because, quite frankly, it gives all the authority to 
the executive branch. The gentleman from California, Chairman Duncan 
Hunter, is right when he says that we are charged under the 
Constitution to raise and maintain the military. And that is the very 
reason that I oppose this particular bill. It contravenes congressional 
responsibility and authority. This bill also fails to achieve 
meaningful reform. The Democratic Open Government and Honest Leadership 
bill will offer a better approach, which will be taken up, Mr. Speaker, 
at the beginning of the 110th Congress.
  This sets a huge administrative burden on the Department of Defense 
to identify thousands of contractors and multiple thousands of 
geographic locations, and list every congressional district. It gives 
the executive branch, I repeat it again, the executive branch, the 
right to grade the performance of Congress. That is not a good thing.
  Let me mention another matter which I have urged and the gentleman 
from California (Mr. Hunter), Chairman Hunter, has urged in the past. 
And that is the bill that should have been on the calendar regarding 
the Iraqi Inspector General. That is a bill that would eliminate the 
termination date of October 7. That termination date, unfortunately, 
got put in the defense bill, and there has been a great deal of media 
attention to it, and quite honestly, we should not have a termination 
date because that is an ongoing process. And I feel very strongly that 
that bill should be on the calendar. I want to say very clearly, 
Chairman Hunter agrees with me that that bill is a good bill and should 
be on the calendar. And it is not up to us. It is not our choice to say 
it should not be, but somewhere along the line, Mr. Speaker, it was 
sidetracked despite the fact that the chairman and I both pushed it 
very, very heartily.
  Getting back to H.R. 6375, I hope that we will take a good look at 
it. This bill defines an earmark as any change to the President's 
budget creating the perception that all congressional initiatives are 
``pork'' and that Congress has no right to review administration 
spending requests. It is not a good bill. Consequently I do oppose H.R. 
6375.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, before making my opening statement, I now 
yield such time as he may consume to the distinguished Defense 
Subcommittee on Appropriations chairman, Mr. Young, out of deference to 
his leadership and longtime activity in this field.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's 
yielding, and I understand his interest in this bill, but I am opposed 
to this bill. I am opposed to this bill.
  If it were simply a bill requiring that the congressional initiatives 
be identified, I have no problem with that. As a matter of fact, the 
Defense Subcommittee identifies all congressional earmarks, if you 
would like to use that term, in the report that we publish along with 
the bill itself.
  But here is what offends me about this bill. This bill would say to 
the Department of Defense, you have to look at all the initiatives by 
the Congress and then issue a report card and the report card would say 
it gets an A, it gets a B, a C, a D, an E or an F. I don't want the 
Pentagon having to spend all that time grading the work that we in the 
Congress do.
  I have cited the Constitution many times, and I am going to do it 
again today. Article I, Section 9, Chairman Hunter referred to it 
generally. It says: ``No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in 
Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.'' Not made by budget 
requests from the White House but made by law. There is another part of 
that sentence that people tend to ignore. It says: ``and a regular 
Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public 
Money shall be published from time to time.'' And we do that and the 
administration does it . . . sometimes. Read this Constitution from 
cover to cover. You will not find anything in this Constitution that 
says Congress can only appropriate money that has been requested by the 
President. Nothing in here says that. Article I, Section 9, however, 
says the President cannot spend any money that has not been 
appropriated by law.

[[Page H8921]]

  This is not a good bill. It flies in the face of the Constitution, 
and it adds burdens to the Defense Department to grade us on a report 
card for the work that we do.
  One final point. Chairman Hunter mentioned the $20 billion that we 
added for reset. That was part of a $70 billion so-called bridge fund 
for the war in Iraq. This Congress, this House of Representatives, your 
Appropriations Committee asked and asked and asked over and over again 
from the Department of Defense, ``What do you want in this $70 
billion?''. To this day we are waiting for a formal answer. So Congress 
had to take the initiative and determine by dealing with the services 
themselves what was needed in that $70 billion bridge fund, and we did 
it and we did a good job at it.
  This bill is not a good bill. I hope you will vote ``no.''
  Mr. SKELTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank our Republican leadership for 
bringing this important bill to the floor today. At a time when our 
Nation is fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as waging a 
global war on terror, we must ensure that every defense dollar we 
allocate is well spent on programs, equipment, and other initiatives 
that support our troops in winning the battle and advancing the mission 
of our armed services. We cannot afford to be wasteful in spending. Our 
freedom and the lives of our men and women in uniform are on the line 
if we waste or misappropriate funding.
  The bill before us today, the Defense Spending Report Card Act, has 
already passed the Senate two times as amendments to the 2007 
Department of Defense appropriations and authorization bills. The first 
amendment passed on voice vote, and the second amendment received 
overwhelming bipartisan support with only one Senator voting against 
it, 96-1, and unanimous in the Senate. Unfortunately, the amendments 
were stripped out in conference. But today we have an opportunity in 
the House to pass similar legislation in a bipartisan way that will 
send a message to both our constituents and our troops overseas that we 
are serious about fully funding our military needs and bringing some 
accountability and transparency to the appropriations process.
  H.R. 6375 is quite simple. It requires the Department of Defense to 
annually report, number one, the total cost of spending initiatives in 
defense appropriations bills; two, the purpose of these initiatives; 
and, three, an analysis of the usefulness of each initiative to 
advancing the goals of the Department of Defense. While there are no 
requirements directing what Congress must do with this report card, it 
will provide Members of Congress with a helpful tool by which to 
determine the value and cost effectiveness of each defense spending 
initiative. This transparency will also encourage greater 
accountability in the funding process, which voters in both parties 
will truly appreciate.
  In recent months we have seen the potential to abuse power that can 
result from a closed-door favoritism approach to government spending. 
Most people will agree that a little sunshine on the Federal 
appropriations process, as well as the authorizing process, and, by the 
way, this bill covers any House initiative that requires the Department 
of Defense to spend money, is always a good thing; and this bill takes 
an important step towards that goal. We should not be afraid of 
transparency but, rather, support it for the benefit of our troops and 
the integrity of the Congress.
  Again, let me thank our leadership and Chairman Hunter for bringing 
this bill to the floor.
  I would like to address a few other questions that have been raised 
by many of our distinguished leaders here. My position is actually 
closer to Chairman Hunter's position, which is I support this bill as 
does Chairman Hunter, but I do not oppose what would be called earmarks 
or congressional narratives. I, in fact, have many defense contractors 
in my district. I annually make requests to the Appropriations 
Committee. I work with the defense authorizations committee. In fact, 
almost every major defense contractor has a facility in my district. I 
have argued with the Department of Defense about what they have as 
their priorities. I absolutely believe Congress has the right to 
initiate whatever spending we so chose. We have the right to override 
the Department of Defense. We have a right to plus-up the Department of 
Defense. And, by the way, anything that is in the President's budget 
that comes to us we can plus-up and it isn't covered by the report 
card. But I believe in transparency. I release every request I make. I 
defend publicly every request I make.
  This bill is very simple. It is about transparency. It isn't about 
whether or not we are going to do congressional initiatives. Of course 
we are. If Chairman Hunter and our ranking member and soon-to-be leader 
of Armed Services, Mr. Skelton, hadn't fought the Defense Department on 
certain things, sometimes the Defense Department does not support the 
troops in the field. In the Appropriations Committee sometimes they 
appropriate things that aren't needed, but there is nothing to fear 
then. If you can defend it, that the generals in the field and that the 
military experts believe it is a better bill, why would you be afraid 
of transparency?
  Now, to the argument of report cards, we do report cards. We do 
report cards and it doesn't take millions and millions of dollars and 
hours and hours to do report cards. And we have done report cards on 
multiple things over in the Government Reform Committee. We have done 
it in other agencies. It is a way that we can force a public 
measurement and a public debate about how contracts are given. Should 
they be given just on the basis of what is in your district or should 
they have a national merit? Can you defend it on a national merit? When 
we debate which kind of planes to move to, whether we go to more this 
kind of carrier or that kind of carrier, how many ships we buy, should 
it be driven by who has a shipbuilding district and whether one place 
is going to close down versus another, that should be a public debate. 
And if the administration and the House disagree, let us force that 
debate and have that transparency. Because at the end of the day, this 
bill is very, very simple: Do you believe in more transparency or don't 
you?
  I appreciated my distinguished friend Mr. Skelton's point on the 
Inspector General in Iraq. Yes, we need more Inspectors General in 
general. That is just part of the problem. We have lost the confidence, 
both parties, of the American people about the process. Those of us who 
are arguing for what is best for our troops, what is best to protect 
our country have nothing to fear, absolutely nothing to fear from 
transparency.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today 
in favor of Mr. Souder's commonsense legislation. As defense spending 
takes up a great percentage of Federal spending each year and is 
perhaps the most complex spending issue we confront in Congress, it is 
past time for us to have a clear tool to determine the effectiveness of 
the billions of dollars we spend each year.
  One of the difficulties in accounting for Defense spending is just 
trying to figure out the total amount of funds spent. Representative 
Souder's legislation will require the Department of Defense to provide 
to us a clear number of how much is spent each year.
  Earlier this year, in my position as a member of the Budget 
Committee, I wrote Secretary Rumsfeld decrying the poor condition of 
financial management at the Department. When this administration took 
office, DOD announced it was adding $100 million to the budget as a 
down payment on improved financial management; and yet, Deputy 
Secretary of Defense England testified before the committee that the 
department was unable to complete a proper financial statement. 
Additionally, the GAO has reported that the Department has failed on 
being able to track the spending we have provided in supplemental 
appropriations despite the Chief Financial Officers Act of 1990, 
mandating that departments must be able to perform this kind of 
recordkeeping.
  As Congress will likely consider another supplemental package of 
possibly more than $100 billion early next year, it is critical that 
we, as legislators, have the tools to determine whether this money is 
being well-spent. Funds allocated to the Department of Defense are 
directly responsible for the safety of our soldiers who are risking 
their lives defending our freedom. We have a duty to ensure that this 
spending is free of waste, fraud, and abuse.
  I congratulate the gentleman on a well-constructed and critical bill 
and urge its immediate passage.

[[Page H8922]]

  Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Hunter) that the House suspend the rules 
and pass the bill, H.R. 6375.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds of 
those voting have responded in the affirmative.
  Mr. SKELTON. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this question will 
be postponed.

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