[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 88 (Tuesday, June 12, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3937-S3939]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                         Defense Sequestration

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I come to the floor, along with my 
colleagues, Senators McCain and Ayotte, to talk about the significant 
uncertainty surrounding sequestration and its threat to our national 
security.
  The triggered reduction in spending is $1.2 trillion. After 
accounting for 18 percent in debt service savings, the required 
reductions amount to $984 billion to be distributed evenly over a 9-
year period or $109.3 billion per year. So what we are talking about is 
$54.7 billion in reductions will be necessary in both the defense and 
nondefense categories, despite the fact--despite the fact--defense 
funding constitutes just 20 percent of the budget.
  As my colleagues Senators McCain and Ayotte are well aware, this 
sequester disproportionately impacts defense spending, putting our 
national security at risk.
  It has been almost a full year since the Budget Control Act was 
passed, and Congress needs a precise understanding from this 
administration as to the full effects of sequestration on national 
security funding. Both Senator McCain and I, along with Senators 
Sessions, Ayotte, and others, have called on the administration to 
detail the impact of sequestration on defense accounts.
  This information is necessary for Congress to address the deep and 
unbalanced defense budget cuts that are expected under sequestration--
which are in addition, I might add, to the $487 billion in reductions 
that were carried out last August.
  What little information has been made available from the 
administration about the planned cuts to defense should give all of us 
pause about our Nation's security if sequestration proceeds without any 
modifications.
  In a letter to Senators McCain and Graham this past November, 
Secretary Panetta said that over the long term, sequestration means we 
will have the smallest ground force since 1940, the smallest fleet of 
ships since 1915, and the smallest tactical fighter force in the 
history of the Air Force.
  If sequestration were to go into effect, we risk turning back the 
clock on our military strength to where it was during the early 20th 
Century, before World War II. That clearly cannot be allowed to happen 
if we hope to have a future in which we are secure, prosperous, and at 
peace in the world.
  I wish to turn now to my colleague Senator McCain, who is the ranking 
member of the Armed Services Committee. He has been a leader in calling 
attention to this cloud of sequestration cuts looming over the Defense 
Department and its threat to our national security. He is, obviously, 
one of the foremost experts in the Senate when it comes to the issue of 
national security, and someone who has been raising the issue of 
sequestration and its impact to our national security interest for some 
time.
  I would ask Senator McCain if he might comment on his observations 
with regard to this issue and its impact on national security.
  Mr. McCAIN. I thank my colleague from South Dakota and appreciate 
very much his leadership on this issue and my colleague from New 
Hampshire, Senator Ayotte, who has done a preliminary study on the 
effect of these sequestrations on our defense industries and jobs and 
employment in States across America.
  In fact, she has been asked by the Conference of Mayors to give them 
assessments. One of the problems we have is not only sequestration 
itself, as my colleague from South Dakota mentioned, but the American 
people don't fully understand the impact--not only from a national 
security standpoint but from an economic standpoint.
  I appreciate and admire our Secretary of Defense who continues to say 
that sequestration would be devastating to our national security, the 
effects would be Draconian in nature. He has described it in the most 
graphic and, I think, accurate terms. But we don't know exactly what 
those impacts would be and, unfortunately, the Secretary of Defense and 
the Defense Department have not given us information as to what those 
impacts would be. The American people need to know and they deserve to 
know what these impacts would be.
  That is why we put in the Defense authorization bill a requirement 
that the Secretary of Defense send to the Congress and the American 
people the exact effects of this sequestration, which he has refused to 
do, up until now.
  Since we have not taken the bill to the floor--and it may not be 
signed until the end of this year--that is why I have an amendment 
pending on the farm bill, to seek that same reporting, because Members 
of Congress, elected representatives, and the American people deserve 
to know the effects of sequestration.
  One, they need to know from the interest of our national security, 
but I would argue to my friend they also need to know from the impact 
on an already faltering economy. I want to thank the Senator from New 
Hampshire, who has done more on this issue. In fact, she has given 
every member of our conference a rough readout as to exactly what the 
impact would be in our States. But obviously, the Senator from New 
Hampshire and I don't have access to the same database the Secretary of 
Defense has as to these Draconian effects.
  So in summary, I would say we are facing what is now known as the 
fiscal cliff: the debt limit, which needs to be raised; the 
sequestration issue; the expiration of the Bush tax cuts; and several 
other issues, which we are all going to now address in a lameduck 
session. That is a Utopian vision for a lameduck session that, frankly, 
is not justified by history.
  One of the aspects of this sequestration, the reason we need to 
address it now, is because the Pentagon has to plan. They have to plan 
on a certain budget. They can't wait until the end of this year, or 
early next year when it kicks in, until January 2, I believe it is, of 
2013, in order to adjust to it. So, one, we need the information.
  And, two, Members of Congress need to know that the sequestration 
issue should be, and must be, addressed. I thank Senator Thune not only 
for his outstanding work on the farm bill but also for his leadership 
on this important issue.
  I yield to my colleague from New Hampshire, who has done probably a 
more in-depth study of this issue and its impact on the defense 
industry in America and jobs and employment than any other Member.
  Ms. AYOTTE. I thank Senator McCain for his leadership as the ranking 
Republican on the Armed Services Committee. No one knows these issues 
better in the Senate than John McCain. So it is an honor be here with 
him, and also my colleague Senator Thune, with whom I serve on the 
Budget Committee. Senator Thune has been very concerned about the 
impacts of sequestration on our national security. I call sequestration 
the biggest national security threat you have never heard of. The 
American people need to know this threat to their national security, to 
the protection of our country, which is our fundamental responsibility 
under the Constitution.
  I fully support the amendment Senator McCain has brought forward on 
the farm bill that he championed, along with Senator Levin, on the 
Defense authorization, because we can't afford to keep hiding the 
details of what will happen to our Department of Defense and our 
military if sequestration goes forward.
  To be clear, as Senator Thune has already identified, the Department 
of Defense is taking significant reductions. In the proposed 2013 
budget from the President, the Department will take approximately $487 
billion in reductions over the next 9 years. That already means a 
reduction of approximately 72,000 of our Army and a reduction of 20,000 
of our Marine Corps. But what we are here talking about today

[[Page S3938]]

is an additional $500 billion to $600 billion in reductions coming in 
January of 2013 that the American people need to know about, and our 
Department of Defense should clearly identify what is going to happen 
with those reductions.
  But here is what we do know. As Senator McCain and Senator Thune have 
already talked about, our Secretary of Defense has warned that these 
cuts will be devastating; that they will be catastrophic; that we will 
be shooting ourselves in the head if we did this for our national 
security; that we would be undermining our national security for 
generations.
  This is what it means, and what our service chiefs have told us so 
far about the preliminary assessments of sequestration:
  For our Army, what they have said is an additional 100,000 reduction 
in our Army, 50 percent coming from the Guard and Reserve, on top of 
the 72,000 coming in the proposed 2013 budget. That would result in our 
ground forces being reduced to the smallest size since before World War 
II.
  For the Navy, our current fleet is 285 and the Navy has said 
previously that we need 313 ships. If sequestration goes forward the 
Navy has said that our fleet will have to shrink to between 230 to 235 
ships and submarines. At a time when China is investing more and more 
in their navy, where we have increased our defense focus in our 
national security strategy on the Asian Pacific region, it would make 
that increased focus a mockery, truthfully, if we allowed sequestration 
to go forward.
  We have heard the same from our Marine Corps. What the Marine Corps 
has said about sequestration every Member of Congress should be 
concerned about. The Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps has said 
if sequestration goes forward, it is an additional 18,000 reduction in 
our Marine Corps, and that the Marines would be incapable of conducting 
a single major contingency operation. Think about it: The Marine Corps 
of the United States of America incapable of responding to a single 
major contingency operation. This is at a time when the threats to our 
country have not diminished. This is at a time when we still have men 
and women, as we sit here today, who are serving us admirably in 
Afghanistan.

  And, by the way, OMB has already said that the OCO--or war funding--
will not be exempt from sequestration.
  We owe it to our men and women who are in the field right now to make 
sure they have the support they need and deserve from this Congress.
  When we look at where we are, this is not just about our national 
defense. But you would think that being about our national defense, our 
foremost responsibility in Congress, would be enough to bring everyone 
to the table right now to resolve this, regardless of whatever your 
party affiliation is. But this is also an issue about jobs, because the 
estimates are, in terms of the job impact in this country, George Mason 
University estimates that over 1 million jobs will be lost in this 
country over 1 year due to sequestration. And that is just looking at 
research and development and procurement.
  Well, let's talk about some of the States that will be impacted, 
because every one of my colleagues represents a State in this Chamber 
that will be impacted by the jobs at issue.
  We look at where our economy is right now, and yet we continue not to 
address this fundamental issue of sequestration when 1 million jobs are 
at stake.
  For Virginia, the estimate is 123,000 jobs; Florida, 39,000 jobs; 
Ohio, 18,000 jobs; North Carolina, 11,000 jobs; Connecticut, 34,000 
jobs; Pennsylvania, 36,000 jobs. In my small State of New Hampshire, it 
is projected that we will lose approximately 3,300 jobs.
  So not only is this a national security issue, but we are also 
talking about our defense industrial base. And once we lose much of the 
talent in that industrial base, it doesn't necessarily come back. We 
have many small employers who can't sustain these cuts, who will go 
bankrupt, and won't be able to come back. And once they are gone, we 
lose their expertise and the U.S. military becomes more reliant on 
foreign suppliers.
  In fact, the CEO of Lockheed Martin has said recently:

       The very prospect of sequestration is already having a 
     chilling effect on the industry. We're not going to hire. 
     We're not going to make speculative investments. We're not 
     going to invest in incremental training, because the 
     uncertainty associated with 53 billion of reductions in the 
     first fiscal quarter of next year is a huge disruption to our 
     business.

  To my colleagues who think we can kick this can down the road until 
after the elections, please understand that when it comes to jobs, 
these defense employers have a responsibility under Federal law, what 
is called the WARN Act, to notify their employees if they are going to 
be laid off at least 60 days before a layoff will occur.
  What that means is there could be hundreds of thousands of WARN Act 
notices going out, likely before the election in November, letting 
people across this country know that they may lose their job because 
Congress has not come forward and addressed this fundamental issue to 
our national security right now.
  In conclusion--and I know Senator Thune is supportive of this. I am 
the cosponsor of a bill along with Senator McCain and others that comes 
up with savings to deal with the first year of sequestration, and I 
would ask every Member of this Chamber: Let's sit down and resolve 
this. We do need to cut spending, and we should find these savings. It 
is important to deal with our debt. But let's make sure we find savings 
that don't devastate our national security or undermine our national 
security for generations or hollow out our force, as our Chairman of 
the Joint Chiefs of Staff has said about sequestration. I would urge my 
colleagues on both sides of the aisle, let's sit down now and resolve 
this issue on behalf of our most important responsibility, which is to 
protect the American people from the threats that still remain around 
the world and are very real. We have seen it with Iran trying to 
acquire the capability of a nuclear weapon. It still remains a very 
challenging time, and we need to protect our country from the threats 
we face.
  I thank my colleague Senator Thune, and I turn it back to him.
  Mr. THUNE. I would say to my colleague, the Senator from New 
Hampshire--because she mentioned that she and I both serve on the 
Budget Committee--that this perhaps could have been avoided had we 
passed a budget that dealt with title reform.
  The reason we have these huge cuts, these steep and unbalanced cuts 
to the defense budget, is because we punted on the Budget Control Act 
to the supercommittee, which didn't produce a result, and this 
triggered these across-the-board reductions in spending--half of which 
come out of the defense budget, as the Senator mentioned, a defense 
budget that represents only 20 percent of Federal spending. So 
proportionality here seems to be a real issue. Why would you gut the 
part of a budget from which you get the resources to keep your country 
safe and secure?
  Frankly, it comes back--in my view, at least--to the fact that now, 
for 3 consecutive years, the Budget Committee, on which the Senator and 
I both serve, has failed to produce a budget, spelling out a more 
reasonable and thoughtful plan for how to deal with these challenges as 
opposed to having this budget axe fall in this disproportionate way on 
our national security interests.
  I am curious as to the Senator's thoughts with regard to the reason 
why we are where we are today.
  Ms. AYOTTE. I would say to my colleague from South Dakota, you are 
absolutely right. It is outrageous that it has been over 1,100 days 
that we have not had a budget in the Senate. In the Budget Committee 
that we both serve on, the Senator and I are anxious to resolve the big 
fiscal issues facing our country.
  I agree with the Senator from South Dakota, if we did that function 
of budgeting, we wouldn't be in this position where we have put our 
national security at risk because we are not taking on the big-picture 
fiscal issue to get our fiscal house in order in Washington and make 
sure we reform mandatory spending so those programs are sustainable and 
available for future generations. So here we are.
  Not only do I serve on the Senate Armed Services Committee, but I am 
the wife of a veteran. It is astounding to me that we would put our 
national security at risk rather than doing our jobs, putting together 
a budget that is

[[Page S3939]]

responsible and proportional. That is one of the underlying reasons why 
we find ourselves in the position we are right now.
  I ask my colleague from South Dakota, as Commander in Chief, the 
President has a responsibility on this very important issue. It is such 
an important and weighty responsibility as President of the United 
States to be Commander in Chief. Where is the President on these 
issues?
  Mr. THUNE. Ironically, the point my colleague from New Hampshire made 
earlier and the statements made by the President's own Defense 
Secretary about what these cuts would mean just speak volumes. It is 
absolutely stunning when we look at the impact this would have on our 
national security budget, and, at least to date, the President is not 
weighing in on this argument at all.
  I think what the Senator from New Hampshire and Senator McCain and I 
are saying is this: Show us your plan.
  If we are going to do something about this, we need to know how they 
intend to implement this. So the transparency issue is very important. 
Asking them to tell us how they are planning on making these reductions 
seems to be a critically important part of not only informing the 
American public but giving Congress a pathway--if there is one--to 
address and perhaps redistribute these reductions.
  When we are talking about a $109 billion reduction that will take 
effect in January of next year--half of which comes out of defense--on 
top of $\1/2\ trillion in cuts to accrue over the next decade that were 
approved as part of the Budget Control Act, that is a huge chunk out of 
our national security budget.
  I think the Senator from New Hampshire made an excellent point as 
well about how this obviously impacts national security first and 
foremost. I have always maintained that if we don't get national 
security right to protect and defend the country, then the rest is all 
secondary.
  But there is a huge economic impact, as was pointed out not only by 
the study my colleague from New Hampshire mentioned but also by the 
Congressional Budget Office recently in speaking about the fiscal cliff 
that hits us in the first part of January next year and could cost us 
1.3 percent in growth, which, according to the President's economic 
advisers, could be 1.3 million jobs. If the national security issue 
does not get your attention, certainly we would think the economy and 
jobs issue would. Yet we are hearing silence--crickets coming out of 
the White House.
  I would hope he would weigh in on this debate and at least provide us 
with an idea of how the administration intends to implement this and 
hopefully a plan about how to avert this. As has been emphasized by the 
President's Defense Secretary, there would be a catastrophic impact on 
our national security interest.
  Ms. AYOTTE. I ask Senator Thune, is this not so important when we 
think about the impact on our national security that now we hear from 
the President that Members on both sides of the aisle should sit down 
instead of kicking this can beyond the elections?
  What I have heard from our employers is that they will have to make 
decisions now that could impact our defense industrial base. We are 
talking about shipbuilders, we are talking about experts, small 
businesses that work in this area. Once those jobs go away in terms of 
a small business, such as a sole supplier on one of our major 
procurement programs, which happens quite often, that expertise goes 
away. We don't immediately pull that back. So we are talking about an 
estimate of 1 million jobs, and the private sector can't wait for us to 
resolve this until after the election. They need us to resolve this 
now. In my view, our military can't wait until after the election, nor 
should our military be put in that position. They should know that we 
are going to resolve this because we want to keep faith with them. We 
do not want to hollow out our force. We do not want to put them at 
risk. So, on a bipartisan basis, this is a critical issue to resolve 
before the election. I wondered what my colleague's view was on that.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, again I appreciate the leadership of the 
Senator from New Hampshire as a member of the Armed Services Committee 
on not only this issue of national security but also as a member of the 
Budget Committee, where we serve together. It is critical that we do 
something soon, and the reason for that, as the Senator from New 
Hampshire mentioned, is that a lameduck session of Congress--is not an 
appropriate time to try to legislate on a major issue such as this, 
particularly given the fact that there is going to be a pileup of other 
issues. We have tax rate expiration issues to deal with and potentially 
another debt limit vote coming up.
  It seems to me that we ought to provide as much certainty as we can 
to our military, to the leaders of our military who have to make these 
decisions, and to the people who build these weapons systems and 
experience many of these reductions that will impact jobs.
  As my colleague mentioned, there is a Warren Act requirement that 
they notify people if they are going to lay off people. There has to be 
a lead time to this, and that is why getting a plan from the 
administration that lays out in specific and detailed terms exactly 
what they intend to do with regard to sequestration is really important 
to this process and as a matter of fundamental transparency for the 
American people and for the Congress.
  Clearly, there is a need--in my view, at least--for us to deal with 
this in advance of the election, not waiting, not punting, and not 
kicking the can down the road as is so often done here.
  I appreciate the leadership of the Senator from Arizona, the ranking 
member of the Armed Services Committee, and my colleague from New 
Hampshire in raising and elevating this issue and putting it on the 
radar screen of the Senate in hopes that something might actually 
happen before the election. But that will require that the President of 
the United States and his administration get in the game. So far, we 
haven't heard anything from them with regard to how they would 
implement sequestration or what suggestions they might have that would 
avoid and avert what would be a national security catastrophe if these 
planned or at least proposed reductions go into effect at the first of 
next year.
  I see that the Senator from Arizona, the ranking member of the Armed 
Services Committee, is back. Does the Senator have any closing comment 
before we wrap up this session?
  Well, let me thank my colleagues in the Senate and particularly the 
Senator from Arizona and the Senator from New Hampshire for what they 
are doing on this issue. I hope that we are successful and that in the 
end we can get some greater transparency from the administration about 
how they intend to implement these reductions and that we might be able 
to take the steps that are necessary, as was pointed out, on a 
bipartisan basis. This is not an issue that affects one side or the 
other, it is an issue that affects the entire country when we are 
talking about our national security interests and the great jeopardy 
and risk we put them in if we don't take steps to address this issue.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the 
Senate in a colloquy with my colleague from South Carolina, Senator 
Graham.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.