[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 164 (Thursday, October 12, 2017)]
[House]
[Pages H8004-H8008]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




      MOTION TO INSTRUCT CONFEREES ON H.R. 2810, NATIONAL DEFENSE 
                 AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2018

  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the 
Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 2810) to authorize appropriations for 
fiscal year 2018 for military activities of the Department of Defense, 
for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department 
of Energy, to prescribe military personnel strengths for such fiscal 
year, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendment thereto, 
disagree to the Senate amendment, and request a conference with the 
Senate thereon.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Texas?
  There was no objection.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to instruct conferees at 
the desk.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Mr. Langevin moves that the managers on the part of the 
     House at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the two 
     Houses on the Senate amendment to the bill H.R. 2810 be 
     instructed as follows:
       (1) To disagree with subsection (c) of section 336 of the 
     Senate amendment.
       (2) To recede from section 1064 of the House bill.
       (3) To disagree with section 1087 of the Senate amendment.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 7 of rule XXII, the 
gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Langevin) and the gentleman from Texas 
(Mr. Thornberry) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Rhode Island.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, the Army has a surplus of pistols. The M-1911 A-1, a 
.45-caliber pistol--the Armed Forces standard issue sidearm for more 
than 50 years--was replaced in the 1980s by a newer model.
  Since then the Army has accumulated stores of surplus M-1911 pistols 
which are housed at taxpayer expense in Alabama.
  There is no national security reason to keep these pistols. The Army 
stopped issuing them 30 years ago, yet the Army has been prevented from 
disposing of them due to parochial interests tied to the Civilian 
Marksmanship Program, or CMP.
  The CMP's proponents basically want to transfer the pistols to a 
private corporation so that it can sell them. Do we want this to 
happen? We have the opportunity in this year's NDAA to stop this 
transfer of tens of thousands of M-1911 A-1 pistols which constitutes a 
multimillion-dollar government giveaway.
  It is also important to note that this would make our streets more 
dangerous at a time when gun violence is all too common.
  The CMP was established in 1903--just to put this in historical 
context--following the Spanish-American War when American militiamen 
demonstrated distressingly poor marksmanship. At that time, our Nation 
needed a better trained and organized militia, and the CMP helped the 
government build a broader base of able citizen-soldiers.
  Now, the program was an important component of our national defense 
back then. But today, Mr. Speaker, over a century later, we have a 
professional military and many rifle clubs, and the CMP is, quite 
frankly, no longer needed. Congress clearly understood this when it 
privatized the CMP in 1996.
  Now, as an initial capital investment at a time when earmarks were 
still common, Congress provided the newly chartered corporation with a 
stock of rifles, ammunition, and other spare parts. The CMP could sell 
the surplus equipment--mostly M1 Garand rifles--in order to fund its 
activities until it became self-sufficient.

                              {time}  1400

  However, it was never Congress' intent to equip the CMP with 
handguns, or it would have provided the corporation with surplus M-
1911-A1 .45-caliber pistols at that time.
  Now, more than two decades later, the CMP is running out of rifles to 
sell. The reality is that it is in dire financial straits as, more than 
20 years later, the program is still reliant on rifle sales to support 
its activities.
  So, Mr. Speaker, it is clearly not the taxpayers' responsibility to 
bail out the CMP. To do so would be an unprecedented government handout 
at a time when earmarks have been banned for years.

[[Page H8005]]

  So what makes this program so special?
  There is nothing.
  Beyond this, it would flood our streets with handguns--the guns that 
are most often used by criminals. I believe this would be extremely 
dangerous when, more than 2 years ago, the first attempt was made to 
effectuate this earmark, I heard the argument that storing surplus 
pistols, as the Army is now doing, is a waste of government funds. 
Well, I agree. However, a handout is not the answer.
  There is no national security reason to put these guns on our 
streets. In fact, an increase in the number of handguns will only 
result potentially in more violence.
  So, Mr. Speaker, we should allow the Army to dispose of these pistols 
by melting them down, as it plans to do with other surplus arms.
  Senate language in the NDAA exempts M-1911-A1 pistols from Army 
disposal, but I urge my colleagues to support the motion to instruct 
the conferees to reject this exemption. There is no reason to store 
these pistols. There is no reason to flood our streets with them. There 
is no reason to give an earmark, again, to a private corporation. They 
should be melted down and repurchased for other military uses, which is 
exactly what this motion supports.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise against the motion to instruct. I believe this is 
the first motion to instruct that the House has voted on so far this 
year and this Congress, so not all Members may not realize that, as the 
House and the Senate are about to go to conference committee to work 
out differences in the House and Senate versions of whatever bill they 
are focused on, procedurally it is possible to have a motion to 
instruct conferees, such as the gentleman from Rhode Island has 
offered.
  That motion is not binding on the conferees, but it is an attempt to 
have a vote on an issue that a Member or group of Members think is 
important or that they can make a point upon.
  The subject of this motion to instruct is the disposal of excess 
weapons, as the gentleman from Rhode Island mentioned.
  I would just say, Mr. Speaker, I know of no evidence that--as the 
government has over the years disposed of these weapons, there is no 
evidence that any of them have been improperly used. They must be 
disposed of fully consistent with the law, and that includes background 
checks and the rest, and the proceeds support safety programs, which I 
would suspect that all of us think is a worthwhile endeavor.
  I would also say, Mr. Speaker, the House has regularly expressed its 
opinion and its will with amendment votes both on the floor and in 
committee over the years. We have voted on this program a number of 
times and it has consistently been the will of the House that this 
program should continue. As a matter of fact, in this year's bill, we 
had a vote in committee and the amendment to provide for this program 
was adopted.
  So, to me, Mr. Speaker, the most important point to make is this: the 
bill before us is one that helps this Congress fulfill the first 
responsibilities of the Federal Government, and that is to defend our 
citizens.
  It also provides the support that the men and women who serve our 
Nation in the military must have if they are to carry out the missions 
to which they are assigned.
  That is the purpose of this bill, that is the focus of this bill: to 
defend the country and to support our troops. That will continue to be 
the focus as the House and Senate move into conference.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I certainly have great respect for the 
chairman and his leadership of the Armed Services Committee. No one 
questions his commitment to defending the Nation in support of our 
military, but we don't need to support earmarks to a private 
corporation.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. 
Carbajal).
  Mr. CARBAJAL. Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak against provisions in the 
House and the Senate National Defense Authorization Act that would 
allow the transfer of all surplus pistols to the Civilian Marksmanship 
Program--or CMP--for sale to the public.
  Allowing the transfer of this large volume of guns for sale to the 
public moves the CMP into the retail gun market and away from its 
statutorily mandated functions. This is a program meant to instruct 
citizens in marksmanship and promote safety in the use of firearms, not 
to deal firearms.
  The Army has opposed such provisions in the past, and I am here to 
oppose any NDAA provisions that would allow the transfer of any surplus 
Army firearms to the CMP.
  I join my colleague, Mr. Langevin, in calling for all surplus 
firearms to be melted down and not distributed to the public.
  There are over 300 million guns in America, nearly one for every 
citizen. We have lost way too many lives to gun violence.
  The Department of Defense should not participate in freely 
distributing their guns onto our streets.
  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to 
the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Rogers).
  Mr. ROGERS of Alabama. Mr. Speaker, the Civilian Marksmanship Program 
is an organization that was established initially by this Congress 
because we needed institutions to help people better understand gun 
safety and how to handle weapons. It has fulfilled a vital mission.
  Fortunately, in recent years, we have been able to not have to fund 
it anymore by being able to self-fund through the refurbishment and 
sale of surplus weapons.
  It has been their mission for a century. These 1911s are surplus 
pistols that were used up until the early nineties by our military. 
Since that time, statutorily, they were made available to law 
enforcement and allied countries.
  As you might imagine, most law enforcement and allied countries would 
rather have new, modern weapons, rather than surplus. So we have 
approximately 100,000 of these weapons in storage at the Anniston Army 
Depot in my district. It costs us in the neighborhood of $50,000 or 
$60,000 a year in direct cost to store these weapons.
  What the Armed Services Committee and this Congress in preceding 
NDAAs has repeatedly done has been to instruct the Department of the 
Army to start turning those over to the Civilian Marksmanship Program 
at 10,000 a year until the full 100,000 has been eliminated from our 
storage.
  The CMP--the Civilian Marksmanship Program--takes those weapons as 
they get them, completely refurbishes them, and then sells them to 
collectors. These are not weapons that wind up on the streets. They 
generally cost between $800 and $1,000, and they are sold to 
collectors.
  To be able to buy one, you have to go through the same background 
check as any other buyer. But not just anybody can buy these. You have 
to either be in law enforcement, the military, or an active member of a 
gun club.
  These are not a danger to the public. In fact, this whole process of 
taking this money, the CMP then sells the weapons and it goes into 
their trust fund to allow them to continue to train Americans in gun 
safety, is a vital mission that we should be supporting. This Congress 
has repeatedly supported it over the years.
  It is my hope that the full body will reject this motion by my friend 
and colleague, Mr. Langevin. It has been defeated repeatedly in the 
Armed Services Committee, and I hope it will be defeated again today.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I would just mention many wonderful 
organizations around the country that would love to have earmarks, but 
we don't do earmarks anymore.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Nevada (Ms. 
Rosen).
  Ms. ROSEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to a provision in the 
NDAA authorizing the transfer of nearly 100,000 surplus military-grade 
firearms to the Civilian Marksmanship Program for sale to the public.
  This multimillion-dollar government handout to a private corporation 
is bad policy. It places more military-grade

[[Page H8006]]

weapons on our streets and in our communities.
  The horrific violence on October 1 in Las Vegas, the deadliest mass 
shooting in modern American history, has forever altered the lives of 
hundreds of thousands of families related to those 22,000 victims that 
were there the day of the shooting.
  It is now more urgent than ever that we take meaningful action on 
passing gun safety measures. That should be our priority, yet here we 
are taking a step backwards.
  Instead of bringing legislation on the floor to ban the manufacture 
of bump stocks that allow semiautomatic rifles to fire hundreds of 
rounds per minute, instead of being on the floor to ban the sale of 
high-capacity magazines used to inflict widespread carnage, or instead 
of being on the floor to expand background checks to all commercial gun 
sales so that felons and the seriously mentally ill and terrorists 
cannot obtain access to dangerous weapons, we are here debating a 
provision that increases a number of military weapons on our streets.
  I know we can uphold the Second Amendment while taking reasonable 
steps to reduce the toll of gun violence inflicted on our communities. 
Putting nearly 100,000 more military-grade firearms designed for Army 
use into our neighborhoods is not a reasonable step in the right 
direction.
  According to its text, the provision included in this bill mandates 
the immediate transfer of an unlimited number of guns to the Civilian 
Marksmanship Program for sale to the public.
  This program was originally created to instruct Americans in 
marksmanship, promote firearms safety, and conduct friendly shooting 
competitions in controlled environments.
  The NDAA provision we are speaking of today would turn this program 
into a mass firearms retailer, with the new mission to sell as many 
military-grade weapons to the public as possible. It defies logic and 
common sense. Gun violence has become a public crisis.
  So I urge my colleagues to join together and work across the aisle to 
decrease the scope and devastation caused by tragic mass shootings. No 
community across America should be forced to experience the grief and 
trauma that my community and others like mine have gone through in 
these past few years.
  I ask all Members of Congress to support the Democratic motion to 
instruct conferees to remove this dangerous provision from the NDAA.
  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, Congress intended for the CMP to become self-sufficient 
after it was privatized in 1996. It was never meant to be the recipient 
of another multimillion-dollar government handout years later, 
especially not a handout of tens of thousands of pistols which then 
would be used immediately for sale to the public to fund its 
operations.
  Again, perhaps one could argue that, when earmarks were around, they 
needed this to fund their operations. Again, there was a time when 
earmarks were in existence. Earmarks are no longer regular order. They 
don't exist anymore. They were done away with several years ago.
  Mr. Speaker, I think it is clear that I don't hold with the need for 
the CMP to receive Federal support.
  On another note, I don't often see eye to eye with the NRA, but I 
must agree with the statement on the NRA's website that the Association 
is ``the premier firearms education organization in the world.''

                              {time}  1415

  Well, the NRA does not receive Federal support from its education 
programs, which are widely accessible, and in our professional 
military, the need for marksmanship training for national security 
purposes has evaporated. Even if we truly think the CMP is deserving of 
a government subsidy, Congress should do so through the appropriations 
process, not through a provision that is, quite frankly, again, an 
earmark.
  As my colleagues so well know, earmarks were banned in the 112th 
Congress, yet the provisions at issue in the House-passed NDAA would 
transfer millions of dollars, ostensibly, in government property to a 
corporation that is in the congressional district of the measure's 
chief advocate. And while I have deep respect for my colleague, the 
government shouldn't be engaged in this type of practice.
  The government has occasionally transferred surplus property to 
nonprofit corporations for education or other purposes; however, it has 
never done so with the intent that the property be immediately sold, 
with the proceeds going to the corporation's bottom line. So if that 
isn't an earmark, Mr. Speaker, I don't know what is. It is blatant 
subversion of congressional order, and it would set, I believe, a very 
dangerous precedent.
  I hope that my colleagues would join me in upholding the rules of the 
House and support the motion to instruct.
  Mr. Speaker, I would also like to highlight the danger of this 
transfer, potentially, to public safety. Injecting tens of thousands of 
new pistols onto our streets by providing them to the CMP, I believe, 
could be disastrous, as handguns are regularly used in crime.
  Now, in 2013, of the 6,498 homicides committed by a firearm for which 
the type of weapon was known, 89 percent were handgun related--89 
percent. Only 4 percent were carried out using a rifle, the type of 
firearm the CMP has traditionally sold.
  The qualities that made the M1911A1 .45-caliber pistol a fun sidearm 
is the fact that it is easily concealed, extremely reliable, and packs 
quite a punch, all qualities that make it prized also among criminals. 
In fact, the Department of Justice has tracked 1,768 M1911A1s over the 
last decade due to their involvement in criminal activity.
  In a time when mass shootings have become all too common and 93 
Americans are killed with guns every day, the last thing we need is 
more guns on our streets.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, again, the bill before us, overall, is a fine mark. I 
was proud to support it in committee, overall, because it provides for 
our national defense. It supports key programs of the Department of 
Defense to make sure our warfighters have every advantage possible. We 
never want to send our warfighters into a fair fight, and this bill, 
overall, goes a long way toward ensuring for our national defense and 
provides great support for our men and women in uniform.
  Unfortunately, this CMP issue has been an unnecessary distraction. It 
is something I don't believe belongs in the bill. I believe that and, 
again, I made the point that we have done away with earmarks, and so we 
shouldn't be using an earmark and subverting congressional authority 
and will through the regular order process, through the appropriations 
process, to help to fund a private organization.
  Again, there are many, I am sure, meritorious organizations around 
the country that would love to have an earmark, but we don't do them 
anymore, and we shouldn't be doing a sidestep here to give a private 
organization such an earmark.
  As I said, I have highlighted again the potential for guns to fall 
into the wrong hands. And although the owners of the weapons may be of 
good character and those who purchased the guns, to fund, again, the 
operations of the CMP, a private organization, even if they have them 
in their home, if there is criminal activity that takes place, whether 
it is an act of violence or if the home is broken into and the weapon 
is stolen, which happens every day in America that a law-abiding 
citizen has a weapon that gets in the wrong hands, that weapon is then 
used in the crime. The more weapons out there, the more likely 
something like that could potentially happen.
  This is what we are trying to prevent. We want to do this in a 
responsible way. Again, we want to make sure that the guns don't just 
wind up out in our streets, and we want to make sure that they are 
melted down like other surplus equipment.
  The Army surely does not need to store them any longer. We want to 
get rid of them. We want the Army to be able to do that, but they 
should be able to do what they do with other surplus equipment, and 
that is melt it down,

[[Page H8007]]

perhaps use that melted down material for making other weapons that the 
Army does need that are relevant at this time.
  Mr. Speaker, I would urge my colleagues to oppose the language in the 
current NDAA. We should work together and support my motion to instruct 
so that, as we go to conference, we have clear direction from the House 
as to what the House believes we should do and not allow these weapons 
out in our communities. We shouldn't be supporting earmarks.
  As I said, I know that the Senate provision does in fact have a 
provision there that would allow these weapons to be melted down, and 
that is the way that we should go. I believe that we have an 
opportunity to make that statement right here.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield as much time as he may consume to the gentleman 
from Washington (Mr. Smith), the ranking member of the full House Armed 
Services Committee.
  Mr. SMITH of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I just really want to support 
Mr. Langevin for his leadership on this issue, something that we 
brought up in committee, and a program that really should be just 
discontinued, and I think the motion to instruct is perfectly 
appropriate.
  It was a program that was originally created, and the reason that we 
were selling back firearms to the public from the U.S. military, the 
program was literally created because we were worried that there 
wouldn't be enough people in our country that knew how to fire a weapon 
if we should need to draft them into a war. That is why the program was 
created.
  Obviously, for a whole bunch of reasons, that is no longer 
applicable. We have an all volunteer military. They are trained to 
shoot. They know how to shoot. We don't need to train random folks with 
weapons from the military.
  Also, originally, the program was simply aimed at rifles; and now 
they have thrown in, I think it is, around 100,000 pistols that they 
want to sell back to the public, in general. And this company makes 
money, the taxpayers don't, and we put 100,000 more weapons out on the 
streets.
  I think if there is one thing we should be able to agree on is that 
there is more than enough firepower out there amongst the public. We 
should not be taking military weapons and selling them back out into 
the public, and this motion, this amendment that Mr. Langevin first 
brought up has a very simple solution. We will hold onto those weapons; 
we will melt them down. I think that is the appropriate response. We do 
not need to sell more firearms out there into the public.
  I think the gentleman from Rhode Island has done an outstanding job 
showing leadership on this issue. I urge us to adopt this motion to 
instruct, and I urge the conference committee to adopt this as part of 
the final National Defense Authorization Act that we ultimately will 
pass.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, may I ask how much time I have left.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Weber of Texas). The gentleman from 
Rhode Island has 11\1/2\ minutes remaining.
  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers other than 
myself, and I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Ranking Member Smith for speaking on 
behalf of this motion to instruct. I deeply appreciate his leadership 
on the Armed Services Committee and his years of service, as I do, 
again, have deep respect for Chairman Thornberry and his leadership as 
chairman of the Armed Services Committee.
  Case in point, the NDAA this year, and as has been the case in past 
years, has been truly a bipartisan effort, and it's one of the reasons 
I truly enjoy serving in the Armed Services Committee is because of the 
bipartisan cooperation that is demonstrated when it comes to protecting 
our country, when it comes to providing for our national defense, 
especially supporting our men and women in uniform. It is a bipartisan 
effort. It is unfortunate that in this one particular case we have this 
difference of opinion.
  We are, again, a program that was initially intended to train 
marksmen years ago when we didn't have a professional military. Maybe 
it had merit and the organization was supported, but we have a 
professional military now, great marksmanship programs and training 
programs, as well as private organizations that do this. But it doesn't 
require or need a government subsidy, and so it wouldn't be appropriate 
in this case any further to continue to support this private 
organization, the CMP program with, ostensibly, a earmark.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California 
(Mrs. Davis).
  Mrs. DAVIS of California. Mr. Speaker, today, we are considering a 
National Defense Authorization Act measure that would transfer 
thousands of military weapons to a civilian nonprofit, the Civilian 
Marksmanship Program. These guns will then make their way into the 
public for purchase.
  The Army has recommended against this proposal. One of their 
concerns, not a surprise, is public safety. For us to go against the 
recommendations of our own military on this matter is, frankly, absurd. 
Every single day, our country--our country--experiences horrific gun 
violence, and the last thing we should be doing is going against the 
advice of our military and putting more guns onto American streets.
  Those who are in support of the measure claim that transferring these 
weapons to the Civilian Marksmanship Program will save the government 
the cost of storing these guns, but the amount of money to be saved to 
store some weapons is really negligible, and that small cost is nothing 
compared to the potential cost to human life by unleashing these 
handguns for the public to purchase.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to employ common sense here. Listen 
to the advice of our Army and support the motion to instruct.
  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my 
time.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlewoman from California for her 
comments and support of the motion to instruct. I also want to commend 
her and thank her for her leadership on the Armed Services Committee.
  Mr. Speaker, just to once again reiterate, a priority of the overall 
NDAA that we worked on in a bipartisan, collaborative way, this one 
sticking point is this provision in the NDAA that, again, amounts to an 
earmark, and it could potentially put tens of thousands of additional 
weapons on our streets that could wind up in the wrong hands. It is an 
unnecessary step.

                              {time}  1430

  Again, when the CMP was first created, it had a legitimate purpose. 
That purpose is no longer needed, per se, for the military in terms of 
marksmanship training. There are other organizations out there that do 
that, but we also have the professional military.
  Mr. Speaker, in closing, the provisions in the House-passed NDAA 
would give a multimillion-dollar handout in the form of .45-caliber 
pistols to the Civilian Marksmanship Program. It is an unnecessary and 
unwise use of taxpayer property that would potentially make our streets 
less safe.
  My motion will instruct our House conferees to reject this earmark 
and allow the Army to melt down and repurpose its surplus firearms, as 
it does with other firearms or surplus equipment.
  Congress needs to find solutions to the endemic gun violence that is 
plaguing our Nation right now. We saw, it seems, time after time, 
multiple incidents where firearms get into the wrong hands and are 
misused, causing loss of life and sometimes, unfortunately, sadly, in 
significant numbers, just as we saw, as Ms. Rosen mentioned, with the 
terrible shooting in Las Vegas: 58 people lost their lives and hundreds 
more were injured. It was a terrible tragedy for Nevada, for those who 
lost their lives, and for those who were injured; and, really, it was a 
tragedy once again that has plagued and affected our country.
  It has to stop. We should not be adding to the problem by injecting 
tens of thousands of handguns onto our streets.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleagues will support the motion to 
instruct, and I yield back the balance of my time.

[[Page H8008]]

  

  Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, first, I want to express my appreciation to the 
gentleman from Rhode Island. As he said, we make every effort to ensure 
that the support for the men and women who serve in the military is on 
a bipartisan basis. The gentleman from Rhode Island is a key leader on 
a number of those issues, whether it is cyber, directed energy, and a 
host of others.
  I appreciate all of the Members on both sides of the aisle who have 
spoken. That bipartisan support is what helped lead us to pass the 
House version of this bill by the biggest majority in 8 years. That 
does not mean we agree on everything, obviously, but when it comes to 
supporting the military, their interests are first, and I think we need 
to keep it that way.
  The subject of this motion to instruct is a long-running program 
designed to support safety programs. While we have had votes on this on 
the floor and in committee over the years, it has never been a 
particularly controversial program, even though the gentleman from 
Rhode Island has consistently been against it from the start. But the 
point is that in both the House and the Senate bills this year, there 
are provisions dealing with these programs. We come to some resolution 
every year, and for 55 straight years the conference report has gotten 
signed into law.
  I would like to correct one point, Mr. Speaker. I do not believe that 
the Army is opposed to this program. As a matter of fact, both Mr. 
Rogers and I have talked to the Army about this, and they have not 
expressed in any sense that they are opposed to it. They were waiting 
to see what direction they are given, and they are happy to go 
implement that.
  Mr. Speaker, in recent weeks, our country has been buffeted by a 
number of tragedies: hurricanes; of course, wildfires going on now in 
the West. And the horrible, horrific murders in Las Vegas are much on 
our minds, as are the victims and the whole communities.
  It is important to take time and to learn what that investigation 
yields so that we can, hopefully, prevent it from happening in the 
future.
  I just want to point out that there is nothing, whether these 
provisions stay or go, that is going to have any effect on an event 
like we just saw in Las Vegas. As a matter of fact, in the history of 
this program, I know of no single instance where one of these weapons 
that has been disposed of for gun safety programs has been used 
improperly. As a matter of fact, most of these weapons go up on a 
mantle somewhere. They are collectors items. So it would be 
inappropriate, in my opinion, to try to tie that horrible tragedy in 
Las Vegas, or others, to these particular programs.
  That leads me to the last point I would like to make, Mr. Speaker, 
and it is similar to the first. On a bipartisan basis, this House and, 
indeed, this Congress, come together to support the men and women who 
risk their lives to defend us. The world is getting more dangerous, 
and, unfortunately--the fault of both parties in both the executive and 
legislative branches of government--we cut our military too much. We 
are seeing the effects of that through declining readiness, through 
increasing accidents, and a whole variety of things where the fruits of 
that neglect is becoming more apparent.
  But I think it is crucial, as we begin to rebuild and repair our 
military, that we not let other agendas, other issues, impair our 
ability to do so. I am concerned, for example, that some Republicans 
say: Oh, yeah, I will increase funding for defense, as long as you can 
cut that money in other parts of the budget.
  I am concerned when Democrats say: Oh, I am for increasing defense, 
as long as you increase other parts of the budget.
  I am concerned when anybody brings any other agenda, any other issue, 
that impedes our ability to support the men and women who serve our 
Nation. We ought to do our best to support them on the basis of those 
issues alone and let other debates, whatever they may be, stand on 
their own as well.
  As I mentioned, Mr. Speaker, motions to instruct are, of course, 
nonbinding. I think, in this case, the better vote is to vote ``no.'' 
There are provisions dealing with this in both the House and the Senate 
bill. I hope that we can come to a reasonable conclusion on these 
provisions and the whole bill. But the goal is to defend the country 
and to support the men and women who serve. We can never be distracted 
from that goal.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate has expired.
  Without objection, the previous question is ordered on the motion to 
instruct.
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to instruct.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the noes appeared to have it.
  Mr. LANGEVIN. 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, further 
proceedings on this question will be postponed.

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