[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Pages 8701-8702]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT

  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, I wish to speak about the bill that is 
before us and reauthorizing funding priorities for the Department of 
Defense.
  I wish first to congratulate Chairman McCain and Ranking Member Jack 
Reed for working together on a very important bill. There are a lot of 
important issues and a lot of important priorities in this legislation 
for our home State in Michigan.
  The fact that we are supporting the A-10s so our troops have the 
close air support they need is very important. It is important that we 
are continuing to invest in research and development and new kinds of 
technologies. We are very proud in Michigan to be the ones that are on 
the frontlines providing research and development for the Army. If the 
Army drives it, we design it, fix it, and build it in Warren, MI, and 
in the surrounding area of Macomb County that we call the Defense 
Corridor, and we are very proud of that. We have vital military 
equipment manufactured here in the United States, and in Michigan, 
specifically, that is supported in this legislation.
  It provides very important pay increase and support for our troops 
that are actually critical.
  My concern is not with the contents of what we are doing in this 
particular bill in terms of supporting the defense of our country and 
supporting our troops. It is the fact that we have budget gimmicks 
being used to fund the Department of Defense.
  Our troops deserve more than budget gimmicks. Those on the frontlines 
deserve more than basically funding essential services or pay raises or 
essential equipment through funds that we know are sort of made-up 
funds--another name for deficit spending. This has been done over the 
years, as we went to war in Iraq and Afghanistan, when there was a fund 
set up--the overseas contingency account--not including any money in 
it, but it was a way to mask the fact that we were not funding the wars 
and we were in fact abusing deficit spending to do it.
  So to continue that with the critical items in this bill is a mistake 
and, frankly, not worthy of the men and women who are on the 
frontlines, putting their lives--putting themselves--in harm's way 
every single day. So it is critical that we do better in terms of this 
budget and the structure of this budget.
  Our families also deserve better, because we need to fully fund the 
full defense of our country--both here at

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home and overseas--without budget gimmicks, without adding to the 
deficit. All those things that create a strong country and security for 
our families need to be done in a way that does not include budget 
gimmicks. And that, frankly, is not what is being proposed.
  That is why I am very proud to be a cosponsor of Senator Reed's 
amendment, which would cap the spending on what has been called this 
overseas contingency account. Others of us at various points have 
called it the fake money account because there is no money in it. It is 
a fancy way of covering up the fact that we are spending and adding to 
the deficit. Senator Reed would basically indicate that this would be 
capped. We would try to begin to rein that in, to cap that amount. We 
would also say very clearly that we are going to address the issues 
that affect the United States in terms of our strength, the defense, 
broadly, of our country--whether it is in the Department of Defense or 
whether it is in other parts of our overall budget as a Nation--by 
basically lifting the caps--for those watching, we talk about the 
Budget Control Act, but there are caps--in a way so we can fully fund 
both the Department of Defense but also the other things that need to 
be done to create security and to fully make sure our families are 
safe, our economy is safe, and that we are aggressively moving forward 
as an economy.
  That is what Senator Reed's amendment would do. It brings some 
balance. It begins to rein in what is a policy that does not make sense 
in terms of using budget gimmicks. As I said before, our troops 
certainly deserve better than that, and our families deserve better 
than that.
  Using gimmicks is a convenient way to avoid dealing with what the 
real problem is. There is this thing called sequestration. People 
wonder: What in the world is that? We put in a policy a number of years 
ago to limit spending. The good news is that we have brought the annual 
budget deficit down by two thirds. This is good news for our country. 
Two thirds of the annual deficit is gone. But now, as we go forward and 
look at what is going to grow the economy and what is going to keep us 
safe, we look at the threats around the world that are coming at us--
not just through the Department of Defense but through every area of 
the budget. When we look at what we need in terms of jobs and the 
economy and so on, we know we need to revisit that policy and stop the 
gimmicks. Don't use gimmicks going forward to pretend that we are still 
meeting sequestration but to look honestly at the needs of our country 
today and move forward.
  Frankly, on the security front alone, security is more than just what 
happens at the Department of Defense, as important as that is. It is 
all of the programs that we rely on day in and day out to keep our 
country safe. Certainly, we care about border security all the time. 
That is not predominantly funded in the Department of Defense. We look 
at cyber security. It is one of the No. 1 issues we have, and we are 
hearing now from a consumer standpoint, from a security threat or 
terrorist standpoint, and from a business security standpoint. Cyber 
security is absolutely critical, and it is not given the same priority 
of importance as the Department of Defense is as we look at the overall 
defense of our country.
  Counterterrorism--who answers the call, no matter what it is? In 
Boston, a terrorist attack--who was on the frontlines there? It was 
local police, local fire, which are under the broad budget parameters 
that are being discussed now by the majority. The Republican majority 
would provide less funding--less funding--for the frontline defense in 
our neighborhoods and in our communities.
  Stopping weapons of mass destruction, airport security is something 
we all know about as we get on airplanes all the time, every week. 
There is Ebola protection, when we look at the Centers for Disease 
Control and all of the issues that relate to diseases--whether it is 
threats at home or whether it is those that can be used in some way as 
a terrorist attack. Many of the Federal agencies fighting terrorism at 
home and protecting us from deadly diseases such as Ebola will not 
receive critical funding under the budget that has been proposed.
  Now, there is a willingness to use budget gimmicks in the Department 
of Defense. Again, our troops are certainly worthy of much more than 
budget gimmicks. But when we look more broadly at the whole budget, we 
don't even see enough to use budget gimmicks of these things. I don't 
think we should be using budget gimmicks, but the point is there is not 
an acknowledgement that there is more to defense and safety for our 
country than just in one department.
  To be strong abroad we need to be strong at home, as well, and in so 
many other areas, as we know. If we want to talk about competing around 
the globe, if we want to talk about what we need to be doing to be 
secure, to have a robust economy, to outcompete the competition, we 
have also to talk about educating our young people--which, by the way, 
is cut in the overall scheme of things in this budget. We have to talk 
about lowering the costs of college. If there is one thing we are 
hearing over and over from young people or from those going back to job 
training programs who lost their job in the economy, going back to get 
new skills to get a new job, it is about the huge debts they are 
incurring to do the right thing. People coming out of college are now 
in a situation where they can't qualify even to buy that first home. 
They are telling me: Do something about college loan debt. We can't 
help young people coming out of college to buy a house. They don't 
qualify because of the amount of debt, and the amount of debt they have 
will equal a house. That is a security issue for us--education, the 
ability to have a college education, job training.
  Investing in cures for diseases--how exciting it is for us to hear 
about all the opportunities now through the National Institutes of 
Health. We have so many promising opportunities and treatments and 
cures, such as on Alzheimer's--which, by the way, takes one out of 
every five Medicare dollars--and in other areas, such as cancers, 
Parkinson's disease, mental health disorders. That is part of our 
strength and being secure and strong and robust for the future.
  Of course, if we are going to be strong, we have to fix our roads and 
our bridges, and we don't have dollars in this budget. In fact, the 
whole highway trust fund is going to run out in less than 60 days now 
if no action is taken by the majority, if there is no sense of urgency 
from our Republican colleagues.
  So we look overall at securing those things at home and abroad, 
whether it is making sure--beyond the Department of Defense--that we 
are funding our border security, cyber security, counterterrorism, 
police and fire departments, airport security, and Ebola protection or 
whether it is investing in our own people in all of this to create the 
opportunity for strong businesses, entrepreneurs, and an educated 
workforce or for infrastructure, making sure that we have those 
airports and we have those roads.
  As I conclude, let me say that all of this leads to the fact that we 
need to next week vote yes on Senator Reed's amendment because that is 
what it is all about: real safety, real security, growing the economy 
of our country. Our people deserve better than budget gimmicks that are 
in this bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.

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