Hearing of the House Budget Committee - The Department of Defense and the FY 2014 Budget

Hearing

Today Maryland Congressman Chris Van Hollen, Ranking Member of the House Budget Committee, made opening remarks at the House Budget Committee hearing on the Department of Defense and the fiscal year 2014 Budget with Secretary of Defense Charles T. Hagel, General Martin E. Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Under Secretary of Defense Robert F. Hale. Below are his remarks as prepared for delivery:

"I want to join Chairman Ryan in welcoming our witnesses. Secretary Hagel, General Dempsey, and Under Secretary Hale, thank you for your dedicated service to our nation. I also want to convey our gratitude to the men and women in the Armed Forces for the sacrifices they make for the rest of us and for our country.

"This week the House will be debating and voting on the National Defense Authorization Act. That will provide an opportunity to provide the resources we need for our Armed Forces. It will also be a chance to address some of the significant challenges that must be confronted -- like the mechanisms for confronting cases of sexual abuse in the military. And it will provide a chance to examine the huge growth in the number of contractors used by the Defense Department and other security related federal agencies -- a fact that has been highlighted by the recent leaks by a contractor to the National Security Agency.

"Here in the Budget Committee we can help honor the sacrifices of the men and women in the Armed Forces by allocating the top-line resources they need to accomplish their mission, and by making sure we have a budget plan that ensures that America remains economically strong and the land of opportunity for their children and grandchildren.

"The choices we make in our federal budget should reflect those goals. We should make budget choices that ensure that our military remains second to none, and make the investments in education, scientific research, and infrastructure necessary to help power our economy, sharpen our competitive edge, and create new opportunities.

"The very deep and very rapid cuts imposed by the sequester place these objectives at risk. You have both spoken plainly about the corrosive effects these cuts have on our military readiness. I also find it shameful that, in this great country of ours, the children of our service men and women stationed on military bases like Fort Bragg will lose five days of school this fall while their teachers are furloughed because this Congress cannot get its act together.

"The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which serves as the independent referee around here, has said that the deep, immediate cuts from the sequester will also reduce economic growth this year by one-third -- which translates into 750,000 fewer jobs in this calendar year alone. I have a letter from a major bio-tech firm that provides one small example of that drag on the economy -- they have imposed a hiring freeze because of the cuts in medical research at the National Institutes of Health.

"These are self-inflicted wounds to our military, to our kids' education, to our economy. The President, and the House and Senate Democrats, have all proposed budgets that would replace these deep, immediate cuts with a balanced approach that makes the necessary investments in our military and our economic growth, while reducing our long-term deficit with targeted cuts to spending and tax expenditures over a period of time. Here in the House, on seven occasions I have asked for a vote on a specific plan to replace the sequester through such a balanced approach. Unfortunately, we have not even been allowed a single vote on that plan in the people's House.

"Our Republican colleagues continue to reject that approach because they oppose any plan to replace the sequester, or to reduce the deficit, that includes any new revenue from closing tax breaks for the wealthy. Even though, I would point out, the CBO recently issued a report showing that 17 percent of the biggest tax breaks go to those with the top 1 percent of income.

"The good news in the House Republican budget is that -- like the Democratic proposals -- it would eliminate the very steep and immediate cuts to defense in FY 2014. The bad news is that they do it by cutting even more deeply into vital investments in our kids' education and in the investments in innovation and technology that help grow our economy. In fact, the Republican budgets would cut the part of the budget that funds education and vital medical research by 19 percent below the sequester. And despite claims to want to strengthen our embassy security in the aftermath of tragedies like Benghazi, the Republican budget slashes State Department operations by over 15 percent below sequester. The White House has rightly stated that the President would veto any such lopsided approach.

"Given the big differences between the House and Senate budgets, you would think that our Republican colleagues would be eager to go to a budget conference to work out the differences in a transparent manner. After all, for years they displayed charts showing how many days it had been since the Senate had passed a budget. Well, the Senate passed a budget 81 days ago. It has now been 58 days since the statutory deadline for Congress to reach a budget conference. Yet Speaker Boehner refuses to appoint budget conferees, while the Senate Democrats have been blocked 12 times from getting Republicans to go to a budget conference. Whatever happened to "no budget, no pay'? Even Senator McCain has said that Republican refusal to go to a budget conference is "insane' and "incomprehensible.' He is not alone.

"Meanwhile, the sequester continues to eat away at our military readiness, at critical investments, and at economic growth. I hope today's hearing will inspire our colleagues to get serious about starting to tackle these big issues now. I don't know what we are waiting for."

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