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Floor Speech
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Chair, I claim time in opposition only to have a discussion.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Chair, let it be said loud and clear, the chair and I and all the members on the Appropriations Defense Subcommittee have been bird-dogging, asking questions, wanting to have great reports on what is happening with the money.
You are in lockstep with what your ultimate goal is and what we have been doing on the committee. In fact, we fund a lot of this. In general, I support the idea of this amendment, but the bill already includes funding the oversight of all of the dollars we are spending to support Ukraine.
I am kind of a penny-pincher, believe it or not. You are smiling, but I ask people a lot of questions. I won't get into that. I ask a lot of questions. I am kind of concerned about some duplicity and inefficiencies in here, which I know is something we are striving to make sure that that doesn't happen.
Madam Chair, keeping track of every dollar, especially when it comes to DOD is something that when I was on the Oversight Committee during the Iraq war and the way that we didn't have oversight over equipment and dollars and cold, hard cash that was being delivered there is something that I am very, very interested in and support doing.
I thank the gentleman for the amendment. The committee has it in hand. I want you to know that this is a bipartisan, full Appropriations Defense Subcommittee thing. We are asking these questions every time somebody is in to see us.
Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Chair, Cyrus Salazar, as has been pointed out, is the director of the Department of Defense for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, and is charged with promoting diversity within the DOD.
The Department has a responsibility to make sure all Americans are welcome in the service of our Nation and that it reflects America's defense.
I worked in the private sector until basically, I mean, I served part-time in city councils and that, but I worked in the private sector until I came here to Congress. I still have a lot of friends in the private sector where I represent 3M. Right across the river in Minneapolis, there are General Mills, Target, and I could go on and on with the companies that we have.
These companies are competing for talent, whether it is the person who is helping you at the Target store with the checkout or whether it is the person that is being recruited to go into teaching or a person who is going to become a CEO or a compliance officer or a bank auditor. We are all competing in the workforce right now.
Our labor trades are competing for the workforce. There are fewer and fewer people entering the workforce, so there is a great competition going on. These companies have diversity offices. They are going out and talking to groups that maybe have never been in the industry before. I will use the building trades again.
In our building trades they are knocking down the doors going to our high schools. They have people just working on diversity, saying, these are great paying jobs, let me tell you about them. Maybe nobody in your family has been a plumber, maybe nobody in your family has been an electrician or a pipe fitter, or maybe you never worked road construction. These are great jobs for you. They are going out and they are recruiting these people.
We are up against the same challenge of recruitment and retention that the private sector is. In fact, we are competing for the same workforce. Of course, in my opinion, we need to be doing some of this diversity and inclusion.
The gentleman from Texas, when he quoted what was said at West Point, I totally agree, those are horrific statements and that person is gone and they should be gone. But the DOD is struggling with a challenge. Right now, our civilian workforce doesn't reflect the diversity of other Federal agencies.
We are trying to get more women, more men, more everybody in this country to know that the DOD is a great place to work and that once you are there, you are going to love the job, and we are going to give you the tools in the toolbox to do it.
Madam Chair, I will close with this. One of the things that I have been working on is cybersecurity and IT and linguistics. I come from a culturally rich district. If you come to University Avenue in St. Paul, the diversity of the restaurants and small businesses that are there, it will blow your mind away. It is rich in diversity.
But we still find, even all being in the same neighborhoods and communities, we still have to do outreach to say you are welcome. One of those places is cybersecurity. A lot of these businesses are being hacked. They are having issues with it. We are going to the high schools and to the community colleges, and we are looking at folks like--there is a place for you in cybersecurity. They are like, me? Yeah, you. Sometimes people need to be welcomed in, they need to have the opportunity to be recruited.
I really think that having someone that oversees opportunity, equal opportunity, diversity and inclusion, making sure that disability programs--we have our servicemembers who come back and sometimes have to be relocated into another position or a job, that is what this office can do.
I know we have gotten down this track of how we can divide ourselves talking about diversity and inclusion. I want us to embrace it in a way to have a more unified workforce and to recruit and retain the best and the brightest to work in the Department of Defense.
Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time because I think we have had this discussion over and over again today.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I claim the time to oppose this amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, we honor and celebrate many cultural events. We celebrate Hanukkah on the National Mall. We light a Christmas tree outside in front of the Capitol. When my father was with the DOD, he served in many bases that the gentleman mentioned in Texas. I can tell you about some observations that I had of celebrating Texas pride. Our country has a history of celebrating a lot of things.
Black History Month was first observed in 1976 by President Ford. Yes, we celebrate Pride Month, and we celebrate other cultural awareness months. This is national Hispanic Pride Month. What they do when the DOD does that is they show that they are committed to creating and affirming an inclusive environment and that everybody is welcome with their diversity. Everybody has somebody to offer.
At a time when the LGBTQ community, along with so many other minority groups in this country, are facing attacks and threats--just think of what happened, Mr. Chair, we had a moment of silence on this House floor after what happened at the Pulse nightclub shooting in Florida-- it is more important than ever that people know that we have their backs when they are under attack.
Mr. Chair, I was in the chair that you are in when this floor ended Don't Ask, Don't Tell in the NDAA, and that made our military feel open and more inclusive. I think of a dear friend of mine who served in the Navy, who served when he couldn't be who he was openly. He was serving proudly in the Navy, but he had to hide who he was until he was discharged, and then he felt he could come out. It was a burden that he carried with him.
This amendment has no place in the Defense bill. I don't think it has any place in the legislation that we do here. We are about coming together as a country, not trying to fight what divides us. We need to be focused on what unites us. One of the things that unites us is we are a country that, awkwardly at times, not everybody agrees all the time, but we are a diverse community. We celebrate that.
I mean, the people who came here when there were originally Thirteen Colonies came here because they were looking for freedom to be who they were. It was religious freedom at the time, but that is what they were looking for.
The Federal Government recognizes these cultural awareness months. The House of Representatives recognizes many cultural awareness events. We do that because we honor the contributions and services of all communities. Pride Month should be no different.
Mr. Chair, that is why I oppose this amendment, and I encourage my colleagues to do the same.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I will close in just a minute. I mentioned a friend. I had several friends in high school--I graduated in 1972--who were gay. They hid the fact that they were. They served when recruitment was kind of down after the Vietnam war. They served honorably and had honorable discharges. When we were in markup in the full committee, Mr. Pocan shared this, and it was very moving to me, so I am going to share it. It refers to the sacrifice that our LGBTQ friends made before Don't Ask, Don't Tell. It is a quote on a tombstone of Sergeant Leonard Matlovich. ``When I was in the military, they gave me a medal for killing two men and a discharge for loving one.''
Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I claim the time to strongly oppose this amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, this feels to me like another attempt by the majority to go after minority groups in the military.
Here is the history. The Reynolds Scholars Program was designed to study women in the military and was named after Lori Reynolds, a decorated female Marine Corps general.
The program was established to comply with the Peace and Security Act of 2017, the FY 2021 National Defense Authorization Act, the Department of Defense Women, and the Peace and Security Strategic Framework, so this is something that Congress has weighed in on.
Let me read the program description to you. The gentleman from Texas has read some excerpts, and I didn't see them in full context. I will take them at face value that he is upset with this, but I will read some of the descriptions for you. I can cite the sources and put them in the full remarks later for the committee to have.
`` . . . women account for the majority of individuals adversely affected by today's armed conflicts, and it affirms the critical role women play in the prevention and resolution of conflicts and in peace- building.''
`` . . . advocates for the recognition of diverse perspectives that increase military effectiveness, and [b] supports the empowerment of half the world's population as equal partners in preventing and managing conflict.''
Now, I have not been to the scholarship program, but I have traveled with military, I have traveled with State, and I have been with women who have been adversely affected by armed conflicts--raped, tortured, bullied, harassed--and it is often our military and our military women who sometimes in these conflicts are having conversations with them and trying to get the facts if there have been war crimes committed. It takes a very special person to do that.
It affirms the critical role, as I said, that women play in the prevention and resolution of conflicts and peacekeeping. President Bush, the Bush administration, when I was first serving in Congress, actually had me go to Yemen and speak with our military at a graduation of Yemen soldiers that we had been working and training with. Part of the message that the State Department and the Bush administration and our Department of Defense wanted to communicate was the importance of young girls going to school.
In Chad, I witnessed, in the refugee camp after the Janjaweed had attacked an area, not only what had happened to the women there, but our military female leaders interacting with the troops there in Chad that we were working with, peacekeeping troops reinforcing that women needed to be treated with dignity and respect.
I will end this particular part of talking about this by saying: Often when we go to build peace, whether it is sustaining the peace in Northern Ireland, whether it is looking for peace in conflict in Africa, whether it is working with terrible situations in Latin America, it is the women whom we bring to the table who can get the attention of the community, the community elders, because they talk about their children and the need for peace.
I don't know if these people were graduates from this program, but I have seen where women make a difference. The male members of our military who are part of these programs are indispensable, and they are very important.
As a woman who stands up for our women in the military and our allies in the military, I have to tell you, I see nothing woke, I see nothing woke about trying to understand the intersection of women and conflict. I only see it as a benefit.
In my opinion, this amendment is antifemale in what it is purporting to take away from the scholarship program moving forward. I oppose this amendment, and
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I have nothing more to say except that I don't think it is intentional sometimes some of the things that are happening on the floor today, but one of the things that we chant as kids is ``Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.'' Words hurt; they hurt.
Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I claim the time to oppose this amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, the fact is, our Earth is warming. The fact is, our climate is changing, and it is unprecedented. I have been to Alaska several times. The last time I was on some of our bases in Alaska, they were dealing with permafrost now not being reliable to land planes on the runways that we have constructed. The Army Corps of Engineers is up there trying to figure out what they do about what is happening with the permafrost and the thawing that they are seeing to make our buildings be resilient and sustainable and how do we build buildings in the future to address this.
That is just in Alaska. I won't even talk about what has been happening with some of our radar facilities sliding off into the ocean.
The start of the hurricane season has begun, and it is historic. Hurricane Hilary brought southern California its first tropical storm watch. That is new. We know that these weather events are worldwide, and we know that they know no boundaries, as evidenced by the recent Canadian wildfires.
The U.S. has already set a new world record for the number of weather disasters this year that could cost $1 billion or more. We have had 23 so far. I am going to refer again to what I had in my opening remarks. This is Tyndall Air Force Base. We flew planes out of there because we knew it was coming, but we weren't able to protect the infrastructure. We are spending billions and billions and billions of dollars.
The other thing I mentioned was what happened in Guam with the recent storms there. The Air Force alone in Guam is saying $40 billion. We have to wake up here. We have to wake up and do what we can to mitigate these costs.
The Department of Defense is the largest and most wide-reaching government agency. It can make a huge difference by climate-friendly changes in the way that they operate. I am proud of the fact that we have worked on them in the Defense bill.
This amendment is needless, and it makes it difficult for the Department of Defense to achieve its climate goals. It jeopardizes our military readiness when we have bases like the one I just showed on Tyndall and what has happened in Guam.
The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Milley, testified that climate change is a serious threat that is facing our country and one that the military must take into account. He went on to say that climate change has a significant effect on military operations: ``Climate change is going to impact natural resources. It is going to impact the increased instability in various parts of the world, and it is going to impact migrations.''
Yes, it is a problem not only here at home on our bases with resilience, but it is a problem with people fleeing climate change and what has happened in their lives and in their countries.
Each of these situations increases the instability in different regions, which could trigger more hostilities that we have to respond to to protect ourselves. Each of these situations can impact different regions in very, very different ways, even in our own hemisphere, so we need to ensure that our military is aware of the problems climate change can cause, and if they can play a role in either resilience of buildings or different energy sources that they use so we are not burning as much fossil fuel, I think we should do that.
Now, obviously, the gentleman disagrees, but I am looking to the future. I am not looking to the past. I am looking for a stronger, more flexible, more resilient and more economically empowered United States because the dollars that we put into much of this climate resilience and that is also transferrable into the private sector. The work that the Department of Defense is doing to reduce its energy costs, whether it is in materials that it is building, whether it is in use with all the equipment that our soldiers are having to carry, ways in which we can solar power some of the equipment that they use so we are not bringing these huge oil trucks in that we all watched every night for how many weeks of our soldiers, many of them dying in front of our own eyes transporting fuel.
I think it can be a win-win, and we need to look at it as a win-win. We can't always be looking at it as a loss-loss.
Mr. Chair,
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to this amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to this amendment, oddly enough, as a social studies teacher who taught some geography. The Department of Defense, the administration, and this Congress have been pretty clear in its opposition to the unwelcomed Chinese assertions of control over Taiwan.
This amendment will do nothing to prevent the Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific, but it would prevent the Department of Defense from buying or displaying a map on how China views the world. Now, if you are going to have a discussion with students about geography and China's ambitions, China has maps. China has maps which rewrite history.
Whether they rewrite history including Taiwan, or whether they rewrite history as they have done in Tibet or what they are looking at doing in other parts of the world with their Belt and Road Initiative, they have maps. We can't be blinded or not acknowledge how they view the world physically and what the world really is.
This would force the Department to put its head in the sand or obtain intelligence or something on what the Chinese have labeled as theirs.
Mr. Chair, I think we can all agree that it is important to know what our allies and adversaries are thinking, and sometimes we have to physically look at it.
Instead, I believe Congress and the Department should focus our time and energy on being clear with China about the respect for international boundaries and the rule of law. One way you can show that is the international boundaries and the rule of law on a map that we can all agree on that is correct and showing how China is coming up with their own maps, reinterpreting the boundaries themselves.
Mr. Chair, I oppose this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I am certain that the gentleman from Wisconsin does not think I appease China. I don't. I do not.
In fact, China, when we went to visit Taiwan at one point while I was on a delegation, they were going to refuse us entry because they see us as hostiles.
China doesn't see me as an appeaser. I want to be really clear. Maybe it is not the intention of this gentleman, but I am going to say it again: You are in a military college situation. You are talking about how China views the world. You put up the real map and somehow or another the Department of Defense can't even procure, create, or display a map that shows how China sees themselves viewing the world.
We are in conflict with China right now in the South China Sea. Not to show how China sees these islands as theirs when we are sending our Navy in there to protect freedom of seas, a map which shows the freedom of seas that they are protecting, that just doesn't make any sense to me.
Mr. Chair, I am at a loss for words why we can't show how China views the world when we are getting ready to defend our democracy, and I yield back the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, the executive branch has the ability to determine how the United States engages and manages our relationship with Taiwan, just as, at times, this Congress has decided when and where to travel. It is because Congress has left it to the executive branch, however, to conduct the diplomacy and the recognition or nonrecognition of foreign states and governments in this case.
Now, I believe, Mr. Chair, if we want to legislate on how the executive branch should engage with Taiwan, then what we should do is mark it up in a separate bill in the Foreign Affairs Committee that deals just with that, either have the authorization handle it or if we are going to have the Foreign Affairs appropriations bill on the floor at some point, I hope.
In the absence of that, the executive branch needs to determine how to handle diplomatic engagements abroad. It is their job to weigh multiple equities and balance delicate factors that are simply not considered by this amendment today.
The gentleman knows and understands that Taiwan is a sensitive geopolitical subject with respect to our relations with the People's Republic of China, and I appreciate that. However, Mr. Chair, we have a select committee in this House, and I think it is something that we should allow them, in a bipartisan fashion, to examine.
There is just too much at stake, in my opinion, to have this amendment decide what guidelines of engagement will be here today on the House floor.
Mr. Chair, I oppose this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, the Department of Defense appropriation bill, we are sending a message, a clear message, and I support that message. What the gentleman from Wisconsin is talking about, Mr. Chair, is the Department of State, and that is not germane to this bill.
There are bills on the floor where it will be germane, and that is my biggest concern with this amendment. I don't want to be a party to not respecting the chairs of the authorizing committees or the chairs and ranking members of the Appropriations Committee that oversees that funding.
That is not what this bill is about today. For that reason alone, to respect the different roles that we have in this body, this amendment, although well-intentioned by my colleague from Wisconsin, is not germane to this bill. We should not overstep our jurisdiction. We should stay with what we are doing with China and Taiwan in the Defense bill, which the chair has marked out clearly.
I support that, but I do not support starting to dictate what the authorizing committee and the Appropriations Committee for State- Foreign Ops should be doing.
Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
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Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chair, I appreciate what the gentleman from Montana said about protecting medical facilities, but I am going to read the amendment: ``At the end of the bill, before the short title, insert the following: Section,'' and the section will be numbered, ``None of the funds made available by this act may be used to enforce any COVID-19 mask mandate.'' It says ``any.''
So, at a DOD facility or at a hospital or something like that, they would not be able to enforce a mask mandate if they felt one was necessary in a certain section of a hospital or clinic.
To the amendment in general, if this was enacted, the Department, as I pointed out, would be limited in what they could do, but they couldn't even purchase any masks in case of a COVID surge. The CDC and the World Health Organization have recommended using a mask as a tool to protect people, especially the vulnerable, in cases of a COVID-19 surge.
Here is why an option is necessary in the military, and I mentioned this earlier, Mr. Chair. I, once again, ask you and my colleagues to consider life in a submarine--the close quarters, the lack of privacy. Think what would happen if there is a COVID outbreak in a submarine. It would have the potential of impacting the ability of that submarine to stay on station or deploy, putting our national security at risk.
If enacted, this amendment would take away a safety tool for the commander, a tool that they have in their toolbox.
One person tests positive for COVID on a submarine. They are all breathing the same air. They are in tight quarters. They are all going to have to put a mask on so they can complete their mission.
Our commanders deserve our trust. They deserve our respect that they are going to act in the best interest of their crew so they can execute their mission.
I don't want to take any tools away from people in that circumstance, and this amendment would do exactly that.
Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.
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