Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2025

Floor Speech

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Mr. HIGGINS of Louisiana. Mr. Chair, in a hearing earlier this year before the Oversight Committee, we had a young American, a squared-away young man, a former Army Ranger, who spoke on what it truly means to become a soldier. He told us: ``Training in the United States Army is meant to melt away the effects of civilian life and to forge Americans into soldiers.''

I concur with that young man, Mr. Chair. Our military was never intended to be and should not be a platform to advance social agendas.

Our Nation's military prowess not only keeps our homeland safe but a strong American military projects strength worldwide, deterring conflicts and pushing back against human suffering across the world.

While we remain the strongest fighting force in the world--this is true--we are waning, and the distractions that we experience within our own ranks must be addressed.

My amendment would eliminate the position of chief diversity officer of the Department of Defense or any substantially similar position. I appreciate that my colleagues, Jeff Duncan, Claudia Tenney, and Jim Baird, are cosponsoring my amendment.

The adoption of this provision will be a strong step in advancing a military that focuses on lethality and elevates excellence and performance, the values that made our Armed Forces great and indomitable worldwide.

This strength in that position worldwide, Mr. Chair, is indeed threatened by this cultural agenda, perhaps driven by good intentions, let me say, reflective of our journey as a nation as we have learned and evolved and grown into a better, stronger nation with regards to diversity, equity, and inclusion. No doubt, my colleagues' intentions to force that agenda within the parameters of our Department of Defense were well-intentioned, but it is injuring our military.

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Mr. HIGGINS of Louisiana. Mr. Chair, in 1988, I joined the Army. I went through boot camp and AIT in 1989 as Private Higgins, an enlisted man. Going through the military police academy in 1989 was quite grueling, and we lost a lot of people. We excluded many young soldiers, men and women. We excluded them because they couldn't perform.

The United States military requires exclusion based on performance. That is all we ever cared about.

We never had problems with recruiting in the United States Army. We missed by 40 percent last year. Do you know why, Mr. Chair? It is because families like mine that historically have served are not advising our young men and women to join the military now because of this insanity they have to go through and because it is weakness that has become embedded and woven within our DOD and forced upon our young soldiers.

You are injuring and you are setting your sons and daughters up for slaughter because war is brutal, and nobody in uniform cares about the gender or the sexual orientation or the skin color of the soldier next to them. All we care about is that they can perform.

This is the brotherhood that we forge. It requires discrimination. We discriminate against those young Americans who cannot make it. If they can't make the cut to earn a slot in our unit, then we exclude them from our unit. They go do something else in life. That is fine, but they can't be in the military.

So, good Lord, please support my amendment.

Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

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