Providing for Further Consideration of H.R. 1960, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Speaker, I'm proud today to stand with my colleagues, Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and Dr. Benishek, in support of their amendment to include the Military Justice Improvement Act of 2013 in the National Defense Authorization Act, and I regret that this rule for this bill did not allow that.

The Military Justice Improvement Act will reform the military legal procedure for handling sexual assault cases by giving a military attorney outside the victim's chain of command the ability to initiate legal proceedings. This is a fundamental change from currently requiring a sexual assault victim to first turn to their commanding officer to investigate and decide how to advance the case.

As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, I'm proud to support this bill that will decrease the occurrence of sexual assault within our military ranks.

The current state of 26,000 reported sexual assault incidents in 2012 is completely unacceptable. This amendment will strengthen initiatives already in the Defense bill that aim to reduce this way-too-high number. Our military men and women deserve better, and this bill is a strong step in the right direction.

Also, Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the amendment by Mr. Coffman that would direct the Defense Department to contract any function not considered to be inherently governmental, with no regard to policy, risk, or costs.

At a time when service and contract costs to our military have risen by 200 percent in the last 10 years and civilian personnel costs have remained relatively flat, I believe it's irresponsible to require our military to outsource important governmental work like developing budgets, overseeing contracts, and interpreting regulations to private contractors.

We cannot allow our Federal employees and civilian personnel to continue to serve at the first line of cuts and furloughs in an effort to cut costs. Federal employees and civilian personnel are a critical component to our national security and consistently deliver their services at significantly lower costs than private contractors. In fiscal year 2010, the Pentagon reported saving nearly $900 million by using civilian workers instead of private contractors.

I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment and let the defense workers continue their service.

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