Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROGERS of Alabama. Mr. Chairman, in light of the late hour, I'm going to synopsize my more full statement, if that's okay with everybody.

Recently, the House passed the FY14 NDAA, and in that document we included a provision that, before the $75 million that the White House had requested for implementation of the New START Treaty, they have to provide to the Congress the 1042 report, which was due 18 months ago, by law, that outlines how they're going to spend the money.

The White House has refused to submit that report to date. We put in the authorization language saying, give us the report and we'll give you the money. I went to Chairman Young and asked him to include this in his appropriations bill. He said he would welcome the amendment. I hope that's still the case tonight, and I urge my colleagues to support my amendment.

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Mr. Chairman, my amendment is simple and it's similar to one that the House has already approved on a different bill, specifically, the FY14 National Defense Authorization Act.

I wish this amendment wasn't necessary, but, the President's actions compel it.

Too often, this President acts as if he is above the law.

He ignores the law when it comes to his healthcare law, he ignores the enforcement of immigration laws, and he violates the Constitution to bypass the Senate to appoint unqualified or ideological individuals to important government positions.

Now he is applying this approach to defense policy.

The President's priority appears to be tearing down our nuclear deterrent, which is America's ultimate security guarantee.

And he is ignoring Congress and the law in doing so.

A clear example is his implementation of the New START treaty with Russia.

The President, in his budget request for fiscal year 2014, is asking for a blank check from Congress to implement the treaty with no questions asked.

This is not the way our Constitutional government was set up to work.

This amendment will force the President to follow the law and hold him accountable if he expects one dime of the American people's money to be appropriated.

The House, through the appropriation power, must have a chance to evaluate whether the implementation of a treaty, and the manner in which an Administration intends to implement a treaty, is in the US national security interest.

That is the reason the 1042 report was required in the FY12 NDAA in the first place.

I remind the House, this report is mandated by law.

Are we really comfortable in this House with letting the President ignore the law of the land as he sees fit?

Recently, the President announced a major new nuclear weapons policy before a modest crowd of Europeans.

He stated he will seek to reduce our deployed nuclear forces by a third--beyond the New START reductions we haven't yet put in place.

We need to put the brakes on this rush to zero.

This President is proposing dangerous and irreversible changes to our nuclear forces.

Congress must ensure we use caution when tinkering with the nation's ultimate insurance policy--our nuclear deterrent.

We know the President has been itching to announce further nuclear force cuts.

Based on the most recent arms control compliance report, it appears, yet another year is passing while the President will ignore significant Russian cheating--let me say that again, Russia is cheating on a major treaty with the United States--so that he can propose further reductions with Vladimir Putin.

And the President appears to have so little confidence in his proposal, he refuses to affirm that his reductions will follow the established precedent--what some call the Biden-Helms standard--of proceeding through a treaty or affirmative Act of Congress.

We must be wary; the Appropriations Power was never intended to be a blank check.

I thank the gentleman from Florida for his support and I urge the House to pass the Rogers amendment and send a signal to the President that we won't cut him blank checks while he tries to circumvent the Congress.

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Mr. ROGERS of Alabama. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman's observations. And while I may not agree with the New START Treaty, I am in no way trying to prohibit it being implemented. It is the law of the land.

However, we do have a constitutional obligation in this House to be responsible with taxpayers' dollars. And under the new treaty law that was signed by the President, he had 90 days to provide the Congress a report on how he was going to spend the money to implement it.

That's all we're saying in this amendment, is when he gives us the report by law that was due 18 months ago, we'll give him the money, but not until then.

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