Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2014

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman and my good friends who serve on these committees with me, this is not about the President and this is not about missile defense. This is about the unnecessary expenditure of a very important national asset--our money.

Testimony given in committee indicates that we may or may not need an east coast missile defense site. And we also know that the current missiles that are being used for these anti-ballistic missiles don't work. At least there's a failure, and there's been repeated failures just in the boost system, let alone if we can hit Iraq with a rock. So the problem here is this money should not be spent now for this site.

It is absolutely clear: the Department of Defense from last year's budget and appropriation has sufficient money to determine where to locate a site. With regard to the cancellation of the missile that was discussed a few minutes ago, it doesn't fit in the existing sites, and so they canceled it because it doesn't fit in the hole in the ground. So what are we doing here? This is $70 million, not a vast amount of money when considering the appropriation for the Department of Defense, but that's $70 million that could be used to--well, how about protecting a levee of some city in the United States? It could be used to much better effect.

There was another amendment that I understand that failed that took another $100 million or so out of this particular thing. We ought to be taking what money's available and putting it into something that actually might work, which would be directed energy. But an amendment for directed energy was refused an opportunity to be heard on the floor. So we really ought to be thinking seriously about how we move forward with this. I have great respect for my colleagues, but we ought not just throw money after other money.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. GARAMENDI. I have great respect for my colleagues on the subcommittee. However, the argument that has been made is incomplete. We're talking about whether we're going to spend an additional sum of money this next year on a program that, A, has large questions about whether it works; and, B, the military doesn't need the money right now. If the gentlemen remember the committee hearing, Mr. Chairman, the general said he didn't need more money now. He had sufficient money from this year's appropriations for next year carrying on the studies that are necessary as to where to locate the site. It may not be on the east coast; it may be elsewhere.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman, if you don't trust the Afghan Government, you should never give them $2.6 billion. This is on top of the $5 billion that they were to receive. This money was specifically added to the budget for the Afghan military to buy something--parts, airplanes. We have absolutely no idea what they're going to do with this money.

We would never, under any circumstance, give our own military a $2.6 billion blank check, but that's exactly what we're doing here. You're asking for fraud and abuse. We should bring this money back and make sure our own people are doing the work that the Defense Department needs.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source