Expressing the need for enhanced public awareness of Huntington's Disease and support for the designation of a "National Huntington's Disease Awareness Month".

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

First of all, I thank the chairman, as well as the staff both on the Republican and the Democratic side and our bipartisan staff in the process to date.

As the chairman noted, we produced a very strong bipartisan bill out of committee. It passed by a vote of 57-1 and addressed a number of key concerns to our national security. A lot of work went into that. I always lose track of the exact numbers, but well north of a thousand amendments were considered in committee and in the Rules Committee.

The staff sifted through all of those and really helped produce that product. That is not an easy job. We are blessed on both sides of the aisle, both on the Armed Services Committee and on the Rules Committee, with an outstanding staff. I thank them for their work in producing this product.

The number one highlight of the product, as the chairman mentioned, is the focus of the quality of life for our servicemembers and their families. We impaneled a group, a task force, to examine quality-of- life issues, led by Don Bacon on the Republican side and Chrissy Houlahan on our side.

The task force really did a remarkable job of doing outreach to servicemembers, their families, and veterans and listening to them about what they need and what is most important to ensure that they have everything they need to take care of their families.

Certainly, one of the biggest issues was pay for junior enlisted. We upped that pay by 19.5 percent, which is a pretty dramatic number, but it reflects the need that those servicemembers face in the current environment.

We also focus on childcare, which is a crucial need, building more childcare centers and eliminating the backlog of people waiting to get access to childcare because we all know that what makes our military the best in the world is not any of the equipment, but the people who serve. We need to take care of the people who serve, and we need to take care of their families, as well. That is the crucial part of the military.

That is what this bill does better than any bill that we have ever done before in this committee and one of the many reasons why this bill is so important.

It is also crucial, as the chairman pointed out, to modernize and update our military. We are in a rapidly changing environment. We have seen that in the war in Ukraine. We saw that in the war in Azerbaijan and Armenia. Drones, counterdrones, and the ability to protect your information systems and make vulnerable the information systems of your adversaries are now absolutely crucial to fighting. We have to be able to upgrade that.

I compliment the chairman. We have worked in a bipartisan way to make sure that we can upgrade our technology more quickly, to work with those companies who are developing the most innovative technologies so that we can field them quickly and get our warfighters what they need in a timely manner.

Then there is the matter of production. We have seen this in the war in Ukraine. We and our allies need to be able to produce more of the critical ammunition and weapons systems that we need to fight, and we are making progress. I think the Biden administration and, particularly, under Secretary Austin, the coalition that was pulled together in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine is remarkable.

North of 50 countries are now working together to help defend Ukraine, but, also, crucially, to build up the partnerships and alliances and to make sure we have enough weapons to be an adequate deterrent to our adversaries. That process is going well. More needs to be done. This bill helps move us forward in that direction.

This bill also focuses on oversight, as the chairman mentioned. We want to free up the military to buy the systems they need by making sure that we don't continue to spend money on systems that they don't need and that we exercise proper oversight.

I particularly highlight the F-35 program. It has been a vexing and difficult program that has been over budget and underperforming for far too long. In this year's bill, we pare back on the number of F-35s purchased and put that money instead into making sure that we can get the F-35s that we are paying for, that they can reach the block 4 that has been so elusive for so many years. That is the crucial part of the job we do.

I think we have put together an excellent product. I am deeply concerned about the amendment process that will play out over the course of the next couple of days, but we will see how that plays out.

The one point I do make on this, an area of contention, has always been diversity. The other side has been critical of what the Department of Defense has done to try to recruit the most diverse people possible. I will say much more on this throughout the amendment process.

Mr. Chairman, we need to be able to access all the talent in this country, not just White men. We need to recruit women. We need to recruit from communities of color. We need to recruit from the LGBT community. That is crucial to making sure we have the talent we need. I hope that this bill doesn't undercut those efforts as we go forward.

As passed out of committee, as it stands right now, this is an outstanding piece of legislation, and I strongly urge everybody to support it.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Norcross), the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces.

Mr. Chair, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney), the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Gallego), the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Intelligence and Special Operations.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Khanna), ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Cyber, Information Technologies, and Innovation.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Kim), the ranking member of the HAS Subcommittee on Military Personnel.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I have no further speakers and am prepared to close whenever the gentleman is. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time to close.

I really don't have a lot more to add from my opening statement. I think we have produced an excellent product out of committee. I just want to mention one thing, and that is I think it is really important, we have passed the NDAA 63, 64 consecutive years? Sorry, I lost track at this point.

There is a reason for that. One of the most important things that we do here in Congress is to give the support to the men and women who serve in our military to defend this country. We take that job very seriously on a bipartisan and bicameral basis. We work together to make sure that we produce a

bill that supports the men and women who serve in our military and puts our country in the best position to meet its national security needs.

I believe, again, that we have done that. I don't love everything that came out of the committee bill, but then you never do. I think we worked in a bipartisan way and produced an excellent product.

I urge Members to support that. I also urge Members to reject any of the amendments that will make this needlessly divisive. I will say, we do not have a woke military. Frankly, I am offended every time I hear Members come down here and claim that we do. We have the best fighting force in the world. If you talk to the men and women who serve, they will tell you that they work very well together, and they deal with the challenges they face in a way that would make us all proud.

What we do have is an effort to make sure that we include everybody in the military, that we recruit from across the country, from across diverse populations, that we include women in a meaningful way in the military so that we can take advantage of the talent that women would bring to the military and do bring to the military.

I hope we will not go too far down the road of denigrating our military as being somehow woke and weak. It is neither. We need to continue to support it and the excellent job that the military does and the men and women who serve and their families who support them do for our country.

I urge us to support this bill, reject divisive amendments, and get us the bipartisan product that we produced out of committee.

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

Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Madam Chair, this amendment would effectively ban electric vehicles and ban any effort to use them. Now, I will certainly agree that we are a long way off from having all electrical vehicles, but that is not what we are debating here. We are debating whether or not this should even be an option within the military.

First of all, from a readiness standpoint, having options is always a positive thing. Energy is enormously important within the military. Having access to it can be difficult, and if you have electric vehicles as an option, that gives you one greater option so that you don't necessarily have to rely on fossil fuels to power a vehicle going forward.

More importantly, the basic debate over global warming--and that is what it is, more than climate change--comes down to the belief that digging up fossil fuels from below the ground and burning them is bad for life. There is considerable evidence of this. It is placing carbon in the atmosphere that is damaging to the planet, and we need to develop alternatives so we are not 100 percent dependent upon fossil fuels.

That is the basic plan here, to save the planet, which is actually kind of important to all of us, certainly to members of the military, and certainly to the defense of our country. Eliminating this as an option goes in the exact wrong direction.

Now, the gentlewoman is correct. It is an industry that is still struggling. The fossil fuel industry, the internal-combustion engine, has well over a 150-year head start, has been very thoroughly subsidized across the board. If you build more charging stations, or if you build more electric vehicles, it will become more affordable and more viable. That is the entire point of this.

This isn't going to happen tomorrow. We are not going to build all electric vehicles tomorrow, but why wouldn't we want that option to preserve our planet and move forward? An outright ban on electric vehicles within the military does not make sense.

I urge Members to oppose this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Virginia (Ms. McClellan).

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

Mr. Chair, the biggest issue here is that we keep hearing about climate politics. It is not climate politics. It is climate policy.

I have reminisced about this before, but back in the 2008 campaign, Republican nominee John McCain and his Vice Presidential nominee, Sarah Palin, were in favor of addressing climate change. There was a bipartisan agreement, but then Barack Obama had the nerve to get elected President and pursue those policies.

All of a sudden, it became partisan. All of a sudden, we decided that the planet isn't, in fact, warming and isn't, in fact, a problem, so we are just not going to worry about it anymore.

That doesn't change the basic facts that it is warming and that fossil fuels are contributing to it, and developing alternatives is going to be crucial to our national security going forward.

This isn't politics. This is basic policy. The lengths to which people opposed to these basic facts will go never ceases to amaze me, like the argument that we can't have electric vehicles come to our aid because they will be sitting there uncharged. Let me assure you that as basic readiness, they will be charged in the same way that gas tanks are currently full.

It is not impossible to have electric vehicles work and function for us. They are doing it all over the world.

Please reject this amendment and understand the need to get us to a more sustainable energy future.

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

Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment and yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chair, this is a very problematic amendment. I mean, we all have parochial interests in our district that we want to protect, but one thing our committee has worked very hard to do is to not put those peripheral interests ahead of the broader interests of the Department of Defense and the national security of this country.

No determination has been made to alter or close Parris Island at this point, but it is being examined for a lot of the reasons that the maker of this amendment stated. For this body to come in and make a political decision to block DOD from being able to analyze that data in a fair and unbiased way is an enormous mistake.

This is the mother of all slippery slopes. I don't think there is a single Member in this body who doesn't have some interest in their district affected by the DOD. They have a base, they have a particular defense product that is maybe being manufactured there, and we could pass an endless array of amendments telling DOD that they can't touch anything in our district. That is the road to an incredibly ineffective, inefficient Department of Defense.

We need to give the Department of Defense the ability to make their decision based on what is in the best interests of the country and the best interests of our national security. There are issues around Parris Island that they are trying to manage due, ironically, to some of the climate change problems that the previous amendments that we have considered in here are studiously trying to ignore, so maybe if we could work on that so that we didn't have the climate change problem, we wouldn't have to worry about this.

However, that point aside, again, we can't be passing parochial amendments that simply try to protect things in our district. DOD needs to analyze the data, the facts, and make the decision on where to allocate resources and where to base based on what is in the best interests of the country.

Mr. Chair, I urge opposition to this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. I just want to clarify one point. I did not say that Parris Island is not at risk. I think you have outlined exactly why Parris Island is at risk.

What I said was a determination has not been made, and it has not been made. I would like the Department of Defense to have the opportunity to make that determination based on the best facts available, not on the parochial interests of Congress saying, no, you can't even consider it.

I don't know how this is going to come out. I don't think anybody knows for sure how this is going to come out. I do know that Congress shouldn't be standing in the way of a factual analysis to figure out what the best decision is.

This amendment takes away any sort of factual analysis and just says under no circumstances can you reduce, much less close Parris Island. That is the wrong approach, and it ties DOD's hands in a way that serves parochial interests. It does not serve the interests of our national security.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition, and yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chair, I don't have an enormous problem with this amendment. The 1033 program is very controversial, as we will get into in the amendment that follows. As to how they prioritize the program within its existing parameters, I can understand that that is debatable going forward, and I am certain that the border communities that the gentleman described have the needs described, but there are a lot of communities across our country that have needs when it comes to dealing with crime of one kind or another.

The 1033 program provides a wide variety of equipment. Prioritizing one group over another, I am not sure that it is justified. Yes, the needs for law enforcement in those areas and those communities are great, but I would have to hear the argument as to why the needs for other communities are not great. It seems like it would be equal across the board.

I would urge opposition to maintain the flexibility for the Department to make those decisions based on their own priorities, not on how Congress has directed it. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, the gentleman answered a question that I didn't ask. I don't doubt the need that you describe in those communities. The question that I asked was why are other communities' needs not as great, which is a more complicated question. Nor do I disagree that there is a time and a place for Congress to prioritize and say this is more important to us.

It just seems to me that there are criminal justice problems out there. In the communities that have tried to defund the police, by the way, they are not asking for these programs, so you don't need to worry about competing with them, sadly. That is a problem which I think I agree with the gentleman on, but not a problem in this case.

My only issue is not with the need of the communities that you are prioritizing, it is an issue of, well, how can we say that those needs are greater than the needs of other communities, that maybe drug and crime problems are not confined to the border, as I think many, many Members can tell you. That is the prioritization that I am more interested in an answer to, how we should balance that.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The 1033 program has been highly controversial because it has led to some pretty substantial pieces of military equipment being transferred to law enforcement--vehicles, in particular--and, to some degree, led to the militarization of the police in the past.

Over the years, we have worked to try to get a delicate balance. I agree with the gentleman that the 1033 program is important and incredibly helpful to local law enforcement.

There are some on my side who don't agree with that, who would like to see the 1033 program banned. There are others on the other side who would like to see it wide open. We have, over the years, as I said, worked to strike a balance between those two things.

Supporting local law enforcement with excess military equipment is what the 1033 program does. It is equipment that is owned by the DOD but that they no longer need and that they can transfer to local law enforcement.

Obviously, you don't want them transferring a tank or a missile launcher or a whole bunch of other things, so there are restrictions on that. From time to time, we debate what those restrictions should be.

The most crucial part of this amendment that I find problematic is it eliminates the executive's ability to do that by not just changing the executive orders that are currently in existence but prohibiting any future executive orders that would reexamine that question.

For that reason alone, and because of the delicate balance that we have tried to strike on the 1033 program, I oppose this amendment and wish we would keep the 1033 program where it is and how we have worked it out over a series of Congresses going back years.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Just to repeat the arguments that I made, I think we have struck the right balance on the 1033 program. We should not upset that balance, nor do I support removing the ability of the President, any President, to issue an executive order on this very important and sensitive program that has impacted communities across the country.

Mr. Chair, I urge a ``no'' vote, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Rogers), the chairman of the committee.

Mr. Chair, I yield 45 seconds to the gentlewoman from Virginia (Ms. McClellan).

Mr. Chair, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Turner).

Mr. Chair, I yield 45 seconds to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Houlahan).

Mr. Chair, I believe we have the right to close, I have one speaker remaining, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Kamlager-Dove).

Mr. Chair, I think that was an excellent close. I would just urge opposition to this amendment for all the reasons that were stated by the previous speaker, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 8070.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, for the first time in decades, this year's Defense bill carries a different short title. It is the Servicemember Quality of Life and National Defense Authorization Act.

We did that to underscore the tremendous gains this bill makes toward improving the quality of life for our servicemembers and their families. No servicemember should have to live in squalid conditions. No military family should have to rely on food stamps to feed their children. No one serving this country should have to wait weeks to see a doctor or mental health professional.

That is exactly what many of our servicemembers are experiencing, especially our junior enlisted personnel. This bill goes a long way toward fixing that. It includes a 20 percent pay raise for junior enlisted. It expands allowances for housing and food and improves the cost-of-living calculation.

The bill authorizes $766 million over the budget request to improve existing barracks and build new ones. It enables the services to pursue public-private partnerships to provide better unaccompanied housing.

The bill reduces dangerous healthcare wait times by waiving referral requirements for specialty care and expanding the number of DOD doctors and nurses with special recruitment and pay authorities.

The bill improves access to childcare for military families by providing over $206 million to build new DOD childcare centers and fully funding childcare fee assistance programs to offset the cost of private childcare.

The bill helps military spouses gain and retain employment by making it easier for them to transfer professional licenses between States. It also gives the DOD the authority to quickly hire military spouses and keep them employed during changes in duty stations.

We are making these historic improvements in the quality of life of our servicemembers because, now more than ever, we need to recruit and retain the best and brightest. That is because the threats our Nation faces, especially those from China, are more complex and challenging than at any other point in the last 40 years.

To deter those threats, the fiscal year 2025 NDAA reforms acquisition authorities and fosters private-sector innovation to speed the fielding of game-changing new technologies that will give us the advantage in a conflict with China. It strengthens our security partnerships with Taiwan and Pacific allies. It fully funds the modernization of our nuclear deterrent, protects the U.S. military bases, the defense supply chain, and academic research from Chinese espionage.

The act builds the logistics network in the Pacific the military needs to carry out operations against China, and it includes new investments to retool and revitalize the industrial base to ensure it can deliver the systems we need to prevail in any conflict.

In the face of the growing threats from China, it is also critical we restore our military's focus on lethality. The fiscal year 2025 NDAA does that by ending divisive policies that have hurt unit cohesion and military readiness. We all know that deterring these threats will be an expensive endeavor, but we acknowledge there are limits as to what we can spend.

That is why this NDAA is focused on rooting out waste in the DOD. If weapons systems are not responsive to the threats we face, we cut them. In fact, this bill includes over $30 billion in savings from cutting systems that can't survive in a conflict with China and by reining in programs, like the F-35, that are not delivering on requirements.

I thank the ranking member and his staff for their tremendous work in putting this bill together. This is a truly bipartisan bill. It passed out of committee 57-1. It executes on hundreds of hours of bipartisan oversight conducted by Members and staff over the past few months.

It will help revitalize the defense industrial base. It will build the ready, capable, and lethal fighting force we need to deter China, and it will provide historic improvements in the quality of life of our servicemembers and their families.

Mr. Chair, I urge all Members to support the bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

House of Representatives,

Committee on the Budget,

Washington, DC, May 29, 2024.

Hon. Mike Rogers,

Chairman, Committee on Armed Services,

Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Rogers: I am writing you concerning H.R.

8070, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year

2025. H.R. 8070 contains provisions that fall within the Rule

X jurisdiction of the Committee on the Budget.

In the interest of permitting your committee to proceed

expeditiously to floor consideration of this important

legislation, I am willing to waive the Committee on the

Budget's right to a sequential referral. I do so with the

mutual understanding that by waiving consideration of the

bill, the Committee on the Budget does not waive any future

jurisdictional claim over the subject matter contained in

this or similar legislation, and the Committee will be

appropriately consulted and involved as this bill or similar

legislation moves forward so that the Committee may address

any remaining issues within its jurisdiction. The Committee

also reserves the right to seek appointment of an appropriate

number of conferees to any House-Senate conference convened

on this legislation or similar legislation and requests your

support if such a request is made.

I would appreciate a response to this letter confirming

this understanding with respect to H.R. 8070 and would ask

that a copy of our exchange of letters on this matter be

included in your committee report and in the Congressional

Record during floor consideration of H.R. 8070. I look

forward to continuing to work with you as this measure moves

through the legislative process.

Sincerely,

Jodey C. Arrington,

Chairman, Committee on the Budget.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Lamborn), my friend and colleague and the chairman of the Strategic Forces Subcommittee.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Banks), the chairman of the Military Personnel Subcommittee.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Kelly), the chairman of the Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Bacon), a very special member of our committee who not only chairs the Subcommittee on Cyber, Information Technologies, and Innovation but also was the chair of the task force that spent last year studying the quality of life issues that our military families have been struggling with and helped put together the package that we have in this year's bill that addresses those issues.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Bergman), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Intelligence and Special Operations.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Waltz), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Readiness.

Mr. Chair, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Gaetz), my friend and colleague from my committee.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wittman).

Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Jackson).

Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Alford).

Mr. Chair, I have one additional speaker. I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Arrington).

Mr. Chair, first, I thank the ranking member, my friend, Mr. Smith, who has been an outstanding partner. The Democratic staff has been very, very good to work with in fashioning this bill in a bipartisan fashion with our Republican staff, and I thank them for doing that once again.

I take great pride in the fact that our country, for 63 consecutive years, has found a way to pass the National Defense Authorization Act, no matter which party is in the majority, no matter which party is in the White House. That speaks well of our country. I want this to be the 64th year that we do the same thing.

Our national security is about to be challenged in ways that we have never imagined. The bill before us today will go a long way toward preparing our industrial base and our warfighters to overcome those challenges.

Mr. Chair, I urge all Members to support this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I strongly support requiring all of our NATO allies to meet their 2 percent obligation, but arbitrarily cutting off funding to NATO with a war raging in Eastern Europe and Putin threatening us with nuclear weapons is absolutely the wrong thing to do.

It also shoots us in the foot. Our force posture in Europe is dependent on the investments we make to NATO. We need a stronger NATO for our own defense.

Mr. Chair, I urge all Members to oppose this amendment.

Mr. Chair, I move that the Committee do now rise.

Madam Chair, one thing we have learned in Virginia is that an all-encompassing approach to energy policy is smart, that it is good for national security, that it is good to have energy independence here. That includes electronic vehicles. That includes wind power, solar power, and not just a myopic view that the only fuel available is fossil fuel.

I am a child of Generation X, so I remember ``Schoolhouse Rock'' basically saying: Energy, we are going to use it all up.

The more we can move to renewable energy, that is just good common sense. It is good energy policy. It is good transportation policy. It is good for national security.

Again, no one has said to anyone in the military: You can only use a zero-emission vehicle. They are not planning to do it. This is an amendment in search of a problem that is counterproductive and could cause harm unintentionally.

Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, we can agree that we want our servicemembers to focus on their job and be ready to do their job, and we know that climate change is having an impact on readiness. We have heard it time and time again.

As temperatures rise, it affects our servicemembers. As sea level rises, it affects our Navy. We have Navy Station Norfolk that is going to be subject to multiple major storms every year. When it rains, there is a street that goes right down the middle of it that floods and bisects the naval station in two.

We cannot keep our head in the sand on the impact of climate change on readiness. They are directly related. We need to focus on how to fix that, not look for solutions to problems that don't exist.

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

Madam Chair, I thank Ranking Member Smith for yielding time.

I have good news in that the NDAA does include a raise for our servicemembers, which is long overdue, but we can multitask.

For all of the reasons that Ranking Member Smith said, it is important that we work to save our planet because, if we don't, it will have longer-term and short-term national security implications and implications for the readiness of our servicemembers, which we heard in committee time and time again.

In addition to the climate benefits, EVs emit less noise and heat, so they are harder for our enemies to detect. They improve responsiveness and flexibility and decrease our reliance on fossil fuels so that, should fuel supplies ever be compromised or slow, our Armed Forces will still be able to respond because they have more options available.

Yet, Republicans want to play politics with climate; not the Democrats. We are working to address climate change. We are looking to respond to climate change and make sure that our military remains ready and does not continue to contribute to global warming itself.

As written, though, this amendment doesn't just block the DOD's adoption of electric vehicles. It prohibits maintenance of existing EVs and charging infrastructure or the potential installation of infrastructure that has already been secured but subject to a servicing contract.

Why in the world would we tie the hands of our military to maintain what they already have? That is just dumb. I don't understand why we are doing it. We shouldn't do it.

Previous NDAAs have contained provisions that address reasonable concerns related to the DOD's adoption of EVs, including ensuring grid stability, proper phasing of support infrastructure, and resiliency planning. That is not in this amendment.

The notion that EVs contain Chinese component parts and are, therefore, more of a threat than traditional internal combustion engines is specious. That argument could be used for every battery found in every vehicle, every phone, every computer, and almost anything that has a battery the DOD uses.

Mr. Chair, I claim the time in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chair, climate change and sea level rise and increased temperatures and increased storms have a direct impact on military readiness, operations, and the health and well-being of our servicemembers.

Yelling and calling people names or ridiculing them for the type of car they choose to drive won't change that fact. When we had Navy leadership in a hearing, I asked them to talk about the impact of climate change on readiness. As sea level rise increases, we have more corrosion of our ships. As temperatures increase, that has a direct impact on the health of our servicemembers.

I went to Naval Station Norfolk, the largest naval station in the world, which is in one of the most vulnerable places to sea level rise, the most vulnerable on the East Coast. I asked the commanding officer: What are you most worried about? She said: When increased storms come and literally water floods a street that bisects this base in half, that the increasing sea level rise is reclaiming the land that Naval Station Norfolk is on and they have nowhere to rebuild.

This amendment would prohibit the Department of Defense from expending funds to implement a broad spectrum of the Biden/Harris administration's executive orders, everything from job-creating, clean energy projects to ensuring that rural, low income, Tribal, and minority communities are not continually, inordinately impacted by pollution from our military installations, which oh, by the way, in Norfolk at one time killed the Elizabeth River, which is slowly starting to come back because Naval Station Norfolk has decided to be a better neighbor and steward of the land that it is on.

We don't need to speculate on the impacts of this amendment because a rider on the fiscal year 2024 Defense appropriations bill made a $500 million cut to climate-tagged accounts immediately impacting operational energy programs that make our servicemembers more effective and lethal, extending on-station times, and reducing the need for refueling.

Come to these military installations that are vulnerable, that are impacted, and talk to their commanding officers and maybe that will help you connect the dots between climate change, climate policy, and military readiness.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, may I inquire as to the time remaining.

Mr. Chair, do you know what I teach my children? I teach them the ripple effect. Your simple act of kindness today may not change and lead to world peace tomorrow, but it will have a ripple effect.

What we do today to reduce our carbon footprint will have a ripple effect. The military has been one of the largest, not just contributors to greenhouse gases, but pollution that has damaged mostly low-income, rural, Tribal, and minority communities who didn't at the time have the power to contribute or consult on the decisions that were being made.

The environmental justice executive order is designed to say we are going to be a better neighbor and we are going to be a better steward and make sure that we are not destroying the environment on which our military bases sit. That is a good thing.

Extreme weather events, sea level rise, and severe flooding has a direct impact on military readiness. I think it is really sad that my colleague doesn't believe the commanding officer of the largest naval base in the world when unprompted is asked what the biggest thing you are worried about, she raised two issues that were related: I am landlocked with the sea encroaching on my base, I have nowhere to go, and it is impacting my ability to ensure we are ready to meet increased national security impacts. As other parts of the planet become uninhabitable, where do you think they are going to go?

Mr. Chair, I ask that my colleagues oppose this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chair, 80 years ago, after the invasion of D-Day, we witnessed the beginning of the end of the Hitler regime. In the wake of World War II and its devastation, NATO was created in an effort to deter then-Soviet expansionism, forbid the revival of nationalist militarism in Europe through a strong North American presence on the continent, and encourage European political integration.

Given what is happening right now with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, now is not the time to say we are going to turn our back on or abandon NATO. We need to strengthen and recommit to our alliance.

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chair, I rise to speak in support of my amendment, which protects defense-related activities from the aggressive use of the Endangered Species Act.

This amendment would curb the Endangered Species Act's application in areas used for national defense-related operations and prohibits the Secretary of the Interior from designating areas necessary for military operations as crucial habitats.

Compliance with environmental laws has created restrictions on how DOD manages, plans, and conducts training exercises on its installations. According to DOD, 85 percent of Army installations have threatened endangered species present. Two million acres of Army training and testing lands have training restrictions in place related to stringent ESA requirements. These restrictions, when applied, harm our readiness and our mission.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, the issue that I bring forward is a longstanding issue.

A 2004 review by GAO discusses issues at the Barry M. Goldwater Range at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, where officials reported that nearly 10 percent of the F-16 training exercises were canceled due to the presence of an endangered species on the training range impact area. That doesn't include the long-range missile testing that now has to be canceled and rescheduled on a regular basis.

Nearly 80 percent of Marine Corps Aviation units train at the Goldwater Range before deployment. The range provides the space and infrastructure for marines to receive this critical tactical aviation training, air-to-ground and air-to-air.

Maybe DOD hasn't asked for it, but my colleagues should go out to the Barry M. Goldwater Range area. If my colleagues are so doggone concerned about biodiversity, they should get their tails down to the border to take a look at the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge. Look at the garbage that has come through because of the illegal aliens and the trash that is there. It is tons. The biodiversity that has been impacted there is incalculable.

They have cut roads through this otherwise pristine desert that sits

right next to the Barry M. Goldwater Range. We have the animals that are driven through. We have the individuals.

If biologists determine that a Sonoran pronghorn may be present within 3 miles of training range impact areas, missions are redirected or canceled. That is a regular occurrence.

I get a kick out of people who live in Northern Virginia. They sell cars. They want to talk about car sales for EVs. Get your tail down to the border. Look at the biodiversity degradation that is there. Talk to the people who run the Barry M. Goldwater Range and other military installations. They are going to tell you that our readiness project is endangered because of strict ESA rules.

This amendment would help protect our mission and our readiness.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, when you say zero evidence, I guess the GAO report gets discounted. I guess the evidence from the people who run the range gets discounted. I guess hearing from the contractors who work there and have to reschedule repeatedly because of the enforcement of the ESA is not evidence either. I guess the fact that China doesn't have to worry about environmental impacts from an ESA impacting their readiness is zero evidence.

When we look at it, in the Southwest, you have the acuna cactus. That is preventing, in many areas in the entire eastern portion of the Goldwater Range, the use of military targets and off-road vehicles, which impedes the ability to get mission ready.

With the continued rising threats abroad, Congress must ensure that military readiness is not negatively impacted by regulatory compliance constraints from radical environmentalists. This amendment ensures that the Department of Defense can conduct the training necessary to keep the men and women of our Armed Forces prepared.

Mr. Chair, I urge passage of this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, as I have done for each of the past 5 years--this is the sixth year in a row--I rise to speak in support of my amendment, which would prohibit funds for any project or activity related to NATO until the Secretary of Defense certifies to congressional defense committees that each member of NATO has spent 2 percent of their respective GDP on defense expenditures.

In 2006, NATO members agreed to spend at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense spending to ensure the readiness of the alliance. By 2014, just three members had reached the agreed-upon 2 percent funding level. Under a new 2014 agreement, each member country has until 2024 to reach their 2 percent goal.

Unfortunately, as of 2023, just 11 of the 32 countries, including the United States, contributed at least 2 percent of GDP on defense. This has to change.

In 2023, Italy was projected to spend just 1.46 percent of its GDP on defense, and its Defense Minister stated that they will certainly not meet NATO's target in 2024 and will likely not meet NATO's target by 2028.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, in 2023, Germany stepped back from its commitment to meeting NATO's target of spending 2 percent, going back on its 2022 commitment to invest more than 2 percent of their GDP to defense year after year.

In 2024, that number is expected to grow, and about two-thirds of NATO member countries are expected to at least meet the 2 percent target. That would be great. Much of the growth that we have seen recently was due, in large part, to President Trump's push to our NATO allies to increase spending to meet the 2 percent standard.

However, more work must be done to ensure NATO allies are paying their

fair share. The U.S. continues to spend far more than its fair share and takes on the overwhelming responsibility of being the world's police.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, we hear about Ukraine and NATO. We haven't even discussed China and other areas around the world that are concerns.

What is our number one threat? For 20 years, we have been told it is our national debt by bipartisan leaders of the military and the Department of Defense. Why do we end up carrying free riders? Why do we lead the way on everything? Because we are America, but let me tell you something: That can't endure.

Why did the USSR go away? The USSR went away not because there was a coup or an uprising. It was a business enterprise that had to declare bankruptcy. That is why the USSR failed, ultimately. At $35 trillion in national debt, we have that danger, as well. We cannot afford to carry free riders indefinitely.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, if you want to strengthen NATO and you want to stop free riding, maybe you use leverage. Maybe you use leverage. If you want to strengthen our country, maybe use leverage to get your partners who are supposed to be your partners to start paying their share.

The only reason that this is even improving is because the previous administration made that a big issue and made that demand. We should make that demand still.

I reiterate: The number one security threat, according to a long line of DOD officials, is our national debt. At some point you simply can't keep funding the military operations you want to fund. If your partners aren't willing to pay their share, you don't strengthen them, you weaken us.

That is what this amendment is designed to do. It doesn't prevent us from putting forward our operations anywhere, but it does encourage and leverage our partners to actually pay their fair share.

Mr. Chair, I urge everyone to support this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chair, I rise in support of the Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2025.

Mr. Chairman, the bill we see before us is a bipartisan package. It enhances readiness, it increases security, and it improves desperately needed infrastructure that has been badly neglected by the Pentagon. Most importantly, it puts our servicemembers first.

The Readiness Subcommittee, which I have the honor of chairing, has included more than $1.1 billion for quality-of-life initiatives. This money will provide critical funding for barracks, in particular, Mr. Chairman, which are in a dire state. To be candid, Mr. Chairman, we literally have barracks with black mold growing in it, with feces on the wall, with ceilings caving in. It should be an embarrassment to every one of our service Secretaries, and we have yet to see anyone in the Pentagon fired for this deplorable state of our servicemembers' barracks.

Mr. Chair, if the Pentagon and this administration won't act, this Congress will. This bill will improve our barracks and improve our aging infrastructure. It will provide transparency to how our facilities are sustained, and that is key.

With more details into how these funds are actually spent and with oversight from Congress, holding the military departments accountable, they will be forced to adequately budget and plan for the upkeep of our facilities that our servicemembers so badly need.

As chairman of the Readiness Subcommittee, I have also focused our efforts on ensuring the Department of Defense is ready to fight with contested logistics in the Pacific. We haven't had to do that since World War II.

Frankly, Mr. Chairman, I think we are taking our logistics infrastructure for granted. We now have an adversary in the Chinese Communist Party that can contest it, that could go after it, and we have to be able to project forward and defend those assets.

This bill will do that, and the bill authorizes over $250 million in INDOPACOM priorities that were left unfunded by the President's budget. I don't know why the President left our priority theater unfunded to the tune of $650 million, but I know this bill will go a long way to fixing that oversight. It also fully funds military exercises with our allies. It mandates the Department of Defense eliminate reliance on Russian energy for our installations.

Mr. Chairman, I encourage my colleagues to support this bill.

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of my amendment to allow the Department of Defense's 1033 excess property program to be administered as originally intended by Congress to assist State and local law enforcement agencies.

For more than 25 years, this program has allowed often cash-strapped local law enforcement jurisdictions to get the equipment they need, almost always excess military equipment that the Department of Defense no longer needs. This is equipment that they need to keep our communities safe at a low cost.

Mr. Chairman, this is equipment that often will be provided to other countries in excess or just sent off to the boneyard. Instead, why don't we save the taxpayers money? Why don't we give police and sheriffs' departments the equipment that they need to keep our communities safe?

I am proud that this amendment is supported by the National Association of Police Organizations and the National Sheriffs' Association.

This amendment would prohibit essentially the enforcement of what I believe is a radical, antipolice series of rules and regulations established through executive order by both former President Obama and, most recently, President Biden, that limited the transfer of lifesaving equipment to law enforcement under the 1033 program.

The executive order also makes the equipment that these local law enforcement entities have, Mr. Chairman, burdensome to use, with literally mountains of paperwork and certifications. If you talk to any of these sheriffs' departments, they say it essentially makes the equipment unusable, particularly for small departments that may have only five, six, or seven officers in it.

This program was created by Congress, and therefore, any changes to the program should be enacted by Congress. President Trump understood this when he rescinded these wrongful policies. Yet, President Biden has put them back in place. He ignored this precedent and issued a subjective executive order giving his Department of Justice veto power over the lawful transfer of this equipment.

This equipment that we are talking about are things like high-water vehicles that law enforcement departments in Florida use in natural disasters. I have a local sheriff's department that is flying a 1968 Huey. They can't get a new helicopter because of all of the restrictions. It is also equipment like body armor, night vision devices, and things the military no longer needs but our sheriffs do need.

I know my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have opposed this amendment year after year. They have made misleading arguments that the amendment will ``militarize'' the police and give them all sorts of unnecessary weapons. This is simply not the case.

Let me be clear: This amendment will maintain the Defense Logistics Agency's authority and discretion. Again, the DLA is run by this administration's political appointees. It will give them discretion over the transfer of all property, ensuring the property transferred is needed and appropriate.

It will also ensure that law enforcement agencies can regain access to equipment that has been taken from them that they relied on in the past for things like search and rescue operations, natural disaster response, and active shooter situations.

In short, Mr. Chairman, this 1033 program is not a ``militarization'' of the

police but, rather, an important tool in protecting our communities.

As so many of our inner cities and States are experiencing rampant increases in violent crime, this amendment is critical now more than ever before.

Our State and local law enforcement put their lives on the line to keep us safe. They are heroes. I think they have been wrongly vilified in many instances. Despite this, they continue to show up to work and put that badge on every day to protect and serve us.

It is time to put an end to these executive orders that discount the critical needs of our police officers and our sheriffs, frankly, in the interest of political optics.

Mr. Chair, I urge support for this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I will read excerpts from the National Sheriffs' Association.

To my colleague's point on future executive orders, again, this program was created by Congress and should be governed by Congress. We should have these debates, but we should then follow what is, year after year, often debated and adjusted through law, not through executive orders.

To my point, the National Sheriffs' Association, which represents over 3,000 sheriffs nationwide, across red and blue States, cities, and counties, says: Across the country, we have witnessed how valuable this equipment has been to local law enforcement, not only in conducting search-and-rescue missions but also in delivering aid to victims of natural disasters like floods and snowstorms. The equipment the sheriffs receive for this program-- The Acting Chair. The time of the gentleman has expired.

Mr. Chairman, I am sorry. I didn't hear you. I urge support of this amendment.