U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Tampa/St. Petersburg, FL) joined top military commanders in criticizing the Republican budget gimmick that leaves the Pentagon unsure about future funding and takes the country down a fiscally irresponsible path.  Despite the warnings, House Republicans today passed a $579 billion defense spending bill -- above the ceiling of $523 billion set by the 2011 Murray Ryan Budget Control Act. The bill also drew criticism because in addition to busting the caps, $88 billion of the total $579 billion represents Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) funds – unstable funds with limited uses. The bill passed by a vote of 278-149.

The legislative scheme creates a hole in next year’s budget and destabilizes critical Pentagon long-term planning. The OCO fund was created for emergency military operations for the War in Afghanistan and cannot fund daily military operations. The White House has already issued a veto threat to such a blatant violation of the Budget Control Act.

The 2016 defense appropriations bill also adds $38 billion or 74 percent more than the President’s OCO request – a major breach of the terms of the Budget Control Act. 

“While the Republicans violate the Budget Control Act in an attempt to swell defense spending, they also break the fundamental tenet of the budget agreement that requires education, medical research and infrastructure funding to be treated the same way as defense,” U.S. Rep. Castor said. “We cannot break the budget caps unless a deal is negotiated that invests in America’s primary military needs and domestic priorities like our students, medical research and crumbling infrastructure.”

Military leaders vociferously have opposed this budget maneuver.

“The one-year OCO approach does nothing to reduce the deficit,” said U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter on May 6.  “It risks undermining support for a mechanism… to fund incremental costs of overseas conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere.  Most importantly, because it doesn’t provide a stable, multi-year budget horizon, this one-year approach is managerially unsound, and unfairly dispiriting to our force.  Our military personnel and their families deserve to know their future more than just one year at a time.  As a nation, we need to base our defense budgeting on long-term military strategy, and that’s not a one-year project.” 

General Martin E. Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said:  “…our men and women in uniform are performing around the globe with extraordinary courage, character and professionalism. It seems to me that we owe them and their families clarity and importantly predictability on everything from policy to compensation, health care, equipment, training and readiness.”

General Daniel B. Allyn, Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army said:  “…what we're doing is increasing that through funding base requirements through OCO funding. And this is a year-to-year drill and we need predictable, consistent funding to get at the readiness that we're talking about here today…”

See additional quotations in attached summary.

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