WASHINGTON — Congressional defense hawks are rattling their sabrers, saying they will try and block any 2016 budget resolution that fails to give the Pentagon more money.
The House Budget Committee this week is slated to unveil a spending blueprint that will keep in place defense and domestic spending caps first established by the 2011 Budget Control Act (BCA). The Senate’s version is expected to do the same.
A House GOP aide tells CongressWatch a group of 70 pro-defense Republican members will “vote against any budget that comes in under $561 billion on defense.”
But the influential political wing of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, signaled Monday that the GOP budget should propose no new spending for the military. But Heritage Action is endorsing another tactic to get the military more funding.
“While the BCA has put significant pressure on our military, the budget must not rely on gimmicks or new spending to align military spending with strategic priorities,” Heritage Action said in a statement. “Instead, it should break the firewall, which would allow lawmakers to prioritize spending appropriately.”
In a YouTube video released Monday, House Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., described his resolution as “a balanced budget for a stronger America.”
The message in the video is largely about keeping federal spending under control, not increasing it.
Rep. Todd Rokita, R-Ind., appears in the video, saying the plan proposes to balance the budget by, in part, “keeping a check on spending” and “making government more efficient.”
Rep. Alex Mooney, R-W.Va., handles the national security section of the Budget Committee video. He says it would give the Pentagon the funds it needs to handle current and future threats.
A battle on the House floor between fiscal and defense hawks is brewing.
Republican sources with ties to the congressional defense caucus began speculating months ago that the hawks might withhold support for the resolution on the floor unless it raised the Pentagon caps.
Such a move, if eventually adopted by both chambers, would allow defense authorizers and appropriators to craft their annual military bills with more funding to spread around.
The caucus began work behind the scenes shortly thereafter, sending a letter to House Speaker Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, thanking him for his longtime support of the military and asking him to ensure the budget resolution gave the Pentagon $561 billion or more.
“Seventy individual members have made it clear that a budget that fails to fully fund defense will not pass the House of Representatives,” Rep. Michael Turner, R-Ohio, said in a statement about that letter.
Turner, who chairs HASC’s tactical air and land forces subcommittee, said the letter should be viewed as a statement about the group’s plans.
“Every member who signed this letter was unwavering in their commitment to vote against a budget resolution that fails to fully fund national defense at or above the $561 billion identified by the president in his budget request,” he said.
Boehner would need 217 votes on the floor. Losing all the signers would leave him with just 147 GOP votes.
The 70 defense hawks want at least as much as requested by the Obama administration, $561 billion, which is $38 billion above the spending caps. House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, has floated to Price a $566 billion figure.
Thornberry told reporters on Capitol Hill Monday there have been “a lot of discussions between Price and other members,” which are “continuing to go along.
“I do not know what his budget will include when it comes to defense,” he said, saying the Pentagon has taken a disproportionate percentage of cuts than other federal agencies since 2010. “We’re continuing to talk.”
The defense caucus really would prefer $577 billion, for which Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Ranking Member Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., have lobbied that chamber’s Budget chairman, Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo.
The House GOP was more blunt on Monday about just what the lower chamber’s defense caucus would do should the budget resolution fail to meet their desires.
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“Every single lawmaker who signed the letter to Speaker Boehner vowed to vote against any budget that comes in under $561 billion on defense,” the aide said. “Members who were supportive of the effort but weren’t committed to the vote were asked not to sign it.”
One longtime federal budget analyst, however, says anything that happens on the resolution is mostly political theater.
“Congressional Republicans don’t really care about passing a budget this year,” Stan Collender wrote in a blog post. “The deficit has been falling, is expected to continue dropping for the next few years and isn’t as big a political issue as it has been recently.
Collender says Republican leaders want to use a tactic known as reconciliation to do some “big things” this year.
“The problem with the GOP’s we-must-have-reconciliation plan is that, it’s not at all clear the House and Senate will be able to agree on a budget resolution,” he writes. “That’s why the leadership has been telling members to be prepared to hold their noses and vote for a budget resolution so reconciliation remains a viable option for something…anything…later in the year.”
Email: jbennett@defensenews.com
Twitter:@bennettjohnt
