By Emelie Rutherford
With a federal government shutdown looming after Friday, House Republicans are facing significant opposition to their plan to fund the Pentagon for the rest of fiscal year 2011 as part of another short-term extension to the rest of the budget.
President Barack Obama and some congressional Democrats said yesterday they oppose the one-week continuing resolution (CR), which would start when the current CR expires Friday night and includes a complete FY ’11 defense budget. The Republican-controlled House Appropriations Committee (HAC) unveiled this latest CR Monday night. The federal government has been funded under short-term CRs, which largely keep FY ’11 funding at FY ’10 levels and prevent new contracts from starting, since FY ’11 began last Oct. 1.
“I have been very clear that the last time we had an extension, it was to give the parties time to go ahead and get something done,” Obama told reporters at the White House yesterday, after meeting with congressional leaders. “We are now at the point where there is no excuse to extend this further.”
The Pentagon funding in the new HAC proposal is similar to a previous budget plan the House passed Feb. 19, which drew rebukes from Democrats because of large cuts to Obama’s FY ’11 federal budget request.
The new HAC legislation would not fund the F-35 alternate engine, developed by General Electric [GE] and Rolls-Royce, according to a committee spokeswoman. It also, like the previous House-passed plan, would allow the Marine Corps to either proceed with plans to cancel General Dynamics‘ [GD] Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle or continuing ongoing system development and demonstration work, according to an aide.
The new HAC plan would extend most of the federal government via a one-week CR that would cut $12 billion in spending. The Department of Defense (DoD) would be the only agency under the proposal to receive a full appropriations bill for the rest of FY ’11, which ends Sept. 30.
The defense funding in the new CR would not reach the level of $540 billion that Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in February the Pentagon would need for the rest of the year. It includes $515.8 billion in base defense spending, which amounts to 2.9 billion less than Obama’s FY ’11 request, yet a 1.5 percent, or $7.6 billion, increase over FY ’10 levels. The HAC’s defense plan cuts all earmarks, to the tune of $4.2 billion, while including $102.1 billion for defense procurement and $75 billion for research and development. The committee’s new CR also includes a separate war appropriations bill worth $157.8 billion.
House Republicans and Senate Democrats have been sparring over how to fund the entire federal government after the current CR expires on Friday. The Senate back on March 9 rejected two CRs that had full FY ’11 defense appropriations bills attached to them: the CR the House passed the previous month and a different Senate Appropriations Committee (SAC) plan; both of those moot plans cut defense spending, though the House reduction was smaller than the SAC’s.
Obama is not alone in rejecting the new House Republican proposal, with congressional Democrats including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) criticizing it yesterday.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Rep. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), chairman of the HAC, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), and SAC Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) met with Obama at the White House yesterday morning. Afterward, Boehner said no agreement was reached, as he and Reid fight over how much to cut in a full-year federal budget for FY ’11.
A bipartisan group of 12 senators, meanwhile, called yesterday for a full Pentagon budget to be included in any measure extending the current CR.
“It is crucial that our men and women in uniform have the resources they need as we engage in military operations on three separate fronts,” they wrote in a letter to Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).
They note that Gates said operating under a CR is hurting procurement and research programs as well as readiness. They wrote that under a CR is the Navy is not able to buy planned ships and the Army and Air Force have to halt programs they later will pay extra money to restart, and 10,000 private-sector jobs tied to naval programs are in jeopardy.
The letter is from Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Joe Lieberman (I/D-Conn.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), John Barrasso (R-Wy.), Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), Jonny Isakson (R-Ga.), Mike Enzi (R-Wy.), Dan Coats (R-Ind.), and Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.).
Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell told reporters yesterday that DoD was preparing for the possibility of a government shutdown, if Congress cannot pass another funding plan by the time the current CR expires Friday night. The Pentagon, he said, would retain the authority and ability to maintain critical military operations including those in Afghanistan, Libya, and Japan. Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn is working on guidance, based on direction from the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, on what other essential missions would continue if the government does shutdown.
Also yesterday, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) unveiled a FY ’12 House budget resolution and plan for cutting the federal budget $6.2 trillion over the next decade by setting non-security discretionary spending at FY ’08 levels. Ryan’s committee is slated to mark up the measure today.
A bipartisan group of 41 House lawmakers sent a letter to Ryan and committee Ranking Member Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) yesterday urging them to support Lockheed Martin‘s [LMT] F-35 program.
“We would oppose any action in the Budget Resolution that would negatively impact the program,” they wrote.