John Ensign: “this amendment is very simply a Defense firewall amendment. We have had these in the past. The chairman of the Budget…”

“this amendment is very simply a Defense firewall amendment. We have had these in the past. The chairman of the Budget Committee will argue that they did not work very effectively in the past. I would disagree. It made it more difficult to take money out of Defense and to spend it on other programs. Our amendment is a little different. It says if you are going to take money out of Defense for social spending programs, then you must do it during the budget process. It brings transparency into the budget process. In the last several years, folks have taken money out of the Defense Department during the appropriations process, put it in other social spending, and then during the emergency supplemental process they backfill the Defense Department. This has cost our country an extra $84 billion over the last 5 years. The problem is the money gets built into the baseline, which costs more money and more money and more money every year; last year alone it was $40 billion. If you want to be fiscally responsible, you should vote for this amendment.”