On the recordOctober 9, 2015
I am voting for this bill overall. In California, we don't drill anymore, and we are cutting down on our refineries even, but this is important for the Nation. One big part of this bill is the Maritime Security Program. If you don't know it, over 90 percent of all the stuff that we transfer to Iraq, Afghanistan, anywhere where there are American troops--all of their gear, their tanks, their weapons, their ammo, everything, for the most part--is shipped on American-flag commercial vessels. Of the 50,000 cargo ships that travel the ocean every day, 79 of those are American-flag. That is it, 79 out of 50,000. Sixty of those are on call when America needs them to transfer our gear to our troops overseas. When I was a lieutenant in the Marine Corps, on my second tour in 2004, I drove down to the San Diego Port with my Marine battery, and we loaded up all the equipment that we would then fall in on in Iraq 2 months later. Without the Maritime Security Program plus-up that is in this bill, we would not be able to go fight wars. We would not be able to move our equipment. We would not be able to support our troops. This is a national security bill. It is not only national security because it is energy security, but it is national security because that is how we support our troops overseas is with the Maritime Security Program, which this bill pluses up. I just want to say thank you to the chairman and everybody who supports this.…
