Jim Banks

As has been said today, the NLRB's decision is a threat to women's sports, and even more so to men's Olympic sports.

It is also, I would like to note that it is a disgrace that one of our witnesses today injected race...

The hearing will now come to order.

Today we convene to address a matter of paramount importance: How the Department of Defense [DOD] monitoring of COVID-19 has impacted our military ranks...

I think it's a really important conversation, the type of oversight that this committee should be doing more of.

We need to look with clear eyes and healthy skepticism at how the Department handled the pandemic...

The data is worrying.

Seems to me like you were skewing the data to make it fit what you wanted the conclusion to be by doing that and to justify your use of the vaccine.

According to DOD data obtained by Senator Ron Johnson there were 275 new myocarditis cases among Active service members in 2021, which is a 151 percent more than average over the 5 years prior.

Many service members and their families are concerned with the safety and value of the COVID-19 mRNA vaccine...

This administration is at war with working-class middle-income families in this country who right now are finding it harder than ever to save, to makes ends meet, and this is another example of it, right? I mean this is pure insanity.

Why in the world would the Biden administration try to bring back a regulation that would do that?

It screws the people who need the help the most.

Discrimination, we look back at old records, 2017, 31 percent of Black service members, 25 percent of Asian service members, said that they had been harassed or assaulted during their service time.

If we continue down the same path of valuing radical ideologies like DEI over national security, the recruits will continue to dwindle.

So this really recent survey says that clearly politics, DEI, 'wokeness,' is a problem.

Today's hearing is focused on 'Recruiting Shortfalls and Growing Mistrust: Perceptions of the U.S. Military.'

But you just said----

I mean, would you disagree that wokeness is a top recruiting obstacle for the Army?

This poll, which we can all read, found that 73 percent of veterans believe that the U.S. military has become too political regarding race, gender, and sexuality.

The All-Volunteer Force is at a crossroads.

I think that it is unavoidable when I am talking to many service members who are currently in the military and those who are leaving that have expressed concerns over the military's use of DEI initiatives.

By all metrics, the All-Volunteer Force has been a success.

You are speaking out of both sides of your mouth. You are defending it.

Why did you invite Roger Waters?