Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the chairwoman and the ranking member for their leadership on this bill. I stand in support of the fiscal year 2019 Defense Appropriations bill. It funds our critical defense needs. It is a great investment in our men and women in uniform. It is going to give them the tools they need to receive. It starts restoring or military's health. A year ago, we heard about half the Navy aircraft not being able to fly because of maintenance issues. Out of 58 combat brigades, only five are ready to fight tonight. Our fighter pilots are getting only one- third of the time they used to get 20 years ago. All of this is unacceptable. We have had 80 fatalities during routine operations. We restored military spending by 10 percent last year. This bill maintains that and keeps up with inflation. It is a great bill that is going to help restore our military. There are two points I would like to make with this bill, though. First, I want to thank the chairwoman for what she and the committee are doing with the OC-135. The OC-135 open skies aircraft flies out of Offutt Air Force Base. It is 57 years old. It supports the open skies mission when we overfly Russia. It has one of the worst maintenance rates in the United States Air Force. It frequently breaks down in Russia, putting them in very awkward, hostile situations with Russians at their bases. So I thank the Appropriations Committee for getting this funding process started to replace these aircraft.…”