Tom Udall

I am supportive of the President's request for military construction in New Mexico.

I think that's going to be very effective.

New Mexico is a very rural State. And as you're aware from our discussions, in rural New Mexico, as well as rural areas throughout the country, it can be very difficult to recruit doctors and nurses and staff to serve in rural clinics…

I assume telehealth is some of the answer there, but part of my question is to ask about what this budget does to increase transportation options for vets.

I think it's very important that you try to take the temperature of veterans in terms of how they feel about not ever seeing an actual doctor in person.

I believe that the VA should do more to inform veterans about the possible threats to their health from exposure to open burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We have a big problem in New Mexico because our medical school on the day of graduation--we invest in all this; the State of New Mexico puts in money--75 percent of our graduates leave the State on that day of graduation.

Given rising suppression costs and the fact that the agency spends nearly half of its budget on wild fire management which I think my colleague, Senator Johnson, alluded to.

But I also want to echo the concerns of my colleagues about the reduction in timber targets from 2.6 billion to 2.3 billion as I read it.

In my State and you heard Senator Murkowski and other of my colleagues talk about how critical the forest products industry is in the improving of the health of our forests while providing jobs.

On a scale of 1 to 10 how confident are you? Ten being the most confident that we're going to have the air assets we need?

I'm not going to continue on and have that conversation with you. But I hear you saying you're focusing on what we call the red zones of the WUI, the Wild Urban Interface.

I want to thank you and your team for your efforts to implement 3 long term stewardship contracts in Colorado that have already released fuels around communities while providing valuable forest products.

I think it's time to act. I think there's great opportunity presenting itself to us in the context of national security, job creation, of course the environmental benefits.

Are human rights conditions in those three countries worsening?

Thank you, Chairman Menendez.

Sequestration would negatively affect the mission readiness and capabilities of the men and women on our front lines.

The impact of sequestration would be disruptive and destructive to DHS, its missions, and our Nation's security and economy.

Sequestration threatens damaging cuts for New Mexico's national labs, military facilities, and border security. If implemented, those cuts will be very damaging, I believe, to our national security.

I believe the sequester's across-the-board cuts, including the 9.4-percent cut facing the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) weapons account, will hamper important stockpile stewardship work across the country.

It is clear from your testimony that sequestration will have very real threats to our national security.

We then break faith with our troops and the men and women in uniform if this takes hold.

It will not make a damn bit of difference who wins the majority in 2014.

I have reintroduced the Assuring Contracting Equity, or ACE Act, with a correction to a drafting error in order to ensure increases in contracting goals for service-disabled veteran owned small businesses and qualified HUBZone small…

I have reintroduced the Assuring Contracting Equity, or ACE Act, with a correction to a drafting error in order to ensure increases in contracting goals for service-disabled veteran owned small businesses and qualified HUBZone small…