Political Quotes

“Absolutely. I am just coming from an armed services hearing, I say to Senator Mikulski, where we were talking about that very same thing. The armed services mission, of course, requires that we protect the men and women in uniform. But so many of the DOD civilians are absolutely critical in doing their appropriate jobs. Sixty percent of the staff, for example, our strategic men, STRATCOM, are civilian employees. They are doing some of the most important work that we need done in the country right now around cyber security. The nurses who care for the wounded warriors I visited at Fort Belvoir Hospital, for example, are DOD civilians. So the furloughs that affect, more broadly, the civilian employees should be reason for significant concern. Again, we are taking a positive step toward addressing some of these issues by embracing the appropriations approach that the Senator has worked on, and we will have an additional ability to take a positive step with respect to the fiscal year 2014 budget.”