Patty Murray: “in the last several days, we have learned some surprising things about the Air Force's decision to award a $40 billion…”

“in the last several days, we have learned some surprising things about the Air Force's decision to award a $40 billion contract to the European company, Airbus. The Air Force wants Airbus, which is headquartered in Toulouse, France, to supply our next generation of aerial refueling tankers. It chose Airbus over the American company, Boeing, which has been making those tankers for the last 50 years. I have made it clear over the past several days that I think this decision is shortsighted and dangerous. But today, even more questions have been raised about the process the Air Force followed to make this decision. So I want to take the opportunity this afternoon to walk through the impact I believe the Air Force decision will have because I think we need to take a good hard look at whether we as Members of the Senate think this contract should be finalized. First, we need to be very cautious about any decision that awards the right to build a critical part of our military air technology to a company that is controlled by a foreign government.”