Outcry heard over looming cuts to defense spending
There’s a growing outcry about looming cuts to defense spending. It’s part of the Budget Control Act signed in 2011.
If nothing changes, on Jan. 1, the military will lose nearly a trillion dollars of its budget over the next decade.
Three senators from the U.S. Armed Service Committee were in Colorado Springs on Tuesday talking about the potential impact.
U.S. Senators John McCain (R-AZ), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) led a discussion at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.
“Both Kelly and Lindsey voted against this … I voted for it,” McCain said. Despite laughing a little about it, McCain said said voting for automatic defense cuts was a dumb idea and it had big consequences.
“We’re traveling around the country talking about this issue,” he said.
“The Marine Corps would be unable to respond to one contingency on behalf of our country. That keeps me up at night,” said Ayotte.
The three Republican senators said the extreme budgets cuts endangers our national security and could have a large economic impact.
They estimate about 18,000 military jobs in Colorado could be cut.
A UCCS student was concerned about their military education benefits. He asked, “Can you explain how that may impact students who really rely on that financial ability to continue their education?”
Fortunately, the senators said VA benefits are exempt from the spending cuts. But they emphasize so much more is not and they point out they can’t solve it themselves.
“We would like nothing more than actually Democrats and Republicans to work together because we know neither party can solve this alone,” said Ayotte.
McCain, Graham and Ayotte have sponsored legislation along with three democratic senators to fix the problem. But McCain said no real action has been taken to move it forward.
Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) agrees these cuts will be deeply harmful to our economy, schools and businesses. He thinks it could also threaten our national security. But he doesn’t think this Republican approach will help the matter.
“Across the aisle, through their comments and efforts it may make compromise more difficult by politicizing the cuts. What I want to do was tell you and the people of Colorado the threat of sequestration could be avoided but only if we in the Congress do what the American people elected us to do,” said Udall.
Udall said we already have a starting point. He points to the president’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform known as the “Simpson-Bowles” Commission.
