Defense
Chairman Ken Calvert
H-405 The Capitol
(202) 225-2847
Majority | Minority |
| Ken Calvert – Chair | Betty McCollum – Ranking Member |
| Hal Rogers | Marcy Kaptur |
| Steve Womack | Henry Cuellar |
| Robert Aderholt | Pete Aguilar |
| John Carter | Ed Case |
| Mario Diaz-Balart | Susie Lee |
| Dave Joyce | Joe Morelle |
| Jake Ellzey – Vice Chair | |
| Chuck Fleischmann | |
| David Valadao |
FY26 Member Day Hearing Instructions
Recent Activity
Madam Chair, thank you for yielding.
The revised spending allocations presented today contain only technical corrections to the initial allocations, which were adopted on a party-line vote two weeks ago.
Because there are no substantive changes from the initial allocations, I must once again oppose them.
They do not change the topline spending levels for any of the subcommittee bills – even though Members on my side of the aisle have consistently asked for bipartisan cooperation on funding levels.
These spending levels continue to short-change our national defense, while providing huge increases to domestic programs. Non-defense spending would increase by nearly 17% overall, and some agencies would receive unprecedented 30-40% increases above fiscal year 2021.
Underfunding our national defense while giving such extreme increases to domestic programs is unacceptable to Members on my side of the aisle.
WASHINGTON – Today, the full committee met to consider the fiscal year 2022 appropriations bills for the subcommittees on Defense and Homeland Security. Committee Republicans were unable to support the bills due to the total spending level and controversial policy provisions that are in the bills.
Thank you, Madam Chair, for yielding.
First, I want to thank Chair McCollum and Ranking Member Calvert for their work on the fiscal year 2022 Defense appropriations bill.
As the former chair of this subcommittee, I know how much hard work goes into drafting this bill and how important it is.
I also want to acknowledge the efforts of the committee staff, specifically our minority clerk, Johnnie Kaberle, and the majority clerk, Chris Bigelow.
Providing funding for our nation's defense is one of the most important responsibilities we have as Members of Congress, and those staffers are so very, very important.
I am pleased to see that this bill funds many priorities for Members on both sides of the aisle.
Madam Chair, thank you for yielding.
These spending allocations will increase discretionary spending by hundreds of billions of dollars to an all-time high of $1.5 trillion.
This nearly 9% increase above fiscal year 2021 comes at a time of record-high deficits and debt:
- This month, the national debt reached an astonishing $28.3 trillion.
- In the first 8 months of this fiscal year, we have already borrowed $2.1 trillion.
We must exercise fiscal responsibility and return to reasonable levels of federal spending, now that the pandemic hopefully is nearing an end.
Although these allocations do not show the exact split between defense and non-defense programs, we know the topline is based on the president's budget. Those numbers included an enormous, 17% increase to non-defense programs. At the same time, the president's budget cut defense spending to below inflation.
