Support the Troops, Don’t Block the Defense Funding Bill, McConnell Tells Senate Democrats
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor urging Democrats to support defense funding:
“America asks a lot of the men and women of its volunteer military force: to undertake dangerous missions in far-off lands, to spend months or years away from their families, and always to sacrifice, so that we might live in freedom.
“These brave men and women do it all without reservation. They ask precious little in return, save for the resources they need to do the job and the support they need to look after their families.
“That’s the least Congress can provide. Seventy one Senators just voted to promise they would provide it.
“It would be very cruel indeed for any Senator who just made that promise to turn around now and block the rest of us from fulfilling their pledge to the troops.
“Passing the legislation before us is the way to fulfill the promise that was just made. Our friends across the aisle know it’s a good bill. That’s why nearly every Democrat voted to pass it in committee, 27-3. That’s why Democrats have hailed this bill as a ‘win-win-win’ and a ‘victory’ for their state.
“They know it gives President Obama the same level of military funding he asked for in his own budget request.
“They know it adheres to bipartisan spending levels that both parties agreed to, that President Obama signed into law, and that President Obama campaigned on in the last presidential election.
“So now our friends face a choice.
“Option 1: Allow the promise they made to our troops to be fulfilled, by voting for a bill they can’t stop praising.
“Option 2: Break the promise they just made, by killing a bill they claim to love — all in service of some unrelated and completely incomprehensible partisan plan.
“It’s the road of bipartisanship and support for our troops that brought us this far. We shouldn’t let partisan politics trip us up now. And we don’t have to, not if common-sense Democrats continue to prioritize pay raises and medical care for our troops over some unrelated gambit to funnel more cash to bureaucracies like the IRS.
“I would just leave my colleagues with something one of our Democratic friends said of men and women in the military: ‘Just as we have called on them to protect us, they are calling on us to provide them with the resources they need...’
“They are. Senators just promised they would. Senators shouldn’t vote now to block us from fulfilling that promise.”
Related Issues: NDAA, Appropriations, America's Military, Senate Democrats
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