WILMINGTON, Del. – U.S. Senators Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Chris Coons (D-Del.) joined 30 additional Senators to introduce the Restoring Military Priorities Act of 2020. The bill would reverse and restore the Department of Defense’s (DoD) recent short sighted and dangerous transfer of $3.8 billion to be used to build part of President Donald Trump’s ineffective border wall. The bill also reduces DoD’s transfer authority so that DoD cannot turn around and try to divert additional funding for President Trump’s border wall. Currently, there is no other process at hand to reverse a reprogramming.
The transfer takes more than $1 billion from the National Guard, including $790 million for the National Guard and Reserve Equipment Account, and may impact funding for units within the state. The transfer also raids nearly $1.5 billion in funds provided by Congress to the Navy and Marine Corps—including funding for replacement aircraft vital to ensure the readiness and safety of our servicemembers.
“Once again, President Trump is ignoring the Constitution, disregarding a coequal branch of government and diverting funds from crucial military programs to build his ineffective border wall,” said Senator Carper. “Not only will this not address the challenges along our southern border, but diverting these funds appropriated to the Department of Defense will impact the readiness of our National Guard and make Americans, and our military, less safe. If President Trump is serious about securing the border, he should work with Congress to build upon the smart investments made by the Obama Administration to address the root causes of irregular migration at the U.S. southern border—rather than raiding funding dedicated to our military and National Guard.”
“It is unacceptable for the Trump Administration to divert Department of Defense funds away from the programs set by Congress,” said Senator Coons. “Not only does this reprogramming undermine the role of Congress in setting funding, but it could also harm the ability of the Delaware National Guard and Guard units around the United States to accomplish their missions at home and abroad.”
Along with Senators Carper and Coons, the bill was introduced by Senators Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Doug Jones (D-Ala.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Cal.), Bob Casey (D-Penn.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), Mark Warner (D-Va.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Catherine Cortez-Masto (D-Nev.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii).
This was the third time in less than one year that the Defense Department has used this unilateral process to bypass Congress and divert funding to President Trump’s border wall. In the spring of 2019, the Defense Department transferred $2.5 billion in funding to be used to build part of President Trump’s border wall, and the President later raided an additional $3.6 billion in military construction funds for his wall. Earlier this month, the Defense Department reprogrammed another $3.8 billion from the men and women of the National Guard and a variety of programs added by Congress to address shortfalls that were in many cases identified by military leaders.
In January, it was reported that President Trump intends to raid $7.2 billion in DoD funds this year to pay for his wall, diverting funding from military families and forcing American taxpayers to pay for his vanity project and failed campaign promise.
Full text of the legislation is available here.
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