Dear House Member:

During consideration of H.R. 4365, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2024, Taxpayers for Common Sense has a series of vote recommendations.

Voting AYE on the following amendment is a vote for fiscal responsibility and greater oversight of how the Pentagon spends our federal tax dollars:

Amendment #169, originally numbered 221 – sponsored by Reps. Jayapal (D-WA), Davidson (R-OH), Moulton (D-MA), Garamendi (D-CA), and McClintock (R-CA). This bipartisan amendment prohibits the use of funds to administer Unfunded Priority Lists (UPLs), extra-budgetary requests that undermine civilian oversight of the military by requiring military leadership to send additional funding requests to Congress without input from the Secretary of Defense or the secretaries of each military service branch. Furthermore, projects on the UPLs were by definition not included in a more than $800 billion defense budget, indicating that they are not true “priorities.”

Voting NAY on the following amendments is a vote for fiscal responsibility and greater oversight of how the Pentagon spends our federal tax dollars:

Amendment #181, originally numbered 43 – sponsored by Reps. Roy (R-TX) and Cammack (R-FL). This amendment prohibits funds from being used to take steps to address the growing national security threat of climate change that Secretaries of Defense in the last several administrations have detailed.  Preventing or limiting actions on climate change would undermine the Pentagon’s ability to assess and mitigate those challenges.

Amendment #170, originally numbered 338 – sponsored by Rep. Leger Fernandez (D-NM). This amendment would prohibit the use of funds to transfer the 6^th Special Operations Squadron from Cannon Air Force Base in Clovis, New Mexico, preventing Pentagon plans to transfer the 6^th Special Operations Squadron to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Arizona.

Taxpayers for Common Sense also urges you to vote NAY on the following amendments, which rely on a 19^th century precedent enshrined in the Holman Rule to reduce the salaries of government appointees to $1. This archaic rule was intended to address patronage positions, not to effectively eliminate the salaries of critical appointees for political reasons as it is being used in these amendments. Enacting these amendments would likely cost taxpayers more in the long run given the impediments they would create to civilian oversight of the military.

Amendment #155, originally numbered 74 – sponsored by Rep. Boebert (R-CO). This amendment would reduce the salary of Shawn Skelly, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Readiness, to $1.

Amendment #156, originally numbered 75 – sponsored by Rep. Boebert (R-CO). This amendment would reduce the salary of Norvel Dillard, Director of Diversity and Inclusion Management at the Office for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion of the Department of Defense, to $1.

Amendment #161, originally numbered 124 – sponsored by Rep. Fallon (R-TX). This amendment would reduce the salary of Kelisa Wing, within the Department of Defense, to $1.

Amendment #167, originally numbered 45 – sponsored by Reps. Greene (R-GA) and Van Orden (R-WI). This amendment would prevent funds from being used to pay Defense Secretary Lloyd James Austin III a salary that exceeds $1.

Amendment #178, originally numbered 175 – sponsored by Rep. Roy (R-TX). This amendment would reduce the salary of Cyrus Salazar (Director of DoD’s Office for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) to one $1.

Furthermore, Taxpayers for Common Sense urges you to vote NAY on H.R. 4365 as it is currently drafted, and to vote NAY on any Continuing Resolution that includes H.R. 4365 as it is currently drafted, to support fiscally conservative values and greater oversight of Pentagon spending.

Finally, TCS is concerned with the numerous amendments that raid large portions of Pentagon funding such as Operations and Maintenance to shift funds to parochial categories in Research, Testing, Development and Evaluation (RDT&E). While not entirely clear, these are presumably to provide additional funding to help fund lawmaker’s pet projects.

Again, TCS believes adhering to these vote recommendations shows support for fiscal responsibility and greater Congressional oversight of how the Pentagon uses our tax revenues. If you have any questions about these recommendations, please contact me or Gabe Murphy at gabe@taxpayer.net.

Thank you for your consideration of these vote recommendations.