U.S. REP. BUCK MCKEON (R-CA) LOOKS TO GOVERNORS TO DRUM UP SEQUESTRATION OPPOSITION
By Jeremy Herb - 05/02/12 12:43 PM ET
A group of governors was successful enough at pushing back against the Pentagon’s proposed cuts to the Air National Guard that House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) now wants to enlist them to fight sequestration.
McKeon wrote a letter to the National Governor’s Association seeking “insight and concerns” about the impact of the $500 billion in automatic cuts set to hit the defense budget starting in January 2013.
McKeon cited a letter signed by 48 governors written to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in February that complained about the “disproportionate” cuts to the Air Guard in the Air Force Budget.
The Council of Governors, a group of governors formed in 2010, lobbied the Pentagon to reduce the cuts to the Air Guard, and the Pentagon agreed last month to restore $400 million in proposed cuts to personnel and 24 C-130 planes.
Now McKeon is hoping the governors will have the same success in the sequestration battle. The Armed Services chairman has a bill that would undo the first year of sequestration, but it has failed to attract Democratic support.
Of course, with sequestration, it’s not the Pentagon that must be convinced to reverse the automatic cuts — Panetta has called them devastating many times — it’s Congress.
And while both Democrats and Republicans have said they don’t want sequestration to occur, they so far cannot find any agreement on $1.2 trillion in alternative deficit reduction to replace the automatic cuts.
Most people don’t expect any movement on the issue until after the November elections, during a lame-duck session.
