Wildlife Innovation and Longevity Driver Reauthorization Act
Floor Speech
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Mr. NORCROSS. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Rogers and Ranking Member Smith for their continued leadership in bringing this bill to the floor. I also certainly thank the members of the subcommittee.
Mr. Speaker, this bill continues the long, proud tradition of bipartisan work by the Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces and is the result of our commitment to work together to find the best solutions to manage the Nation's military.
I especially thank our chairman, Mr. Rob Wittman, and his staff for their support in building this strong, bipartisan bill.
Mr. Speaker, this bill carefully addresses affordability and achievability of current and future modernization requirements.
At the same time it continues the oversight necessary to ensure a responsible execution of these programs, including: the tactical aircraft programs; the ISR, which is the intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft; and the oversight of the services' force design strategies and modernization priorities.
This bill also includes the subcommittee's multiyear effort to manage the largest acquisition program in the history of the Department, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. In this bill, it provides strong legislative mandates to ensure the Department and its industrial partners deliver the aircraft that the services are paying for: the TR-3/Block-4 version of the F-35.
Critically important is what we started 5 years ago, to identify and buy down modernization and safety risks in our munitions industrial base.
In addition, this bill provides much-needed support for our warfighters, a 14.5 percent pay raise.
I certainly want to take a moment to thank our staff members who have been instrumental in bringing this to the floor: Jay Vallario, Dave Sienicki, Heath Bope, and Michael Kirlin. I also thank my staff, Sam Devito and Robin Dickey.
Unfortunately, despite all the bipartisan achievements, after 64 years, we are deciding to jam into it a partisan wedge. I am sad to see these political games.
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