Military Retirement
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Ms. AYOTTE. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from South Carolina.
I picked up an editorial this morning from the Washington Post that calls the cuts to the cost-of-living adjustments to military retirees minuscule and demeans this criticism. It calls the cuts teensy-weensy.
I don't understand why anyone would want to support a measure that singles out--in other words, under this budget agreement, the group that got the cuts to their current benefits are those who have sacrificed the most for our country. To call this minuscule or teensy-weensy--I don't think it is so minuscule, as the Senator from South Carolina said, to an E-7 who makes about $25,000 a year in retirement and will lose close to $72,000 from the time he or she retires at 40 until they are 62. That is about 3 years of their retirement. That is not minuscule in a working family.
This is not a minor situation. It is not minuscule to our veterans, those wounded warriors who have given the most, and who have, unfortunately, suffered so much.
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Mr. GRAHAM. This applies to disabled retirees as well, right?
Ms. AYOTTE. It does. We have all visited Walter Reed and we have all met our wounded warriors who are heroes. They have sacrificed more than we could ever ask anyone to sacrifice for our Nation. Some of them don't have arms, legs. They receive a medical retirement because of their service and their disability as a result of the service they have rendered so gravely for our country, and they get cut under this too. I don't think the cut to them is teensy-weensy or minuscule. Only in Washington would this be minimized in terms of how people are viewed as minuscule or teensy-weensy in light of the service they have given to our country. I thought this description of it was wrong and offensive and demoralizing in terms of the message it sends to our men and women in uniform.
I think the encouraging part of where we are right now is that so many in this body have come forward and said we need to fix this and recognize this does have an unfair impact on our military retirees and, of course, those who have received a medical retirement.
Whether I disagreed with my colleagues voting for the agreement, regardless of where my colleagues stand on the agreement, I think it is time for us to come together on a bipartisan basis and do the right thing and fix this on behalf of our men and women in uniform, especially our wounded warriors.
Obviously, this body realizes this is not minuscule and this is not teensy-weensy in terms of the impact on our heroes and those who have sacrificed so much for our country. I am very encouraged to see so many of my colleagues over the last couple of days coming forward with different ideas about how we can fix this and do the right thing on behalf of our men and women in uniform.
I have introduced a piece of legislation that would come up with billions of dollars for a pay-for to fix this. I know others have different ideas. But I know this: We can put politics aside. We can fix this for our men and women in uniform.
After we go home for the holidays, I think when we come back in January, this should be a No. 1 priority in this body, which is to do the right thing for our military retirees, for those who are our wounded warriors. The number of people I have seen speak out on this issue in the last few days gives me encouragement that we will be able to do this and do it quickly on their behalf, to right this wrong. Some of them are 19 years in. Maybe they have done multiple tours in Afghanistan and are thinking of retiring. We need to let them know we understand their sacrifice, we should not have singled them out, we will get this right, and that we understand that of all the people who should not have been singled out in this agreement are those who take the bullets for us and whose families have had to go through multiple deployments.
I think about the fact that when someone has done a 20-year military career and one has had multiple deployments, the spouse can't have the same kind of career as if they were able to live in one place. They sacrifice so much because they are traveling around the world and the retirement they receive obviously recognizes that.
So as we leave for the holidays, I hope when we get back, we get this right, we take this up, we honor the service of our men and women in uniform and do what is right.
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