OVERNIGHT DEFENSE: Senate movement on sequester

by Jeremy Herb - 06/21/12 9:56 PM ET

At a breakfast roundtable with reporters Thursday, House
Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) questioned
whether Congress was “mature enough” to fix sequestration, and suggested it was
time to “kick it down the road” and delay the cuts.

Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) also did not sound overly
optimistic speaking at the Bloomberg Government Defense Conference Thursday.
Moran said that until House Republicans dropped their “no new revenues” pledge, a
deal would not be possible.

{mosads}Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), who has
started discussions with McCain on reversing sequestration, also pointed to the
House GOP.

“The problem is Republican leaders in the House — they will
not talk about revenues,” Levin told reporters after speaking at the Bloomberg
conference. “As long as they take that absolute stand they can’t get anything
done.”

Next steps for
sequestration: The Senate sequester legislation — which would still need to
be passed by the House — does not directly move toward actually averting the automatic
cuts themselves, but it can be viewed as one bit of momentum for senators to find
a solution themselves. Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said that he does not agree with one proposal
floated last week by Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.), which would cut $100 billion from defense and
non-defense spending in the deficit-reduction deal, rather than $500 billion.

But both McCain and Levin dismissed that as an obstacle in
their talks, with McCain saying the heads of the Armed Services panels — Levin and his House counterpart, Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) — can have “frank
discussions” about what should be done, even if they disagree.

Levin said the $100 billion proposal
was just one suggestion, and that he’s most concerned right now with finding a broad
set of principles the two sides can agree upon to give the private sector some
confidence than going back to figure out the details afterward.

“I don’t think I see a huge deal before the election, so let’s do
what we can,” he said.

To plan or not to
plan: House
Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) was asked at the
press breakfast whether he thought the Pentagon — the king of planners — really
was not planning for sequestration.

“It’s hard for me to believe that the military
people that I know would just sit on their hands and not plan for this,” McKeon
said, echoing a suspicion many in the defense world have expressed that privately the Pentagon
is making preparations.

A Pentagon press secretary, however, again shot down
the notion the Pentagon is making plans, saying the department has not “been directed
to do so.”

“And if we start planning for sequestration, then that puts
us in a very tough position with respect to very sound defense strategy that we
outlined in January,” George Little said. Of course, if the Senate sequestration reporting
provision does become law, the Pentagon will have to drop its “thou shalt not
plan” stance.

More sequestration job reports: The administration’s silence on implementing sequestration hasn’t stopped outside groups from touting their own devastating findings, and another grim jobs report was released Thursday. This time, the number of potential jobs losses inched up even higher, to 1.2 million jobs, according to the report from the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). The job losses include more than 1 million private-sector workers and 200,000 military jobs, and the report says the unemployment rate would rise by 0.7 percent.

The NAM study adds to the ammo of defense advocates, who have also been citing a study from the Aerospace Industries Association that found 1 million jobs would be gone under sequestration. An AIA spokesman said the trade association supports the sequestration reporting amendment that passed Thursday.

Which sequestration
measure?: Sens. John Thune (R-S.D.) and Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) issued a
joint press release after the sequestration amendment was included in the farm
bill with the headline: “Senate Adopts Thune-Sessions Sequestration
Transparency Plan.” While it’s true the amendment that passed is quite similar
to legislation offered by Thune and Sessions, the amendment that passed was in
fact an agreement between Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who are not mentioned in the
release. The senators try to offer a bit of justification in the statement, saying:
“Thune and Sessions were the first senators to call for more transparency from
the administration on sequestration.”

Panetta’s newest
enemy, jetlag: Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is giving two speeches in the
next 20 hours shortly after returning from a quick trip to Saudi Arabia.
Panetta led the U.S. delegation to offer
condolences after the death of Saudi Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz Al
Saud. The secretary is speaking at Thursday evening at the National Press Club,
where he’s being awarded the Center for National Policy’s 2012 Edmund S. Muskie
Distinguished Public Service Award. Friday morning, Panetta will speak at the DOD
Veterans Affairs Suicide Prevention Conference.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:

— Administration: Hot mic was ‘stating
the obvious‘

— McKeon: Time
to punt on defense cuts

— Clinton: Nuclear Iran would
spark arms race

— Senate demands answers from Obama on
cuts

— McKeon won’t push to reinstate
DADT

Please send tips and comments to Jeremy Herb, jherb@digital-release.thehill.com, and Carlo Munoz, cmunoz@digital-release.thehill.com.

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