U.S. Representative Mike Rogers (R-AL), Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, delivered the following remarks at a Rules Committee hearing in support of the Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and National Defense Authorization Act for FY25.
Chairman Rogers’ remarks as prepared for delivery:
Chairman Burgess, Ranking Member McGovern, members of the Committee, thank you for having me here today.
And thank you and your staff for helping us get H.R. 8070 to the House floor.
I’d also like to thank Ranking Member Smith for his tremendous help in moving this bill forward.
I am very grateful to have him as a partner.
For the first time in decades, this year’s defense bill carries a different short title.
It is the Servicemember Quality of Life Improvement and National Defense Authorization Act.
We did that to underscore the tremendous gains this bill makes toward improving the quality of life for our servicemembers and their families.
No servicemember should have to live in squalid conditions.
No military family should have to rely on food stamps to feed their children.
And no one serving this country should have to wait weeks see a doctor or a mental health specialist.
But that’s exactly what many of our servicemembers are experiencing, especially the junior enlisted.
This bill will go a long way toward fixing that.
It includes a 20 percent pay raise for the junior enlisted.
It expands allowances for housing and food and improves the cost of living calculation.
The bill authorizes $766 million over the budget request to improve existing barracks and build new ones.
It enables the services to pursue public private partnerships to provide better unaccompanied housing.
The bill reduces dangerous healthcare wait times by waiving referral requirements for specialty care and expanding the number of DoD doctors and nurses with new special recruitment and pay authorities.
The bill improves access to childcare for military families by providing over $206 million to build new DoD childcare centers and fully funding childcare fee assistance programs to offset the cost of private childcare.
It also fills DoD childcare staff vacancies by making pay and benefits competitive with private industry.
The bill helps military spouses gain and retain employment by making it easier for them to transfer professional licenses between states.
It also gives DoD the authority to quickly hire military spouses and keep them employed during changes in duty stations.
These improvements are the result of recommendations we received from a special panel Ranking Member Smith and I set up last year to closely examine servicemember quality of life issues.
I want to thank Don Bacon and Chrissy Houlahan and all the members of the panel for their hard work and dedication.
We are making these historic improvements in the quality of life for our servicemembers because now, more than ever, we need to recruit and retain the best and the brightest.
That’s because the threats our nation faces, especially those from China, are more complex and challenging than at any point in the last 40 years.
To deter these threats, the FY25 NDAA -
- Reforms acquisition authorities and fosters private sector innovation to speed the fielding of game-changing new technologies that will give us the advantage in a conflict with China.
- Strengthens our security partnerships with Taiwan and Pacific allies.
- Fully funds the modernization of our nuclear deterrent.
- Protects U.S. military bases, the defense supply chain, and academic research from Chinese espionage.
- Builds the logistics network in the Pacific the military needs to carry out operations against China.
- And it includes new investments to retool and revitalize the industrial base to ensure it can deliver the systems we need to prevail in any conflict.
In the face of growing threats from China, it’s also critical we restore the military’s focus on lethality.
The FY25 NDAA does so by ending divisive policies that have hurt recruiting, unit cohesion, and military readiness.
We all know that deterring these threats will be an expensive endeavor.
But we acknowledge there are limits on what we can spend.
That’s why this NDAA is focused on rooting out waste at the DoD.
If weapons systems are not responsive to the threats we face, we cut them.
In fact, this bill includes over $30 billion in savings from cutting systems that can’t survive a conflict with China and by reigning in programs like the F-35 that are not delivering on requirements.
The bill we are presenting today is truly bipartisan.
It passed out of Committee 57 to 1.
It executes on hundreds of hours of bipartisan oversight conducted by Members and staff over the past few months.
It will help revitalize the defense industrial base
It will build the ready, capable, and lethal fighting force we need to deter China and our other adversaries.
And it will provide historic improvements in the quality of life for our servicemembers and their families.
As you consider which amendments to make in order, I would respectfully request that you focus on amendments that advance the security of our nation and the needs of our servicemembers.
Thank you again for the opportunity to be here.
