Congress should craft a long-term budget deal now rather than continue budget gridlock by approving a long-term Continuing Resolution (CR), according to five major defense associations.
Leaders of the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA), National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA), Air Force Association (AFA), Navy League, and National Guard Association sent a letter this week urging congress to “work together to avoid an extended continuing resolution or a government shutdown in Fiscal Year 2016.”
The letter warns that an extended CR would hurt national security and the whole economy. CRs “create needless and avoidable inefficiency that wastes taxpayer money,” the letter states. Further, the leaders stress that continuing resolutions make meeting operational needs of the military services more difficult.
The associations urges Congress to avoid putting national security in a “CR trap” that results when continued use of CRs produces longer-term CRs. The associations want Congress to “come together again [as they did after the shutdown in 2013] in a bipartisan fashion and strike a multi-year deal that will create stability and efficiency in our spending.”
Former Department of Defense (DoD) Comptroller Bob Hale (currently a Fellow at Booze Allen Hamilton) has also underscored concerns about long-term CRs recently calling them a “nightmare” for the military. Hale said a year-long CR (continuing defense funding in FY2016 at the FY2015 levels) would produce serious problems for the military services. He argued for a return to long-term stability in defense budgets by fixing sequestration.
