By Congressman JOSH BRECHEEN
On Wednesday, I voted “no” on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2027. While I support providing for a robust national defense, I could not in good conscience vote for this legislation as it authorizes a $263.4 billion (29.6 percent) increase over the authorized level for the previous fiscal year. Looking to history, we know that once a level of spending is authorized, appropriators will rarely provide less funding than the maximum allowed. Furthermore, departmental funding baselines almost never decrease over time.
Our Founding Fathers believed that public debt was among “the greatest of the dangers to be feared.” As George Washington once wrote, “avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions in time of peace to discharge the debts, which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burthen, which we ourselves ought to bear.” We are currently facing the largest national debt in our country’s history, owing over $39.5 trillion, and we simply cannot bear the cost of additional, unpaid-for spending.
To achieve the transformative defense spending necessary for our nation’s future, we must either, in the current Reconciliation 3.0 or in a future reconciliation package, find meaningful offsets that would allow us to reach a higher annual defense spending target in a fiscally responsible way. Unlike providing additional defense funding in a reconciliation package, which is a one-time expenditure, this bill would be a $260 billion increase in the annual defense discretionary baseline that I could support if we offset the cost elsewhere. Without any further changes to spending, this would mean roughly $2.63 trillion in additional debt loading over the next 10 years.
While I could not support this package due to my spending concerns, I supported the SAVE America Act being joined to this legislation after final passage. I have voted in favor of the SAVE America Act and its predecessor, the SAVE Act, five times. I support leadership’s decision to join the SAVE America Act to other pieces of legislation whenever they can, but I could not vote for legislation that could lead to an additional debt load of $2.63 trillion over the next ten years. I continue to be hopeful that we will be able to pass the SAVE America Act through the reconciliation process, which we advanced this week.
Brecheen led charge to end solar and wind subsidies
This month, all new wind and solar tax subsidies officially ended. This would not have happened without the efforts almost exactly one year ago where Representatives Chip Roy, Ralph Norman, Andrew Clyde and I refused to accept a lesser bill and voted it down in the Budget Committee to force a more conservative final product — stopping what wind energy lobbyists had kept alive for three decades.
Special credit also went to Alex Epstein for his help in advising us as we fought for the best deal possible for American energy and ensuring President Trump’s hard-fought agenda for ending the Green New Scam was truly delivered upon.
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