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Issues

National Security

House Passes Emergency Spending Bill to Increase Military Benefits and Humanitarian Relief

16 March 2005

U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee voted in favor of a House emergency spending bill (H.R. 1268) that will increase funding for the safety and benefits of American troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. The legislation gained bipartisan support because it met many of the demands of critics of the Iraq war and post-war planning to improve troop security and pay, congressional accountability and worldwide humanitarian efforts. Inslee has cosponsored legislation to improve safety for American troops in Iraq and today's bill itemizes specific increases in military death gratuity benefits, troop and vehicle armor, and pay for service members. The bill also forces the Administration to provide Congress with a plan on post-war Iraq before receiving military-construction funding.

Said Inslee, "In addition to opposing the decision to start this war, some of my biggest concerns of post-war Iraq have been the lack of body armor and security for our troops, and the insufficient benefits given to our service members and their families. Secretary Rumsfeld and the Bush Administration have sat on their hands long enough while brave American service members have asked for life-saving equipment. Those like me who were against the war and my colleagues who supported it should be united in sending a strong message that no military personnel in Iraq should have to dig through landfills for scrap metal to protect themselves."

Inslee additionally supported the humanitarian assistance in the bill for tsunami-affected areas in Southeast Asia, for the Palestinian/Israeli conflict and areas in Africa, and for funding buoys as part of a global tsunami warning system - a network that Inslee has advocate for and which he will soon be introducing separate bipartisan legislation to implement. Overall, the bill will provide $81.3 billion in funding for operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and in areas of humanitarian need.

Summary of Emergency Spending Legislation

Military Benefits:

• Increases, from $12,000 to $100,000, the benefit to families whose loved ones are killed in action.
• Provides an additional $75 million in funding to equip service members with body armor, which is $12 million more than the administration requested.
• Grants payment for travel of family members of military personnel who are ill or injured as a result of active-duty service.
• Provides $611 million - $48 million more than requested - for add-on vehicle armor kits and $50 million for radio jamming equipment to protect against remote controlled explosive devices. The bill also grants $51 million in funding for up-armored Army Humvees.
• Continues the increases in Imminent Danger Pay, the Family Separation Allowance and Hardship Duty-location Pay.
• Increases subsidized life insurance from $250,000 to $400,000.

Military Accountability - No Blank Check:

Under the legislation, the Department of Defense must give Congress a detailed plan for overseas base establishment and construction before it receives funding for military-construction in Iraq.

Humanitarian Aid:

• Provides $656 million in tsunami disaster relief assistance to the areas in Southeast Asia affected by the devastating tsunami last December, and provides $23 million to build and deploy tsunami-detection buoys in the Pacific, Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico.
• Provides $92 million for humanitarian assistance in Sudan and $200 million in food and refugee aid to war-ravaged countries in Africa. The bill also secures $580 million for global peacekeeping programs.
• Provides $200 million in economic development for the Palestinian territories in the West Bank and Gaza, including funding for schools, agriculture and democracy programs.
• Provides $372 million to help Afghanistan farmers move away from poppy production to alternative crops.
• Provides $55 million for nuclear nonproliferation efforts to secure nuclear materials outside of the former Soviet Union

Since the Spring of 2003, Inslee has hosted Congressional Iraq Watch sessions in the House of Representatives, which scrutinize the President's lack of a post-war strategy in Iraq, and the intelligence used to justify the war. Inslee and his colleagues have advocated for increased body armor and troop security, as well as greater congressional accountability of funding in Iraq.

U.S. Rep Jay Inslee