Fmr. Sen. Alan Simpson: This is the Biggest Threat to U.S. National Security
President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Defense Gen. James Mattis issued a warning Thursday at his Senate confirmation hearing, saying the biggest threat to our national security is the federal debt.
"We don’t want a military that just breaks the bank, but at the same time, we cannot solve this debt problem on the backs of our military alone…I consider it an abrogation of our generation's responsibility to transfer a debt of this size to our children,†Mattis said.
In an interview on FOX Business Network’s Cavuto: Coast-to-Coast, former Senator Alan Simpson (R-WY) said he agrees with Gen. Mattis’s growing debt concerns, and thinks the defense department won’t be the government’s first target when it looks to eliminate wasteful spending.
“I mean there’s enough stuff in there to get at anything you want in the way of money without harming our ability to respond militarily in the most powerful way and we gotta get into that damn budget,†Simpson said.
A study reported in December 2016 by the Washington Post documented $125 billion worth of administrative waste sparking fears in Pentagon leaders that Congress would use it as an excuse to cut the defense budget.
The former debt commissioner chair is also concerned with the budget measures Congress is using to repeal Obamacare which he says could worsen the debt and deficit.
“I just think there’s a big mistake with doing repeal without replace [of Obamacare] right behind it. I wouldn’t separate them for very long. I keep them together because one impacts the other. You can’t get rid of the taxes and hope to reduce the cost,†Simpson told host Neil Cavuto.
Simpson continued “the clatter and the clamor of special groups†is the reason why two-thirds of the Federal budget is not being addressed.
“We are in a tough in a situation and the big guts stuff is not being touched at all and won’t be,†he said.