House Pencils in Millions for Jets the Air Force Did Not Request

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Hill jets may be scrapped
By: John Bresnahan
August 10, 2009 07:23 PM EST

The new congressional jets may be getting scrapped.

After an uproar over a proposed purchase of new executive jets for use by senior government official, including members of Congress, the top Defense appropriator in the House has offered to eliminate funding for the planes – but only if the Pentagon, which operates the jets, agrees.

“If the Department of Defense does not want these aircraft, they will be eliminated from the bill,” Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), the chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommitee said Monday evening.

Murtha was quick to point out that these jets, approved by the full House last month, were not additions to the current group of 24 executive aircraft already used for top officials, and were being purchased to replace older ones that have maintenance and safety issues.

And in his statement, Murtha basically put the blame on the Pentagon, whose spokesman has been quoted saying that the House Appropriations Committee added four executive jets beyond the Pentagon’s original request. The Defense Department originally requested $220 million for four jets – a total bumped to $550 and eight jets by the committee.

“These aircraft will not increase the overall passenger aircraft fleet, but instead will replace older aircraft that have both safety and maintenance issues,” Murtha said. “In addition, these newer model aircraft cost significantly less to operate than the current aircraft.”

Murtha also needled the Pentagon a bit, saying that “85 percent” of the use of these aircraft comes from the executive branch, and not Congress.

Murtha’s move may end what has been an embarrassing uproar for House appropriators, who approved the Defense spending bill with no objection about the congressional jets. There is already a movement in the Senate to kill the funding for the aircraft.

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) said the funding “kind of makes me sick to my stomach,” and has vowed to kill it. Sens. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.), both senior members of the Armed Services Committee, have also voiced their opposition to the plan.

The controversy is not going unnoticed in the Senate Democratic leadership circles either. Senate insiders said the Senate Appropriations Committee is unlikely to approve the additional plane funding, although Sen. Dan Inouye (D-Hawaii), the chairman of the panel, was unavailable for comment on Monday.

Yet when the Pentagon-spending bill was taken up by the House, first in the Defense subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, then the full committee, and finally on the chamber floor, the executive-plane provision attracted no notice and no opposition emerged from either side of the aisle.

The full House Appropriations Committee, in fact, marked up the Pentagon bill in 15 minutes with no amendments.

Even Rep. Jeff Flake (Ariz.), an outspoken critic of congressional “earmarks” who offered more than 500 amendments to cut wasteful spending in the defense bill, had nothing to say about the plane provision when the overall package was being debated on the House floor. Flake ended up voting against the defense bill on final passage.

How the passenger plane buy became a controversy is a testament to the current political environment, especially the sensitivity that government officials – both on Capitol Hill at the White House - have to any new perks for themselves as ordinary Americans suffer through the worst economic downturn in decades.

Back in February, President Obama signaled that he was not interested in the Navy’s multi-billion program to build a new “Marine One,” the official helicopter for the Commander in Chief. With the cost of the program to build new choppers ballooning from $6 billion to an estimated $11 billion – or roughly $480 million per copter – Obama said the current Marine One “seems perfectly adequate to me.” The White House has threatened to veto the Pentagon bill if Congress includes any funding for the project.

The new planes were be added to a fleet of two-dozen aircraft used to ferry top military and political officials around the United States and overseas. Members of Congress account for roughly 15 percent of that use.

The overall cost of the Pentagon’s request was $220 million.

But the House Appropriations Committee, on its own initiative, added three additional Gulfstreams to the package, and tacked on another 737 for good measure, bringing the total purchase to eight aircraft.

The new price tag - $550 million.

A person familiar with the drafting of the defense-spending bill said no effort was made by the Appropriations Committee to hide the aircraft buy, adding that the language authorizing the purchase “was in the print all the time.” That means it was fully known to appropriators from both parties throughout the drafting of the Pentagon legislation, or any other lawmaker who had read through the bill.

This source said the new aircraft would be significantly cheaper to operate than existing planes, and noted that the House Appropriations Committee was essentially just speeding up the aircraft purchases laid out in a 2006 Air Force program.

No mention was made of the plane purchase during floor debate on the defense spending bill.

Last week Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper, reported that the House Appropriations panel had approved funding for three new Gulfstreams. Rep. Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.), who state is home to the General Dynamics unit that builds Gulfstreams, submitted a request to the panel for one additional plane.

Then on Aug. 7, the Wall Street Journal reported the 737 purchases and detailed that the overall package was for eight new planes.

The newspaper also tied to the new planes to the trips lawmakers take around the globe during the August congressional recess, including a world tour by House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) and several other members and their spouses.

A Pentagon spokesman said that the Defense Department asked for only what it needed, laying the blame for additional buys on the House Appropriations Committee.

Now it looks like Murtha is calling the Pentagon’s bluff and offering to eliminate the new fleet altogether.