Todd Jacobson
NS&D Monitor
3/07/2014
On top of the $11.9 billion in Fiscal Year 2015 President Obama is requesting for the National Nuclear Security Administration, the Administration wants another $600 million for weapons and nonproliferation spending, though the additional request received a chilly response on Capitol Hill this week. The additional funds are part of the Administration’s “Opportunity, Growth, and Security Initiative “ (OGSI), a $56 billion add-on that boosts the President’s budget request above the $1.014 budget deal agreed to by Congress earlier this year. The $56 billion would be paid for through a “package of revenue enhancements”—be-lieved to involve tax cuts and other spending cuts that the Administration hasn’t identified—according to NNSA Budget Director Robert Nassif, who confirmed that the OGSI funding is not part of the agency’s main $11.9 billion funding request.
The NNSA also hasn’t identified for what projects the extra money would go toward, releasing only top-line budget numbers this week. Additional funding for the weapons program, for which the President asked for $8.3 billion in FY 2015, would total $504 million, and an extra $96 million would go toward the $1.6 billion request for nonproliferation work. According to the White House Office of Management and Budget, the extra funding would go toward “accelerated national security investments within the National Nuclear Security Administration, including facilities construction, deferred maintenance projects, and research and development to keep nuclear weapons safe, reliable, and effective.”
Congress Not Receptive to Spending ‘Roadmap’
In a statement, Obama called the OGSI funding a “roadmap for how and where additional investments should be made in both domestic priorities and national security this year.” However, Congressional appropriators on both sides of the aisle have not thrown any support behind the additional funding. “Contrary to the president’s wish list of additional spending, my committee will abide by the budget caps for fiscal year 2015 put into place by law, which total $1.014 trillion,” House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) said in a statement. “This funding level will require hard choices and difficult trade-offs between important federal programs—including our national security—but it is the duty of Congress to make these decisions on behalf of our people and our nation’s financial future.”
Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), the chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, agreed. “We have a budget agreement for Fiscal Year 2015, and the Senate Appropriations Committee will adhere to the spending caps in that deal,” she said in a statement. “But we need to do more to strengthen our economy, protect our country and build our future.”
