A Democratic House with a Democratic Armed Services Committee chairman who is openly skeptical of the established nuclear modernization program is perhaps the most plausible consequence of the 2018 midterm elections, for those who watch the National Nuclear Security Administration.
Reps. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) and Adam Smith (D-Wash.) are not in particularly competitive races. In that respect, they are much like most other nuclear-adjacent politicians running for re-election this year — especially those whose geographically remote House districts have been politically stable for many cycles.
However, Thornberry might be turning over his gavel to Smith come January, if the Democrats convert their polling leads into election wins and retake the House of Representatives the night of Nov. 6.
At deadline Friday for Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor, the polling aggregator RealClearPolitics showed Democrats with more than a seven-point lead in an average of several generic ballots: ballots that ask likely voters whether they are more likely to pull the lever for Democrats or Republicans in the midterms. The ballot is widely considered a reliable indicator of who will win the House.
Thornberry, like most Republicans, is all-in on the vitamin injection President Donald Trump’s administration has proposed for the 30-year nuclear weapons modernization program set in place by the Barack Obama administration.
Smith, maybe more so than most Democrats, is not.
In the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review published in February, the administration proposed building a low-yield, submarine-launched nuclear warhead; studying a low-yield nuclear sea-launched cruise missile; unretiring the B83 gravity bomb; and marching on with the Obama-era program to — among other things — upgrade the warheads and replace the missiles that make up the U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile fleet.
In September, Smith — ranking member of the powerful committee that sets House policy for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) every year in the annual National Defense Authorization Act — told the Monitor the U.S. wants to buy more intercontinental ballistic missiles than it needs.
In May, in a speech on the House Floor, Smith prefaced his support for the chamber’s version of the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act by explaining what a terrible idea he thinks it is to build a low-yield, submarine-launched ballistic-missile warhead. The Trump administration says the United States needs the weapon to check similarly powerful Russian threats. Congressional Democrats say existing nuclear weapons already do that, and that Russia cannot tell the difference between a low-yield submarine missile launch and a city-destroying high-yield submarine missile launch.
Add to that Smith’s regular refrain that the roughly $1-trillion nuclear modernization and maintenance program is going to take a bite out of more urgent military spending, and the stage is set — in the event of a Democratic House takeover — for the first two-sided public debate on nuclear-weapons policy since the start of the Trump administration.
Of course, there are hundreds more members of Congress than Smith. Some of them represent important facilities in the NNSA’s nuclear security enterprise.
Here’s a snapshot of the races those members are in, based on data compiled by RealClearPoilitics, Ballotpedia, and publicly available polls. The races are grouped under the NNSA sites affected by them, which are presented here in alphabetical order.
Kansas City Plant
Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) is seeking an eighth term representing Missouri’s 5th District, which includes the Kansas City Plant where the National Nuclear Security Administration assembles and services the non-nuclear components of nuclear weapons. Cleaver faces Republican contender Jacob Turk: a software engineer who has unsuccessfully bid for Cleaver’s seat before.
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), the tightrope-walking Democratic incumbent, faces a real challenge from Republican candidate Josh Hawley, the state’s attorney general. Trump has stumped for Hawley, who — depending on the poll — is either neck and neck with, or just ahead of, McCaskill, with the finish line looming. McCaskill has a seat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, which makes annual authorizations for all NNSA facilities, including the Kansas City Plant. The committee also approves political nominees for senior NNSA leadership positions.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), of California’s 15th District, seeks a fourth term representing constituents including the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Swalwell faces Republican challenger Rudy Peters: a Navy veteran who is running on Trump’s platform, and even using Trump’s campaign slogan.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the state’s senior senator, is about as powerful a nuclear policy maker as California has on Capitol Hill. A skeptic of nuclear modernization who is open about her desire to curb nuclear weapons, Feinstein is the ranking member of the Senate Appropriations energy and water subcommittee that writes the Department of Energy’s annual spending bill. She is also polling ahead of her general election opponent, California state Sen. Kevin de León: a Democrat running to Feinstein’s left.
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Rep. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) seeks a sixth term representing the state’s 3rd Congressional District: the birthplace of the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal. He faces Republican challenger Jerald McFall for the usually Democratic seat. Luján serves on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, giving him some say in matters of congressional nuclear policy and oversight. However, the heavy lifting on nuclear policy is mostly handled in Washington by the state’s Senate delegation including…
Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), who seeks a second term and, according to a late-October poll by the Albuquerque Journal, had a big lead on Republican challenger Mick Rich and Libertarian Gary Johnson. Heinrich has a seat on the Armed Services Committee, which he used throughout Trump’s first term to press New Mexico’s nuclear priorities on the current senior leadership of the NNSA, including Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty.
Nevada National Security Site
Amid scandal, Rep. Ruben Kihuen (D-.Nev.) is not seeking a second term in the 4th District. He did not sit on any committees with jurisdiction over the NNSA and will be replaced by either Republican Cresent Hardy or Democrat Steven Horsford — or, just perhaps, one of the other four candidates in the race.
Pantex Plant
Several Texans in Congress have some meaningful connection to the NNSA’s main weapons-assembly and storage plant in Amarillo, Texas. But perhaps none have so clear a connection as Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas), who both represents the plant and writes laws that shape the future of the facility as chair of the House Armed Services Committee. Thornberry is seeking a 13th term in the 13th District, and while he may not lose his seat to Democratic challenger Greg Sagan, he may yet lose his Armed Services gavel.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), meanwhile, has been under seige in the national spotlight in his race with Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke. Polls and pundits say Cruz, seeking his second term, is pulling ahead of O’Rourke in a race that should be a slam dunk in a state that reliably puts Republicans in statewide offices. Cruz has been known to poke around in the Senate on Pantex’s and NNSA’s behalf. This year, he stepped into the debate over the National Defense Authorization Act for 2019 to keep the NNSA bureaucracy firmly attached to the Department of Energy. Language had appeared in the committee draft of that bill that would have great increased NNSA’s autonomy from its parent agency.
Sandia National Laboratories
Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-N.M.) won’t be back for New Mexico’s 1st House District next year. She is running for governor in New Mexico. That means the Albuquerque-based Sandia, styled as the engineering lab supporting the two major design nuclear weapons shops at the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories, will get a new representative this year: either Democrat Debra Haaland or Republican Janice Arnold-Jones. It’s a reliably Democratic district. Lujan Grisham did not sit on any committees with jurisdiction over the NNSA.
Savannah River Site
Rep. Joe Wilson (D-S.C.), seeking his ninth term in the 2nd District of South Carolina, has never had a competitive challenger for his reliably Republican seat, and he still does not. Should he return for another term, he’ll arrive with his seat belt buckled to continue the Palmetto State’s fight for the jobs and votes at the Savannah River Site’s Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility, construction of which NNSA officially canceled in October. Wilson is up against Democrat Sean Carrigan.
Y-12 National Security Complex
Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.) seeks a 5th term in the 3rd District. He is a reliable ally for the NNSA’s main uranium complex (even if he lacks the towering influence over the site commanded by Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), chair of the Senate appropriations panel that funds Y-12). Fleischmann clobbered his Democratic challenger in the 2016 race, and his district is reliably Republican. He faces Democrat Danielle Mitchell.
Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) is famously leaving Congress over his political differences with Trump. Corker chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and so has some peripheral influence over NNSA. However, he won’t leave any holes in committees that fund or write policy for the NNSA. Vying to replace Corker in the upper chamber are Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) from Tennessee’s seventh congressional district and former Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat. Blackburn is a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, so Tennessee would lose a vote there if she goes to the Senate as a freshman.
