Mitt Romney photo

Romney Campaign Press Release - Sen. Jim Talent: Obama's Potential Defense Cuts Are "Irresponsible"

July 12, 2012

"The President signed and supported cuts in the defense budget of close to a trillion dollars that his own Secretary of Defense has said—we're talking about Leon Panetta, here—are devastating to the military and equivalent to shooting ourselves in the head. This was done with no strategic analysis of the needs of national security and no plan for how to implement the cuts. Even now we don't know the details of how the cuts are going to be implemented. We do know that they're planning to cut 200,000 troops. Given the state of the economy, it's equivalent to laying them off and the military is sending them to the unemployment lines." — Former Senator Jim Talent

"Welcome To Virginia President Obama" Press Conference Call

July 12, 2012

Click Here To Listen To The Entire Call

Highlights From The "Welcome To Virginia President Obama" Press Conference Call:

FORMER SEN. JIM TALENT: "The context of this is that in the last year the President signed and supported cuts in the defense budget of close to a trillion dollars that his own Secretary of Defense has said—we're talking about Leon Panetta, here—are devastating to the military and equivalent to shooting ourselves in the head. This was done with no strategic analysis of the needs of national security and no plan for how to implement the cuts. Even now we don't know the details of how the cuts are going to be implemented. We do know that they're planning to cut 200,000 troops. Given the state of the economy, it's equivalent to laying them off and the military is sending them to the unemployment lines. These are the men and women who have defended this country and, again, with no analysis that the needs of national security allow for this or call for this, and at a time when Iran is making progress towards a nuclear weapon, Syria is in the middle of a civil war, Chinese power is surging, we have men and women fighting and putting their lives at risk in the field in Afghanistan. So in all my years in and around Washington, it's the most irresponsible thing a Commander-in-Chief has done."

REP. RANDY FORBES: "So if you look at it from an economic point of view, this is something that is going to have an enormous, devastating blow on Virginia, especially in northern Virginia and in the Hampton Roads area. Final thing, Senator, as you know, this not just about individuals in the military, although 200,000 or so of them are going to get these pink slips. It's not just about defense contractors, which is going to be huge for them because these pink slips are going to start going out in October from a lot of these defense contractors. But it also is going to have a huge impact on beauty salons, restaurants, car dealers, the entire economy as you have this unstable situation that's there. That's why we're hoping in November we're going to get a Commander-in-Chief that's going to say 'we're going to stop this from taking place.'"

FORMER NAVY SECRETARY JOHN LEHMAN: "Somebody's got to bring some common sense because the damage, the long-term damage to the service's readiness, to the business base, to the employment is just going to be devastating." 

Mitt Romney, Romney Campaign Press Release - Sen. Jim Talent: Obama's Potential Defense Cuts Are "Irresponsible" Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/301810

Simple Search of Our Archives