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Floor Speech

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Mr. RUTHERFORD. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of Stauber amendment No. 83 that is in this en bloc.

This amendment would simply provide oversight over the DOD's management of religious and medical exemptions for the COVID-19 vaccine requirement.

At a time when we need every servicemember we can get, I am concerned that there are people being discharged from the military without full consideration of their religious or medical exemptions.

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Mr. RUTHERFORD. Mr. Speaker, it is past time for more transparency in the exemption process so we can ensure that our servicemembers' requests are being properly considered and fairly adjudicated.

While I don't think our servicemembers should be subject to the COVID-19 vaccine at all, the least we can do is bring transparency to the process of those who are seeking a legitimate exemption.

I thank Mr. Stauber for introducing this commonsense amendment and looking out for the best interests of our men and women in uniform.

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Mr. RUTHERFORD. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this amendment.

The Freedom-class littoral combat ships fill an important operational need in the Navy's fleet. We have invested billions in this program and decommissioning nine ships at the beginning of their service life is complete financial malpractice and takes away from important assets that can be used around the globe.

This amendment would have a direct negative impact on our national security.

The Chinese Communist Party plans to expand their fleet, which will reach 460 vessels by 2030. Meanwhile, in the same time period, the U.S. fleet will shrink to less than 300.

These ships aren't perfect, as was mentioned earlier; no new class of ship is. But scrapping these ships at less than half their average life cycle is like throwing away a dime to save a nickel.

Admiral Gumbleton himself said that the fix for these isn't an exorbitant amount of money. Why is it worth scrapping them entirely and throwing away billions of hard-earned taxpayer dollars?

The push to decommission these ships is a multimillion-dollar misstep. These ships are out in the fleet and they are executing missions in littoral waters, making our country safer--from helping the Coast Guard with drug interdiction in SOUTHCOM to maritime security operations in CENTCOM.

Mr. Speaker, a vote in favor of this amendment is a vote against national security, and I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this amendment.

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