WASHINGTON — Missing from the statement by the US Senate's top defense appropriator about the White House's budget request was any mention of increasing defense spending.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., also will chair the panel's Defense subcommittee. But, like Senate Budget Committee Chairman Sen. Mike Enzi, Cochran has been mum about a coming fight within their caucus over about military spending.
The defense hawks want to raise spending caps to give the Pentagon more money. The fiscal hawks want to keep those caps in place to hold the line one federal deficit reduction.
Complete coverage of the fiscal 2016 budget request
Cochran is an old bull and yields ample power within the GOP caucus.
When his office issued his first official take on President Barack Obama's 2016 federal spending plan, including a $585 billion Pentagon spending plan, Cochran hewed close to party leaders' themes.
He issued no call for raising the defense caps.
"The president has the right to propose all manner of new spending and tax increases in his budget request, but I think a Republican-led Congress will insist on greater budget discipline," Cochran said.
"Our country remains in a perilous fiscal situation, with debt levels projected to continue to rise to historic highs," he said. "The president's budget does not address that fact, and would actually increase our debt by trillions of dollars over the next 10 years."
