See below for video and highlights from Sen. Tim Kaine’s weekly press availability – which this week focused on Sen. Kaine’s deep concerns with the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) – and his intention to vote NO unless the “illegal and foolish” Iran war ends or Congress votes to authorize it. Also, Sen. Kaine referred to the “rebrand[ing]” of the Department of Defense as the “Department of War” a “juvenile move” by Trump et al. In addition to the NDAA, Sen. Kaine was asked about the budget impasse in Virginia (largely over tax breaks for data centers), and also about Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s firing of Virginia Tech Rector John Rocovich. Here are a few highlights (bolding added by me for emphasis) from what Sen. Kaine had to say on all of this.
- “… so there’s much good in the [FY2027 NDAA] bill. And usually the good in the bill makes a yes vote an easy call. But while I paid the compliment that this bill was developed in a business-as-usual frame, and that is a high compliment given the way we do business, we’re not living in usual times since we last did an NDAA…we have embarked upon a war against boats in the Eastern Pacific and Caribbean based in my view on very dubious legal justification…We launched a war to depose the Maduro regime in Venezuela, leaving the actual regime in place and blocking the Venezuelan opposition in terms of exercising their right rightful power to create a Venezuela for Venezuelans. And now we’re involved in a completely illegal war against Iran that I think will hit 100 days this weekend. A war that has cost the lives of US troops, hundreds injured, 14 dead, thousands of civilians killed, damage to US military installations and the installations of allied nations in the region. A war that was started without a clear plan or rationale, a war whose course has been backing and forthing based on presidential whims that seem to change every day, whether we’re in a ceasefire or on the verge of a deal or on the verge of renewing a bombing campaign. And this war is not only hurting our troops, but it’s dramatically affecting the global economy, making life much harder for our allies, making life much, much harder for American families who are paying higher gas costs, higher costs for other goods. American families were already stressed out by Donald Trump’s unilateral decision to impose tariffs on virtually everything. And now they’re stressed out by the president’s unilateral decision to declare a war. and all of these wars, the Caribbean and international water boat strikes and Venezuela and Iran and threatened wars against Greenland, Cuba, Mexico, Colombia, and who knows where else depending on the president’s mood tomorrow have been without congressional support that’s required by the constitution.
- “And you can read through the entire NDAA this year and and like almost not be aware that any of that is happening. And my deep worry is that this is an NDAA that kind of ignores the reality that is driving so much economic pain, but also challenge to our troops right now, which is a president who has grown intoxicated by the notion that he can start wars while bypassing Congress and a Congress that has so far been subservient and allowed its powers to be eviscerated. That should have been a core component of this NDAA. But frankly, I worry that the NDAA not only ignores it or turns a blind eye to it and doesn’t really deal with it, but may even further it. Why do I say that? The first is just the sheer amount of defense spending. Last year, the NDAA authorized spending up to about $850 billion. This bill was pitched at $1.15 trillion, but with the administration saying, that’s not all, We’re going to send a $350 billion reconciliation package to you. So, the real way to think about this bill is it is the on-ramp to a $1.5 trillion defense budget. And the administration has also indicated that they intend to send a supplemental defense bill to fund the war in Iran or replenish what’s been depleted because of the war in Iran that could also amount to hundreds of billions of dollars. And so you begin with the White House is deciding it can exercise war, the most solemn power a nation has without Congress. And Congress has been unwilling to check that impulse. and now is going to essentially write a blank check to an administration that has shown no interest in consulting with Congress on the most critical matters of war, peace, and diplomacy that the Constitution put upon the shoulders of Congress to play key roles in making the decisions that are the right decisions for the country.”
- “There were efforts made in committee to fence off funds for Iran and not allow them to be used unless Congress authorizes the war. That amendment failed. There were efforts made to reduce the topline funding by something that might be the equivalent of what we’ve spent in Iran thus far. That effort failed. There were efforts made to require some notification of Congress of what the actual costs of the war in Iran have been thus far. Those amendments failed. There were other amendments to try to check executive abuses of the US military power. For example, that the US military should not be able to be deployed to election sites during critical elections. Those amendments failed. And so we end up with an NDAA that while it has much good in it, and if it were written a year ago, you know, might have gotten an overwhelming bipartisan vote, this NDAA occurring in the midst of at least three different military challenges… wars that have not been authorized to in the middle of that put even more funds in the hands of this president strikes me as deeply unwise, at least without some checks on executive power that the SASC was unable to include.”
- “In some ways, the most telling thing about the NDAA as it comes out of committee is a detail that might seem like a small thing, but sometimes small details really tell the whole story. And that was an amendment that was offered uh at the end of our deliberations yesterday to change the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War. It was interesting. The amendment was offered and unlike other amendments that get offered, nobody really wanted to speak about it. Just here’s the amendment. Let’s have a roll call vote. But I spoke about it and I told the SASC committee members about the history of why the Pentagon is called the Department of Defense. The United States, like most other nations, had secretaries of war or ministers of war into the 20th century; in the aftermath of the devastation of World War II, President Harry Truman, who had seen action as an army officer in World War I, bloody battle action that that seared on his brain the realities of the horrors of war and who then had to make some of the most consequential decisions about war that have ever been made by a US president, including the use of the atomic weapons in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end the war with Japan, he and Congress in 1947 looked at that devastation and they said, you know, war should not be the goal of the United States military. Defense of the nation should be, along the line of the oath that everybody takes who wears the uniform of the United States to support and defend the Constitution of United States. People sign up to defend this nation. One of my kids volunteered to defend this nation. They don’t sign up to go to war. They sign up to defend the nation, to defend our people, to defend our values, to defend our allies. And that defense often requires war, not as the preferred option, but as the necessary option. And when that is required, we have to be the best at it and prepare our troops to succeed. But war isn’t the goal. And so, President Truman and Congress wisely decided to switch the name of the Secretary of War and the war apparatus to a defense apparatus. And guess what happened when the United States made that move in 1947? It led to a a sea change around the world and other nations did the same thing. Our allies, the United Kingdom and France, switched their ministries from war to defense. Our then adversaries. Japan and Germany, switched their ministries from war to defense. Even nations we consider adversaries today – Iran, China, Russia, North Korea – have agencies that manage their military that are titled as defense agencies, not war agencies. There’s no nation in the world now that calls the agency that manages its military a war department or a war cabinet or, you know, a war agency. Nobody does it. Brazil was the last nation to abandon that arcane tradition in 1999. And yet now the United States, if this SASC provision becomes law, there’s a similar provision that’s passed the Republican majority on the House side through the HASC committee, we will stand unique in the world as the nation that uses the descriptor war to describe the agency that manages our military. I think that’s juvenile. I think it’s embarrassing. I think it is a desire to appeal to an adolescent fantasy of this president and this secretary of defense. I don’t think it is a wise decision in the least. And in fact, if we woke up tomorrow and the newspaper said the nation of China was changing its defense ministry to a war ministry, we would have serious concerns about their intent. And other nations around the world will see this change and will have even deepening concerns. They already have deep concerns. They’ll have even deepening concerns about the direction of this nation. We should not send the signal that the United States prefers war. We have a seal of this country that has an American eagle on it, a bald eagle, and the bald eagle has the lightning bolts of war in one claw and the laurel branches of peace and diplomacy in the other. And that eagle’s face is always directed toward the laurel branches to signify that we are strong and we have might and we have power, but we prefer diplomacy. We reserve the right to use our military might should we need to, but that’s not our preference. Nations will use this against us in propaganda. I can only imagine Russia and China going to nations and continents like Africa and the Americas where the population is growing very fast and there’s a competition between the United States and China to develop partners and allies and to have influence. Our adversaries will use this to paint a picture of the United States that I don’t believe is an accurate picture. And yet, I guess I’m forced to conclude that is at least it is at least an accurate picture of this president. The president claimed that he would bring an end to war, that others were interested in forever wars and he would stop wars and bring it into it. And instead what we’ve seen is a president who has grown intoxicated by war. And he’s not the first in the history of this country or of this world. He’s not the first president, king, monarch, emperor, ruler who grows intoxicated by war. That tendency of executives was noted by the framers like Madison and Jefferson at the time the constitution was drawn up and that’s why they put the power of war in the hands of Congress. That tendency has was remarked upon by Abraham Lincoln. The tendency was remarked upon by Dwight Eisenhower. There can be a creeping extension of power by an executive to seize more and more power in all areas, including in the power to wage war. That’s one of the reasons that years ago, our forefathers decided to cast off tyranny and embrace a democratic form of government with checks and balances and counted upon counted upon Congress, the first branch, to provide that check and balance against presidents who grow too intoxicated with their own power. That is a grave, grave threat to this country. And the NDAA that has just been passed out of the Senate Armed Services Committee, for all the good it contains, has turned a blind eye to that threat and in some ways through this excess funding and the renaming of the department, has even increased the threat. And for that reason, with deep regret, I voted against the bill. and when it’s on the floor, we’ll try to convince my colleagues to do the same.”
- “…for me, [the Virginia budget dispute/stalemate] is bringing back my own first session as governor 20 years ago. I mean, it is pretty amazing. 20 years ago, my two Republican houses didn’t agree on a budget until I think it was the 27th or 28th of June and I was prepared to run government anyway and my attorney general Bob McDonnell was saying, ‘governor, you can’t run government anyway.’ Many of the same arguments that I hear being made now were being made then. My gut told me that my two houses would figure it out. Not least of which because they didn’t want the governor riding in on a white horse and saving a situation when they couldn’t do their job. And my gut tells me about this dilemma that there are some important issues at stake, I’m not saying there aren’t, but when you’re dealing with budgets, you are dealing with numbers. And when you’re dealing with numbers, you’re often also dealing with things where you can split the difference or find a middle path. And so it’s serious, but I have a high degree of confidence that there will be a budget on time.”
- “The data center issues sort of started right at the end of my term and some of the data data center tax exemptions have been added to over the years and the projection about what they would cost has grown, because who would have predicted the explosion of this industry sector? No one was predicting in 2006 and nobody I think could have predicted that Virginia would have monopolized so much. I mean, we’re the global leader in this. But again, when you’re dealing with with things like tax exemptions and numbers, you’re seldom dealing with an all or nothing proposition. It strikes me that there is some compromise there between the two house positions. And you’ve got you’ve got some tough negotiators on each side within this Democratic leadership, but you also have some really savvy people who know how to find a deal.”
- “…over the weekend I sort of grappled with that cognitive dissonance between a process that seemed like business as usual but a reality about the president’s use of the American military, his refusal to say he wouldn’t use troops to deploy to polling places on election day. And I just concluded that there was too big a gap between opposing illegal wars and wanting to stop them and supporting an authorizing bill that would dramatically increase a budget to the very Pentagon that the president is using to carry out what I believe are unlawful actions.”
- “…I worry about a trend that says, well, you know, let’s just put more and more of it in a reconciliation bill that can be done by the majority without minority input and bypass the appropriations process altogether. We started down this path last year. This takes it to a different level. And it is a trend that I think we should nip in the bud by requiring this stuff to be part of the defense appropriations bill and not separate in a reconciliation package.”
- “If by the time we get to this bill on the floor, and I mean, for me, the hardest thing to swallow was doing this big increase to the Pentagon when we’re in the middle of illegal wars. If by the time you get to floor action, either on a Senate bill or on a conference report, the Iran war is over or Congress has acted to authorize it, my calculation might be a little bit different.”
- “I haven’t spoken with the governor about either the action [the firing of VA Tech Rector John Rocovich] or the lawsuit [by Rocovich against Gov. Spanberger]. I was concerned about the circumstances of President Sands’ retirement announcement and particularly concerned, my main concern was some initial reports that there was going to be a rush job to find the next president of Virginia Tech, which in my view would have been a horrible mistake. This is such an important institution to the Commonwealth and since Tim Sands has said he would stay on until the search was done, why rush a search? Take the time to do the search and get it right. But after expressing those initial concerns, the board considered the timing and decided that they would take the time to do the search the right way. And at that point, I was glad to hear that. So, I have no knowledge about the decision with respect to the former Rector, but I do know that the statute in Virginia gives the governor pretty much unilateral power to make decisions such as this.”
- “I’m a Democrat who is a very pro-military Democrat. I come from one of the most pro-military states in this country in terms of who our population is. I don’t know of another state that has as per capita a connection to active guard reserve, DoD civilian, DoD contractor, military family veteran. I mean, Virginia is so connected to our military. And look, I was a governor for four years and was having to preside over an awful lot of deployments of my Virginia Guard into Iraq and Afghanistan. And I went to too many funerals and too many wakes and I went to deployments and I went to homecomings where the leader of the unit could not say all present and accounted for when they came home and sometimes when they could. That was the emotional moment of the homecoming. I don’t think Virginians are different than Americans on this. We honor our troops and we believe that they are always going to do their very best and we’re proud of their service. But where where we’ve fallen short as a nation is when our troops get really betrayed by poor civilian decisionmaking to take over the failed French colonial project in Southeast Asia from the French…That wasn’t the troops making that decision, it was the nation’s civilian leadership and our troops suffer to to blunder into a war in Iraq on the false pretenses that they had a WMD program. That was not the troops making a bad decision, that was civilian leadership making a bad decision. And we owe it to our oaths, to our constituents, but especially to the troops to not use them in wars that are based upon spurious rationales, on wars that are illegal. There’s no shortcut to getting this right. You got to do it the way the framers intended and have a congressional deliberation and have Congress put their thumb on the signature and sign up if we’re going to send our kids, our best and brightest, to risk their lives, you can’t shortcut it. And we now have a president who has said he was going to end forever wars who’s become so intoxicated with this, he doesn’t even make the pretense of coming to Congress, he just wants to bypass Congress and do it on his own. And I think we stand up for the right version of American strength when we try to check that abuse of power and we’re standing up for our troops and their families when we do that.”
KAINE STATEMENT ON COMMITTEE PASSAGE OF FISCAL YEAR 2027 NATIONAL DEFENSE BILL
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) and Ranking Member of the SASC Subcommittee on Seapower, released the following statement regarding SASC’s passage of the Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA):
“I’ve been on the Senate Armed Services Committee since 2013, and every year, I look forward to working with my colleagues to craft an annual defense bill that supports those in uniform and protects our national security. There’s a lot of good in this year’s legislation—including provisions I pushed for to give our servicemembers a raise, upgrade Virginia’s military installations, invest in shipbuilding, and strengthen the AUKUS agreement. But I can’t in good conscience vote to advance a bill that helps clear the way for over $1.5 trillion in Pentagon funding at a time when the Trump-Vance Administration is waging an illegal and foolish war in the Middle East that is hurting our servicemembers and crushing Americans at the pump. Rather than taking steps to end this deeply unpopular war, this bill rebrands the Department of Defense as the Department of War, a juvenile move that sadly describes the reality of a President who has abandoned meaningful diplomacy in favor of starting doubtful wars in multiple locations and threatening even more. As glad as I am about portions of this bill, I remain laser-focused on ending the Iran War, not rewarding the Pentagon by authorizing a blank check for more of it. Unless this war ends, or Congress votes to authorize it, I will remain a ‘no’ on this legislation when it comes before the full Senate for a vote.”
