GOP Defense Bill

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-CA) and other GOP colleagues today held a press conference to promote H.R. 3662, which they have named the "Down Payment To Protect National Security Act." The bill would delay sequestration by one year while also slashing the federal workforce by 10 percent over a decade, McKeon said, noting Defense Department civilians would not be exempt.

The workforce cuts would save $127 billion, enabling the Pentagon to avoid $55 billion in cuts while also sparing non-defense discretionary accounts from $55 billion in cuts and gleaning $17 billion for deficit reduction, according to McKeon. No Democrats have signed up to back the bill, he said, noting this is unlikely to happen given the president's threat to veto legislation that stops sequestration without slashing the federal deficit by $1.2 trillion.

The administration maintains that Congress "cannot simply turn off the sequester mechanism, but instead must pass deficit reduction at least equal to the $1.2 trillion it was charged to pass under the Budget Control Act," Defense Secretary Leon Panetta noted last month.