Election Results: Passed
Approve: 95
Disapprove: 2
Abstain: 2
Calling on the U.S. Congress to Significantly Decrease the Funding for Department of Defense and to Use those Funds for Social Welfare and Combating the Climate Crisis
Whereas, Martin Luther King Jr. stated in his April 4, 1967, address, “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death,” and
Whereas, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Sixth Assessment Report (2023) states that limiting global heating to 1.5 o C will involve rapid, deep and in most cases immediate greenhouse gas emission reductions, and
Whereas, a National Priorities Project study shows a $100 billion Pentagon cut could pay for:
- Funding the clean energy and child care provisions of President Biden's Build Back Better initiative
- Powering every household in the United States with solar energy
- Hiring one million elementary school teachers amid a worsening teacher shortage, and
Whereas, the Poor People’s Campaign declares $350 billion in annual military spending cuts would make the nation and the world more secure, and
Whereas, a $350 billion cut in National Defense Authorization Act for FY2024 would still leave the Department of Defense with more funds than China and Russia combined;
Therefore, be it Resolved, that Veterans For Peace calls on the U.S. Congress to reduce funding levels to Department of Defense programs by $100 billion to $350 billion taking into consideration the findings and recommendations contained in the 2021 Congressional Budget Office report ‘‘Illustrative Options for National Defense Under a Smaller Defense Budget’’; and to use those funds for social welfare and combating the climate crisis.
Submitted by:
Gary Butterfield, VFP Chapter 91 – San Diego
garyvfp@gmail.com
Co-sponsored by VFP Climate Crisis & Militarism Project
https://www.veteransforpeace.org/take-action/climatecrisis