Democrats, with their takeover of the House on Tuesday, are now positioned to rein in defense spending and create a headache for President Trump as he pursues a Space Force and controversial policies such as transgender service restrictions.
The new majority is also expected to turn the page on two years of Republican rule by naming Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., a staunch critic of the president and skeptic of big Pentagon budgets, the new House Armed Services Committee chairman next year.
This marks a major shift after leadership by Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, and the late Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., on Congress’ armed services committees, which led to major hikes in defense spending and big-ticket political wins for Trump.
Now, Democrats have the influence to redirect that spending, rethink Republican defense policies, and launch an array of hearings on administration policies that were marginalized during their time in the minority.
Shrinking defense budget
Even before the elections on Tuesday, signs were pointing to an end to the last two years of big Republican-led defense budgets. Empowerment of House Democrats could help cement it.
In a surprise move, President Trump ordered a $33 billion cut in national defense spending, from the planned level of $733 billion to $700 billion in fiscal 2020.
Democrats were already skeptical of past spending hikes, though were supportive of shoring up the depleted military services, and are eager to shift focus to domestic spending priorities such as infrastructure, healthcare, and education.
Smith has called this fiscal year’s $716 billion defense budget “too high” and warned that the money will not be available in the future due to recent tax cuts and a ballooning deficit.
“We are not in a fiscal position to have the size of defense budget that a lot of people envision when they start spinning out all of these nightmare scenarios about everything that we have to be prepared for,” Smith said during a defense conference in September.
Trump’s order to slash $33 billion from the 2020 budget could dovetail with the Democrats’ urge to rein in spending.
“With Democrat control of the House, there will be much less pressure on the president to increase defense spending. Congress, I think, played a very strong and even decisive role in influencing the president to increase the defense budget as aggressively as he did in the last cycle,” said Andrew Hunter, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Space Force
The House shift also comes just as the Trump administration is set to send a proposal to Congress in February for the creation of the new Space Force military branch, which has become one of the president’s signature proposals and potentially the first new service branch since the Air Force was created in 1947.
Now, the president’s plan could become a ripe target for Democrats.
“Space Force is the victim of having been an idea advanced by President Trump, so I don’t even know that it will get a real hearing on the merits in the House,” said Thomas Spoehr, the director of the Center for National Defense at the Heritage Foundation.
The Pentagon will need legislation to create the new service branch that falls under the purview of the House Armed Services Committee, which had been a driving force behind a space service under Republican leadership.
Smith opposes the new service and has said he questions the cost, which could run into the billions of dollars, and the need for segregated space operations. Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson estimated the price tag to be $13 billion, but many have questioned the figure.
“A lot of it will be on the basis of cost. Even a lot of the people who are advocates for doing a Space Force are concerned that the way the department goes about creating another service could kind of ‘gold-plate’ the idea and lead to something that is too costly and beyond what is needed,” Hunter said.
Oversight and hearings
Despite the new majority, House Democrats must still work with the Senate to pass any new defense policy. That means many are ready to focus on something they can do on their own: oversight hearings and investigations into Trump and his administration.
“On oversight they can really make a mark, because that doesn’t require anyone to go along with them, they can just do it on their own,” said Kurt Couchman, the vice president of public policy at the Defense Priorities think tank.
A proposed policy by Trump and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis barring many transgender people from serving in the military could among the hearing targets.
Democrats are eyeing protections in LGBTQ rights and are interested in how Mattis and the Pentagon wrote the transgender policy, which Trump originally ordered in tweets and medical associations have criticized as based on cherry-picked science.
“My guess is if there is a Chairman Smith there will be a hearing on that subject, people will be called to testify. I don’t see the House being able to do anything of substance about the policy as long as the Senate stays in Republican hands,” Spoehr said.
Democrats could also call hearings into Trump’s deployment of troops to the border as well as the thousands involved in operations around the globe.
“My sense is that Democrats as a whole are interested in looking at some of the overseas missions and seeing if there might be some savings there because they seem to be skeptical of the top line for military spending,” Couchman said. “I think we will see a lot of oversight into how much Afghanistan and Yemen and Syria are costing us, also Africa missions, and what the value is.”
