Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, is making good on his proposal to slash billions in spending from Pentagon support agencies.
The latest version of the House Armed Services Committee’s annual defense authorization bill released Friday includes his push for a 25 percent reduction in Pentagon spending on services such as contracting and property management. The money will come from about $100 billion in annual funding for 28 defense support agencies and field activities.
The Armed Services chairman floated his proposal to reform the Pentagon’s so-called Fourth Estate, which employs hundreds of thousands of workers, as draft legislation last month, and it was greeted with skepticism from experts and opposition from a federal union.
“These reforms focus on a collection of Defense agencies that are not part of a military service and do not report directly to the secretary of defense,” according to a House Armed Services summary of the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act released Friday.
The Fourth Estate accounts for 20 percent of the Pentagon’s overall budget and 25 percent of its workforce.
Thornberry wants the reduction by 2021 in logistics, human resources, services contracting, and real property management. His plan would also eliminate some agencies altogether, including the Washington Headquarters Service.
Deputy Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan recently said he is aligned with Thornberry on the need for reforms, but said he is focused on making the existing agencies and support activities more efficient.
But former Pentagon managers testified to the Armed Services Committee that a 25 percent reduction to the total $100 billion Fourth Estate budget was unrealistic because much of the funding goes to important programs such as missile defense or politically sensitive programs such as military schools.
The American Federation of Government Employees, 270,000 Defense Department workers, urged Thornberry to abandon the cuts and instead opt for regular reviews of the programs.
The NDAA summary released Friday shows the bill would require the Pentagon to justify the usefulness of Fourth Estate programs every five years or eliminate them.
