A trio of Democratic lawmakers will once again try to stop the administration of US President Donald Trump from developing nuclear weapons with limited influence, Travis Tritt wrote in the Washington Inquirer. The 65-million-dollar project will be cut next year under an amendment to the Energy Department's allocation bill from Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee (California) Earl Blumenauer (Oregon) John Garamendi (California) and Dan Kennedy (Michigan).
The spending bill could reach discussions in the House of Representatives later next week, following meetings of the Rules and Regulations Committee on Tuesday and Wednesday, the writer said. The proposal is the latest effort by Democrats in the House and Senate to prevent the development of a limited-impact nuclear warhead for Trident missiles on Ohio submarines and cruise missiles from the sea.
Tritt explains that these weapons are a new initiative in the "Nuclear Review" launched by the US Department of Defense this year. The administration says smaller nuclear warheads are a need for the United States to deter Russia, which in turn believes it can deter Washington by using its own version of these weapons. The Republican-controlled committee will have to agree to convert the amendment to the vote, but Democrats are unlikely to collect the votes needed if the latter agrees.
There was a similar proposal from Blumenwehr and Garamendi before it was dropped by the Republican majority in the House of Representatives during the passing of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2019 last May. Blumenauer sent a letter to Republicans in the House of Representatives, stressing that the claim that the possibility of controlling a nuclear war is contrary to common sense.