Super Committee Members’ Staffers-Turned-Defense Lobbyists Fighting Against Military Spending Cuts

The service chiefs were on Capitol Hill today scaring members of Congress about the (baseless) dangers of further reducing America’s bloated military spending budget. But lawmakers, particularly on the Republican side, and their allies in the Obama administration, have already been campaigning against further cuts. But the real lobbying is coming from the defense industry. The National Journal reports that 22 of the super committee members’ former staffers are now defense industry lobbyists. And according to a new report, they “are using their clout to derail Pentagon cuts just weeks before the panel’s deadline to make its deficit-reduction suggestions to Congress.” The defense industry gave more than $1 million to the 12 members of the super committee over the last two election cycles, while “the industry as a whole spent $144 million on lobbying in 2010 and now employs 1,000 lobbyists.”