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President-elect Joe Biden’s candidate for Secretary of Defense, retired General Lloyd Austin, will sit for his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday, but he will have to overcome another hurdle to secure the post – a waiver which allows recently retired soldiers to lead the Department of Defense.
Current law requires a civilian to serve as Secretary of Defense – meaning a candidate who has served must have retired at least seven years before taking the post, unless Congress accepts a waiver of this requirement. A number of Democrats have indicated they would agree to such a waiver, although they objected to doing the same for President Trump’s First Secretary of Defense, General James Mattis.
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“The threat to homeland security that the United States currently faces is serious. We need a Defense Secretary on the job immediately,” Senator Chris Murphy, D-Conn tweeted Monday. “I will vote to confirm Lloyd Austin and grant him a waiver, and I urge other senators to do the same.”
Murphy admitted he opposed a waiver for Mattis and defended the change in stance, saying Austin’s prompt confirmation was needed due to “homeland security” threats.
Murphy also claimed that a waiver for Mattis was problematic for him because President Trump and his new Secretary of State Rex Tillerson lacked experience and he did not trust National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.
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“A DoD general was particularly worrying under Trump,” Murphy said. “Trump had no foreign policy experience, a penchant for glorifying violence, a total neophyte Secretary of State, and an unstable, hawkish former general as an NSA.”
Murphy went on to say the situation was now “different” under Biden, due to his extensive government experience and the diplomatic experience of several of his Cabinet picks.
The Connecticut senator was not alone in opposing a waiver for Mattis, but now publicly supports one for Austin. The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., Also feels the current situation differently.
“Today I sent a letter to all of my fellow Democrats in the House urging them to vote in favor of granting Defense Secretary-designate @LloydAustin the waiver needed to complete his historic confirmation,” he said. Smith tweeted.
Smith’s opposition to Mattis’ waiver, however, was in large part due to its broad nature – he did not specifically name Mattis – and the fact that Mattis did not sit at a hearing on the matter.
“If we don’t defend ourselves now, countless numbers of us are going to be overthrown,” Smith said at the time, according to Politico.
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“We all want to support General Mattis. We want this bipartisan vote,” he continued. “The way to get this vote is to do what we said we were going to do and have it appear before the Armed Services Committee.”
Austin is due to appear before Smith’s committee on Thursday.
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