U.S. Senator David Perdue (R-GA) joined The Hugh Hewitt Show to discuss this year’s defense bill and his efforts to help students and teachers safely return to the classroom or virtually learn until the time is right.

Click here to listen.

Highlights:  

Democrats Decimated Readiness: “Georgia is very important to our military and our national defense. The last two Democratic presidents reduced spending in the military by 25%. We saw what Obama and Biden did in eight years. They decimated our readiness. In 2017, only 3 of our Army Brigade Combat Teams could go to fight that night. We’re trying to rebuild our military, but it’s going to take time because of the hole that Bill Clinton and Barack Obama and Joe Biden gave us.”  

Rebuilding Our Military: “This NDAA supports the National Defense Strategy and helps us continue to stand up to China. We need to build a space strategy, and we’re doing that. President Trump has now created the Space Force. We need to integrate our cyber networks. Third, we need to rebuild our Navy. Even if we hit our goal of 355 ships by 2034, we’ll still be at least 70 ships short of what China will have. As we sit here today, China has at least 50 more ships than we have, but it’s more draconian than that. China outsticks us because they were not part of INF so the ranges of some of their missiles are more advantageous than ours. We’re moving to correct all of that, but these are three big priorities of the current NDAA.” 

Back To School: “I believe these decisions ought to be made at the local level. My mom and dad were school teachers. I won’t second guess the local administrators who are deciding to do virtual learning. I’ve got a bill, the SCHOOL Act, that would help with PPE to protect teachers and students, provide best practices, get more data, and connect the health community with the education community.” 

All Hands On Deck: “This is a critical time. If we lose a year and a half for some of these children in the third and fourth grade who are not reading at grade level, many of them will not graduate from high school. I wrote an op-ed about Morehouse College and we call out what happens particularly with young Black boys who are not reading at grade level. We ought to have all hands on deck to help those young boys get to reading on-level, because we’re losing generations of Black men who can really help us turn the country around and be leaders of the next 50 years.”