Washington, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock (D-GA) is joining a bipartisan push to modernize and upgrade barracks on military bases across the country. In a letter to the Department of Defense (DoD), Senator Warnock joined Senators Jon Ossoff (D-GA), John Cornyn (R-TX), Marco Rubio (R-FL), and Ted Cruz (R-TX) in pressing the Department to increase armed service funding requests to upgrade barracks on military bases across the country. The Senators also asked the DoD to commit to greater transparency on steps they are taking to improve decrepit infrastructure, which affects military readiness and quality of life for servicemembers. The letter comes in response to a U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that found dangerous living conditions including clogged showers, mold growth, and a lack of hot water in barracks, and other physical and mental health risks for servicemembers.
“Those who have already answered the call to serve deserve a standard of living commensurate with the most modern and capable fighting force in the world,” the Senators wrote. “Anything less represents a failure to uphold the U.S. government’s commitments and endangers military readiness.”
Senator Warnock has long been a leading advocate in the Senate for Georgia’s servicemembers and military families. This summer, Senator Warnock introduced a bipartisan bill that will help servicemembers across Georgia and the country obtain sufficient and affordable housing by restoring the full Basic Allowance for Housing (BAH) benefit. In 2021, Senator Warnock successfully included a bipartisan provision in the FY22 NDAA to direct the DoD to collect important data related to military spouse employment and the challenges they face. In 2022, Senator Warnock helped to pass the bipartisan PACT Act, the largest expansion of veterans’ health benefits in decades. He was also successful in securing multiple important wins for military families in the FY23 NDAA, including securing two of his provisions in the NDAA that will make housing more affordable for military families, easing the burden of relocation for military families and raising servicemember pay by 4.6%.
Click here to read the bipartisan inquiry.
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