[国会纪录卷163，第55（星期三，2017年3月29日）] [家] [第H2523]政治阶级和国家的其他扬声器临时。主席承认，从北卡罗莱纳州（巴德先生）5分钟的绅士。BUDD先生。议长先生，你可以把这个国家分为两类人，不是共和党和民主党，但在政治类和全国其他地区。政治课做得比以往更好。十一出美国最富有的县中的20个都在特区地铁区域。对于每一个美元的平均家庭收入特区，普通家庭在戴维县，我住的地方，赚取55美分。政治课是活的，做好自己。在另一方面，那些谁不面向政府 - 医生，汽车修理工，服务员，调酒师，工厂的工人 - 仍在盈利，他们也正是10年前。我不指出这一点的第一人，但我想谈谈这种动态在现实中如何发挥出来一个教科书式的范例。 I am referring to a recently announced $418 million arms deal between the U.S. and Kenya. It is for 12 airplanes that are essentially armed crop dusters. There is only one slight problem with the deal, the defense contractor that was chosen to fulfill the sale doesn't even make these type of airplanes. They have never done it before. In fact, there is an extra $130 million built into this deal to design a whole new airplane. IOMAX USA, a service-disabled, veteran-owned small business in my district, makes these airplanes. They have been doing it for 7 years. They have got 50 of these airplanes in the Middle East. These planes have dropped more than 4,000 bombs on ISIS. They are the only U.S. manufacturer of this type of aircraft. They were not even considered for the deal, which was awarded without competition. Nobody got a chance to bid. Nobody knew about it, except for the company that got it and the bureaucrats who were involved. That is how the D.C. area got so wealthy. If you know the right people and you have the right lobbyists, you get awards like this from the Federal Government without competition. It doesn't matter if you don't even make the product, they will give you some extra money to design it from scratch if you know the right people. IOMAX, a small business just like the millions of others in our country, doesn't have those connections. The giant defense contractor involved in this deal does, and so they get the money. Something is wrong with that picture. The problem lies with a secretive acquisition unit within the Air Force called Big Safari. Now, I don't say ``secretive'' lightly. At one point in 2013, Big Safari's commanding officer told a reporter: Don't be angry or upset when your Freedom of Information Act gets turned down; that is just they way we do business here at Big Safari. And the commander's words were true. I asked for information on this, and they turned me down saying that the information was sensitive, but unclassified, and for official use only. I asked them 19 questions, and they answered only four of them having to do with the very basic elements for the deal that were already public. Under that secrecy, Big Safari doles out billions in government contracts. I imagine it makes things convenient for when Big Safari employees go to work for the same companies to which they direct these large defense contracts, which we have found that they do with some regularity. You don't even have to go to a different building, in some instances. We have got a confirmed case of a Big Safari employee awarding a contract, quitting, and then going to work on the same program with the same company he has just given the contract to. The forgotten men in this equation are the employees of IOMAX, mostly veterans, mostly blue collar, who have to compete against a $13 billion defense contractor and a $4 trillion Federal Government that appears to have forgotten impartiality. We need to shine the light on this deal with congressional oversight, and we need to ask ourselves who exactly the Federal Government is supposed to be working for, the country or for the political class. Mr. Speaker, we need to fix this. It is a symptom of a very serious disease that our democracy cannot long survive. ____________________