Pearce Nuke Funding Measures Go Down
The Arms Control Wonk notes today that Rep. Steve Pearce's last ditch effort to restore some funding for a new nuclear warhead design has failed. Pearce, a Republican from New Mexico's southern congressoinal district, had introduced an amendment to the FY 2009 National Defense Authorization Act that would have restored $10 million for the Reliable Replacment Warhead (RRW).
The Bush Administration has been pushing RRW as way to update the nation's aging nuclear weapons arsenal with what it thinks will be a more reliable and secure design. RRW opponents say the program isn't necessary -- that the current stockpile is plenty reliable and that a new design undermines global nonproliferation efforts. Pearce, a vocal supporter of a strong nuclear deterrent, says the new design would allow the country to dismantle old bombs at a faster pace and would help reduce the size of the stockpile. But Congress has been hesitant to fund the program this year, as it waits to see how a new presidential administration might approach the country's nuclear weapons policy.
Pearce, by the way, was also behind another unsuccessful amendment this week that would have increased funding for plutonium pit manufacturing by $50 million. Pits are the radioactive cores of modern nuclear weapons, and they're produced at Los Alamos National Laboratory, home to thousands of workers whom Pearce is courting in his bid for U.S. Senate.
Pearce's primary opponent Rep. Heather Wilson has been accusing Pearce of supporting efforts to cut LANL funding, a charge the Pearce camp calls distorted.
"He wants (LANL) to maintain its nuclear mission," Pearce spokesman Brian Phillips told the Independent Thursday.
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