“I want my colleagues to vote against this amendment. It bans transgender Americans from serving in the military. There is no proof that transgender troops hurt the military, and our armed forces are strongest when anyone qualified can serve.”

“Madam Chair, this amendment would codify President Trump’s executive order banning transgender Americans from serving in the United States military. Since that order came down, the military branches have forced out Americans who have served their country bravely and honorably, leaving entire professional careers behind and gaps in the units and chains of command they once held together. This amendment would codify that exclusion into law. There are no grounds to exclude trans people from the military except for hatred, prejudice, and bigotry. There is no evidence that having transgender troops negatively impacts military readiness. Our military is strongest when every qualified servicemember is able to serve. Who are we as a country when strong, qualified, patriotic candidates who want to serve their country are turned away simply because of ignorant legislating? The American people want Congress to support our servicemembers, not waste time rooting out the ones they want to use as political pawns. I urge my colleagues to vote against this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.”

“I oppose this amendment. Transgender people already serve in the military, and studies show they do not harm readiness. Kicking out qualified troops wastes money and hurts our armed forces.”

“Madam Chair, it seems like my colleague on the other side of the aisle has just as little understanding of parliamentary procedure as she has understanding of military readiness. This amendment is a waste of time. The trans military already exists. This executive order is already in effect. So what does this amendment actually do? It makes discrimination permanent. RAND and the Pentagon have already studied this. They concluded that allowing trans Americans to serve openly doesn’t hurt unit cohesion, operational effectiveness, or readiness. Commanders said it made their force stronger. Do you know what actually hurts readiness? Kicking out trans servicemembers despite their stellar performance and discharging people we have spent time, money, and resources training because of who they are, not how they performed. That costs money. That hurts readiness. Secretary Hegseth loves talking about the importance of meritocracy in the military, but kicking out qualified people because he doesn’t like their identity is the exact opposite of meritocracy. If you are really cynical and think that trans people only serve to get their healthcare paid for, you would be wrong. The Pentagon spent 6,400 times more on trans servicemembers’ career development than on their healthcare. One of the trans servicemembers I met told me that their most costly procedure was for their shoulder reconstruction after being injured in the line of duty. For the record, shoulder reconstruction has nothing to do with being trans. Here is the double standard at the heart of this amendment. Hormone therapy is standard, evidence-based care. They just made a whole new policy about it.”

“I want the House to vote against this amendment. Transgender people should be allowed to serve in the military. The only thing that should matter is whether a person can do the job.”

“Madam Chair, I rise today in strong opposition to Representative Boebert’s amendment. I am proud to live in an Army town, and I am the only LGBTQ person to serve on the House Committee on Armed Services. I find it outrageous that this Commander in Chief and his loyalists want to kick true Americans out of the military for a reason that does not pertain to a person’s capability as an effective soldier, sailor, airman, or marine--all because they think there is something inferior or less than if you are trans. We know what happens in our country when we lose the most qualified members. We saw it during Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. LGBTQ servicemembers are critical and essential to our Armed Forces. When any American is called to serve our country, there should be no requirements other than can you do the job and exceed the expectation. I really don’t understand how you can justify this. On one side, hiring should only be by merit, but then on the other side of your mouth, you only want harmful restrictions on those who are highly qualified for the work. One of the greatest things about being American is being one of many. In 250 years, we know the value of our country is marked by the service and the sacrifices of those who came before. Playing politics isn’t just cruel because it discriminates. It is cruel because it puts other servicemembers at risk. I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment because all Americans who serve should be able to serve with dignity, respect, and our Nation’s thanks.”

“I want my colleagues to vote against this amendment. Transgender troops are fit to serve, and they have kept our country safe.”

“Madam Chair, let me conclude by saying that trans servicemembers are honorable. Trans servicemembers are truthful. Trans members are disciplined. Trans members are heroic. Trans members have sacrificed for our country. They are physically and mentally fit to serve and have made America safer. Madam Chair, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no’’ on this amendment. I yield back the balance of my time.”

“I oppose this defense bill and will ask the House to send it back to committee. It spends too much money on the war with Iran. I want to stop all funding for this war and spend that money helping Americans with their daily living costs instead.”

“Madam Chair, I thank our esteemed ranking member for his leadership. I am here to speak in strong opposition to the entire bill, but I do have to say: To see folks who have never worn the uniform on this House floor try to fight culture-war BS when we are in the middle of an actual war is a grave, grave disservice to those in uniform. My opposition to this bill is deeply personal. It is personal to me. Having served 27 months in combat in Iraq, I watched us double down on a losing strategy year after year while my friends and fellow soldiers, many of whose names are on this memorial bracelet I wear, fought and died. It is personal to the now 18 families who lost their loved ones in this reckless war in Iran--sons, daughters, husbands, wives, somebody’s whole world. It is personal to the hundreds more wounded, many carrying injuries that will last their entire lives from this war. It is personal to the American people, people who are working hard, doing everything that they are asked, while watching the cost of their gas, their groceries, and their utility bills skyrocket; watching the President and Hegseth spend over $100 billion of their hard-earned taxpayer dollars while they continue to flail and fail. Now they are trying to ask for another $1.5 trillion of my constituents’--our constituents’ taxpayer dollars to double down on this reckless, ill-conceived war. This is a straight-up betrayal from a President, by the way, who promised to end wars, not start wars; a President who has never spent a single day in uniform but is more than willing to send other people’s kids to fight in his wars; a President who is now blatantly disregarding the widely held will of the American people and the bipartisan view of this Congress as recognizing the successful passage of a War Powers Resolution by escalating this war rather than winding it down. We can’t let that happen. On behalf of all of our constituents, on behalf of the American people, we have to stop throwing good money after bad. We have to stop repeating the mistakes of the forever wars that my generation fought and served in. That is why I have been fighting to include my No Funds for Iran War Act in this NDAA, to make sure we don’t spend a single penny more on this reckless forever war in the Middle East; to make sure we are investing here at home to lower housing costs, lower grocery costs, lower utility costs, and lower healthcare costs. That is what the American people want. That is what I am fighting for, and that is what my colleagues here are fighting for. Unfortunately, Mr. Chair, since the majority has refused to include my provision in this bill, I do plan to offer a motion to recommit this bill back to committee, and I urge my colleagues to support it. Mr. Chair, I include in the Record the text of my amendment.”

“I want the House to pass this legislation. The Constitution gives Congress, not the president alone, the power to send our country to war.”

“Mr. Chair, truly, especially to my colleagues of both parties who have worn the uniform of this country, it is foundational and enshrined in our Constitution that it is this body that has say, not a single, unitary executive, to send us to war. This legislation is common sense and bipartisan. I urge my colleagues to support it.”

“I want people to vote against this amendment. It stops military healthcare from covering gender-affirming care for servicemembers and their families. Denying families this healthcare hurts our military readiness and will cause people to leave the military.”

“Mr. Chair, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. This amendment bans gender-affirming care for servicemembers and their dependents under TRICARE. Recently, the Secretary of Defense just came out in support of gender-affirming care for our male servicemembers by providing the testosterone testing and treatment for those who need it. The DOD Secretary and Republicans have already canceled health coverage for less than 1 percent of the population within the Department of Defense. The Secretary is currently kicking out transgender servicemembers, and now this cruel amendment is targeting dependents of servicemembers who are receiving hormone therapy and mental health counseling for gender dysphoria. Dependents not receiving adequate healthcare is a factor pushing people to separate from the military. This culture war ideology amendment can result in a readiness gap issue. I strongly oppose this amendment and urge my colleagues to vote ``no.’’ I reserve the balance of my time.”

“I urge my colleagues to vote no on this amendment. It bans mental health care for transgender children. This will force service members to leave the military to protect their kids, which hurts our military readiness.”

“Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to this amendment. Once again, my Republican colleagues are moving forward with a sweeping ban on necessary healthcare, including mental health care for children. This isn’t about cost. This isn’t about force readiness. In fact, this amendment will harm our military’s force readiness. This amendment will force servicemembers out of the military either for their own sake or for the sake of their children since this amendment bans mental health care for trans children. There are and will be trans children born to military households. That is a fact. What parent would choose staying in their job if that means denying their child access to mental health care? This amendment makes it impossible for the military to retain servicemembers with trans children. This is an inhumane, wasteful, regressive amendment, and I urge my colleagues to vote ``no.’’”

“I oppose this amendment. Congress should not ban gender-affirming medical care for troops and their families. Doctors, not politicians, should make medical decisions.”

“Mr. Chair, I don’t believe that 435 Members of Congress should play pretend doctor and try to decide the medical care of servicemembers or their children that we have never met. In fact, even the physicians in this body know that there is a legal and ethical standard: that a doctor has to establish a patient-physician relationship, like an evaluation or an exam before prescribing care. None of us should be overriding the actual doctors who decide what kind of care is and isn’t necessary. For the record, every major medical association in this country, representing over 1.3 million American doctors, recognizes that trans healthcare and gender-affirming care is safe, effective, and medically necessary. Prescribing any kind of care, whether it is puberty blockers or hormones or anything else, doesn’t happen on a whim. It is after a rigorous, deliberate, multi-step physical and psychological evaluation by doctors. Here is the worst part about all this, the double standard at the heart of this amendment: Gender-affirming care is standard evidence- based care. In fact, the military relies on it for cisgender troops: troops with thyroid conditions, low testosterone, or other hormone needs. They just made a whole new policy about it. My colleague literally said: It is to make sure someone is more masculine. Making someone who is masculine more masculine is literally the definition of affirming one’s gender with gender-affirming care. The same medical treatment can’t strengthen readiness for a cis man and hurt readiness when a trans servicemember or our military families need it. A blanket ban on healthcare is a cruel punishment for kids. Denying them mental health care and therapy is especially disgusting when they are more likely to feel alone and isolated because of the vitriol they hear from people in this very body, people in power like my colleagues. We are better than this. Our troops are better than this. Our troops deserve better than this.”

“I oppose this amendment. Gender dysphoria is a real medical condition, and this amendment cruelly denies treatment to service members and their families.”

“Mr. Chair, gender dysphoria is real. It is a real diagnosis, and there is a treatment for it. Yet, our colleagues want to deny them. Both in this debate and in the previous debate, my colleagues have said gender dysphoria is a mental health issue, and it needs to be treated. Yet, they want to deny individuals, the dependents--family members of our servicemembers and those servicemembers--the treatment required in order to help and support them. I have a friend, because of this Nation’s policies, who is being forced--is leaving this country so that her daughter can go get the treatment that she can get in another country. This policy, this amendment, is cruel. It is meant to just basically root out a whole people that exist. You want to deny their existence. That is unfortunate, and it is cruel. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.”

“I want the House to vote against this amendment. It discriminates against military kids playing school sports. It would also hurt girls' privacy by forcing them to undergo invasive physical exams to prove their sex.”

“Mr. Chair, it is unfortunate that, once again, I am here fighting with my colleague from South Carolina to prevent her from injecting culture wars into our military. Let’s clear up a few things. This amendment isn’t about the Olympics. It isn’t about the World Cup. It isn’t even about college-level athletics. It is about discriminating against kids in preschool, from preschool to high school, whose parents are serving this country. These are kids who are trying to find a place where they fit in and belong, and this amendment makes them a political and physical target. Military kids change schools frequently due to their parents’ careers. They have mastered the art of saying good-bye to their new friends, their home, their routine because they do it so often. They have missed birthdays and holidays and milestones with their parent when they are deployed, and sometimes they have to grow up too soon, taking on additional responsibilities when one parent is away. We should be doing everything we can to make sure that these kids get to be kids. However, this amendment does the opposite. It politicizes kids who just want to play on a soccer team with their friends. My colleague talks a lot about men forcing their way into girls’ locker rooms. Well, this amendment actually is about forcing men into girls’ locker rooms. It actually makes young girls more vulnerable to the likes of Larry Nassar, who would celebrate a policy like this because it makes it easier to victimize little girls. Think about it: Actual predators will be happy about this amendment. It could force any girl, especially tall, muscular, or more masculine- presenting girls to have to undergo invasive exams to prove that they are a girl. It could require girls of all ages to answer personal questions about their bodies and physical development to adults they may not know. I remember being a girl growing up, and as comfortable as I may be now talking about my period with all of you, that would be my worst nightmare in middle school, but that is the experience we would be forcing on millions of little girls around the country; not just trans girls, all girls. Talk about an invasion of little girls’ privacy. At the end of the day, what is this really accomplishing? The number of trans girls in DODEA schools competing in sports is incredibly small. I bet the author of this amendment doesn’t even know of any. This isn’t a crisis, but my colleague is pretending it is to score political points. The parents of these military kids serve so we can have debates in this Chamber. The least we can do is not make their kids the collateral damage in culture war fights. Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no,’’ and I reserve the balance of my time.”

“I oppose this amendment. It would make military schools check girls' bodies to decide who can play on sports teams. This is harmful, invasive, and excludes trans children.”

“Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this amendment. This amendment’s language opens the door to invasive, degrading, and humiliating physical examinations of children, children who simply want to play softball or join a basketball team. That is creepy. This amendment would require the Department of Defense Education Activities schools to determine eligibility for girls’ sports teams based on a girl’s reproductive system. This amendment will empower child predators. We can have a nuanced conversation about eligibility rules for elite sports teams, but this amendment is a one-size-fits-all approach that dictates the same rules for a kindergartner wanting to play soccer as a 12th grader participating in competitive basketball. It does so in the most dangerous way, by opening young girls to invasive exams. Our communities thrive when every child, including trans children, can be part of a team, learn sportsmanship, and challenge themselves. They falter when we write exclusion into our laws.”

“I oppose this amendment to ban transgender girls from sports. These bans harm all girls by leading to unfair investigations, harassment, and bullying of students who do not look feminine enough. Transgender girls are far more likely to be victims of violence than to cause it.”

“Mr. Chair, my colleague says that we are just fear- mongering about what these bans would actually mean, but we have actually already seen how trans sports bans have been used to target all girls. A high school athletic association secretly investigated a female athlete without telling her or her parents to see if she was trans. She was not. The same association had investigated other complaints, receiving them because ``an athlete doesn’t look feminine enough,’’ and none of those allegations that the students were trans were verified to be true. In another incident, a Utah State school board member falsely suggested in 2024 that a high school basketball athlete was trans, subjecting her to relentless harassment and bullying, including threats of violence. In Florida, a school investigated a trans student’s participation in girls’ sports, and investigators repeatedly asked other individuals, all children, to describe how the student appeared in various stages of undress. If this does not disturb you about how our young girls will be treated in sports, then you are clearly not paying any attention. Let’s be clear: Trans girls and trans women are much more likely--four times more likely than Cis people to be the victims of violent crime, not the perpetrator. Let’s also be clear about something. The author of this amendment has led her own investigations that have failed, trying to prevent our colleagues from being able to use the restroom. She is talking about the right to vote. Her side of the aisle is literally pushing to take away a woman’s right to vote because of the SAVE Act, and Secretary Hegseth doesn’t think women should have the right to vote or serve in the military. This is absurd. I yield back the balance of my time.”

“I oppose this amendment. It creates a school voucher program that will strain the military's budget. The military already does not give enough money to the public schools that teach military children, and this amendment would make that problem worse.”

“Mr. Chair, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. As a member of the House Armed Services Committee and the Education Committee, I represent a military district with about 7,000 sailors and officers. Many of those children use local schools which the Federal Government partially reimburses through the Impact Aid Program. The notion that we are going to start a new program--and really this program is about who pays. It is about funding vouchers. It is not really whether or not military families have a choice in terms of whether they themselves want to go to a parochial school or to a private school. That is not the point. The point that we are talking about here is, again, that this is going to put a stress on the Pentagon’s budget, who already, as I said, underfunds Impact Aid and DoDEA schools. If you look at the President’s budget that came over, Mr. Chair, there was actually a cut to Impact Aid in terms of what was sent over. We are going to be in a fight over at the Appropriations Committee to restore funding. Again, as someone who represents a district with public schools that are proudly in the business of offering education for K-12 students, this, again, is just going to be another pressure, external pressure, in terms of reducing what, in fact, these communities really deserve, which is to have the military fully compensate an item that families really depend on in terms of making sure whether they are deployed or whether when they are on base they are getting education and that the local community is not taking an unfair hit in terms of paying for those services. Again, this amendment would generate a new cost to the Pentagon’s budget in terms of DoDEA funding and Impact Aid funding who, again, today are not actually up to the levels that fully paid for those services. For that purpose, I oppose the amendment. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.”

“This plan uses vouchers, and vouchers cost money. The sponsor has not explained how to pay for them.”

“Mr. Chairman, this is a voucher program, and vouchers cost money. That is really the issue that I think the proponent really didn’t, in my opinion, adequately address. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Hawaii (Ms. Tokuda).”

“I oppose this amendment. It creates a school voucher program that takes tax money away from public schools and gives it to private and religious schools. Most military children go to public schools, and we should invest our money there instead. Private schools also do not have to protect children with disabilities or follow federal civil rights laws.”

“Mr. Chair, I claim the time in opposition to this amendment. Mr. Chair, we all want the same thing for our military families. While our servicemembers carry out the mission to protect and defend our Nation, we have a duty to care for the loved ones whom they leave behind. For families with school-aged children, that means investing in safe, stable, high-quality schools where every child can learn, grow, and thrive. This amendment does the opposite. It creates a new, unfunded voucher program that diverts taxpayer dollars to private, including religious, schools instead of strengthening the public schools that educate most of our military-connected children. This year, taxpayers are investing $3.6 billion in DoDEA schools, but the majority of military-connected students attend local public schools, which receive just $70 million in Impact Aid, even though they lose local property tax revenue because of nearby military installations. These schools welcome military children every time new orders arrive, helping them navigate new classrooms, new communities, and the challenges of constant moves and deployments. If Congress is prepared to invest more in military children’s education, and I fully support that, we should be investing where most of them are already learning: our public schools. This amendment also falls short for families raising children with disabilities. Public schools are legally required to identify students with disabilities and provide the services and accommodations they need. Private schools are not. They may lack specialized staff or refuse to admit a child altogether. Unlike public schools, private schools are not required to follow the same Federal civil rights protections. Taxpayer dollars could fund schools that discriminate in admissions based on disability, religion, sex, sexual orientation, and other characteristics. A voucher is not a real choice if a school can simply turn a child away. Our military families deserve better. Let’s strengthen the schools they rely on, fully support DoDEA and public schools through Impact Aid and ensure every military child has access to a well-funded, accountable education.”

“Vote no on this proposal. Towns with military bases do not get enough federal money to pay for educating military kids. We should not start new education programs until we fully pay these towns back.”

“Mr. Chair, I think Congresswoman Tokuda did a very nice job in terms of laying out the reality of what is actually going on in communities where military installations and military bases exist. Those are tax exempt properties where the communities are, again, more than glad to educate the children of military servicemembers. They have to find a way to finance the cost of that education. Unfortunately, the existing programs in place today, DoDEA and Impact Aid, fall short in terms of making sure that those communities are fairly reimbursed. Mr. Chair, we are not in a place where there should even be a discussion about starting new funding programs for education paid for by the taxpayer until we keep the promise to those communities that we are going to reimburse the cost of educating military schoolchildren. For that reason, Mr. Chair, I urge a ``no’’ vote from all our colleagues, and I yield back the balance of my time.”