Influential Taxpayer Organization Joins Call To Eliminate Funding for Extra Engine

Americans for Tax Reform, an influential grassroots taxpayer organization, has joined the call to eliminate funding for the costly and wasteful extra engine for the Joint Strike Fighter.

ATR President Grover Norquist and Center for Fiscal Accountability Executive Director Mattie Corrao wrote to House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Norm Dicks today urging him to, “swiftly reject any funding for the F136 Alternative Engine Program in the Department of Defense Appropriations Bill or the National Defense Authorization Act."

Norquist and Corrao explain that, “While proponents argue that the Alternative Engine Program is necessary to maintain a competitive engine market, there is nothing competitive about an entrenched political subsidy for an unnecessary and unwanted product” and reminding the chairman that “almost all of the Department of Defense’s engine contracts are already single source and there is no evidence that this has negatively effected engine production or national security.”

They also note that the extra engine “has been unwanted for four years by the officials charged with keeping the country safe is one that should be expeditiously removed from all future funding considerations.”

The full letter is here.