Today, Congressman Doug Lamborn (CO-05) voted on the conference report for the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010.

This conference report authorizes over $550 billion in budget authority for the Department of Defense (DoD) and the national security programs of the Department of Energy. It also includes an unrelated bill establishing federal hate crimes.

“I have a long history of supporting our men and women in uniform, but I cannot give my support to a bill to which the Majority in this Congress has cynically attached a hate crimes bill. This legislation threatens the very freedoms of speech and religion that our soldiers are fighting to protect.

“It is inappropriate to use a defense bill as a vehicle for passing an unrelated, highly controversial, and unnecessary social engineering bill. The liberal Congressional supporters of this hate crimes bill should have given Members the opportunity to give it a straight up-or-down vote.

“It is one of Congress’s highest duties to support our men and women in uniform and this attempt to hijack a defense bill to insert a radical liberal agenda into it is utterly disrespectful to them.”  -- Congressman Doug Lamborn (CO-05)