House bill would reduce Defense secretary’s salary to $1
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House lawmakers passed an amendment to a Defense spending bill that would reduce Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s salary to just $1, though the provision is unlikely to become law in a piece of legislation that seems doomed to fail.
The amendment, offered by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), was agreed to in the House by voice vote Wednesday afternoon.
The provision states clearly: “None of the funds made available by this Act may be used to pay Defense Secretary Lloyd James Austin III a salary that exceeds $1.”
Greene hailed her victory in passing the amendment, saying Austin should be fired from his post for the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 and for low military recruitment.
She said even $1 was too much for the Defense chief.
“There’s a loss in confidence in Lloyd Austin’s leadership and he deserves to be fired,” Greene said in a Wednesday video after the vote.
Austin, who has an annual salary exceeding $221,000, is a retired four-star general who served 41 years in the military and is the first African American to lead the Defense Department.
The Senate confirmed him by a 93-2 vote in 2021.
Greene, however, has frequently railed against his leadership. The Georgia Republican has also complained about U.S. service members being fired for refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccines.
“Secretary Austin has not fulfilled his job duties; as a matter of fact, he’s destroying our military,” Greene said on the House floor.
For the amendment, Greene used the Holman rule, which allows the House to reduce the salaries of federal employees or fire them.
Other conservative lawmakers in the House have also complained about Austin, particularly over the Afghanistan withdrawal. Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.) introduced articles of impeachment against the Pentagon chief last month over the withdrawal.
The spending bills to fund the federal government face an uncertain future in the House, which is struggling to pass them, and are unlikely to pass in the current form in the Senate.
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