But will Rep. Bill Young get the message?

Washington, D.C.  – Rep. John Murtha today abandoned efforts to keep the F-22 production lines open, announcing he will offer an amendment to his own defense spending bill that will strip funding for future fighter jets.

USAction/TrueMajority has played a lead role in educating the public and lobbying Congress about wasteful defense spending. The F-22, built to bolster our defenses during the Cold War era, is the perfect example of an obsolete weapons system that does nothing to enhance our country’s security.

“They said it couldn’t be done, but today’s announcement shows we can beat the purveyors of Pentagon pork,” said Matt Holland, Pentagon Budget Campaign Director for USAction/TrueMajority. “Cutting wasteful Pentagon spending is like turning around a giant ocean liner. But we’ve learned that with diligence from concerned taxpayers, the rudder works and this ship of state can be turned around.”

On Wednesday, USAction/TrueMajority began airing a radio ad in the St. Petersburg, Florida district of Rep. Bill Young, who took more than $100,000 in campaign contributions from defense contractors and repeatedly did their bidding in a House defense subcommittee and on the House floor, including supporting the obsolete F-22. The ad was paid for by USAction/TrueMajority members who oppose spending on wasteful and unnecessary weapons..

The ad features Mike Burns – a former US Air Force pilot and POW who spent years in the same ‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison camp as Senator McCain – who calls on Congressman C.W. Bill Young to reject his campaign contributors and vote to end the F-22 Raptor fighter jet.

“This is one of the most worthless and unnecessary programs and we’ve spent 30 years dumping money into it,” Burns says in the ad, “I’m asking Congressman Young to vote against [the F-22]. Be a lion, not a gopher for Lockheed Martin.”

Congressman Young is one of a handful of Representatives who write the FY10 Defense Appropriations bill, which includes the F-22. He is also one of those appropriators that is the focus of a new report by USAction/TrueMajority that profiles the web of connections between powerful weapons manufacturers and House appropriators. The report, Putting the Pork out to Pasture, can be viewed at http://truesecurity.usaction.org/node/2

“Rep. Young received more than $100,000 in contributions from defense contractors in 2008,” Holland said. “So far this year, Young has already asked for $40.1 million in earmarks for those same donors. Vets and voters are asking – and rightly so – who Rep. Young represents: them, or weapons-builders.”

Burns is a member of Florida Veterans for Common Sense, a group that works to bring responsibility and effectiveness to military decisions.

USAction/TrueMajority’s half a million members have pledged to keep pressure on any member of Congress who continues to spend billions on weapons we do not need while lining their campaign war chests with money from weapons builders.

USAction/TrueMajority worked in coalition to defeat the F-22. Coalition partners include VoteVets, Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities, Taxpayers for Common Sense, Common Cause, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Women’s Action for New Directions and other groups.