Duckworth Secures Key Provisions to Support Illinois Military Bases and Servicemembers, Protect Rock Island Arsenal Jobs, Bolster Manufacturing and Quantum Research

Duckworth Secures Key Provisions to Support Illinois Military Bases and Servicemembers, Protect Rock Island Arsenal Jobs, Bolster Manufacturing and Quantum Research

[WASHINGTON, D.C.] - Combat Veteran and U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), who served in the Reserve Forces for 23 years and is a member of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC), successfully secured several important provisions to support Illinoisans, servicemembers, Veterans and our state's economy that passed SASC this week. Among the provisions Duckworth secured are measures to protect jobs at the Rock Island Arsenal, invest in Illinois military bases and infrastructure, expand access to health care for military families and strengthen Illinois's leadership in manufacturing as well as quantum computing research and development at the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park in Chicago.

"The brave Illinoisans who serve our nation in uniform at home and abroad deserve to know that our country fully supports them as they and their families sacrifice to defend our country," said Senator Duckworth. "In the face of Trump's unlawful domestic deployments to intimidate our communities, I worked hard to ensure this bill includes provisions that would protect Illinoisans' civil rights against this egregious misuse of our military. I'm also proud to secure important provisions that would protect jobs at Rock Island Arsenal, modernize our military infrastructure, support defense manufacturing and expand health care access for military families while supporting groundbreaking quantum computing research in Chicago. These are strong investments in Illinois that will ensure our servicemembers and military infrastructure are better equipped for tomorrow's challenges."

Key provisions that Duckworth secured in the committee-passed bill include:

• Protecting Illinoisians from the Misuse of the Military:
  • By Increasing Transparency on Domestic Use of the Military: This provision requires the President to notify Congress and justify in writing within 7 days of providing access to military equipment-including surveillance equipment-bases or facilities to support law enforcement. This provision would provide Congress with quick information to push back on President Trump for using military bases for detention, providing military surveillance equipment to support police or Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and claiming it is legal to deploy the military to American cities for logistical support. This provision is a modified version of Senator Duckworth's Military in Law Enforcement Accountability (MILEA) Act.
  • By Stopping Military Funds and Facilities from Supporting Non-Military Missions, Such as Domestic Immigration Enforcement: This provision would require a report on the procedures that award Department of Defense (DoD) contracts for the construction and operation of migrant detention facilities and would require DoD to seek feedback from local communities.
  • By Safeguarding American Civil Rights: This provision would require an Independent GAO report reviewing the Administration's practice of detailing Judge Advocates (JAGs) to serve as Special Assistant U.S. Attorneys (SAUSAs) on non-military cases, like immigration cases, and assess their impacts on military readiness, morale and DoD missions.
  • By Improving Congressional Oversight of DoD Support to Federal Agencies: This provision would require Requests for Assistance (RFAs) from all federal departments and agencies, such as military deployments to support domestic federal law enforcement, to be received in writing before approval, with limited exceptions.

• Supporting Illinois Military Bases, Servicemembers and Veterans:
  • By Improving DoD Services to Troops Transitioning into Civilian Life: This provision directs DoD to appoint a senior official to oversee policy and programs that help servicemembers transition to civilian life or to the Reserve Component after leaving active duty. This provision is a modified version of the Servicemember Civilian Transition Support Act, which Senator Duckworth helped introduce.
  • By Strengthening Our Servicemembers' Medical Care in North Chicago: This provision would ensure the facility operations of the Captain James A. Lovell Federal Healthcare Center for servicemembers and Veterans by extending the expiration date of the Joint Medical Facility Demonstration Fund for the Lovell Federal Healthcare Center.
  • By Making our Airspace Safer and Preventing Near-Miss Collisions: This provision would improve coordination between DoD and Civilian air traffic control systems by requiring a risk assessment of DoD's air traffic control systems and plan for modernization.
  • By Supporting our Firefighters and Enhancing Fire Safety on Military Installations: This provision would require a report on critical staffing issues facing civilian firefighters at the DoD.
  • By Improving Access to Care for Our Airmen and Their Families: This provision would require an assessment of the mix of active-duty and civilian medical personnel at Air Force Medical Treatment Facilities and options for filling personnel shortfalls, especially in remote, underserved locations. This provision would strengthen access to care for these servicemembers and their families, especially during ongoing military operations that pull away active-duty medical providers.
  • By Increasing Access to Diapers for Military Families: This provision would require a full assessment of the effectiveness and gaps in existing programs to provide diapers to military families.
  • By Improving Care for Military Families Experiencing Limb Loss and Limb Difference: This provision would implement a program to connect eligible beneficiaries with peer mentorship, family navigation, educational resources and non-clinical support services.
  • By Reducing Administrative Burden on Our National Guard and Reserve Components: Language requesting a report on the Department's proposal to reduce over 30 legacy duty statutes into four clear categories. This provision would also ensure pay, allowances, medical care, retirement credit and survivor benefits correspond to duty category rather than cumbersome, disparate historical statutes.
  • By Helping Make Soldiers' Administrative Experiences More Efficient: Language asking for an assessment from the Army about the feasibility of establishing a program to create a secure digital identity record to enable continuity of individual data from recruitment through Veteran transition.
  • By Better Identifying and Using Existing Space for Servicemember Relocation or Missions: This provision would expand an existing Army Online Real Estate tool pilot program into a broader DoD-wide Online Real Estate tool across the Services.
  • By Supporting Illinois Air National Guardsmen in Belleville, Peoria and Springfield: This provision would ensure our military receives critical supplies and munitions quickly in a crisis or conflict by demanding answers on when the new Air National Guard Contingency Groups-the Air Force element responsible for opening airfields in contested environments to allow for timely delivery of supplies and munitions-will be fully manned and equipped to achieve their mission.
  • By Enabling Illinois National Guard (NG) Medical Providers to Conduct Essential Medical Training in a Timely Fashion: This provision would expand the ability of NG healthcare providers (HCP) to have their licenses be portable across state lines under all title 32 statuses, not just during actual or potential disasters, as long as National Guard provide care to members of the uniformed services. Previous licensing processes delayed Guardsmen from completing critical medical training, such as trauma care, they need to prepare for combat medical needs.
  • By Improving Quality of Life and Retention of Dual-Military Couples: This provision would direct the DoD to brief Congress on current processes, administrative challenges and recommendations regarding managing geographic relocation of dual-military couples.

• Strengthening and Protecting Jobs Rock Island Arsenal:
  • By Enhancing Oversight of Possible Workforce Changes: This provision would require written notification to the Congressional Armed Services Committees prior to approving significant civilian workforce changes that result in 50 or more job losses at special facilities like Rock Island Arsenal.
  • By Ensuring the Army's Mobilization Mission Remains Efficient: This provision requires a report on the status of First Army and any possible plans to realign, disestablish, relocate or otherwise change its structure.

• Expanding Defense Manufacturing Opportunities Across Illinois:
  • By Championing American-Made Combat Boots in Belleville: Several provisions would create a pilot program to support the sale of American-made combat boots, invest an additional $50 million in U.S. textile and footwear production, require a review of supply chain vulnerabilities and compliance with the Berry Amendment and improve quality standards for combat boots used by servicemembers. These provisions are modified version of Senator Duckworth's Better Outfitting Our Troops (BOOTS) Act, which recognizes that our defense industrial base for combat boots needs investment in order for it to support our troops and help ensure they have the sturdiest and most protective boots in a possible war, like those manufactured at Belleville Boot Manufacturing Co.
  • By Strengthening Medical Treatments for Servicemembers: Language ensuring that the U.S. military has the supplies to treat servicemembers after nuclear exposure by authorizing the procurement of treatments for acute radiation syndrome and cutaneous radiation injury.
  • By Modernizing Defense Manufacturing: Language encouraging the Secretary of Defense and Military Departments to pilot scalable approaches to integrate digital solutions that improve supply chain awareness for the organic industrial base, ensuring DoD can meet wartime munition demands with little unexpected delays.
  • By Protecting DoD Communications in Near-Peer Conflict Zones: This provision would assess how emerging technologies that allow for telecommunications equipment to change frequencies and modalities through random, alternative frequencies could enable more secure and resilient communications in contested environments.
  • By Safeguarding Servicemembers From Cancer-Causing PFAS Chemicals: This provision would demand an accelerated review of how to acquire and expand the production of PFAS-free materials used in protective military gear against chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear threats.
  • By Enhancing the Navy's Aerial Refueling Operations: This provision authorizes the procurement and investments required to accelerate testing, integration and future capability growth of the MQ-25 unmanned platform. This provision would enhance the Navy's aerial refueling capacity and extend the operational reach of carrier-based strike aircraft in contested environments.
  • By Improving Military Aviation Safety: This provision would improve runway lighting for military airfields and strengthen military aviation safety by requiring a report on the Air Force's plans to incorporate wireless control and monitoring capabilities into the Expeditionary Airfield Lighting System (EALS) program.
  • By Accelerating Production of F-15EX Fighter Aircraft in St. Louis: This provision would improve deterrence against near-peer adversaries by accelerating the production rate of the F-15EX fourth-generation fighter aircraft, through authorizing the Air Force to procure F-15EX aircraft on a multi-year basis.
  • By Supporting the Continued Modernization of the F-35: Language addressing the critical capability gaps in a fifth-generation fighter jet by requiring a report on the status of solutions for the F-35's power and thermal management system and cooling capacity. The report will identify capability gaps that integrate leading American technology into this essential platform, which is key to deterring conflict in the Indo-Pacific.
  • By Improving Rotary-Wing Safety: This provision would increase the safety of rotary-wing aircraft operating in civil airspace by requiring the Army to evaluate the incorporation of digital night vision into helmet mounted displays.
  • By Strengthening Critical Indo-Pacific Infrastructure: This provision would enable the Army to procure modern Heavy Dump Trucks to build and repair critical infrastructure, support logistics and prepare deployment and testing areas.

• Bolstering Illinois as an Innovative Leader in Energy and Quantum:
  • By Ensuring High-Quality DoD Usage of Quantum Computing at Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park: This provision would require that DoD use DARPA's Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI) analysis-which evaluates a company's technology and design for whether it can achieve utility-scale, i.e. computational value that exceeds the cost-in any acquisition of a quantum computer.
  • By Driving Cutting-Edge Development of Modeling and Simulation on Quantum Machines, supporting activities at Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park: $5 million authorized for the Naval Research Laboratory to develop modeling and simulations that can operate on quantum machines to improve ship design, ocean and weather forecasting and prevent corrosion on expensive Naval platforms.
  • By Enhancing the Sustainability of Spent Nuclear Fuel and Prevent Damage to Local Communities: This language would direct a briefing on the feasibility of a DARPA pilot program to invest in the research and development of innovative defense and government uses of domestic spent nuclear fuel to minimize long-term storage needs.
  • By Ensuring the U.S. Has Sufficient Stockpiles of Unobligated Uranium for Defense Purposes: This provision would require the National Nuclear Security Administration to examine and identify gaps in the supply chain for domestic uranium and nuclear fuel and write a strategy to ensure a continuous supply of unobligated uranium and nuclear fuel for defense needs, including for energy.

Other key funding for Illinois projects include:

• $79 million authorized for the Construction of a New Aircraft maintenance hangar to support the training and operational mission of the 126^th Aerial Refueling Wing and its eight KC-135 aircraft at Scott Air Force Base.

• $38 million authorized for the construction of an Area Maintenance Support Activity shop at the Philip H. Sheridan Armed Forces Reserve Center, Fort Sheridan, Illinois.

• $25 million authorized for new combined Firefighting, Training and Damage Control Wet Trainer facility for the Recruit Training Command at Naval Station Great Lakes.

• $750,000 authorized for the construction of a new Child Development Center to replace existing operations and consolidate childcare programs at Naval Station Great Lakes.

• $750,000 authorized for the construction of a replacement bridge that provides the only significant access between Main Side South and Main Side Central areas of Naval Station Great Lakes.

• $4.3 million authorized to construct a Readiness Center with a SCIF to support the information operations mission of the Intelligence Electronic Warfare Battalion.

• $2 million authorized for the funding of research and development of advanced ceramic oxygen generation technologies to help equip next-generation aircraft with more reliable oxygen systems.

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