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News > World

US: Military Industry Spends Millions on Lobbying Efforts

  • U.S. drones have killed hundreds of civilians in Pakistan.

    U.S. drones have killed hundreds of civilians in Pakistan. | Photo: Reuters

Published 6 August 2015
Opinion

Top contractors lobbied for the main legislation authorizing defense spending.

The top 53 defense contractors deployed more than 400 lobbyists and spent tens of millions of dollars in the last months to push the U.S. government to increase national military spending, Time magazine reported Wednesday.

The increase in lobbying spending comes as a result of caps on military expenditure in the last few years in order to lower government debt. This went from US$528.2 billion in the 2011 fiscal year to US $496.1 billion in 2015.

According to Time, lobbyists said that despite past budget cuts, they were optimistic that the government will not increase spending on social welfare programs but rather on defense contracts this year.

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While most of the lobbying between April and June went towards the National Defense Authorization Act, the main legislation authorizing defense spending, they were also aimed at supporting banks.

Boeing, a US$100-billion corporation that makes military aircraft, spent almost US$13.2 million on lobbying to supporting the Export-Import Bank because it receives billions in financing from this bank.

Lobbying expenditure by the top contractors were 25 percent higher between April and June this year than in 2014 during the same period.

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