Sen. Claire McCaskill praises military, talks 2018 run, during Springfield stop

After earlier hints that she will run to retain her seat, ​U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill offered confirmation Tuesday — although the announcement arrived coded in military jargon.

"I would hope that the people I work for re-up me," she said during a visit to the National Guard facility at the Springfield-Branson National Airport, adding that she'd be "asking for another tour."

A spokesperson later confirmed that the Missouri Democrat does intend to run for a third Senate term in 2018. But McCaskill kept the focus on service members during her time in Springfield.

The senator threw a few jabs at House Republicans during the visit but had nothing but good things to say about the Missouri military while touring an airport hangar filled with helicopters and the National Guard technicians who repair them.

McCaskill offered up the facility as an example of how the military can save money. The senator was onsite for a tour and was briefed by Missouri National Guard officials with the Theater Aviation Sustainment Maintenance Group, which helps maintain National Guard helicopters across the Midwest.

“A new blade on one of the helicopters they work on here is about $200,000,” McCaskill told the News-Leader. “They can, at a fraction of that, rework and fix a blade. So if you have a number of blades on a helicopter, and you’re saving $150,000, $175,000 per blade, do the math. I mean, it is real money that is in fact being saved here, millions and millions of dollars are being saved.”

The senator’s stop in Springfield was part of a series of meetings with military leaders to discuss Missouri’s role in homeland security. The meetings are intended to give McCaskill, a member of the Senate’s Armed Services and Homeland Security committees, a chance to better familiarize herself with military operations and capabilities in Missouri — and to stock up on ammunition for future congressional discussions about military budgeting.

“I now am aware of a number of areas that I want to ask some pretty tough questions about to our military leadership,” she said. “Why aren’t we doing more of this? Why aren’t we thinking about our cyber units as elite squads, almost special forces?”

A Monday session with the Missouri National Guard at Jefferson Barracks in south St. Louis County prompted her to call for better recruiting strategies for cybersecurity personnel. She then visited Whiteman Air Force Base in Warrensburg, where previous tours spurred McCaskill to speak out about combat stress experienced by drone pilots. She also visited Honeywell’s Kansas City National Security Campus for a discussion on nuclear safety.

Tuesday morning, she was in St. Joseph to tour the Rosecrans Air National Guard Base before traveling downstate to Springfield. She also planned a trip to Fort Leonard Wood.

McCaskill declined to discuss presidential politics, or the tighter-than-expected Senate race pitting her Republican colleague, Sen. Roy Blunt, against Democratic challenger Jason Kander, saying she didn't want to talk politics at a military facility. But she didn't hold back criticism of Congressional Republicans, who she accused of "playing fiscal games" with military spending.

Specifically, she took issue with usage of the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) fund, which the Department of Defense maintains separately from its base budget.

The fund is used to fight the militant group calling itself the Islamic State, for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and “to support European allies in their efforts to counter Russia’s aggressive acts,” according to a report by the Department of Defense. For fiscal 2016, the fund’s budget was $50.9 billion, down about $13.3 billion from the year before, according to the defense department.

Rather than using the fund exclusively for those efforts, the U.S. House of Representatives has used the OCO fund for other military expenses, McCaskill said.

“When the Republicans want to talk about fiscal responsibility, what they’re doing when they’re talking about that is they’re raiding that fund for base operations,” she said. “… And now, what’s going to happen is, we’re going to run out of money to fight the fight.”

McCaskill is expected to discuss support services for military families when she finishes her tour Wednesday in Jefferson City, where Gov. Jay Nixon on Tuesday spoke at the opening of the inaugural Missouri Governor’s Cybersecurity Summit. A McCaskill spokesman said the two events were coincidental.