Rep. Rob Wittman on the Speed of Relevance in Modernizing America's Defense Industrial Base

Lauren Bedula 0:01 Welcome back to Building the Base. Lauren Bedula and Hondo Geurts here recording live from the Reagan National Defense Forum. And we've done this several years in a row and a lot of energy out here. We are so thrilled to be here now with Congressman Rob Wittman, Vice Chairman of the House Armed Service Committee, and Co-Chair of the Defense Modernization Caucus. Sir, we've got so much to dig into. Thank you for joining us today. Rep. Rob Wittman 0:22 Lauren, there's so much that so much to talk about. Hondo, you and I go way back, working on a lot of different things, and a lot of things happen today. Are things that have been spoken about and contemplated for a number of years. A good thing now is that things are really starting to come to fruition. Hondo Geurts 0:36 Yeah, it's amazing to see the change. Now you've been on, you've been leading in this area for so long. Most folks think you've been there forever. You know what? Give us a little background, how, you know, what got you interested in politics? And, you know, I went a little bit, how'd you get there? We were talking fishing earlier, yeah, you know. But give us a little bit of a background. Rep. Rob Wittman 0:56 Sure, well, you know, listen, it goes back a number of years. Now, when I got out of college, I came back to the little, small town that I grew up in, and I was not happy. The scout troop had disbanded. There were no community organizations there. So friend of mine was a state trooper. He and I reformed the Boy Scout troop. Another friend of mine and I formed the Junior Chamber of Commerce, better known as the JC. So I started down that road, and then somebody asked me, Hey, do you want to serve on the planning commission? And I'm like, Well, sure. Why not? So a year later, there was a vacancy in the chairmanship there. So careful what you wish for. I got elected chairman. Then a year after that, was a vacancy on the town council that was back in 1986 my interest from there grew. So I served 10 years on the town council, four as mayor, and then a vacancy on the board of supervisors. Served 10 years there, two as chairman, and there was a vacancy in the House of Delegates seat. So I ran and served there for two terms, or was elected to two terms. Served one and then ran for Congress in '07, again, a vacancy. So it never was on my radar screen to go out there and run against somebody in office. It was all about where can I best serve. So, you know, it really has been my interest in connecting good public policy to decision makers in positions that can actually put those things in place. So that's always been my my love and and that's why, for me, there's such an affinity for national defense issues, because there's so many things out there that are important to this nation, such an incredible opportunity, so many people that are dedicated, both those that serve in uniform, those that serve in the civilian sector, those in industry. And I'm very much about good public policy and solving problems and those things. So that's why I so enjoy serving on the Armed Services [Committee]. Lauren Bedula 2:46 Now, clearly a theme of service throughout and as you mentioned, also real focus on defense and national security and in your service. Rep. Rob Wittman 2:55 Yes. Lauren Bedula 2:55 What's your take been on the evolving defense industrial base during this period of time? Any themes that you've seen? Hondo Geurts 3:00 Are you seeing a willingness to start talking about that yet, or is it kind of, we got to get the first step down, and then this is the second step we got to take. What's, what's a sense from Congress of interest in that area. Hondo Geurts 3:46 Yeah. I mean, you know, we spend, I think, 70% of the cost of weapons system on sustainment, yes. And we spend 100% of our time talking about the new acquisition, buying stuff. So, you know, we've worked a lot together. You know, in your area, both of interest and constituents big on the maintenance side, Rep. Rob Wittman 4:58 Yes. Rep. Rob Wittman 4:09 No, I think, I think Congress is more ready than ever. And I've been very adamant and vocal to say, when we when we look at where we are with acquisition reform, when we ask people to come up to the hill, you know, we need to ask people to come up and talk to us about the failures. And I know they're going to be scared as all get out and oh my gosh, what are they going to do? But I've been been very vocal and adamant to say we need to bring them up. And first of all, thank them for taking the risk, because it does take a little bit of backbone to do that. Thank them for taking the risk, and then ask them to reflect on what they learned in the process. I mean, you look at companies that make quantum leaps in how they develop their systems. You know, Space X is, is always looked at as the example. But look at, look at Starship, and look at that, that launch platform, and look at what Elon did. Elon said, we're going to launch. And they said, Well, you know, we're not sure if the launch pad can take it. Don't care. We're going to launch. They launch. The launch pad broke up. Guess what? Took out some of the engines. The spacecraft itself failed, but they learned a tremendous amount from that, and he was willing to lose a lot of money in order to learn what we have to be willing to do as a member of Congress is, is not, not to be critical of taking the risk and understanding that in some of those instances, you're going to lose resources. You're even going to lose some time, but you will be able to make that up and what you learn and what you can do to advance time wise and more efficiency wise, going in the future. And I think that's a really different paradigm for folks in the Pentagon to put in place. I mean, the Pentagon has always been a process, process, process, and process centric mindset has come about from Congress chewing people up because there was a mistake or you did something that didn't work, those kinds of things. I mean, look at, look at the, what I think is a watershed moment. Look at what the Navy was willing to do with constellation, where they looked at and said, Man, this is this. This feels really familiar. This feels like LCS, you know. And maybe looking at the future, maybe we don't need an exquisite platform. Maybe we need to be putting lots of dollars into the atritable platforms, these 150 180 foot platforms, and look at enabling them. Listen, I think it was a smart move, you know, it was one that I would argue maybe should have done a year earlier, but it was also one that's the typical textbook example of mission creep, of saying we're going to take the Fram, which is, you know, Fincantieri design, and we're just going to convert that over to us, use a design or ship that was 85% compliant with the requirement based upon the design from the FREMM and Fincantieri. And then Navy said, Well, we got to do this. We got to do that, got to do that. So 85% design complete. Now turn to 15% and then... Hondo Geurts 5:18 Business case falls apart. Hondo Geurts 7:36 And do you think Congress is ready to enable some level of failure and look past that, or is that still to be proven? Lauren Bedula 7:36 Now, I mentioned before we started that Congressman Ryan was on in the past as a guest and spoke so highly of his partnership with you in the Defense Modernization Caucus. So I have a two part question. One, I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about the vision for the caucus and the impact to date and two, just best practices and reaching across the aisle and teaming with groups. We see this with non traditionals and traditionals partnering or investors working with DoW. What are best practices to kind of team up and get things done? Rep. Rob Wittman 4:59 Well, it is. It's moving in the right direction. I call it. It's the first step in the 12 Steps to recovery. The first step is acknowledging you got a problem. So we're at that first step where we acknowledge that the the system that we are putting forth to do maintenance is, is, is absolutely broken. And then to connecting sustainment with production. And what we did in the House this year was to look at F-35 and say, our F-35 a-sub-o operational availability was incredibly low. And why was it low? Because we have no parts inventories, and what better time to build parts inventories, and when you're in new production. So what we did is we said we're going to build 10 fewer aircraft. We're going to put those resources towards producing many more parts for F-35 so we can keep the ones we have flying. And remember, we have a big pipeline of aircraft that are now making their way into the Air Force. So it's things like that where you have to make those connections too, on sustainment, and then also looking at, are there better ways that we can do the maintenance side of things? Are there better ways that we can get depots to operate at a more efficient level? Should we do more privatization? Should we do less privatization? How do we make sure that it's more performance based outcomes? How do we look at what the airlines do. Let me tell you, if you look at the airlines, if that aircraft is sitting in a hangar, they are not making money. And but the problem is, on the military side, it's like, if that aircraft is sitting in the hangar, it's like, well, we're just gonna have to wait and and we have to have more of a business mentality there. I was just talking with the chairman, CEO of Lockheed about how that paradigm needs to change. And they've had a lot of discussions with folks here about, how do we change that paradigm? How do we get to more of a commercial model on sustainment? Because on the commercial side, if those assets aren't, aren't, aren't giving you a return on investment, then then you're losing money, which is much different than what happens in the military. So I think if we change that perspective, so I'm excited about how we can make big changes, and what was looked at as routine, but now needs to be done differently. Rep. Rob Wittman 3:00 Yeah, you know, for years, I think it was best expressed to say that for years, the national defense sector was looked at as the leader in technology, and it was looked at within DOD. So, you know, we had the Navy labs and Hondo you and I talked about those, and they did some really incredible work there. You look at also the Air Force side, the Army side, some really incredible things there and the subject matter, experts of where technology was going were usually residing within DOD. Now the change today is there's so much technology evolving around us at a much faster pace that it's almost impossible for anybody in DOD to keep up with it. So now the challenge is, is, how do we get that technology in the hands of the war fighter? How do we use, you know, things in the software realm, and DOD has always been, and still to some extent, is, a hardware centric organization, and it's tough for them looking and go, Hey, now we have to make sure software informs hardware. So that's a transition too. We have some incredible things going on in the software realm. So, you know, I think the biggest transformation is is a Department of Defense that was well suited for where the world was a decade ago, not so well suited for where the world is today. So I think that this transformation that's happening now, as was said earlier, that this isn't reform, it is transformation, and I think it is 100% transformational. Is, how do we change the entire structure of how we do acquisition, not just nipping around the edges? And listen, Mac Thornberry, who was there prior, did some things to try to simplify things, and that is, you should be able to go and buy something from Amazon have versus having to go through a massive acquisition process. So those things are pretty easy to solve. The ones, ones we're working on right now are a little bit tougher, and they take not just Congress acting, but they also take what's happening now in the Department of Defense and the service branches, and I tell folks that this point right now, I think, is as transformational as Goldwater Nichols. The challenge is, is we have to look at this as a journey, not as a destination. This is not the end of what acquisition reform is going to be. Just as I spoke an earlier panel, you know, we didn't, haven't done a whole lot there on what we do to reform the maintenance side. And Hondo you and I talked about that. In fact, you led the effort at the time to say, let's use Digital Twin to start to model how we do maintenance for the Navy. It's those sorts of things that we really need to take the next step with. And I'm as excited about that as I am what's happening right now, where hopefully the NDAA gets to the House floor next week, get that signed into law. But this is indeed one of those transformational moments and and it's a different feeling now than I have experienced in my 18 plus years here in Congress, and that is all the different forces are coming together so Congress, House and Senate have have now elevated this to a single bill that is about acquisition reform. The Pentagon has made it their effort at every level, including the service branch chiefs and the service branch secretaries, to say the we are going to do this, and the one remaining piece is to make sure that the middle management in the Pentagon now executes this. I would argue that is going to be difficult, because it's always been a little bit of resistance there, but I think the right atmosphere has been established to make sure that people understand first of all is we want you to do this. We want you to do it quickly. We want you to take risks and and listen, failure is not a bad thing, as long as you're not doing things irresponsibly and as long as you're learning from that. So I think, from Congress's standpoint, our job too, is to make sure, in the coming year that we bring people back in and ask them, what's working. Tell us where you took a risk. Tell us where it worked. Tell us where it did. Where it didn't work. Tell us what you learned. Tell us how the process is unfolding, so that this doesn't turn out to be something where people go well, you know, Congress did all this stuff, but they still call us up on the Hill and lambast us when something doesn't work or when something goes awry. So I think Congress has to be part of this too, and then, you know, we have to be very willing to take those next steps. And the next steps are to further refine the acquisition process, and then also to make sure that this now permeates other aspects of the military. Most importantly, the sustainment side. You know, we talk about all this acquisition reform or transformation, is on new systems, everything new. The challenge now is, is, how do we do the things that are part of the routine, taking care of the stuff that we've got? That's another big step we have to take. Rep. Rob Wittman 8:22 Sure, well, listen the you know, it's great to work with Pat. Pat's fantastic US Military Academy graduate. He gets it. You know, my background is the Army side too. I was in the Corps Cadets Virginia Tech. So we have that sort of commonality there, and how our college educational experience shaped us operating within a very tight military structure. So Pat and I have that in common. And we also have a mindset in common to what we have to do to modernize and that we have to elevate that at the congressional level. So we have, we have been just shoulder to shoulder in that effort to make sure we're lifting up that effort. I would tell you, there's not a there's not a molecules worth of difference between us and what we see needing to happen on the on the reform side and what we need for our nation's military. And Pat's got a great perspective, because he served in uniform and he also then ran a business. So he sees both sides, which is incredibly valuable. And I think too, it goes to show that, you know, it's it's easy to get caught up in the political differences, but if you really get past that, the sort of noise that occurs between both parties. And actually drill down to, you know, what does Pat have in common with my interests? What is, what do I have in common with Pat's interests? And then look at districts. I mean, our districts are very similar in kind of the makeup of constituencies. So I think, I think what you find is that members of Congress can get a lot of things done if they kind of look past the politics of things and look really to what their districts have in common, where their interests overlap. I mean, I have a great relationship with Don Norcross, who is our subcommittee ranking member. Don represents an interest or a district and interest in New Jersey. They're very similar to mine, Don and I get along great. And the same with Joe Courtney. You know, Joe Courtney from Connecticut too. We have a lot of things in interest with ship building. So it, it, it just takes some effort. It takes too, getting to know members. This is a people business. You have to, you have to invest in getting to know people, getting to know them and their families. What drives them? I mean, this is a this is a challenging job, as much as the public may look at it otherwise, it's a challenging job. It's demanding. If you do the job right, it's very demanding. And you want to be able to get things done, and you want to be able to develop relationships with people on other side of the aisle, as much as today, things are divisive. I would argue the way our government works best is for you to say, yeah, maybe we agree on these things, but let's find the things we agree upon and then get those things done. It makes legislating a whole lot easier, and it makes achieving things in the interest of the nation a lot easier. You know, the things that we're able to do in the NDAA, the NDAA is still the one last vestige of bipartisanship, although sometimes even that's challenged these days, but I think we'll get it done next week. I think the version will come out either today or tomorrow, and then middle of next week, the House will vote on it, the Senate will vote on it right after that, after that, and then it'll head to the President's desk. So another example about how now for you know, 68 years plus, the Congress has passed National Defense Authorization Act. You can't name any other major piece of legislation where that has happened on an annual basis. So, you know, good, good example there. Something that all of us feel responsible to continue, and then understanding that this has to be a bipartisan effort. I mean, look at the NDAAs that came out of committee, you know, only one vote against the NDAA, which tells me pretty good job that was done by the leadership there and the members. Rep. Rob Wittman 5:18 Exactly. Then schedule moves to the right. Costs go way up. And I think the I think the Navy was smart, in fact, at Sea Air Space earlier in the year, I actually got up when Secretary Phelan, came in to give his speech, and I said, the Navy's at a tipping point with Constellation, and that they going to have to make a decision pretty quickly. Are you going to go or are you going to are you going to stop and and I, you know, I didn't, I didn't want to, I didn't want to be vocal in in how I thought the decision ought to go, because I didn't want them to feel like, well, Congress is kind of forcing us to do that. But I'm glad that they looked at it as a business case and said, No, we're gonna do something different. Hondo Geurts 10:40 You know, another, I think, very bipartisan issue right now is re industrializing, yes, the country. I think that's, you know, one of the few areas where everybody's agreeing on, and again, you're in a very industrial heavy area. We used to talk a lot about labor and how do we rebuild the labor force we need? What's your take on how that's going? Are we making progress? And where do we still need to focus energy if we really want to bring back the capacity and capability we need? Rep. Rob Wittman 17:34 Yeah, you know, it's a really exciting time. I think people that are here, from Department of Defense to the industry to Congress and others, you know, really feel the momentum changing. I mean, it's palpable and how people feel that the one big metric that I see is the vast change of attendees here. I mean, as little as five years ago, most of the attendees here were all with the prime contractors. You know, the five primes. You look at it, you and if you saw a name tag with something else, you're like, Oh, who's that today, if you look at the attendees here, they're overwhelmingly non traditionals. You know, the primes are still here, the traditionals, as we call them, are still here. But the exciting thing to me is the number of non traditionals that are here and the number of people that are part of private equity firms and venture capital firms, because they also see great opportunity here in investing in the future defense industrial base our nation. So I think that, to me, is the most compelling change that we're seeing each year that gets bigger and bigger and it gets more exciting, because those people bring really innovative ideas, a high level of enthusiasm and excitement. And two, it brings that excitement to members of Congress, to tomorrow defense, to all those folks that are charged with, you know, executing this new direction for the Pentagon. Rep. Rob Wittman 9:31 Well, I think you know, some things that happen that are important. I had a bill in called the Freedom to Invest in Tomorrow's Workforce Act that allows parents to use their 529, savings accounts for any post secondary education, not just two and four year degrees. So that opens the door for them to have their child go to a trade school or to get a certification or credential that opens up a lot of opportunities. I think too, that there's still a challenge for us to get parents to overcome what is a bias against career and technical education and a bias against, you know, going straight into employment after high school. You know, I whenever I have a chance to talk to high school students or teachers or school administrators, and my wife was a teacher for 42 years, as was my mother, I always tell them, I said, our education system needs to be focused on the 3E's so that when students complete that 12th year, they ought to be lined up for the three E's. They ought to be on track to be employed, on track to enlist or on track to enroll. That's it, the three E's. And if they do that, their path forward is going to be in good shape. But let them determine what's best for them. And let's equally emphasize all of those, because right now, some students think my only track to success is college, and even sometimes parents think that, and I think parents ought to be looking much more closely at what's my return on investment. Because if I'm going to spend hundreds of 1000s of dollars on my child's education, and they get a degree in an area that has an oversupply of degrees there, and the starting salary is well below what they would need to just make a payment on a car or to rent an apartment, or even these days, Lord forbid, try to buy a house. You know, I think they have to look at that. And in many instances, the path in earning potential over a lifetime is much better in a career in technical education path than it is in a college track. And many times, too parents, and I think even students looked and say, Well, I've got to do this. Well, no, you know, there's a lot of opportunities out there. My son's a great example. You know, went to went to college for a couple of years, and after a sophomore year, went to his mom first and said, Hey, I'm wasting your money. I have no idea what I want to do. And his mom said, go talk to your dad. So he came to me and I said, Listen, don't, don't live your life for me. You know, find something and jump out of bed raring to go to work and work hard, and life will work itself out. You'll be fine. So, you know, he was a very industrious young man. And he started as a crew member on a big commercial fishing boat, went to maritime school, got his certification. So today he has, you know, the certifications where he can pretty much operate most anything on the on the high seas, and he loves it, and has his own commercial fishing business, as well as runs a boat. Hondo Geurts 19:10 I've seen all the great fish in your office. Rep. Rob Wittman 21:01 So anyway, so, so he's so it just goes to show that, you know, we just need to think about things a little bit differently today. And the re industrialization really is about I tell folks the three most important things to re industrialization is workforce, workforce, workforce. And then make sure we're tailoring an education system that provides for opportunities for our young folks today. And then make sure, too, that we work where the jobs are, that is the industry where the jobs are, and make sure they help develop curriculums in these community colleges and Career and Technical Education schools to make sure that we're producing graduates so they can immediately hire. Lauren Bedula 22:13 And I know, as we wrap up here, you've got a busy, busy day out here. You've been to the Reagan defense forum many times. You've been featured for many years, any any final thoughts on how this year might feel different, or kind of the evolving energy out here? Hondo Geurts 22:30 We were laughing a little bit before we started of, you know, normally, I'm the one answering all the questions and the other one asking. So it's, it's good to be on the other side of the microphone. Rep. Rob Wittman 22:56 Sure. Hondo Geurts 22:56 We can't finish this out with a little without a little shipbuilding, sure talk, you know, you and I spent a lot of time trying to, trying to work on that, and you continue that. What's your sense of how that's going and where we should want to be in a couple years? I mean, it's a big ship to turn no pun intended, right? It's not going to get fixed overnight. But are you seeing improvement, and where do you think we really need to be in the next, say, three to four or five years? Rep. Rob Wittman 22:56 you saw a name tag with something else, you're like, Oh, who's that today, if you look at the attendees here, they're overwhelmingly non traditionals. You know, the primes are still here, the traditionals, as we call them, are still here. But the exciting thing to me is the number of non traditionals that are here and the number of people that are part of private equity firms and venture capital firms, because they also see great opportunity here in investing in the future defense industrial base our nation. So I think that, to me, is the most compelling change that we're seeing each year that gets bigger and bigger and it gets more exciting, because those people bring really innovative ideas, a high level of enthusiasm and excitement. And two, it brings that excitement to members of Congress, to tomorrow defense, to all those folks that are charged with, you know, executing this new direction for the Pentagon. Rep. Rob Wittman 23:24 Yeah, listen, I think, I think we're very much at a tipping point, or inflection point, with shipbuilding. And again, it goes right back to workforce. And developing workforce today is very different in the post covid world. It really is all about, how do we attract folks out of high school into these skill sets. How do we keep them there? And if you look at where just a company like Huntington Ingalls Industries has to go, they have to have to hire 5000 ship yard workers a year because of people retiring and attrition, that's a pretty tall order. And the question is is, how do you make sure that your schools in the region have a pipeline to you. How do you make sure you keep the apprentice school at the high level that it operates at? Also, how do you change the workplace? And here's, here's something that it really is about the quality of life. I mean, it used to be years ago, you're like, ah don't worry about that. But what's happened now is, is salary scales have closed with other jobs out there versus the shipyard. It used to be, you'd always get work as a shipyard, because the wage differential was so much bigger than anything else. People would go to the shipyard and they'd be willing to work outside when it's cold or when it's hot. You know, today, the wage differential is much closer, and people are going, Well, wait a minute. You know, I won't make that much less serving chicken sandwiches at Chick fil A as a versus a starting worker at a shipyard, I'm just going to serve chicken sandwiches and I get the same healthcare benefits and those things. So they've done a lot to open that spread up, to pay shipyard workers more, to make sure they have good benefits packages. Another thing to have to look at is to work conditions. I mean, you look at places like electric boat that now are doing a lot of their work indoors because it's so cold up there. The same at Bath Iron Works, the same at HII, I mean, it's a pretty tough environment to work in. Now, it's, it's hard to do that on things like an aircraft carrier when you're building that, but you can set up the dry dock there to where it's it's fairly comfortable for these workers. I mean, there's still some some, you know, some challenges there, but still doing and then simple things, like, you know, if you're going to work with only with 30,000 other people, and you come to this area and you look at it, go, where am I going to park? Something as simple as parking? And then you either have to park a long distance away. Or what some shipyard workers do is, you know, the shift starts at five o'clock, so they'll show up there to get a parking place at 330 in the morning, and they'll sleep in the car and set the alarm and then get up to go something simple like that. So it's the Navy starting to invest now the Commonwealth, Virginia is investing in things like parking decks, but little things that before you never thought about in the same way today, with recruiting and retaining sailors, soldiers, airmen and Marines, when I came along, we were in old wooden barracks. You know, you had a you had literally a pot belly stove at the end. There was no air conditioning there. The air conditioning was open up the windows, and there'd always be a hole in the screen. The mosquitoes would eat you up, and it would just, and, you know, and your and your, your drill instructor would say, Just bear it out. And you're like, okay, okay, you know, today that just doesn't happen. So when we're building now, you know what are essentially dormitories versus barracks, and these things are incredibly nice, but those are the things we have to do to make sure that we are recruiting and retaining not just members of the military, but now shipyard workers. Because the expectation is, is, is, you know, you're, you're going to do some things to try to make life easier for me, and we should. I mean, that's a that's a challenging job to be a shipyard worker, and you don't want to add extra burden to that, especially if you look at the areas that people travel from to go to the shipyard. I mean, where I live is two hours away from the shipyard. There's a bus that comes through there every day to the commuter parking lot, and people get on the bus to go work at the shipyard. So, I mean, it just just tells you, so you've got to do things to make things easier for shipyard workers. Because everybody else is, you know, all the other competing businesses are saying, well, I'm going to give you this. Going to give you that. Give you that. So I think, to me, that's the big place where the shipyards need to go. Now, they're seeing that, and they're working on that. Another thing too, is that, you know, things like CO robotics going to be a much more important part of what happens today. You know, we look at, whereas we talked about Digital Twin, you're going to have to recruit shipyard workers, not just to produce the weld, but to monitor multiple robots that are doing the welds, but also to be the software programmers that program the software for work that happens there. So your your workforce is going to be much more diverse as far as skill sets. You know, it used to be, we hire welders, electricians, Sheet Metal Workers, and that's it, and you just trained them in those areas, and that's how you went to work. Today, you're going to have to hire people the wider skill set, and then you're going to have to do even more too to make sure you enhance their skill set. So, you know, the apprentice school is not only going to be welding and electrical work, but it's going to be software programming. You know, process, process controls on how you do process, digital printing, you know, additive manufacturing, all those things. So the world's changed. We have in Virginia and Danville, the Virginia Advanced Manufacturing Center, which is teaching these shipbuilders how to do advanced manufacturing on on things like the Columbia class submarine. So, very, very different world. And it's and it's happening at the speed of relevance. So, you know, we have to do these things, not just say, well, we'll think about it. We'll do a little bit. This has to be done at the speed of relevance. Lauren Bedula 23:43 And it's so exciting to see. And many of the non traditional players you mentioned out here, not thinking about data analytics, but how they can help us ship building and very interesting areas like that. Rep. Rob Wittman 23:43 They are great, and they are and they are process driven. They're interested too. And how do we develop software that enables things to happen, not just enables the platform, but enables the manufacturing process. It's really exciting times. Rep. Rob Wittman 23:43 Well, Congressman Wittman, thank you so much for all the work you're doing in this area and for coming on to talk about it. We're so excited to see where it goes from here. Rep. Rob Wittman 30:36 Well, it's great to be here. We're excited about it. We have to make sure we come back next year, please, and compare things. Say, where are we now and what's left to do? Lauren Bedula 30:40 We would love that. Yeah, thank you again for joining us. Rep. Rob Wittman 30:43 Thank you. Hondo Geurts 30:44 Thank you, Sir. Rep. Rob Wittman 30:44 Hondo, thanks. good to see you again.