This week, the U.S. House will vote on $900 billion for war and nuclear weapons. This is $60 billion more than last year — even more than the military requested — and this increase alone is more than the entire funding for diplomacy, international aid and genocide prevention. Instead of building health, prosperity and security at home, it would waste billions on never-ending wars. The Pentagon can’t even pass an audit. An internal Department of Defense report identified $125 billion in military waste over five years. In 2015, Boulder County taxpayers spent $833 million on the military. Throwing more money at the Pentagon does nothing to encourage a culture of fiscal responsibility there.

The House plan cuts “non-defense” programs by $1.3 trillion over the next 10 years while increasing the federal debt through military spending and tax cuts. President Trump has proposed cutting 17 percent of the State Department and humanitarian assistance, 36 percent of the Environmental Protection Agency, and 14 percent of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, among others.

Do we really need intercontinental ballistic missile bases that are no longer useful when even the president boasts of supreme air and sea defenses? Why is Congress spending over $20 billion over the next five years for littoral combat ships the Pentagon doesn’t want and U.S. Sen. John McCain called “flawed?”

The Department of Energy has an ambitious plan to spend an estimated $1 trillion on nuclear weapons over the next 30 years. Nuclear weapons are obsolete and unusable. They are not going to stop a resurgent Russia, resolve conflicts in the Middle East, protect against cyber threats, slow climate disruption or stop the spread of deadly diseases. Spending a trillion dollars of taxpayer money on these weapons is outrageous.

Rep. Polis sponsored (failed) amendments to reign in Pentagon spending. I urge Sen. Gardner and Sen. Bennet to oppose this mindless military expansion and support reasonable budget priorities.

DeAnne Butterfield lives in Boulder.