U.S. Rep. Tom Barrett, R-Charlotte, said he’s glad the USS Abraham Lincoln will soon be relieved after more than 250 consecutive days at sea in the Middle East.
Concerns have been raised about the mental health of sailors aboard the ship and a lack of food and other supplies amid the abnormally long deployment.
Barrett, who was a helicopter pilot for the Army, told reporters Tuesday in Lansing that service members should be given “the absolute highest level of dignity and level of service.”
“Everyone understands when they serve in the military that they are making a sacrifice, and you serve in some austere environments,” Barrett said. “I went through that myself. And it’s not that we intentionally put men and women in that position. It’s an understanding of some of the complications and challenges that our men and women face in uniform.”
Asked last week if the deployment had gone on too long, President Donald Trump said, “not nearly long enough.”
Another U.S. aircraft carrier, the USS George Washington, is on its way to the Middle East to relieve the USS Lincoln after nearly nine months, a record-setting time at sea.
U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Tipton, and former Gov. John Engler joined Barrett at the press conference after touring the Tower on Grand housing development, which will be the tallest building in Lansing once construction work is complete.
Johnson said the project, which is part of the five-development New Vision Lansing, is a snapshot of federal policies meant to create opportunities for growth and expansion.
Data centers are another important part of that growth, Johnson said.
While he said data center projects should come with local regulations of utility rates and resource use, he said a moratorium on development is “a dangerous prospect.”
“We’re in a race with China on that AI race, and if they’re able to leapfrog us in that race is a very dangerous thing,” Johnson said. “So, it’s got to be measured. There’s got to be a measured approach.”
While the tour was an official event, organized through Barrett’s office, Johnson acknowledged that Barrett’s re-election campaign is expected to be one of the closest U.S. House races in the country and could determine control of the chamber.
Johnson said that’s why five cabinet secretaries have also traveled to Barrett’s district since June, including Tuesday morning when Interior Secretary Doug Burgum toured the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams at Michigan State University.
He said Republicans “have to defy history” in the midterms, noting that the party of a sitting president rarely pick up seats. But he said this year will be different, arguing that Republicans have stronger candidates and Democrats are “almost at the stage of open civil war right now.”
Barrett faces climate organizer William Lawrence in November, who won the primary with a plurality of votes after former Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink and former Navy SEAL Matt Maasdam split the moderate vote nearly evenly.
Lawrence, a co-founder of the climate organizing group Sunrise Movement, let his Democratic Socialists of America membership lapse, refuting “any attempt to label me in a way which is intended to divide or to frighten.”
“There’s a lot of things I agree on with a lot of people in DSA, but the fact of the matter is the national organization has a tendency of producing statements that are neither consistent with the general will of the membership, nor grounded in any clear and consistent political strategy,” Lawrence said. “And at a time we need to fend off all of these national media narratives trying to pigeonhole me into some box, we simply cannot afford that distraction.”
But that didn’t stop Johnson from tying Lawrence to DSA national co-chair Megan Romer, who answered during a lightning round of questions on Fox News that the organization wants to abolish the U.S. Senate and replace the president and Supreme Court with an executive and judicial branch elected by Congress.
“They want one unicameral body of the House to run everything,” Johnson said. “Why? Because they think, over two or three cycles, they can get enough communists and Marxists elected … and that they'll take over the chamber, and then they'll take over the means of production.”
Affordability has remained a key concern for voters, with average gas prices in Michigan up more than $1 per gallon since last year.
Johnson predicted that the war in Iran will be winding down soon, which he said could bring relief for people feeling the strain of high prices for gas and groceries.
“Whether we do it in the next 77 days before the election or not, people understand you cannot turn the government over to radical Marxist communists,” Johnson said. “Because they will take over everything.”
