Democrats seek to block funding for Trump military parade

Feb. 8 (UPI) -- A pair of Democratic Congressman introduced legislation to block federal funds from being used for President Donald Trump's proposed military parade.

Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., and Rep. Marc Veasey, D-Texas, introduced bills in their respective chambers to prevent federal money from being used to fund the demonstration of military strength proposed by the president.

Pentagon spokesman Charlie Summers said Tuesday that the planning process for a parade long-desired by Trump has entered its "infancy."

Millions of dollars would likely be required to ship Abrams tanks and high-tech military hardware to Washington, D.C., for the proposed event.

"We have the best armed forces in the world. We don't need to flex our muscles to showcase our military hardware," Cardin wrote in a letter to his Senate colleagues. "Our brave military men and women flex their might around the world every day on behalf of our nation."

Cardin said his bill would prevent grand-scale parades as a "show of force" as well as limit the impact of national military parades on military readiness.

Veasey shared a series of tweets introducing the PARADE Act, short for "Preventing Allocation of Resources for Absurd Defense Expenditures," and suggested potential parade funds instead be allocated to other military causes.

"The PARADE Act ensures that [POTUS] cannot spend millions amd millions of taxpayer dollars on a military parade that strokes his big ego and his authoritarian wish list," Veasey wrote.