Heather Wilson: LANL to layoff 400-800

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - On Tuesday Heather Wilson, Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, released a statement in response to a voluntary lay-off at Los Alamos National Labs.

According to the release, 400-800 jobs will be lost at Los Alamos as a result of President Obama’s budget cuts.

Wilson’s statement was sent before any official announcement was made by Los Alamos.

Los Alamos issued an official release on the layoffs by 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Wilson's full statement below:

“400-800 jobs lost at Los Alamos will affect a lot of families and businesses in Los Alamos and Rio Arriba County,” Wilson said. “I'm afraid it is only the beginning. I expect there will be hundreds more jobs lost unless we change direction.

“A little over a year ago, President Obama made a commitment to modernize our nuclear weapons complex in order to maintain a safe, reliable nuclear deterrent at lower levels of forces. That commitment included replacing a 60-year-old facility at Los Alamos for handling plutonium. In his new budget, however, President Obama has broken that commitment. And as a result, an estimated 1,000 jobs will be killed for 10 years in Los Alamos.

“One of the best ways to provide for our defense needs would be to reduce excessive red tape from Washington and move more of the budget into programs. The President's budget includes almost $500 million a year in National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) administrative costs. We would be better off as a nation if most of this money were moved to programs like CMRR at Los Alamos. Having helped create the NNSA as a semi-autonomous agency attached to DOE, it is now clear to me that the change did not take hold. The priority should be science — not paying for layers of bureaucracy.

“I believe we need a handful of people who will steward our nation’s defense even in a time of peace. New Mexico needs someone who will fight for our laboratories — someone who understands our state's unique contributions to national security. I intend to stand up for New Mexico and fight for our labs when I am elected to the U.S. Senate.”