WASHINGTON – Congressman Tim Huelskamp (KS-01) on Monday afternoon met with visiting Army leadership and spoke at a Community Listening Session about Fort Riley, a critical Army divisional post located in the Big First Congressional District.

Even on a Monday afternoon, a crowd of over 1,500 concerned Kansans showed up to voice their support for Fort Riley. The Listening Session room hit capacity, and as parking ran out, organizers used buses to shuttle people to the event from a remote location.

In his remarks, Congressman Huelskamp stressed the state-of-the-art facilities at Fort Riley, the high number of deployments of Fort Riley troops, and the $1.6 billion in military construction investments since 2005. Excerpts from Congressman Huelskamp’s remarks at the listening session included:

“Later this week or next the President of the United States will approach Congress… to ask for additional authorization of military force. And the crown jewel of the Army, those that are leading the tip of the spear fighting ISIS are from Fort Riley.”

“We treasure Fort Riley not just because we love the soldiers, but because we love our nation, and we understand that we don’t want a budget-driven military. We want a mission-driven military. And Fort Riley provides unique, mission-critical capabilities