Rep. Wittman hosts roundtable with Navy official, defense industry leaders

Emma Rose Brown, The Virginian-Pilot on May 2, 2026

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U.S. Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Va., hosted a roundtable with Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Mike Duffey and defense industry leaders Friday in Williamsburg, Virginia, as lawmakers gear up for the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act process.

Wittman called the moment a “big transition time” for the military, and highlighted expanding technologies in artificial intelligence and unmanned systems. He said Virginia is at “the forefront” of that expansion.

“There’s lots of great opportunities here in the Hampton Roads area as we look to expand our defense budget to modernize the military,” said Wittman.

About a dozen representatives from companies including Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding, BAE Systems, BWX Technologies, Virginia Ship Repair Association and Auterion attended the roundtable at the Williamsburg Inn. The event was closed to the media; all attendees except Wittman declined to participate in a media availability.

Wittman said attendees discussed how changes to acquisition have allowed more small and medium-sized businesses to get into the space. He also highlighted the need for sustainment reform.

“Instead of doing ship maintenance one ship at a time through contract, we ought to do multi-ship contracting. Let’s take a group of ships — the ships we know that need to be maintained over the next five years — and let’s issue a contract for all of those ships, which will bring down the cost and create more certainty,” he said.

Asked whether he was concerned about shipyard backlogs, Wittman said the operational availability of ships has not been where it needs to be.

“We have to do more there because we have fallen behind and not done the things that we need to do,” said Wittman. “And listen, it’s not the industry’s fault — it’s the inconsistency of the demand signal that comes from either the Navy or from the Pentagon. We have to fix that.”

The roundtable took place just days after news broke that the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford is on its way back to Norfolk following an extended deployment.

Wittman said the Ford is on track for interim repair, which is a shorter-term repair than an RCOH, or mid-life carrier overhaul.

The Ford’s deployment has been taxing on the ship and the crew. In April, it became the longest-deployed carrier of the post-Vietnam era.

Sailors and their loved ones have expressed their frustrations about the Ford’s lengthy, issue-plagued deployment. According to the Wall Street Journal, the length of the deployment is leading some sailors to consider leaving the Navy, including the mother of a toddler who said she hasn’t seen her child in almost a year.

In January, NPR reported on ongoing plumbing issues — with the Ford averaging about one sewage maintenance issue per day.

After a fire raged aboard the carrier March 12, hundreds of sailors lost their bedding, and were sleeping on cots, floors and tables. USNI News reported that 2,000 sweatsuits were sent to the Ford because damage to the laundry facilities limited the sailors’ ability to wash their clothing. About 1,000 mattresses were taken from the USS John F. Kennedy, which recently conducted sea trials and is scheduled to be delivered to the Navy next year, and flown to the Ford.

In March, then-Navy secretary John Phelan traveled to Norfolk, Virginia, to hold a town hall with families of the Ford and Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group, which has also been on extended orders. Attendees described the event as heated and said little new information was shared by Navy leadership.

Asked whether the ongoing conflict and extensions will change the current carrier rotation, Wittman said “it shouldn’t.”

“But the world gets a vote in this. So when we have a demand signal around the world where our carrier strike groups need to be in these places, sometimes those deployments get extended, and when they do, it puts additional pressure on our sailors and our ships. So we have to be mindful of that.”

Wittman acknowledged that extended deployments stress sailors and families.

“There’s always an issue when quality of life for sailors is at the top of the list of concerns expressed by sailors. So we should be looking at it very seriously,” Wittman said Friday. “As the old saying goes, we recruit sailors, but we retain families.”