LAS VEGAS (AP) -- The potential for defense budget cuts and layoffs at Lockheed Martin loom over plans to deliver the first F-35 fighter jets to Nellis Air Force Base early next year.
The base in southern Nevada is set to get 36 Joint Strike Fighter jets over 10 years. Automatic defense budget cuts of nearly $500 billion are set to take effect in January unless Congress agrees on another deficit-reduction plan or suspends the current plan.
Some Republican senators say it would be a mistake to cut the defense budget so steeply, a point they reiterated in recent visit to Nellis.
A Nellis spokeswoman tells the Las Vegas Review-Journal it would be premature to speculate how the cuts would affect Nellis because details of those cuts haven't been decided yet.
