Heck lands on Armed Services committee

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nev., a medical officer in the Army Reserve, had been angling for a seat on the House Armed Services Committee. On Friday it came through.

Heck's office confirmed the freshman has been assigned to the influential military policy panel.

Overall his workload will have a decided security tilt as he already has been named to the House Intelligence Committee.

Heck also will sit on the Education and Workforce Committee. But in order to add Armed Services, he had to drop off the House Homeland Security Committee, his spokesman said.

Rep. Buck McKeon, R-Calif., the new chairman of the Armed Services Committee, served as Heck's assigned "mentor" during the fall campaign and wanted to have the freshman join him, according to Phil Perine, a Las Vegas real estate agent and retired naval officer who volunteered on Heck's campaign.

Adding Heck to Armed Services "was an easy decision and a move I supported strongly," McKeon said Friday.

Heck, an emergency room physician, joined the Army Reserve in 1991 and currently is a colonel. He was deployed to Iraq for three months in 2008. By coincidence he has Reserve duty in California this weekend, according to aide Darren Littell.

"From the 422nd Signal Battalion who held their deployment ceremony just yesterday to the men and women at Nellis and Creech, Nevada's role in our country's defense is unmistakable," Heck said. "My goal is to live up to the high standard Nevada's brave servicemen and women have set."