Navy ship maintenance would drop, readiness would suffer and stress on sailors would ratchet up if federal budget gridlock drags far into 2017, Navy leaders said Wednesday.

The one piece of good news for Hampton Roads: Newport News Shipbuilding would probably do “better than most” in a worst-case budget scenario, acting Navy Secretary Sean Stackley said Wednesday.

That picture emerged as Stackley spoke at the Sea-Air-Space Exposition in National Harbor, Md., and Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson testified with other service chiefs before Congress.

The lead-up to this crisis began in December, when Congress passed a “continuing resolution” that limited federal spending at 2016 levels through April 28. The idea was to give the Trump administration more time to get settled and submit its own spending plan.

Since then, the Trump team has submitted a $30 billion supplemental defense spending bill for the rest of this fiscal year, which runs to Sept. 30. The administration has also proposed a $668 billion measure that lays out defense spending for fiscal year 2018.

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