The Tide Is Turning Against Astronomical Pentagon Spending
Public Citizen News / Sept-Oct 2026
By David Rosen
This article appeared in the Sept/Oct 2026 edition of Public Citizen News. Download the full edition here.
President Donald Trump has demanded an eye-popping $600 billion annual increase in Pentagon spending that would bring its total annual budget to $1.5 trillion for the first time. The administration is aiming to reach this total through two or three separate spending bills.
The first legislative step will be passage of the fiscal year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The version drafted and passed by House Republicans in late July proposes a $250 billion increase over the fiscal year 2026 Pentagon base budget, bringing the total to nearly $1.15 trillion.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration hopes to add another $350 billion to the Pentagon budget through a partisan budget reconciliation bill. On top of that, the president is seeking an additional $67 billion through a supplemental appropriations bill to offset the costs of his illegal and unconstitutional war in Iran.
None of this is the routine but lamentable year-over-year increase in military spending. It would effectively double the Pentagon’s budget. This is budget depravity – a gift beyond the wildest imagination of the military-industrial complex, and a monumental diversion of resources from domestic and human needs. That’s what Public Citizen and its allies have repeatedly told lawmakers in Congress, and for the first time in decades, many appear to be listening.
Even as millions of Americans struggle to pay for health insurance, prescription medications, housing, education, gas, electricity, water, and groceries, Trump and Republicans in Congress keep insisting that the nation cannot afford basic investments in human needs. Yet, at the same time, they are demanding astronomical sums for Pentagon spending, military contractors, and an ill-conceived war in Iran that is driving up gas prices.
Trump kicked off his Pentagon spending spree in 2025 by slashing health care and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food assistance by $1 trillion over the next 10 years while increasing Pentagon funding by $150 billion. A year after Republicans handed that money over via reconciliation, the Pentagon has yet to obligate more than 80% of it.
Now, Trump’s proposed 2027 federal budget comes with even more cuts to programs that invest in human needs. In April, Trump said, “We’re fighting wars… It’s not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things.” When asked about rising gas prices resulting from the war in Iran, Trump responded that he does not “think about Americans’ financial situation.”
Momentum is building in Congress to block Trump’s Pentagon spending plans. The Armed Services committees in both chambers of Congress have a long tradition of rubber-stamping ever-higher Pentagon budgets, yet this time is different. In early June, 12 House Democrats and nine senators from both parties broke with tradition and voted in their respective committees to completely reject Trump’s Pentagon budget.
In addition, an amendment to cut Trump’s Pentagon budget by $150 billion received 25 votes in the House Armed Services Committee. Nearly all the Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee backed a parallel amendment introduced by U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.).
Over the summer, 27 House Democratic appropriators voted against Trump’s defense appropriations bill. And in July, Senate Democrats blocked the House version of the NDAA from advancing. This legislation usually enjoys robust bipartisan support, but this time there was no rubber stamp.
These departures from tradition signal how galling a $1.5 trillion Pentagon budget request is, especially now.
The U.S. already spends more on its military than the next several countries combined. The Pentagon has never passed an audit, cannot account for much of the money it receives, and has repeatedly proved unable to spend all the money it already has.
Polls show that most voters now see this clearly, with three out of five opposing Trump’s Pentagon spending proposal.
The upcoming Senate vote on the NDAA, expected sometime during Congress’s post-election work period, offers voters, lawmakers, and the media an opportunity to ask a straightforward question:
If Congress can find hundreds of billions of additional dollars every year for the Pentagon, why can’t lawmakers find the resources to keep hospitals open, strengthen public education, and lower costs for working families?
The $600 billion Trump wants to devote to additional Pentagon spending could instead be directed toward the needs of the American people, including restoring funding for health care, food, housing, and climate action.
The money would be enough to pay for ALL of the following:
- Restoring the cruel Medicaid and SNAP cuts included in the Republican reconciliation bill;
- Restoring Affordable Care Act subsidies;
- Providing universal day care and child care;
- Expanding Medicare to cover dental, hearing, vision, and home health care;
- Quadrupling the budget of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency;
- Making massive investments to address the climate catastrophe;
- Ending homelessness in America;
- Making major investments in affordable housing; and
- Making college free for anyone from a low-income household.
The American people are fed up with spending more on bombs and less on basic needs. And they are furious with a pointless, deadly, illegal, unconstitutional, and protracted war that is costing lives and driving up gas prices.
Public Citizen and its allies will continue to pressure lawmakers to reject astronomical, accountability-free spending requests that do little more than line the pockets of warmongering defense contractors.
What makes this moment different is that the tide is finally turning.