U.S. Defense Budget for Fiscal Year 2027 Hits Record High

Reference News Network reported on April 6 According to AFP on April 3, as the U.S. engages in a costly war with Iran, the White House on the 3rd unveiled its budget proposal for the fiscal year 2027, requesting Congress to increase the already massive U.S. defense spending by 42% within a year.

According to documents released by the government, this proposal, announced just months before the midterm elections, will cause U.S. military spending to soar to $1.5 trillion next year.

If the proposal is approved by Congress, which is narrowly controlled by the party of the Republican president, it will mark the highest level of defense spending in the modern history of the world's number one superpower. Compared to the defense budget for fiscal year 2026, this increase will amount to exactly $445 billion. The White House stated that this increase "supports President Trump's plan of 'peace through strength'."

The White House explicitly pointed out that overall non-military spending for fiscal year 2027 will be reduced by 10%.

The White House plans to cut several programs, arguing that these programs promote ideologies opposed by the administration: including projects related to gender issues, racial or gender discrimination, and climate change issues denied by Trump.

In the budget led by Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, certain social, educational, and healthcare-related expenditures will be significantly reduced. Vought is implementing the principles outlined in the extreme conservative "2025 Plan" that he crafted. According to this plan, the budget for the major public medical research institution—the National Institutes of Health—will be cut by $5 billion, and funding for development aid and humanitarian assistance programs will also be reduced by billions of dollars.

In contrast, this plan significantly increases spending related to Trump's anti-immigration policies and other security missions. For example, the White House is requesting $152 million next year to reopen the notorious "Devil's Island" prison project, which is a key initiative of the U.S. president.

The U.S. defense budget has long been far ahead, ranking first in the world. The Peter G. Peterson Foundation reported in 2024 that U.S. military spending exceeds the total of the next nine countries combined.

"Now Trump actually wants our military spending to exceed the total of the 34 countries that rank below us," criticized Democratic Congressman Mark Pocan on the social platform X.

This defense budget proposal was made after more than a month of military operations against Iran, which costs up to $2 billion a day.

Representatives of the Democratic opposition, hoping to regain control of Congress in the midterm elections in November, have criticized the government's request, protesting that "the American people need healthcare spending, not war spending."

The president's opponents have also widely circulated excerpts from a speech Trump made at a private luncheon this week. "We are at war," the Republican said, "We cannot afford childcare, Medicaid, and Medicare, which should be the responsibility of the states, not the federal government."

Some conservatives within Trump's camp may also oppose this budget proposal, which does little to alleviate the U.S.'s extremely heavy public debt (over $39 trillion).

According to a report from Singapore's Lianhe Zaobao on April 3, the White House submitted a spending proposal to Congress, requesting that next year's U.S. defense budget reach $1.5 trillion due to increased defense spending resulting from the war with Iran.

The proposal submitted by the White House on the 3rd also requests Congress to cut approximately $73 billion (10%) in non-defense spending, with specific measures including "reducing or eliminating 'wokeism', weaponization, and wasteful projects, and returning responsibilities to state and local governments."

The Pentagon is expected to release detailed budget requests in a few days, but if Congress adopts the president's proposal, the plan could add trillions of dollars to the already growing federal debt over the next decade.

TASS reported on April 4 that the U.S. fiscal year 2027 budget proposal did not mention Ukraine even once. In this 92-page document, none of the chapters referred to Ukraine. One of the goals of this budget is to reform the U.S. foreign aid mechanism to "eliminate fraud and abuse." (Translated by Lin Xiaoxuan and Zhao Zhipeng)