Reviews Lifestyle The New Sober Boom Getting Hooked on Quitting Education Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous Is College Necessary? Finance Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset Crypto Investing SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters ‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

Lifestyle The New Sober Boom Getting Hooked on Quitting

Getting Hooked on Quitting

Education Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous Is College Necessary?

Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous

Is College Necessary?

Finance Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset

Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear

Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset

Crypto Investing SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters ‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

Investing SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters ‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters

‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

Reviews Lifestyle The New Sober Boom Getting Hooked on Quitting Education Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous Is College Necessary? Finance Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset Crypto Investing SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters ‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

Lifestyle The New Sober Boom Getting Hooked on Quitting

Getting Hooked on Quitting

Education Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous Is College Necessary?

Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous

Is College Necessary?

Finance Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset

Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear

Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset

Crypto Investing SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters ‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

Investing SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters ‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters

‘Dark’ Personalities Drawn to BTC

“An out-of-touch plea for more money”: Trump seeks $1.5 trillion for new defense budget

Massive cuts to domestic programs, with higher state taxes, would bolster the spending increase

Published April 3, 2026 2:47PM (EDT)

For 2027, President Donald Trump is asking for a record military defense budget of $1.5 trillion as part of the White House’s proposed budget plan. If the budget passes, it would constitute the largest military budget in U.S. history. The proposal calls for a 44% increasing in spending, according to a 92-page document released Friday by the Office of Management and Budget.

“President Trump promised to reinvest in America’s national security infrastructure, to make sure our Nation is safe in a dangerous world,” the document reads. “The 2027 Budget upholds this promise and would ensure that the United States continues to maintain the world’s most powerful and capable military.”

The budget will also continue to “constrain non-defense spending and reform the Federal Government.” This includes cuts to more than $73 billion in domestic government programs across housing, education, health care and the environment.

Trump proposed the spending increase in January as a means to build a “dream military” that would “keep us safe and secure.” Recently, Trump has urged lawmakers to approve increases in defense spending, specifically in the ongoing Iran War. Trump said military spending supersedes domestic programs.

“It’s not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things,” Trump said during a Wednesday speech that was posted to YouTube and later deleted. “We have to take care of one thing: military protection. We have to guard the country.”

Start your day with essential news from Salon. Sign up for our free morning newsletter, Crash Course.

The proposed budget met instant pushback from lawmakers. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, said the budget “fails to meet the needs of working Americans.”

“It’s just an out-of-touch plea for more money for guns and bombs, and less for the things people need, like housing, health care, education, roads, scientific research and environmental protection,” Merkley said in a statement to Salon.

Rep. Gabe Amo, D-R.I., said the budget shows what Trump values “trillions for wars of choice.”

“He doesn’t value your health care, housing or education,” Amo said in a post on X. “This budget’s dead on arrival.”

about Trump’s economy

Why the Iran war could make everything, not just oil, more expensive

“Cut the check”: Lawmakers and companies demand refunds from Trump’s illegal tariffs 

Fox News turns sour on Trump economy — and so do his voters

Related Topics ------------------------------------------

Copyright © 2026 Salon.com, LLC. Reproduction of material from any Salon pages without written permission is strictly prohibited. SALON ® is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a trademark of Salon.com, LLC. Associated Press articles: Copyright © 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

© Salon