Pentagon Spending

In this era of racial reckoning, national security policy and defense budgets cannot be exempt from the scrutiny of their effects on communities of color.

On April 9, President Biden officially sent to Congress what is known as the “skinny budget” – a 58-page summary of a much larger and more detailed budget proposal to be submitted later this spring. The skinny budget contains only the “top-lines,” or total request levels, for each category of spending, with minimal details about how the funds will be allocated among specific programs. We found a lot to love about the proposal, even in its skeleton form.

Early in 2017, in the first months of the Trump administration, Congress increased Pentagon spending by $15 billion over the levels of the outgoing Obama administration. The total—$634 billion— was more in inflation-adjusted terms than the United States spent at the height of the Vietnam War.

There are some things that can’t be put back in the box. And others that shouldn’t.

As Congress works to get Americans back into jobs lost in the COVID-19 crisis, it must focus on proven solutions. Dollar for dollar, spending on the Pentagon and national defense creates fewer jobs than other top industries. According to a Brown University study, $1 billion invested in education will create over twice as many jobs as $1 billion spent on the Pentagon.

President Donald Trump’s proposed FY 2020 budget lays out a disturbing vision for the future of our country that offers billions more for war, walls, and detention at the expense of our families, our health, and our safety.

Congress must take many steps to set the Pentagon’s final budget. For the fiscal year starting on October 1 (FY 2018), Congress and the president have already agreed to fund operations through December 8, 2017 at last year’s spending rate. Between now and then they still must reach a deal on the full year’s budget, or buy still more time.

On October 7, 2001, the United States officially began Operation Enduring Freedom and the war in Afghanistan. Almost 19 years later, the United States finds itself struggling to conclude two decades of relentless war that has cost trillions of dollars and an untold number of lives.