Sen. Mark Kelly says Trump administration's $1.5 trillion Pentagon budget request is "outrageous"

Source: CBS News

May 10, 2026 / 1:09 PM EDT


Washington — Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona said Sunday that the Trump administration's $1.5 trillion budget request for defense spending is "outrageous.". "They need to submit a defense budget that makes sense for the moment we're in," Kelly said on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan."

Last month, the administration released its fiscal year 2027 budget proposal, which serves as a starting point for negotiations with Congress over annual spending. The proposal would mark a 42% increase in defense spending from 2026 levels.

"When I got to the Senate five and a half years ago, the defense budget was just over $700 billion," Kelly said. "Now they're asking for twice as much money — it's nearly the amount that the rest of the world pays for its defense."

Kelly, who sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said some of the budget proposal's components pose serious difficulties. In addition to a pay raise for troops and resupplying critical munitions, the funds would also go toward building a space-based "Golden Dome" missile defense system, among other things. "There's stuff in there, like Golden Dome," he said. "The physics on that stuff is really, really hard. I'm very confident we're going to spend a lot of money, we're going to get a system that doesn't work."

Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/sen-mark-kelly-pentagon-budget-request/