Trump seeks $1.5tn for defense department in budget request to Congress
Donald Trump has asked for $1.5tn in defense department funding in his latest budget request to Congress for the 2027 fiscal year.
This would include a pay increase for most troops, funds for the president’s missile defense system, the Golden Dome, and resupplying “critical munitions”. This comes as the US-Israel war on Iran enters its sixth week.
The White House said today’s budget request builds on the historic $1tn overall defense topline for 2026. The 2027 budget request includes a ten percent decrease in non-defense spending, a reduction of $73bn.
Key events
California Democratic representative Jimmy Gomez introduced a bill on Thursday that would prevent Trump from putting his signature on US currency. The bill comes a week after he Trump administration announced it would end a 165-year-old tradition of putting the treasury secretary’s signature on currency instead of the president’s name.
The treasury claimed that it was making the move to honor the US’s upcoming 250th anniversary, while Gomez described the change as “the kind of thing you see from dictators and wannabe strongmen who think the country belongs to them”.
Donald Trump issues executive order declaring all DHS employees will receive pay and benefits during partial shutdown
Donald Trump has issued an executive order that declares all Department of Homeland Security employees will receive pay and benefits during the partial government shutdown.
The “Liberating the Department of Homeland Security From the Democrat-Caused Shutdown” memo is similar to Trump’s executive order from last week which called for issuing pay to TSA agents during the shutdown.
Democrats have refused to back a proposed funding bill for the DHS that would give money to ICE, while House Republicans rejected a compromise last week that would have funded DHS while excluding funds for ICE and other offices focused on immigration enforcement.
Jamie Raskin, Democrat representative, weighs in on Iran downing US aircraft
Democratic representative Jamie Raskin weighed in on Iran’s downing of two American military aircraft. Raskin told CBS News that the incidents appeared to be proof that the US military does not have “complete domination of the skies”.
Raskin, the House judiciary ranking member, also argued that the US should seek international cooperation to put an end to the war and that an aerial bombing campaign alone is not capable of the type of regime change that Trump has vowed to achieve.
“You essentially can’t bomb your way to victory,” Raskin told CBS.
There’s a clearer sense of what transpired after a second US military aircraft was shot down in Iran, according to NBC News, which cited a US official in its report.
The A-10 Thunderbolt aircraft was hit with Iranian fire and managed to make it into Kuwaiti airspace, where its pilot ejected before the plane crashed. The pilot is now safe, NBC reported.
My colleague Lucy Campbell has more details in our Middle East crisis blog:
Tillis vows to withhold crucial vote for attorney general nominee if they excuse January 6 insurrection
Outgoing Republican senator Thom Tillis has vowed to block any nominee to permanently replace Pam Bondi as attorney general if the candidate excuses the January 6 attack on the US Capitol – a threat that could deprive the White House of a crucial vote.
“The threshold for somebody following Pam Bondi ends the moment I hear they said one thing that excused the events of January 6,” Tillis said in an interview with CNN.
The North Carolina lawmaker, who is retiring at the end of his term, has refused to back Donald Trump’s to lead the Federal Reserve, Kevin Warsh, until the justice department ends its investigation into the incumbent, Jerome Powell.
Here’s a recap of the day so far
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Donald Trump has asked for $1.5tn in defense department funding in his latest budget request to Congress for the 2027 fiscal year. This would be $445bn higher than 2026 levels, and include a pay increase for most troops, funds for the president’s missile defense system, the Golden Dome, and resupply “critical munitions”. The proposal also comes as the US-Israel war on Iran enters its sixth week.
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The 2027 budget request includes a 10% decrease in domestic spending, a reduction of $73bn. This includes $5bn in funding cuts to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), $1.3bn in non-disaster grant programs for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), a plan to privatize airport screeners, and slashing Nasa’s budget by $5.6bn. Hidden in the blueprint is also a request for $152m to return Alcatraz prison island to an active facility, following up on the president’s calls last year to reopen the infamous prison turned tourist destination.
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Democratic lawmakers quickly blasted Trump’s budget plan, vowing pushback during negotiations throughout the year. Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said that his party “will make sure it never passes”. Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate appropriations committee, said the draft offered a “bleak and unacceptable” view of the country’s priorities. Jack Reed, the ranking of member of the Senate armed services committee, said that the $1.5tn in funding for the DoD is “flawed” and “irresponsible”.
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Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, confirmed that Donald Trump has been briefed on the news that a US F-15E jet was shot down over Iran. One US service member has been rescued, while another is still missing, according to officials familiar with the matter.
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The US labor market added 178,000 jobs in March, ahead of economists’ expectations. After an extraordinary contraction in February, employers showed signs of resilience amid the US-Israel war in Iran. The unemployment rate fell to 4.3%, according to data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
More Democrats have lambasted the president’s latest budget request to Congress for the 2027 fiscal year.
Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Senate armed services committee, called that the proposal – specifically the $1.5tn funding for the Pentagon a “flawed” and “irresponsible”.
“I will not rubber-stamp a bloated, undisciplined budget. I will work with my colleagues on a bipartisan basis to carefully scrutinize every penny,” the Rhode Island lawmaker said in a statement. “The U.S. Department of Defense doesn’t lack funding, but it currently lacks responsible civilian leadership and management.”
Chris Stein
Democratic lawmakers have blasted Donald Trump’s budget blueprint today.
Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said that his party “will make sure it never passes”.
Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate appropriations committee, said the draft offered a “bleak and unacceptable” view of the country’s priorities.
“President Trump wants to slash medical research to fund costly foreign wars. It doesn’t get more backward than that, and the only responsible thing to do with a budget this morally bankrupt is to toss it in the trash,” Murray said in a statement.
The White House proposal will be the starting point for negotiations that will probably occupy Congress’s appropriators in the coming months, and are unlikely to be enacted in full.
Trump briefed on downed US fighter jet
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, confirmed that Donald Trump has been briefed on the news that a US fighter jet was shot down over Iran.
As we noted earlier, US forces are searching for crew after a F-15 fighter jet was shot down. According to reports, one crew member has been rescued. As of now, we don’t know how many crew members were on board.
My colleagues are covering the latest here:
Trump seeks $5.6bn cut to Nasa budget in 2027
Also in Trump’s budget proposal is a $5.6bn cut to Nasa’s budget for 2027, including a $3.4bn cut to the space agency’s science unit that would cancel roughly 40 programs, a 23% cut as Nasa’s new chief plans an array of new missions under the flagship US moon program.
It comes two days after Nasa launched its most ambitious mission in decades, sending four astronauts on a mission around the moon under its Artemis program.
The budget requests additional funds for Artemis to land astronauts on the moon by 2028, and the establishment of a lunar base camp.
But in the cuts are the termination of over 40 “low-priority missions” in the science program, including “the grossly over-budget Mars Sample Return mission” and the Servir program, which “imposed climate extremism on developing countries”.
It also proposes cuts to legacy human exploration systems, space technology, and the International Space Station.
Trump has also requested cuts for the Office of STEM Engagement, which is described as “subsidizing woke STEM programming”, including the termination of initiatives on diversity in engineering for Historically Black Colleges and Universities and K-12 STEM engagement activities.
White House requests $152m to reopen Alcatraz in budget request to Congress
Tucked away within Trump’s budget proposal to Congress is a request for $152m to return Alcatraz prison island to an active facility, following up on the president’s calls last year to reopen the infamous prison turned tourist destination.
The budget seeks funds for the Federal Bureau of Prisons to cover the first-year costs of rebuilding Alcatraz into “a state-of-the-art secure prison facility”. Congress would need to approve the request in a spending bill for justice department.
The request reads:
For years, the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) has housed violent criminals in crumbling detention facilities. Building on a $5 billion investment secured in the President’s WFTC, the Budget further invests in BOP to ensure competitive pay, safe working conditions, and an end to longstanding correctional ofcer shortages. Within this level, the Budget also afrms the President’s commitment to rebuild Alcatraz as a state-of-the-art secure prison facility, providing $152 million to cover the first year of project costs.
Last May, Trump announced on social media that he was directing the Bureau of Prisons, the US Department of Justice, and other agencies to “reopen a substantially enlarged and rebuilt ALCATRAZ, to house America’s most ruthless and violent Offenders.”
Reuters notes that Alcatraz, which opened in 1934, had been billed as America’s most secure prison given the island location, frigid waters and strong currents.
It closed as a prison in 1969 and has been under the National Park Service’s auspices. The Bureau of Prisons’ website recounts that it was closed because it was too expensive to continue operating, noting it was nearly three times more costly to operate than any other federal prison.
Taz Ali
A search is under way for the crew of a US fighter jet that was shot down by Iran, a person familiar with the matter has confirmed.
As we reported earlier, Iran claimed that it had shot down a US fighter jet, with state media reporting it was an F-35 warplane.
The fate of the crew remains unclear.
It follows reports by Iranian state media that the US military is searching for an American pilot of a downed aircraft in Iran, following earlier reports that Tehran had shot down a US F-35 fighter jet.
Trump eyes $63bn in additional DHS funds, proposes privatizing TSA security screeners
The president has also requested an additional $63bn for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). This would include $10bn for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and more than $18bn for Customs and Border Protection (CBP). This funding would also supplement the $190bn that the department received through Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, that he signed into law last year.
A reminder that the record-breaking partial shutdown, affecting several DHS subagencies, is ongoing. It’s unclear when the funding lapse will end, after House lawmakers took no action on Thursday on Senate-passed legislation to reopen most of the DHS, but withhold funds from ICE and border patrol.
Democrats have refused to pass an appropriations bill without stronger guardrails on federal immigration enforcement, after two US citizens were fatally shot by agents during the administration’s crackdown in Minneapolis.
When Congress returns from its scheduled two-week recess, Republicans are expected to work with Democrats to pass the compromise measure, then begin writing another measure funding ICE and CBP unilaterally using the budget reconciliation process, which can circumvent the filibuster.
Transportation Security Administration (TSA) workers had been affected by the ongoing shutdown, until Trump signed an executive order directing immediate payments to employees last week.
As part of the White House’s budget request, the president has proposed privatizing TSA airport screening, saving the department an estimated $52m for the upcoming fiscal year. Trump also suggested cutting $1.3bn in non-disaster grant programs for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema).
I’m going through Donald Trump’s budget request to Congress now, and pulling out some of the key investments – and many of the most consequential cuts and eliminations.
Notably, for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the White House is pushing for lawmakers to appropriate funding to establish the Administration for a Healthy America (AHA). This, you may remember, is health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr’s planned consolidation of many subagencies whose workforces he slashed last year. In the budget, the White House says that these programs “duplicate other federal spending, promote radicalized DEI ideologies, or use taxpayer funds to support radical nonprofts that are not aligned with administration policies”. Last year, Congress didn’t provide funding for AHA, but in 2027 the administration is hoping to secure funding as part of the $111bn it requests fo the wider HHS.
However, Trump is hoping to cut $5bn in funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which has seen wholesale cuts to research, grants and funding since the president returned to office.
In the budget request, the administration writes that the NIH “broke the trust of the American people with wasteful spending, misleading information, risky research, and the promotion of dangerous ideologies that undermine public health”.
