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

[BumRushDaShow]

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/

[dave99]

1. You are correct Senator Mark Kelly

[Igel]

2. I remember when "using a missile to shoot down a missile" was considered cray-cray.

Why? Because (a) it was damned expensive, (b) the physics was hard, even for those with degrees in mathy things like accounting, much closer to physics than, say, lawyering and poli-sci-ing, but those physics folk managed to pull it off, with help from the comp sci peeps.

Now it's assumed. And all those saying how impossible it was are either dead, having gone silent; or still alive, and having gone silent. Because while the physics was 'hard' and every failed test may have advanced the project, every failed test was evidence that it could never, ever, work. "Star Wars" and all that crap. Until it entered production with non-trivial success rates. Until it's assumed. (And those who were wrong, well, if you don't mention you were wrong allies will never bring it up, right?)

"Golden Dome" is just more of the same with much shorter time frames because of higher velocities of incoming and greater distances. Because delta-t = delta-x/ v. (I want to say that this is the 'really hard physics', but it's not so I won't.) Can it work? Dunno. Depends on hypersonics and distribution of anti-missile installations. But if it did, for sure the PRC and Russia would stroke out, so, hey, it's a worthwhile gamble.