White House seeks $17.5 billion for Golden Dome, but most funding hinges on reconciliation

The Trump administration’s Golden Dome missile defense system might get $17.5 billion in fiscal 2027 after receiving a $23 billion down payment through a reconciliation bill passed last summer. 

But almost all the funding for President Donald Trump’s ambitious missile defense shield hinges on another reconciliation bill – the White House is asking Republicans to pass a significant portion of the president’s massive $1.5 trillion defense budget request through the party-line reconciliation process. 

To get to the $1.5 trillion figure, the White House wants $1.15 trillion to come through the regular appropriations process, while another $350 billion through reconciliation process.

“For decades in Washington, Democrats have demanded and received corresponding increases in wasteful and harmful programs for every increase in the defense budget. This administration has successfully shifted that paradigm by including a much-needed increase to defense spending in a reconciliation bill passed with only Republican votes – avoiding the traditional spending ratchet,” the White House said. “This strategy of decoupling funding for Republican priorities from Democrat waste and use of executive fiscal tools has proven to be a success, and we continue to deploy it in this year’s budget.”

The base budget request for fiscal 2027 includes approximately $400 million for the Golden Dome, with the remaining $17.1 billion expected to come from reconciliation funding if approved by Congress. It’s not clear, however, if Trump will have enough support within his own party given last year’s multitrillion-dollar spending package.

“The initiative’s scope is to develop and mature a versatile, multi-layered defense system. The goal is to not create a ‘perfect’ defense, but to provide an increasingly effective shield that enhances the U.S. capability to deter attacks, disincentivize arms racing, and negotiate from a position of strength. For fiscal year 2027, the program will balance investments in next-generation technologies with the strengthening of existing foundational capabilities to improve near-term readiness and build for the future,” the White House said. 

Last year, Trump positioned the Golden Dome as a revolutionary, nearly 100% effective shield that would be able to intercept missiles fired from all over the world, but analysts said the budget documents reflect a shift toward a much more limited approach.

“Golden Dome is the epitome of taxpayer waste — expensive, unviable, and strategically counterproductive. From the beginning, the president has sold Golden Dome to taxpayers as an impenetrable shield against all missile threats. But the budget request explicitly contradicts this vision, because it’s a fantasy. It admits what we’ve known all along — that no missile defense system can reliably protect the United States from nuclear weapons. Less-than-perfect defenses against shorter range, conventional missiles have shown some utility, though the Iran War has underscored their limits when facing a sustained barrage. But when it comes to nuclear weapons, even one missile getting through would be catastrophic, and chances are many would get through in the event of a nuclear war,” Gabe Murphy, a policy analyst at Taxpayers for Common Sense, told Federal News Network.

“A leaky Golden Dome would defend the U.S. against nuclear weapons about as well as buying everyone in America a bullet proof vest—and it would cost a lot more,” he added.

According to the budget documents, the Pentagon plans to obligate nearly $20.5 billion for Golden Dome in fiscal 2026. Trump previously said the Golden Dome would be completed in about three years and cost approximately $175 billion. The price has already gone up by $10 billion. 

Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein, Golden Dome’s program manager, said last month that all of the funding for Golden Dome under reconciliation from last year has flowed.

“We’ve got a very close partnership with [the Office of Management and Budget] and [National Security Council] on execution of those funds,” Guetlein said.

The White House pitched the Golden Dome in the budget documents as a “layered defense of the homeland from the nation’s adversaries” that will “keep Americans safe.”

Murphy said the idea that Golden Dome would disincentivize arms racing is “laughable.” 

“Building it would achieve the opposite, incentivizing our adversaries to build more nuclear weapons to ensure they can overwhelm our defenses,” Murphy said.

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