Trump wants to add nearly $7 trillion to the $39 trillion national debt with his new military budget, watchdog warns

Budget hawks in Washington have their eyes trained on April 3, when the White House is scheduled to release its fiscal year 2027 budget request, centering on a significant “historic” defense spending increase to $1.5 trillion. The national debt crossed $39 trillion just weeks ago and is alarming figures as varied as Elon Musk and Jerome Powell.

Musk, the world’s richest man and, briefly, an advisor to the White House who was involved with the Department of Government Efficiency before departing in 2025, put it bluntly at a conference appearance last September: “If you look at our national debt, which is insanely high, the interest payments exceed the Defense Department budget—and they keep rising.” His conclusion: “If AI and robots don’t solve our national debt, we’re toast.”

President Donald Trump’s response to this situation is to fix the fact that interest payments exceed military budgets by taking out more debt to boost the military budget, according to a top watchdog calculation.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB), a nonpartisan fiscal watchdog, estimated Monday boosting the defense budget by the expected amount would increase total defense discretionary spending...