Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth invoked President Ronald Reagan Wednesday in a push for Congress to pass a $350 billion defense reconciliation bill, calling the package a generational investment in U.S. military power that surpasses even the Reagan-era buildup of the 1980s.
“President Reagan rebuilt our military for a generation,” Hegseth wrote on X. “President Trump’s Recon 3.0 ($350B) will build even more — and we need it more than ever.”
The post came in response to Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell, who argued on X that the One Big Beautiful Bill Act had already produced more than $68 billion in private investment and created over 94,000 new jobs through its defense industrial base provisions, and that Reconciliation 3.0 must now sustain that momentum.
“The cost to re-start shuttered factories was monumental,” Parnell wrote. “Now we must keep them roaring at full throttle. Today, sustaining these efforts means the cost of keeping these factories open will deliver more weapons and capabilities to the warfighter at a faster scale while continuing to deliver new entrants into the Defense Industrial Base. This momentum is vital. We cannot afford to slow down even for a second. It’s time to pass Reconciliation 3.0 immediately and take the fight to the next level.”
The Scale of the Request
The Trump administration’s fiscal year 2027 budget request totals $1.5 trillion in total defense spending, split between $1.15 trillion in base discretionary spending through the regular appropriations process and $350 billion through a new reconciliation bill, according to a White House fact sheet. The administration says the combined total represents a 44 percent increase over the FY26 defense budget and exceeds even the Reagan buildup, approaching the level of historic increases seen just prior to World War II.
The White House has framed the $350 billion reconciliation strategy as a deliberate effort to break with past practice, where defense increases required corresponding increases in non-defense spending favored by Democrats. “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 on its One Big Beautiful Bill page.
What the Money Would Buy
The $350 billion package is targeted at the military’s highest-priority modernization programs. The Golden Dome missile defense shield would receive $17.5 billion in FY27, with nearly all of that contingent on reconciliation passing, according to the White House fact sheet. The budget describes the program as developing “game-changing space-based missile defense sensors and interceptors” and enabling technologies for a layered, next-generation homeland defense system.
Shipbuilding would receive $65.8 billion for 18 battle force ships and 16 non-battle force ships, what the White House calls the “Golden Fleet.” The budget includes initial funding for a Trump-class battleship, next-generation frigates, and expanded capacity at public shipyards. The administration describes the 41-ship order as the largest demand signal to the maritime industrial base since the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration, per the White House fact sheet.
The reconciliation bill would also add around $280 billion to weapons accounts, including major increases for critical munitions such as PAC-3 interceptors, Tomahawk cruise missiles, and JASSM series missiles. For aviation, the bill would fund 85 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters in FY27 — up dramatically from 47 in FY26 — with 53 of those contingent on reconciliation, per the White House. The bill also funds the F-47 Next Generation Air Dominance platform and expanded investments in drones, autonomous systems, and artificial intelligence.
What the First Reconciliation Bill Built
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law on July 4, 2025, included $150 billion in mandatory defense funding developed in close collaboration between the House and Senate Armed Services Committees and the White House, according to the House Armed Services Committee. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker called it a “generational upgrade” in national defense capability at the time of passage.
The Pentagon moved aggressively to spend that funding, planning to obligate the entire amount in a single fiscal year. Pentagon comptroller Jules Hurst confirmed in March that all but $1.3 billion of the $153 billion allocated to the Department of Defense had been released to the services and program managers. The administration also funded a 7 percent pay raise for military personnel ranked E-5 and below, 6 percent for E-6 to O-3, and 5 percent for O-4 and above, per the White House fact sheet.
Congressional Resistance
Despite the White House push, the path through Congress is contested. Sen. Mitch McConnell, chair of the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, said “regular order appropriations are the right way to meet the scale and scope of the requirements of our military,” expressing skepticism in an April 3 press release. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Wicker told reporters reconciliation funds for defense may not pass until after the midterm elections.
Rep. Betty McCollum, ranking member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, told Hegseth directly during a hearing that “the administration is taking an enormous risk by asking for $350 billion in priorities through reconciliation,” warning that last year’s bill created funding holds for vital programs that appropriators had to fix. Rep. Ken Calvert, who chairs the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, argued the programs “deserve all the full scrutiny and sustained attention that the appropriations process provides.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters he was not ruling out a third reconciliation bill but said any new spending would need to be offset with cuts or revenue increases. “I’m not ruling it out. A lot of it would depend on what’s in it,” Thune said. President Trump has been pressing for fast action on Truth Social, branding the package “Recon 3.0” and urging Republicans to pass it without delay.