Senator Wicker on Trump’s budget request: President’s advisors “were apparently not listening”

• The Senate Armed Services Committee chairman says the budget request would decrease President Trump’s military options and his negotiating leverage.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) sent President Donald Trump’s topline discretionary budget request for fiscal year 2026 to the U.S. Congress on Friday.

The President’s proposal reduces non-defense discretionary by $163 billion or 23 percent from the 2025 enacted level. The White House said it would also increase defense spending by 13 percent, and appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security would increase by nearly 65 percent, “to ensure that our military and other agencies repelling the invasion of our border have the resources they need to complete the mission.”

However, Mississippi U.S. Senator Roger Wicker (R), the Senate Armed Service Committee chairman, took issue with the OMB’s request.

Wicker said in a statement released Friday that President Trump successfully campaigned on a Peace Through Strength agenda, “but his advisers at the Office of Management and Budget were apparently not listening.”

“For the defense budget, OMB has requested a fifth year straight of Biden administration funding, leaving military spending flat, which is a cut in real terms,” Senator Wicker said. “The Big, Beautiful Reconciliation Bill was always meant to change fundamentally the direction of the Pentagon on programs like Golden Dome, border support, and unmanned capabilities – not to paper over OMB’s intent to shred to the bone our military capabilities and our support to service members.”

Wicker continued by saying OMB is not requesting a trillion-dollar budget; it is requesting a budget of $892.6 billion, which is a cut in real terms.

“This budget would decrease President Trump’s military options and his negotiating leverage,” Wicker said.

He explained that the U.S. faces an “Axis of Aggressors” led by the Chinese Communist Party, “who have already started a trade war rather than negotiate in good faith.”

“We need a real Peace Through Strength agenda to ensure Xi Jinping does not launch a military war against us in Asia, beyond his existing military support to the Russians, the Iranians, Hamas, and the Houthis,” Wicker added.

A statement from the White House claims the budget request for the Department of Defense does build on the President’s promise to achieve peace through strength by providing the resources to rebuild the military, re-establish deterrence, and revive the warrior ethos in the Armed Forces. 

“In combination with $119 billion in mandatory funding, the Budget increases Defense spending by 13 percent, and prioritizes investments to strengthen the safety, security, and sovereignty of the homeland, deter Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific, and revitalize our defense industrial base,” the White House statement reads.

Yet, Senator Wicker maintains the request does not go far enough.

“I have said for months that reconciliation defense spending does not replace the need for real growth in the military’s base budget,” Wicker said. “That is what I will work to achieve in Congress with President Trump and Secretary Hegseth to implement the President’s Peace Through Strength agenda.”