Imagine your friend hits the gym. He cuts junk food and starts lifting, and suddenly he’s up 5 pounds — but now it’s muscle, not flab. The scale doesn’t tell the story. The guy looks better, moves faster, and is 10 times tougher. That’s exactly what President Donald Trump is doing with the U.S. military.
The same media that cried about mean tweets is now freaking out over a “$1 trillion” defense budget. They see the number and shout “Hypocrisy!” They say Trump promised to drain the swamp, so why is defense spending higher?
But Trump isn’t just throwing money at the Pentagon. He’s reshaping it — cutting the bloated, corrupt, bureaucratic mess former Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama left behind and building a war machine that’s leaner, smarter, and deadlier. You want peace through strength? This is how it looks.
Let’s talk Air Force One. It was a flying monument to government waste. In Trump’s first term, he saved taxpayers $1.4 billion by renegotiating the contract. Now, in his second term, he’s at it again. When Boeing dragged its feet, Trump went full CEO mode: Calling out the delays publicly, turning to Elon Musk, and signing an executive order in April to fix the mess.
And guess what? It’s working. With the Department of Government Efficiency in charge, it’s starting to seem that more progress has been made on Air Force One in the past few months than during Biden’s bureaucratic sleepwalk.
That’s just one example. The Department of Defense said DOGE has found over $80 million in DOD spending that does not fit the department’s mission. DOD spokesman Sean Parnell highlighted “$1.9 million for holistic diversity, equity and inclusion transformation and training; $6 million to the University of Montana to ‘strengthen American democracy by bridging divides’; $3.5 million by the Defense Human Resources Activity to support DEI groups; and $1.6 million to the University of Florida to study the ‘social and institutional detriments of vulnerability and resilience to climate hazards in [the] African Sahel.’”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is working to cut $50 billion from the Pentagon every year for the next five years. That’s $250 billion in waste gone. That’s how you drain the defense swamp without weakening America.
So why is the top-line budget still $1 trillion? Well, unlike Democrats, Trump understands the point isn’t just to spend less; it’s to spend wisely. It’s about cutting fat and building muscle.
America’s military isn’t as sharp as it should be. Our nuclear systems still rely on tech from the 1960s. China now has a bigger navy. Cyberattacks have exposed major vulnerabilities in our digital defenses.
Trump’s $1 trillion defense budget fixes that. It redirects funds toward 17 specific priorities that actually matter, such as a real homeland missile shield (an American Iron Dome), a nuclear arsenal that doesn’t run on floppy disks, and new bases to push back against Beijing. This is how you win in the 21st century.
Biden spent four years letting the military rot while pushing woke training manuals and gender studies in the ranks. Trump is reversing that, and fast. No more diversity seminars while China builds nuclear weapons. No more bureaucrats dragging out weapons programs for years while enemies gain ground. Under Trump, the Pentagon answers to America first, not the globalist consulting class.
We cannot defend this country by defunding our ability to fight. But we can stop subsidizing Europe’s lazy welfare states, cut off defense contractors who got rich off endless wars, and build a military that reflects the strength, speed, and will of the people. Trump isn’t trying to police the world. He’s trying to make sure no one can touch the United States.
So yes, the defense budget has a “T” in front of it, but don’t be fooled; this isn’t business as usual. This is Trump doing what he does best: turning around a broken system and making America strong again. If we’re going to cut spending, let’s start with the flab, not the arms that hold our sword and shield.
Charlie Kirk is the founder and CEO of Turning Point USA and Turning Point Action. He hosts the top-ranked podcast and nationally syndicated radio program The Charlie Kirk Show.