Sen. Warren: “The National Guard are not pawns and taxpayer dollars are not a piggy bank for Trump’s political stunts.”

August 6, 2026 - Washington, D.C. – In a new response to U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Jules Hurst III, President Donald Trump’s nominee to become the Pentagon’s comptroller, confirmed that the Pentagon’s deployment of National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., is set to cost an additional $1.4 billion through the end of the Trump administration. Senator Warren is the Ranking Member of the Senate Armed Services (SASC) Subcommittee on Personnel.

The new estimate, which accounts for October 2026 through January 2029, adds to the hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars spent to date on Trump’s National Guard deployment.

“While American families are getting flattened by skyrocketing costs, Donald Trump is spending $1.4 billion to keep troops on the streets in Washington for years on end. The National Guard are not pawns and taxpayer dollars are not a piggy bank for Trump’s political stunts,” wrote Senator Warren.

As part of Hurst’s confirmation process, Senator Warren noted reports indicating that DOD is planning to maintain a National Guard presence in Washington, DC through 2029 and in questions for the record, asked Hurst to provide a detailed cost estimate of the expected Guard deployments through 2029.

Hurst provided the following information in his response: 

The Department requested $605.1 million in the FY 2027 President’s Budget to fund the Make DC Safe and Beautiful mission. This request includes approximately $375.7 million for pay and travel allowances and $229.4 million for operations, including contracted lodging and meals. This costing assumes an average strength of 2,500 National Guard personnel through January 2029 (based on historical manning data and excluding the temporary surge for Freedom 250 events). Based on these planning factors, the Department projects costs as follows to support this mission:

• FY 2027: $605.1M ($375.7M in pay and travel allowance, and $221.2M in Operation and Maintenance (O&M))
• FY 2028: $625.8M ($388.3M in pay and travel allowance, and $237.4M in O&M)
• FY 2029: $198.3M ($123.2M in pay and travel allowance, and $75.4M in O&M)
• Total: $1.429 billion for FY 2027 through FY 2029

In January, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that Trump’s National Guard deployment in Washington, D.C. cost $223 million through the end of 2025, and that deployments in Los Angeles, Memphis, Chicago and Portland, Oregon, together cost an additional $273 million in 2025.

Senator Warren has led the fight to hold the Trump administration accountable for mishandling military funds to pursue political stunts:

• In May 2026, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) released new answers from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and the Department of Defense revealing the Pentagon’s financial support for the Trump administration’s cruel immigration agenda was far higher than initially reported by DoD.
• In April 2026, Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), along with Representative Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) and Representative Troy Carter (D-La.), urged the Inspectors General of the Departments of Homeland Security and State to open an investigation into the Trump administration’s attempts to deport people to countries they have no ties to. These deportations use the military to conduct the international deportation flights and detain noncitizens on U.S. military bases within the United States and overseas.
• In March 2026, Senator Warren (D-Mass.) and Representative Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) led 52 members of Congress in a new investigation into potential corruption in government contracts stemming from the White House’s fast-tracked expansion of inhumane warehouse-based immigration detention facilities using a Navy contracting vehicle.
• In January 2026, following a new report by the Congressional Budget Office revealing Trump’s domestic deployments of the National Guard and Marines have cost at least $589 million — more than double what Senator Warren’s bicameral investigation previously found — she called for the Trump administration to “answer for wasting more than half a billion taxpayer dollars.”
• In December 2025, at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) pressed Trump’s nominee to be Army General Counsel, on the deployment of the National Guard and reports that senior Judge Advocate General (JAG) officers have been sidelined after raising legal concerns about military operations.
• In December 2025, Senator Warren (D-Mass.) and Representative John Garamendi (D-Calif.) co-led the release of a new report, along with 11 other members of Congress, revealing the Trump administration diverted more than $2 billion of military funds and resources from the Pentagon to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for immigration enforcement, and its impact on readiness and morale. The report also revealed that the diversion of funds was happening at the expense of updates to barracks, maintenance hangers, and military construction projects in the Pacific.
• In October 2025, Senator Warren (D-Mass.) joined colleagues in requesting that CBO provide an independent assessment of the projected costs associated with the Trump administration’s deployment of the National Guard to U.S. cities.
• In September 2025, Senator Warren (D-Mass.) led more than 60 members of Congress in opening a new investigation into the Trump administration’s practice of detaining and sending immigrants to countries where they have no citizenship or connections of any kind. These deportations use the military to conduct the international deportation flights and detain noncitizens on U.S. military bases within the United States and overseas.
• In February 2025, Senators Warren (D-Mass.) and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) pressed Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on the military’s deployment of active-duty forces to the southern border and Guantanamo, and the Department of Defense’s (DOD) new involvement in immigration detention and deportation.
  
  Source: Senator Elizabeth Warren