Ernst: Winning the War on Waste at the Pentagon

Our armed forces are the most powerful, advanced, courageous, and capable team made up of the finest men and women ever assembled. President Trump’s call for a $1.5 trillion defense budget demonstrates an unwavering commitment to maintaining this might.

If we are going to spend nearly as much on defense as the rest of the world combined, however, we must be able to defend to taxpayers how every dollar is spent.

As a combat veteran and member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I know firsthand that billions of dollars meant for the military are missing the target. That’s because the current system doesn’t incentivize efficiency and it rewards spending money on “the wrong thing,” to quote the CEO of a leading defense firm.

Examples aren’t hard to find, either.

The Air Force paid 80 times more than the market price for a soap dispenser for an aircraft. When the price of a single item is marked up that much, how do we know if we’re getting a fair deal on the other parts of the plane? A more extensive review found we aren’t, with a quarter of all the spare parts being purchased at unreasonable prices.

The Pentagon reported almost $11 billion in confirmed fraud over seven years. The Government Accountability Office warns this estimate massively undercounts other potential fraud that could be spotted and prevented with better management.

This includes fraud committed by bureaucrats, like the hundreds of thousands of dollars of transactions made by Pentagon personnel at bars, casinos, nightclubs, and even Super Bowl parties. Another audit that I requested concluded that it was impossible to measure the productivity and performance of the Pentagon’s remote work policies, while uncovering many bureaucrats working from home are being overpaid, sometimes for years.

The Pentagon is the only federal agency that has never passed an audit. The Marine Corps, which just passed its third straight audit, proves accounting for taxpayer money should not be “Mission Impossible” for the rest of the services.

But folks, this isn’t just an accounting problem—how we spend money matters. Without proper oversight, we may be funding threats to our own service members and national security.

Consider 47 fighter aircraft had to be grounded after a foreign manufacturer was discovered providing defective parts and illegally exporting sensitive military data!

More recently, over $1 billion worth of Army weapons, vehicles, and repair parts were found to be deteriorating because the equipment wasn’t being properly tracked or stored.

If soldiers tried to use these broken weapon systems to go to war, the price would be paid not just in dollars but also in casualties.

Every single misspent dollar comes at the price of protecting our own nation. We cannot afford to shortchange our troops, whether in the air, at sea, on the ground, space, or cyberspace, while billions of defense dollars are being squandered.

During the previous administration, the Pentagon diverted defense dollars toward octopus hypnosis, calculating how long seals—the fin-footed, semiaquatic mammals, not Navy SEALS—sleep, and monkey mind reading.

While I’m sure we’re all looking forward to learning what’s on the minds of monkeys, I already know what’s on taxpayers’ minds—they are fed up with Washington wasting the money they worked hard to earn.

That is exactly why I authored the COST Act, which was enacted as part of the National Defense Authorization Act in 2021. This provision requires that all research and development projects paid for by the Pentagon provide a public price tag for taxpayers, but the Biden administration did not comply with the law.

For failing to defend taxpayers against waste as commander in chief, I am giving my February 2026 Squeal Award to President Biden.

The Trump administration is committed to strengthening both our national defense and accounting of defense dollars.

To support these efforts, I am introducing The Reviewing Every Check and Each Invoice Purchasing Troops’ Supplies (RECEIPTS) Act.

I am also asking the Pentagon’s Inspector General to investigate noncompliance with the COST Act and issue recommendations to ensure taxpayers finally receive the transparency they were promised.

We depend on our troops to win wars against foreign enemies and taxpayers are counting on Washington to win the war on waste. The outcome of both battles is pivotal to the future of our nation.

Joni Ernst, a native of Red Oak and a combat veteran, represents Iowa in the United States Senate.

Click here for an official portrait of Senator Ernst.

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