President Donald Trump’s so-called Golden Dome, a missile defense program to shoot down any potential threats to the U.S., will cost about $1.2 trillion to develop, deploy, and operate for 20 years, according to a new estimate from the Congressional Budget Office. That’s just a little more money than the $175 billion Trump said it would cost last year. Trump signed an executive order calling for the creation of the program in Jan. 2025, shortly after being sworn into office for a second time. Back then it was called the Iron Dome for America. The program is modeled off of Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, though the name Golden Dome became more popular, given the president’s tacky fondness for all things gold. Trump has billed the program as something necessary to protect the U.S. from threats not just launched from the Earth, but also missiles that could be sent from space. The weaponization of space is still not a reality, at least not in the way Trump has talked about it.
“This design for the Golden Dome will integrate with our existing defense capabilities and should be fully operational before the end of my term, so we’ll have it done in about three years,” Trump said during a press conference in the Oval Office in May 2025.
