Under Secretary of Defense Comptroller Jules Hurst, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine testify before the Senate on May 12, 2026. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon is in a race to get $152 billion in 2025 reconciliation spending under contract by the end of September or lose a chunk of the cash.
The Pentagon has already issued guidance to its program offices on how to spend the money before the deadline hits at the end of the fiscal year, a senior department official told Breaking Defense this week.
“Our strategy focuses on maximizing the utility of every dollar in a timely, yet responsible, manner,” the official said.
Last year, lawmakers approved the One Big Beautiful Bill, a sprawling mega-bill that included roughly $152 billion for an array of defense initiatives, including Golden Dome, two Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, munitions, nuclear modernization and more. Although that legislation dictated broad contours for how money should be spent, not all of the defense spending in the bill was tied to specific weapons programs — giving the Pentagon latitude for how it executed the funding.
