Congress
Top Senate GOP defense hawk has Pentagon budget boost plan — with sunnier post-Trump-win prospects
Sen. Roger Wicker, one of Capitol Hill’s most vocal defense hawks, will soon get the chance to pursue a larger Pentagon budget — and it stands a much better chance with Donald Trump headed back to the White House.
The Mississippi Republican is poised to chair the Armed Services Committee after the GOP romped in Tuesday’s Senate elections. And he brings to the role a plan for tens of billions of dollars in new military spending to expand the Navy and Air Force, modernize the nuclear arsenal and ramp up defense manufacturing.
“We’re not where we need to be in our Navy and our Air Force,” Wicker told Mississippi’s WAPT News in an election night interview. “So that’s going to be an opportunity for me as chairman of the Armed Services Committee, if this majority that’s been projected does hold, to work across the aisle … and build up our military so we can stay out of war.”
Though Wicker, who has been the top Armed Services Republican since 2023, might have the inside track with a Trump administration on spending, he’ll also be one of the most prominent GOP advocates of continuing to arm Ukraine. As chair, he’d likely need to navigate differences between defense hawks and Trump on whether to continue aid.
Budget battle plan: Wicker laid out his preferred roadmap for defense in the spring, urging the U.S. to make “a short-term generational investment” to deter an increasingly cooperative Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, which he has termed an “Axis of Aggressors.”
The plan proposes a $55 billion hike over President Joe Biden’s most recent defense budget request, eventually ramping up to 5 percent of gross domestic product — which would bring annual military spending to more than $1 trillion. Within that, Wicker wants to expand shipyard and industrial capacity to more quickly achieve a 355-ship Navy and expand the Air Force by blocking the retirement of some aircraft and adding 340 fighters over five years.
Wicker won an initial round in June when a bipartisan coalition in the Armed Services Committee voted to increase the price tag of its annual defense policy bill by $25 billion.
That heightened spending may not come to fruition this year, as extra funding would break budget caps agreed to last year and could see opposition from fiscal hardliners in the House. But it showed bipartisan support for a larger military budget that Wicker could capitalize on as chair.
A Trump roadmap? Perhaps just as importantly, some experts argue Wicker’s detailed budget blueprint could provide the GOP administration with fodder for at least their initial defense budget request. While the full extent of Trump’s Pentagon plans isn’t yet clear, confirming top officials and other issues could constrain his first-year spending blueprint.
“They’re going to probably want to go to people whom they trust more and lean on them,” said Bradley Bowman, a former Senate Republican aide who is now a senior director with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “And that would be Sen. Wicker.”
Though hawks have muscled through defense increases in divided government, Wicker has criticized Biden’s spending plans as unserious. He likened raising the Pentagon budget under a Democratic White House “pulling teeth” and suggested a GOP president would be more committed to the cause.
“We’re going to have to increase our national defense to keep us out of a war,” Wicker said in a recent interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. “The idea is to keep the peace by being so strong nobody will take a chance on us.”
Ukraine campaigner: Wicker — a vocal GOP advocate for Ukraine aid alongside Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell — urged Biden to use his final days to step up support for Kyiv. He wants faster weapons transfers and looser restrictions on strikes inside Russia, arguing the administration’s limits have left Kyiv “hamstrung.”
While it would be easy for Wicker to confront another Democratic administration for not giving Ukraine what it needs, it’s an open question how he would approach Trump, who has opposed more U.S. spending and has instead said he aims to broker an end to the conflict before he even takes office.
Observers say Wicker is likely to keep those differences behind closed doors.
Bowman argued that Wicker’s “unimpeachable conservative credentials” could help him make an argument on the value of NATO and arming Ukraine. Mackenzie Eaglen, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, noted that while there’s still considerable Republican support for arming Ukraine, a potential Trump administration must be convinced to ask for more aid. That could occur, she argued, if the White House is convinced it hastens an end to the war with Russia.
“If their team can be convinced that a last and final surge of military assistance for Ukraine — that is almost entirely spent here in the United States — strengthens Ukraine’s position in a negotiated settlement to end the war, then it is possible,” Eaglen said. “I suspect this will be attempted in private as long as possible to see what comes over in a [fiscal 2026] White House budget request and whether it includes a supplemental.”
Top Republican officials are increasingly accepting the House may already be lost as they shift to trying to limit the damage and salvage a Senate majority.
After waiting for weeks to see if the party’s deluge of money could help a raft of GOP incumbents who appeared to be in terrible shape in internal polling, more recent internal Republican polling still shows deep erosion in Trump country.
Now, Trump officials and Republican operatives say more candidates may have their funding from GOP campaign groups cut off in the coming days, before it’s too late to spend the money elsewhere to shore up other shaky races.
“I speak to a lot of people. There is no one who has privately stated that they believe Republicans can hold the House — not in recent weeks, anyway,” said former Rep. Carlos Curbelo, who lost in the last big House Democratic wave in 2018 after representing a South Florida swing district.
Five senior House Republicans, granted anonymity to candidly discuss their party’s precarious position, told Blue Light News the House has all but slipped from their grasp.
One of those Republicans compared the situation to Democrats’ 2006 flip of the House — specifically noting that potential Senate seat flips in North Carolina and Ohio could have downballot effects, while House candidates in redrawn red states like Florida and Texas are “hanging on with their fingernails.”
President Donald Trump’s political operation and the top House GOP super PAC have been cutting off ad spending across the map in races they feel are no longer winnable or worth the money, including for Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Tom Kean Jr.
And some national operatives are already starting to point fingers over who’s to blame, arguing that surprisingly-competitive Senate races are sucking away donor attention — therefore forcing House operatives into tough spending decisions.
White House officials insist they’re not giving up on the House, and that moves by the president and his team to shift the allocation of resources shouldn’t be seen as them prioritizing one chamber over another.
“The cutting of resources should not dictate what the philosophy is or what the outlook is for the overall race at large,” a senior White House official said. “It’s not doom and gloom around here. Everyone’s very positive, upbeat.”
But on the ground, Republicans seem to be giving up hope for any saving grace from the president in the final stretch.
“President Trump has made this election all about himself,” a second senior House Republican said in an interview. “Now we have to survive that political storm.”
What else we’re watching:
— WATERS, CASTEN FACE OFF ROILS DEMS: House Democrats are poised to face a polarizing choice on the other side of the midterm elections: Shove aside one of the most prominent Black progressives in their party in favor of a middle-aged White guy with similar policy views, or hand one of the most powerful gavels in Congress back to a nearly 90-year-old as their base clamors for generational change. That fight between Rep. Sean Casten, 54, and Maxine Waters, 88, to be Financial Services’ top Democrat also threatens to derail the party’s unity as members race to take back control of the chamber.
— GOP’S TAX CUT DATA DELAYED: The Trump administration is delaying the release of detailed data showing how Republicans’ 2025 tax cuts affected millions of Americans’ taxes, even as it tries to tout the law ahead of the midterms. The data — which is expected to provide the first detailed look at taxpayers taking advantage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, including new deductions for overtime wages and tipped income — was scheduled to be released in July and updated in September. But the IRS said it’s awaiting approval to publish the figures. The delay has already irked some who complain it is part of a pattern of the administration withholding otherwise routine releases of tax data.
Meredith Lee Hill, Andrew Howard, Mia McCarthy, Jasper Goodman, Katherine Hapgood, Riley Rogerson and Brian Faler contributed to this report.
Adam Hamilton raised $10.6 million in the third quarter of 2026 across his Senate campaign and his joint fundraising committees, his campaign tells Blue Light News, a significant haul for the Kansas Democrat.
The fundraising total illustrates Democrats’ newfound bullishness about flipping a Senate seat in the deep-red state for the first time since 1932.
“This grassroots support sends a clear message: with three weeks until Election Day, Adam Hamilton is building the momentum to win,” said Hamilton campaign spokesperson Tyson Brody.
Hamilton’s third-quarter figure is nearly triple his $3.66 million second-quarter total. His campaign did not provide a current cash-on-hand total.
National Democrats began pumping money into Kansas in recent days, a sign of their growing hopes that Hamilton could win. Last week, Senate Majority PAC — Senate Democrats’ top super PAC — reserved $5 million in television ads backing Hamilton. American Bridge PAC and Lower Costs Now, a new group affiliated with former Vice President Kamala Harris’ super PAC, have spent in Kansas in recent weeks.
Republicans have also flocked to Kansas to prop up Marshall: Senate Leadership Fund, the Senate GOP’s top PAC, has spent or reserved nearly $11 million backing Marshall in the past week, according to tracking firm AdImpact.
“It took us five months to raise $15 million. [Marshall] got it in a day,” Hamilton said at a campaign event in Lawrence, Kansas on Monday. “So please help us.”
Marshall’s campaign has yet to release his third-quarter fundraising totals. As of mid-July, Marshall had over $5 million in the bank to $1.73 million for Hamilton.
A bipartisan Senate duo is urging Trump national security officials to “bring its full capacities to bear” to stave off threats posed by artificial intelligence — sooner rather than later.
Washington Sen. Maria Cantwell, the top Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee, and Republican South Dakota Sen. Mike Rounds, who serves on the Senate Armed Services cybersecurity subcommittee, are calling for a full government response to a growing number of cybersecurity breaches.
“Recent AI security incidents should serve as a warning,” the senators wrote in a Tuesday letter to Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton and White House Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios. “Advanced AI agents have escaped testing environments, bypassed safeguards, and gained unauthorized access to real-world systems owned by government agencies and private organizations.”
Spokespeople for Clayton and Kratsios did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Their letter comes as lawmakers struggle to hash out what legislation on AI safety, if any, might look like. Members are currently in recess ahead of the November elections and there’s little hope progress can be made by the year’s end.
But those lawmakers who have been engaged on the topic for years now have mapped out administrative actions the Trump administration could move on now, without waiting on Congress.
The Cantwell and Rounds priorities include: strengthening federal AI safety and security standards at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, or NIST; expanding independent testing capabilities at the Center for Advancing Innovation and Standards for Super Intelligence, Department of Energy and the national labs; and working with the tech industry to develop and deploy defensive AI tools.
Specifically, the senators wrote, new NIST standards should address the risks posed by advanced AI capabilities, including the “potential misuse by malicious actors” to conduct sophisticated cyberattacks, automate attacks at scale and agents that threaten external systems and critical infrastructure.
They also said the federal government capacity should be complemented by universities and other research organizations, as well as by private sector, third-party evaluators.
Finally, they point to ways the government could use existing programs at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to work with AI labs to help detect threats and reinforce vulnerable systems.
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