As taxpayers, we are funding our own endgame, but we don’t have to.
Anti-War activists gathered outside the Internal Revenue Service offices in Manhattan for a demonstration on the “traditional” deadline date to file taxes to protest federal tax dollars being spent on the Pentagon and all US wars.
(Photo by Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Melissa Garriga
Nov 05, 2026
Common Dreams
Tuesday night’s election results proved that a majority of people in this country do not want war and genocide. Polling overwhelmingly showed that the war on Iran was one of the biggest motivating factors in voting. So why are we about to give the very people voters rejected an unprecedented $1.5 trillion budget to continue their reign of death and destruction? Why are we going to allow Congress to hand over the largest war budget in human history to weapons manufacturers and AI tech billionaires who work at the behest of known war criminals?
In the next few weeks, Congress is set to pass what should be viewed as the deadliest piece of legislation of our time—the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA)—or the country’s defense budget, as it is more commonly known. Its potential passage is setting US taxpayers up to be the funders of their own demise by giving carte blanche to a department of war criminals and their humanity-destroying techno-fascist friends with an obscene $1.5 trillion treasure chest to control, murder, oppress, and destroy the planet as we know it.
Sounds a bit hyperbolic? Not if you look at their past and what they are openly saying now, as a prologue.
If you were watching a summer blockbuster and the main characters were handing over their hard-earned money and essentially their trust to the person you know is going to assassinate them in the final act, you would be screaming at the screen, “Don’t do it!”
To understand why this war budget is a catastrophic time bomb, you first have to understand what it actually funds. Under the guise of providing national “security” and protecting “democracy,” the annual Pentagon budget does little of both. Instead, the budget, which consistently fails its financial audits, is a mechanism to funnel billions of dollars into the pockets of weapons manufacturers, who make the very weapons that murder men, women, and children and destroy the planet. Well over half of the discretionary budget each year goes directly to private contractors.
Between 2020 and 2024, the Pentagon designated roughly $2.4 trillion out of $4.4 trillion in discretionary spending to private industry. But hey, at least those private companies are providing much-needed jobs for America’s workforce, right? Well, not so fast.
According to the Climate and Community Institute, employment at military contractors has plummeted over the past three decades: from an estimated 3.2 million workers during the Reagan military-spending peak in the mid-1980s to 1.1 million workers in 2020. The drop occurred even as Pentagon budgets rose 22% over the same period. Meanwhile, the industry’s top recipients of military contracts, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, General Dynamics, and Boeing, pay their CEOs a combined salary of almost $100 million a year. They are literally making a killing off the killing of others.
And now, not only are we draining our pocketbooks for weapon company CEOs, but we are also subsidizing tech-overlords whose recent main objective is to move jobs and agency away from the working class to robots, as well as use that very technology to mass surveil those who oppose it. The Pentagon is requesting an unprecedented $58.5 billion this year for an artificial intelligence program. This program is already responsible for the February 28 Minab School massacre that murdered at least 156 schoolchildren and staff.
Even more frightening, the money for that deadly program is set to go to the most insane lineup of anti-worker villains, including Sam “bad things should happen to benefit AI” Altman; Peter “if you’re evil, you’re not bad” Thiel; and Elon “AI will make jobs irrelevant” Musk. They’re openly telling us they don’t need humans anymore. Meanwhile, they are building their bunkers so that when the United States military finally plunders away all the resources around the world, they can survive.
Why are we handing the military $1.5 trillion to do all this? As it stands, US taxpayers are already paying $116.43 million every hour for war and terror. That’s more than $4,000 in weapons and war costs for the average taxpayer last year alone. Both figures will likely double, since the Trump administration’s request tops former President Joe Biden’s already bloated $1 trillion. Meanwhile, nearly 30% of people have to finance groceries, and 45,000 people will likely die because they lack health insurance or access to affordable healthcare.
If you were watching a summer blockbuster and the main characters were handing over their hard-earned money and essentially their trust to the person you know is going to assassinate them in the final act, you would be screaming at the screen, “Don’t do it!”
But that is exactly what is happening right now, and in fact, many are screaming.
Polls consistently show that Americans are moving away from a war-centric approach to foreign affairs. Almost two-thirds of people in the United States disapprove of President Donald Trump’s war on Iran, and 60% disapprove of the US-supported genocide in Gaza. Similarly, 59% of voters believe the proposed $1.5 trillion Department of Defense budget is too high, and 3 in 5 voters (58%) prefer directing government funds toward domestic priorities like healthcare rather than military or war spending.
The voices are there, but most of those with the power to stop it aren’t listening or are too invested in the war-industrial complex to care. Which begs the question: How can we even call ourselves a democracy, much less its defender, when we, the people, seem to have no agency outside of voting and the majority’s demands are ignored?
This administration, as did previous ones, proudly ignores what the majority is begging for: an end to the genocide in Gaza and the occupation of Palestine; an end to the war on Iran that was started for no reason and is currently sustained through the administration’s pompous arrogance; an end to Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s reign of terror across the United States; an end to the AI-data center boom that is chipping away at our humanity and livelihoods; and reinvestment into the things that will actually keep us safe, such as healthcare, housing, and climate justice.
Make no mistake, the $1.5 trillion set to go to Pete Hegseth’s war department is not funding our security; it is funding our endgame and stealing from our lifelines. If passed, it will be nearly impossible to undo the damage that will come. We all must unite around this—healthcare workers, environmentalists, teachers, journalists, students, veterans—and make democracy actually work for the people before it’s too late. We have to let those we elected to work for us know that this is a red line that humanity cannot afford to cross.
History shows that public pressure can influence policies. Our collective voice can change this country’s trajectory—if we mobilize now. We don’t have to fund our endgame; we can say no. Join us in DC November 10-13 as we demand our country stop funding war and start funding life.
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Melissa Garriga
Melissa Garriga is the communications and media analysis manager for CODEPINK. She writes about the intersection of militarism and the human cost of war.
Full Bio >
Tuesday night’s election results proved that a majority of people in this country do not want war and genocide. Polling overwhelmingly showed that the war on Iran was one of the biggest motivating factors in voting. So why are we about to give the very people voters rejected an unprecedented $1.5 trillion budget to continue their reign of death and destruction? Why are we going to allow Congress to hand over the largest war budget in human history to weapons manufacturers and AI tech billionaires who work at the behest of known war criminals?
In the next few weeks, Congress is set to pass what should be viewed as the deadliest piece of legislation of our time—the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA)—or the country’s defense budget, as it is more commonly known. Its potential passage is setting US taxpayers up to be the funders of their own demise by giving carte blanche to a department of war criminals and their humanity-destroying techno-fascist friends with an obscene $1.5 trillion treasure chest to control, murder, oppress, and destroy the planet as we know it.
Sounds a bit hyperbolic? Not if you look at their past and what they are openly saying now, as a prologue.
If you were watching a summer blockbuster and the main characters were handing over their hard-earned money and essentially their trust to the person you know is going to assassinate them in the final act, you would be screaming at the screen, “Don’t do it!”
To understand why this war budget is a catastrophic time bomb, you first have to understand what it actually funds. Under the guise of providing national “security” and protecting “democracy,” the annual Pentagon budget does little of both. Instead, the budget, which consistently fails its financial audits, is a mechanism to funnel billions of dollars into the pockets of weapons manufacturers, who make the very weapons that murder men, women, and children and destroy the planet. Well over half of the discretionary budget each year goes directly to private contractors.
Between 2020 and 2024, the Pentagon designated roughly $2.4 trillion out of $4.4 trillion in discretionary spending to private industry. But hey, at least those private companies are providing much-needed jobs for America’s workforce, right? Well, not so fast.
According to the Climate and Community Institute, employment at military contractors has plummeted over the past three decades: from an estimated 3.2 million workers during the Reagan military-spending peak in the mid-1980s to 1.1 million workers in 2020. The drop occurred even as Pentagon budgets rose 22% over the same period. Meanwhile, the industry’s top recipients of military contracts, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, General Dynamics, and Boeing, pay their CEOs a combined salary of almost $100 million a year. They are literally making a killing off the killing of others.
And now, not only are we draining our pocketbooks for weapon company CEOs, but we are also subsidizing tech-overlords whose recent main objective is to move jobs and agency away from the working class to robots, as well as use that very technology to mass surveil those who oppose it. The Pentagon is requesting an unprecedented $58.5 billion this year for an artificial intelligence program. This program is already responsible for the February 28 Minab School massacre that murdered at least 156 schoolchildren and staff.
Even more frightening, the money for that deadly program is set to go to the most insane lineup of anti-worker villains, including Sam “bad things should happen to benefit AI” Altman; Peter “if you’re evil, you’re not bad” Thiel; and Elon “AI will make jobs irrelevant” Musk. They’re openly telling us they don’t need humans anymore. Meanwhile, they are building their bunkers so that when the United States military finally plunders away all the resources around the world, they can survive.
Why are we handing the military $1.5 trillion to do all this? As it stands, US taxpayers are already paying $116.43 million every hour for war and terror. That’s more than $4,000 in weapons and war costs for the average taxpayer last year alone. Both figures will likely double, since the Trump administration’s request tops former President Joe Biden’s already bloated $1 trillion. Meanwhile, nearly 30% of people have to finance groceries, and 45,000 people will likely die because they lack health insurance or access to affordable healthcare.
If you were watching a summer blockbuster and the main characters were handing over their hard-earned money and essentially their trust to the person you know is going to assassinate them in the final act, you would be screaming at the screen, “Don’t do it!”
But that is exactly what is happening right now, and in fact, many are screaming.
Polls consistently show that Americans are moving away from a war-centric approach to foreign affairs. Almost two-thirds of people in the United States disapprove of President Donald Trump’s war on Iran, and 60% disapprove of the US-supported genocide in Gaza. Similarly, 59% of voters believe the proposed $1.5 trillion Department of Defense budget is too high, and 3 in 5 voters (58%) prefer directing government funds toward domestic priorities like healthcare rather than military or war spending.
The voices are there, but most of those with the power to stop it aren’t listening or are too invested in the war-industrial complex to care. Which begs the question: How can we even call ourselves a democracy, much less its defender, when we, the people, seem to have no agency outside of voting and the majority’s demands are ignored?
This administration, as did previous ones, proudly ignores what the majority is begging for: an end to the genocide in Gaza and the occupation of Palestine; an end to the war on Iran that was started for no reason and is currently sustained through the administration’s pompous arrogance; an end to Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s reign of terror across the United States; an end to the AI-data center boom that is chipping away at our humanity and livelihoods; and reinvestment into the things that will actually keep us safe, such as healthcare, housing, and climate justice.
Make no mistake, the $1.5 trillion set to go to Pete Hegseth’s war department is not funding our security; it is funding our endgame and stealing from our lifelines. If passed, it will be nearly impossible to undo the damage that will come. We all must unite around this—healthcare workers, environmentalists, teachers, journalists, students, veterans—and make democracy actually work for the people before it’s too late. We have to let those we elected to work for us know that this is a red line that humanity cannot afford to cross.
History shows that public pressure can influence policies. Our collective voice can change this country’s trajectory—if we mobilize now. We don’t have to fund our endgame; we can say no. Join us in DC November 10-13 as we demand our country stop funding war and start funding life.
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Melissa Garriga
Melissa Garriga is the communications and media analysis manager for CODEPINK. She writes about the intersection of militarism and the human cost of war.
Full Bio >
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