What Could We Do With a Billion Dollars a Day?

Choosing Between Forever Wars and Our Future

We need to talk about the escalating war with Iran. In June, Congress passed a measure directing the president to end the use of armed forces in Iran, yet the United States continues to spend billions of our taxpayer dollars on a war of choice, on a war no one wants. Trump said the war would be over in a few weeks, but we are seeing the beginning of a forever war. The Pentagon has said the war has cost the U.S. about $30 billion, and sources say the internal overall cost estimate is $80 billion to $100 billion. Congress has the power, and the responsibility, to rein in these billions and stop this unconstitutional war. Let’s dive in. 

The Conflict

In February 2026, roughly 20% of the world’s oil and natural gas flowed through the Strait of Hormuz, making it one of the most important maritime trade routes in the world. Then, the United States began, without congressional approval, to bomb Iran. As expected, Iran shut down the Strait, and it has remained closed for the past four months. As of this past week, news shows the U.S. continues to pound Iran’s military, and it is unclear if the escalation will end anytime soon, as the flimsy ceasefire agreement is falling apart. 

Trump called the United States the “guardians of the Hormuz” and then floated the idea that ships would pay the United States a toll worth 20% of the value of their cargo to pass through the Strait. Effectively, he proposed a toll. While this would upend centuries of U.S. precedent, it would also permanently increase the cost of oil and natural gas, even after the Strait is reopened. In his typical fashion, Trump has backtracked from the claim that others pay a toll.

The U.S. Central Command says the U.S. has struck at least 300 Iranian targets, including drone storage sites, military speedboats, and air defense systems. Iran’s response? According to sources, Iran has threatened to block further trading routes in the region, as the U.S. launched new strikes on military targets. Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said the Strait of Hormuz would remain shut until the U.S. ends its acts of aggression. Let’s be real. Both sides have repeatedly violated the ceasefire agreement, Iran has been highly effective at controlling the Strait, and we are worse off than we were before we initiated this conflict.  

Donald Trump has proven to us again that he has no idea what he is doing, and we are getting stuck in an economic tug-of-war. Every day the Strait is closed or blockaded by Iran in retaliation for U.S. strikes, global markets are destabilized. Despite his promises to end “forever wars,” we are deeply entangled in a $100 billion conflict where Iran is currently setting the terms, though the rest of the world is profiting. According to the Guardian, oil companies are on track to make an extra $234,000,000,000 in profits. $234 billion more than they were already projected to earn during 2026. That’s just industry taking more at the pump. Let’s look at where our tax dollars are going.

The Largest Military in the World Gets Even Larger

For fiscal year 2026, Congress appropriated $839.2 billion for certain national defense activities of the Department of Defense (DOD) through the Department of Defense Appropriations Act. This funding was $8.4 billion more than its request. The DOD is now asking for a $1.45 trillion budget plus about $50 billion for other defense activities. A budget of $1.5 trillion, or $4.1 billion per day. Sources say this is the largest inflation-adjusted dollar amount in history and the largest one-year increase since the Korean War. Trump’s response? He hopped on social media to rant again, saying these billions are necessary to build a “Dream Military.” What about Tom Cole? In a press release from March, Cole states, “President Trump is right when he calls the effort to eradicate Iran’s nuclear weapons program.” In a more recent interview, Tom Cole says this new funding request is a “reasonable request” that isn’t “over the top.”

Despite billions of our taxpayer dollars going to a war of choice, raising gas prices through the roof, forcing struggling Americans to struggle even more, Tom Cole believes Congress has been “underfunding defense for over a decade.” When asked about the memorandum of understanding for the negotiations, he says he’s seen it; he would have written it differently if he were the author, but he will not be critical of those who wrote it. Why? Because he “trusts” whatever Trump is trying to do. Instead of trusting a corrupt businessperson with billions of our taxpayer dollars, we should think about what those billions could do for us and turn that anger into action. 

What A Billion Dollars a Day Buys

$1 billion is a lot, but how much is a lot? You could spend $5,000 a day for more than 500 years before you would run out of money. Breaking it down even further, it means you would have to spend over $100,000 every day for the next 25 years to reach $ 1 billion. Let that sink in. 

$1 billion per day equals $365 billion per year. The federal government could use this money to provide every single public school teacher in the United States a $20,000 per year raise for $70 billion, provide free lunch and breakfast to public school children for $25 billion per year, provide housing to every single American for $30 billion per year, eliminate tuition at every public institution for American citizens for $50 billion per year. We would still have nearly $200 billion remaining. We do not have a funding or a budget problem in the United States; instead, we have a priority problem. We prioritize bombs, planes, tanks, munitions, bailouts, and ICE rather than prioritizing the American People. Instead of burning billions to fund a forever war, that daily billion could provide services that actually improve lives. It could fund universal healthcare, ensuring all Americans are healthy because healthcare is a human right. It could rebuild local infrastructure in our very own communities instead of funding the “rebuilding fund” for damage caused by strikes in Iran. Strikes that should never have happened in the first place.

Conclusion

Congress has the power to rein this in. They passed a measure in June to end the use of armed forces in Iran, and Trump didn’t listen. So just like a teenager who doesn’t listen, cut him off. Let’s not forget. The Constitution explicitly gives Congress, not the president, the power of the purse. It also grants Congress the power to declare war, not the president. Let’s stop Tom Cole from rubber-stamping massive defense requests without oversight and continuing to add to the federal debt. After all, during Cole’s time in Congress as a “fiscal conservative,” we have only borrowed $33 trillion. 

I will say it again: they have no idea what they are doing. Yet, Cole stands behind Donald Trump. He says Trump has proposed things that will move us in the right direction and that he’s very supportive of those efforts. The truth is, simple solutions to this conflict are out of reach. There needs to be an agreement on how the Strait of Hormuz will operate. I believe it needs to be a free and open one, but we fumbled the ball, and now Iran controls the Strait of Hormuz. Congress controls the power of the purse and the right to declare war. It is time for Congress to reassert its role in this conflict, rein in spending, remove American forces from Iran, and get back to improving the lives of Americans. And when you send me to Washington, D.C., that is exactly what I will do.

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H.Con.Res.38 - 119th Congress (2025-2026): Directing the President Pursuant to Section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution to Remove United States Armed Forces from Unauthorized Hostilities in the Islamic Republic of Iran. 

Julia Manchester, Do the Math, The Hill, https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5808137-trump-war-timeline-pressure/.

 Iran war cost could be as much as $100 billion, https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/iran-war-cost-much-100-billion-rcna587362.

Damian Carrington, $30M an Hour: Big Oil Reaping Huge War Windfall from Consumers, Analysis Finds, The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/apr/15/big-oil-huge-war-windfall-consumers.

FY2026 Department of Defense Appropriations: In Brief, Library of Congress, https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48891.

The president’s $1.5 trillion Pentagon Budget will Not Make the Country Safer, Center for American Progress, https://www.americanprogress.org/article/the-presidents-1-5-trillion-pentagon-budget-will-not-make-the-country-safer/.

Tom Cole, Cole Statement on Strikes in Iran, https://cole.house.gov/media/press-releases/cole-statement-strikes-iran.

Rep. Tom Cole Remarks on U.S.-Iran Conflict and Negotiations, C-SPAN, https://www.c-span.org/program/news-conference/rep-tom-cole-remarks-us-iran-conflict-and-negotiations/681653.