Apr 5, 2026
Secretary of State Marco Rubio had a message for Iran this week: invest in your people, not your weapons.
"Imagine an Iran that, instead of spending their wealth, billions of dollars, supporting terrorists or weapons, had spent that money helping the people of Iran," Rubio said during an appearance on ABC's Good Morning America on March 30 (1). "You'd have a much different country."
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He repeated the sentiment in an interview with Al Jazeera the same day, adding that if Iran had redirected its military budget, the country "wouldn't have water shortages" and its economy "would provide opportunities for an incredible people" (2).
Hard to argue with that. Unless, of course, you look at what's happening in Washington.
'We're fighting wars. We can't take care of day care.'
Two days after Rubio's remarks, President Donald Trump made the same calculation — but about America.
At a White House Easter luncheon on April 1, Trump told guests he had instructed his budget director, Russell Vought, not to send federal funding for day care (3). The event was closed to the press, but clips were inadvertently posted to the White House YouTube page before being taken down.
"We're fighting wars. We can't take care of day care," Trump said — then kept going, telling guests the federal government can't afford child care, Medicaid or Medicare.
"It's not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare — all these individual things," he said. "We have to take care of one thing: military protection. We have to guard the country."
The White House later said Trump was referring to rooting out fraud in federal programs. Trump did mention scams briefly, but the thrust of his remarks was that military spending has to come first — and everything else should be handled by the states (4).
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The $1.5 trillion price tag
Shorly after, Trump made it official. On April 3, the White House submitted its budget proposal for the coming year. The ask: $1.5 trillion in total military spending, which the White House described as a "$445 billion or 42-percent increase" over the current year (5). Defense analysts say it would be the largest single-year jump in defense spending since the Korean War.
That figure is separate from a $200 billion request the Pentagon has floated to cover the cost of the ongoing war in Iran, which has been burning through roughly $1 billion per day since strikes began on Feb. 28 (6).
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The budget does include some non-defense investments. It proposes $145 billion in discretionary funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs and $481 million to continue an air traffic controller hiring surge at the FAA. It also introduces a workforce development program called Make America Skilled Again, which would give states more flexibility with federal job training funds and require that at least 10% go toward apprenticeships.
But the price tag for all of it comes with $73 billion in cuts to programs that directly affect American households. Among the biggest targets: a $5 billion reduction to the National Institutes of Health, cuts to K-12 and higher education funding, the elimination of a federal program that helps low-income families pay their heating and energy bills, and deep cuts to grants that fund local community services like housing, job training and anti-poverty programs (7). All told, spending on everything outside the military would drop by 10% — to its lowest level since the Eisenhower era, according to one analysis (8).
Americans aren't buying it
Polls suggest Americans already see the trade-off — and don't like it. A March 2026 AP-NORC poll found that 59% of Americans believe U.S. military action in Iran has gone too far, and 45% are now "extremely" or "very" worried about being able to afford gas in the coming months — up from 30% in November (9).
A separate CNN/SSRS poll found that 71% of Americans oppose Congress approving the Pentagon's proposed $200 billion in additional war spending (10).
The domestic cuts aren't polling any better. A poll by health research group KFF found that 76% of the public opposes major cuts to Medicaid — including 55% of Republicans. Three-quarters also oppose cuts to mental health and addiction services, and 74% oppose cuts to infectious disease tracking (11).
Trump's own base isn't on board either: a separate KFF poll found that 82% of Americans, including a majority of those who voted for Trump, want Medicaid funding to stay the same or increase (12).
Rubio was right about one thing: a country that prioritizes weapons over its people would be "a much different country."
Article sources
We rely only on vetted sources and credible third-party reporting. For details, see our editorial ethics and guidelines.
U.S. Department of State (1); U.S. Department of State (2); NBC News (3); CNN (4); The White House (5, 7); CNN (6); MS NOW (8); AP-NORC (9); CNN/SSRS (10); KFF (11, 12)
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Rudro is an Editor with Moneywise. His work has appeared on Yahoo Finance, MSN Money and The Financial Post. He previously served as Managing Editor of Oola, and as the Content Lead of Tickld before that. Rudro holds a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from the University of Toronto.
