Originally published in Federal News Network
Written by Anastasia Obis

A key Senate appropriator is demanding answers from the Defense Department about how it plans to spend nearly $900 million in military construction funding tucked into the Trump administration’s reconciliation package.

During the Senate Appropriations Committee budget hearing on Tuesday, Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) pressed Dale Marks, assistant secretary of Defense for energy, installations and environment, to explain which construction projects the Pentagon plans to fund with the budget reconciliation measure, as opposed to the remainder of the military construction budget that will move through the traditional appropriations process.

Marks, who testified alongside senior officials from the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and Space Force, said he did not have a project-by-project list available yet but suggested that a more detailed plan would emerge as the department prepares its Future Years Defense Program for fiscal 2027.

“I believe it would be there. Again, what we’re looking at is the submission of the 2026 budget as a standalone and the FYDP will come in 2027, so we’ll have granular looking into the future. But let me get back to you on that, and I’ll do my utmost to answer that for you,” Marks said.

The exchange highlights a broader concern among Democratic lawmakers that the Defense Department lacks a clear and transparent plan for the additional $150 billion requested by the Trump administration through the reconciliation process — and no mechanism to account for how the funds would be spent. “The legislation as written is effectively a blank check, a slush fund with no real checks or balances or mechanisms for oversight. It is, by definition, an opportunity for waste, fraud and abuse,” Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.) said when she voted against the House version of the reconciliation bill in April.

“I note with concern that the White House has decided to circumvent the budget process and push $900 million of MILCON funding into the partisan reconciliation measure. Let me be clear, MILCON in a reconciliation bill is not MILCON appropriations. It’s a slush fund. The nature of reconciliation is such that neither this subcommittee, nor the whole Senate will have control or meaningful oversight of those funds,” Ossoff said during the hearing.

“It’s my belief that if Congress makes the mistake of accommodating this request to fund military construction via reconciliation rather than through the appropriations process, we bow to executive overreach, degrade our own constitutional authority and drastically diminish our ability to oversee the use of these funds,” he added.

There is also growing concern among lawmakers that the Pentagon may be planning to use the reconciliation funds not to upgrade facilities or bolster national defense infrastructure, but to build new migrant detention complexes across Defense Department facilities nationwide and around the world. 

In March, a group of Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, pressing him about his plans to use military installations as migrant detention centers. In addition, multiple outlets have reported that DoD and Customs and Border Protection officials have been inspecting military bases as potential sites to hold a projected influx of migrants.

“If the administration does intend to fund the construction of migrant detention facilities at military bases using military construction funds, it should include those specific plans in its budget request. At minimum, the administration must provide the subcommittee with a detailed accounting of how it intends to use the $900 million requested for military construction in reconciliation,” Ossoff said.

Ossoff also raised alarm over the Defense Department’s increasing reliance on emergency authorities to reprogram military construction funds, bypassing the normal appropriations process.  “There is a place for the use of emergency authorities to support reprogramming. If it becomes a habit, it can circumvent the appropriations process,” Ossoff said.