Senate Dems urge investigators to check Pentagon's math on Iran war
Source: USA Today
Updated May 28, 2026, 12:24 p.m. ET
Senate Democrats are pressing federal budget investigators to examine the gap between the Pentagon's stated cost for the Iran war – $29 billion – and outside estimates that peg the cost up to tens of billions of dollars higher.
In a letter sent May 27, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Jeff Merkley, the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer urged the Congressional Budget Office to "take into consideration the significant divergence between the administration’s public estimates" for the Iran war's cost and outside estimates from media outlets and analysts.
"We are concerned that the administration has not been fully truthful or transparent in its public accounting of the war’s costs so far," they wrote. Another 17 Democratic senators signed the letter. The Congressional Budget Office is a government agency charged with providing nonpartisan analysis and information to lawmakers on the Hill.
Rep. Brendan Boyle, top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, asked the CBO in early March to investigate the cost of the war, which began in late February with a massive bombing campaign by the United States and Israel. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2026/05/28/senate-democrats-iran-war-cost-letter/90278167007/
Link to Sen. Warren PRESS RELEASE - Warren, Merkley, Schumer, Lawmakers Urge Nonpartisan Congressional Scorekeeper to Determine True Cost of War in Iran
Link to LETTER (request) (PDF) - https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/warren_merkley_schumer_letter_to_cbo_re_cost_of_war_with_iran.pdf
RELATED - Link to Rep. Boyle request for GAO investigation (PDF) - https://democrats-budget.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/democrats-budget.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2026-3-5-hbc-rm-boyle-letter-to-cbo-on-iran-costs.pdf
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