Trump says administration has ‘identified funds’ to pay troops next week
By Veronica Stracqualursi, CNN
(CNN) — President Donald Trump said Saturday that “we have identified funds” to pay military troops on October 15 as the government shutdown is headed into a third week.
In a post to Truth Social, Trump said he will “direct our Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, to use all available funds to get our Troops PAID on October 15th.”
The funds for military paychecks will be pulled from the Pentagon’s research and development money that’s available for two years, according to a spokesperson for the White House Office of Management and Budget.
The Pentagon said in a statement that it “has identified approximately $8 billion of unobligated research development testing and evaluation funds” from the prior fiscal year that will be used to issue paychecks if the shutdown continues past October 15.
The move to redirect funds that lawmakers have already appropriated could open the Trump administration up to legal challenges, because Congress holds the power of the purse.
As service members were in danger of missing their first paychecks, congressional GOP leaders had rejected the idea of voting on a standalone bill for military pay, marking the most dramatic step yet to attempt to force Democrats to end the shutdown.
Trump had previously promised that service members would still be paid despite the government shutdown.
“We will get our service members every last penny. Don’t worry about it,” Trump said at a Navy event in Norfolk, Virginia, last weekend.
It is also unclear whether the US Coast Guard ‚ which is the only military branch that operates under the Department of Homeland Security — would receive pay from the diverted funds. During a partial government shutdown in 2019, active-duty Coast Guard members did not receive paychecks — the first time in history that US Armed Forces service members were not paid during a lapse in government funding. They were later given back pay.
CNN has reached out to the White House budget office.
The-CNN-Wire
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