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Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is facing backlash for criticizing Secretary of War Pete Hegseth for the Pentagon’s spending on luxury items, including food for the miliary, despite similar expenses under former Biden administration Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin.
The top Senate Democrat said Hegseth’s spending in the final month of fiscal year 2025, $93.4 billion, which included millions of dollars on steak, seafood and furniture, could have instead been used to extend the Affordable Care Act.
Social media users panned Schumer online for the remarks, accusing him of cherry-picking a politically convenient area to care about spending, lambasting him for not supporting feeding high-quality meals to military members and citing similar defense spending during the Biden era.
“Hegseth spent $93 billion in one month – roughly the cost of extending the ACA tax credits for THREE YEARS,” Schumer wrote. “But instead of lowering American’s healthcare costs, Hegseth used millions of taxpayer dollars on fruit baskets, Herman Miller recliners, ice cream machines, Alaskan King Crabs, and a Steinway & Sons grand piano.
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“A true grifter in every sense of the word.”
During the Biden administration, Austin’s spending nearly mirrored Hegseth’s. Food expenses across administrations went toward feeding members of the military, according to the nonprofit Open the Books, which conducted the spending analyses.
There is no record of Schumer scrutinizing Austin’s spending. Fox News Digital reached out to the senator’s office for comment on the matter.
Defense spending is historically modest compared to past decades, representing a small fraction of the United States’ gross domestic product at 3.7%. Its share of the GDP has decreased significantly since the 1950s, according to an analysis by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
Schumer’s grievance also comes as he leads Senate Democrats’ resistance to funding the Department of Homeland Security, which has been shut down for about a month. Democrats have demanded changes to the department’s deportation policies, which are nonstarters for Republicans. Essential DHS components, like Immigration and Customs Enforcement, remain operational at this stage, but some agencies, like the Transportation Security Administration, are facing pains as workers go unpaid.
Critics slammed Schumer over the comment on social media.
Fox News analyst Guy Benson called Schumer “the leader of the ‘Learing Center’ fraud party,” in reference to a viral video about welfare fraud scandals in Minnesota, saying Schumer “finally [discovered] one spending line item he’s willing to cut.”
Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Texas, said Schumer “thinks it’s bad that U.S. troops get to eat steak & lobster during deployment” and that the Affordable Care Act is a “failed” plan that makes healthcare more expensive.
“Remember that Democrats would have you eating MREs,” another commenter posted, referring to military-issued “Meals Ready to Eat.”
“Chuck Schumer hates the troops,” Republican communicator Steve Guest wrote.
A commentary writer for the conservative Washington Examiner said, “You said nothing in 2024.”
Another social media user told Schumer he “should’ve done the 30 seconds of research to find Lloyd Austin’s September 2024 expenditures before posting. Missed your outrage back then.”
Hegseth’s spending in September 2025 was the highest the Pentagon has seen on grants and contracts since September 2008. Austin, however, held the record before that, spending $79.1 billion in September 2024.
The last month of the fiscal year has long been notorious for spending that appears lavish as agencies face pressure to “use it or lose it” so that they can justify keeping their budget for the next year. Contract and grant payment schedules also include September due dates, which can contribute to the spending uptick.
In 2024 under Austin, according to an audit by Open the Books, “the military spent $103.7 million on meat, fish and poultry in September, partially because it ordered raw lobster tail 147 times for $6.1 million. It also dropped $16.6 million on ribeye steak, $6.4 million on salmon and $407,000 on Alaskan king crab.”
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Similar to Austin, Hegseth spent $6.9 million on lobster tail, Open the Books found. Austin spent about $1.5 million more than Hegseth on ribeye steaks. Hegseth more than quadrupled Austin’s spending on Alaskan king crab, while Austin’s spending on salmon was roughly six times that of Hegseth’s. The food went toward feeding military personnel, the nonprofit noted.
The Biden and Trump administration’s Pentagon expenses saw parallels for other line items, too. Hegseth’s $5.3 million on Apple products is comparable to Austin’s $5.1 million. Both spent more than $1 million on musical instruments. Hegseth tripled Austin’s spending on footrests at about $111,000, according to the data.
Fox News Digital reached out to Biden’s office and the Pentagon.
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