(The Center Square) – The Congressional Budget Office estimates President Donald Trump's "Golden Fleet" of nuclear-powered battleships would cost taxpayers about $275 billion for 15 ships through 2056, an estimate the agency calls "highly uncertain."
The lead ship alone, the future USS Defiant, would cost $23.4 billion, according to the latest CBO report. The Navy is requesting $1.8 billion in its fiscal 2027 budget, including $1 billion in advance procurement costs.
The $23.4 billion estimate is above the Navy's own earlier figure. In its budget submission, the Navy put the lead ship at $15.1 billion, but that was for a conventionally powered version. CBO's higher figure reflects nuclear propulsion and the agency's standard adjustment for shipbuilding costs, which historically rise faster than inflation.
CBO cautioned that the ship's displacement could grow from 35,000 to 41,000 tons, a range in the Navy's own budget documents. Such an increase would raise the estimated cost of the lead ship by about 16%.
Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., the Senate Budget Committee's ranking member who requested the analysis, said a 25-ship fleet – the eventual goal Trump has stated – could cost $455 billion, according to Budget Committee calculations. CBO put the potential cost as high as $528 billion under a higher-cost scenario.
CBO said it is unlikely the Navy can begin building such a large clean-sheet design on schedule in 2028, noting the service's delays on smaller ships; destroyers now take an average of 11 years to deliver, up from five in the early 2000s. The Navy canceled the Constellation-class frigate in November 2025 after years of delays, a loss the Heritage Foundation's Brent Sadler estimated at nearly $3 billion.
Senior Navy leaders have testified that final assembly would occur at Newport News Shipbuilding, already behind on three aircraft carriers and multiple submarines.
Mark Cancian, a defense analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, wrote that the battleship "will never sail," predicting a future administration will cancel it before the first ship reaches the water.
Emma Salisbury of the Foreign Policy Research Institute argued the ship contradicts the Navy's own strategy, which is shifting toward smaller, distributed and unmanned vessels rather than large, expensive ones.
The Navy has called the Trump class "the most lethal surface combatant ever" built. At more than 35,000 tons and up to 880 feet long, it would carry 128 missile cells, hypersonic Conventional Prompt Strike missiles, a rail gun, high-powered lasers and a nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile, according to CBO and Navy documents. The Navy says it will defend carrier strike groups or lead its own formation as a fleet command ship.
Sadler, the Heritage analyst, supports the broader buildout, saying the growing naval threat from China makes a larger, more capable fleet urgent. He has urged the Navy to lean on proven designs rather than start an ambitious new class from scratch.
The Navy did not immediately respond to a request for comment on CBO's estimate.
The service plans to order the first ship in 2028 and estimates it would take eight years to build, although CBO said that start date is unlikely to hold.