Live updates: Pete Hegseth testifies to lawmakers over Iran war funding - BBC

What the report says

BBC News reported that US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth appeared before the Senate Appropriations Committee to defend the White House’s request for $87.6bn in extra defence funding, including $67bn linked to the war with Iran. Hegseth told lawmakers the Pentagon’s latest estimate of the conflict’s cost so far is about $37.5bn, and said the additional money would support what he described as a strategy of strengthening US security through military power.

The hearing, which BBC said lasted more than three and a half hours, also included testimony from Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen Dan Caine and Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins. Republican committee chair Susan Collins called the supplemental funding important for national security, while Democratic vice-chair Patty Murray argued that the Trump administration had entered the Iran war without congressional authorization and criticized the scale of the spending request.

BBC reported that the session was repeatedly disrupted by protesters, including one holding a “no war on Iran” sign. Democrats pressed Hegseth on whether the administration had met its stated objectives, after prior claims about Iran’s military capacity and the war being won. In exchanges with senators including Jon Ossoff, Kirsten Gillibrand and Gary Peters, Hegseth defended the administration’s position and said Iran no longer had an “effective” military, while clarifying that this did not mean it had no ability to attack.

The hearing followed the deaths of three US soldiers in the Middle East and fresh US strikes ordered by President Donald Trump, according to the BBC account. Congress is expected to consider the broader funding package as lawmakers debate the war’s aims, cost and duration.