Defense Primer: Defense and Intelligence Unfunded Priorities

Updated June 2, 2026

Defense Primer: Defense and Intelligence Unfunded Priorities

Introduction

By law, certain U.S. Department of Defense (DOD)

officials and other executive branch agency officials are

required to submit reports to Congress describing defense

and intelligence-related priorities that were not included in

the President’s annual budget request. (DOD is “using a

secondary Department of War designation” under

Executive Order (E.O.) 14347 dated September 5, 2025.)

These reports, known as unfunded priorities lists (UPLs),

identify certain programs, activities, or mission

requirements for which appropriations were not requested,

along with the funding amounts that may be necessary to

resource them. Pursuant to 10 U.S.C. §222a, the highestranking officers of the U.S. military services and combatant

commands (COCOMs) are to submit UPLs (also called

unfunded requirements, or UFRs) to the Secretary of

Defense (SECDEF, who is “using a secondary Secretary of

War designation” under E.O. 14347), Chairman of the Joint

Chiefs of Staff (CJCS), and congressional defense

committees. Some Members have described DOD unfunded

priorities as “wish lists” that reduce budget discipline and

increase unnecessary spending. Others have described them

as “risk lists” that identify items intended to support

strategic objectives. With the value of such items

sometimes totaling tens of billions of dollars a year (e.g.,

DOD submitted $53.7 billion in FY2026 UPLs), Congress

has typically debated authorization and appropriation of

funding for certain unfunded priorities.

Background

For decades, reports accompanying defense authorization

and appropriation legislation have sometimes referenced

“unfunded requirements” of the military. For instance, the

conference report (H.Rept. 97-749) to accompany the

National Defense Authorization Act for FY1983 (NDAA;

P.L. 97-252) authorized appropriations within the Operation

and Maintenance, Air National Guard accounts for certain

“unfunded requirements” (i.e., cold weather gear and

chemical defense equipment). By the mid-1990s, according

to some accounts, the services routinely submitted lists of

unfunded priorities to Congress. In the 2000s, conference

reports accompanying defense authorization and

appropriation legislation sometimes referenced the

“unfunded priority list” of DOD or a military service, or the

“unfunded requirements list” of a military service. In 2009,

in preparation of the FY2010 President’s budget request to

Congress, then-SECDEF Robert M. Gates limited access to

information about proposals to decrease funding for certain

defense programs—a move that he acknowledged generated

congressional concerns over transparency into the

department’s budget development process. In 2021, thenChairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark A.

Milley said unfunded priorities lists provide a “flexibility

option” for lawmakers. In 2023, then-SECDEF Lloyd J.

Austin III said he would support removing statutory

requirements for UPLs.

Selected Legislation

FY2013 NDAA. Section 1003 of P.L. 112-239 included a

provision expressing the sense of Congress that certain

military officers “should” submit to Congress, through the

CJCS and the SECDEF, “a list of any priority military

programs or activities under the jurisdiction of such officer

for which, in the estimate of such officer additional funds, if

available, would substantially reduce operational or

programmatic risk or accelerate the creation or fielding of a

critical military capability.”

FY2017 NDAA. Section 1064 of P.L. 114-328 established

the statutory requirement of 10 U.S.C. §222a for annual

reports on unfunded priorities of the services and

COCOMs. In particular, the statute requires the service

chiefs and combatant commanders to submit within 10 days

of the President’s budget request to Congress a report on

the unfunded priorities of the service or command under

their jurisdiction. The statute requires the officers to submit

the documents to the SECDEF, CJCS, and congressional

defense committees (i.e., the House and Senate Committees

on Armed Services and Appropriations). The reports are to

include items in order of priority and such information as

the line-item number in procurement accounts, program

element number in research and development accounts, and

the sub-activity group in operation and maintenance

accounts. The statute defines an unfunded priority, in part,

as a program, activity, or mission requirement that “is not

funded in the budget of the President” and “is necessary to

fulfill a requirement associated with an operational or

contingency plan of a combatant command or other

validated requirement.” Section 1696 of the act established

a similar statutory requirement (10 U.S.C. §222b) for an

annual report on unfunded priorities of the Missile Defense

Agency (MDA).

FY2021 NDAA. Sections 924 and 1006 of P.L. 116-283

amended 10 U.S.C. §222a to include among the officers

required to submit reports on unfunded priorities the Chief

of Space Operations and the Chief of the National Guard

Bureau, respectively. Section 1005 established the statutory

requirement of 10 U.S.C. §240i for the DOD Comptroller to

submit a report on unfunded priorities related to audit

readiness and remediation.

FY2024 NDAA. Section 1003 of the FY2024 NDAA (P.L.

118-31) amended 10 U.S.C. §222a to include additional

reporting requirements related to UPLs of the armed forces

and combatant commands.

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Defense Primer: Defense and Intelligence Unfunded Priorities

Selected Permanent Laws

Table 1 lists statutory provisions requiring components of

DOD, the intelligence community, and other agencies to

submit UPLs, under varying terms.

Table 1. Selected Provisions in United States Code

Related to Defense and Intelligence UPLs

Title and

Section

Description

Department of Defense

10 U.S.C. §222a

Military services and combatant commands

unfunded priorities

10 U.S.C. §222f

Under Secretary of Defense (USD) for

Research and Engineering unfunded

priorities

10 U.S.C. §240i

USD(Comptroller) unfunded priorities for

audit readiness and remediation

10 U.S.C. §4815

National technology and industrial base

unfunded priorities

10 U.S.C. §4901

note

Small business innovation research and

small business technology transfer

programs unfunded priorities

10 U.S.C. §5513

Missile Defense Agency unfunded priorities

Department of Homeland Security

14 U.S.C. §5102

note

Coast Guard shoreside infrastructure and

facilities projects unfunded priorities

14 U.S.C. §5108

Coast Guard unfunded priorities list

Department of Energy

10 U.S.C. §6288

National Nuclear Security Administration

unfunded priorities

Intelligence Community

50 U.S.C. §3113

Intelligence community unfunded priorities

Source: CRS analysis of selected provisions of the United States Code.

DOD UPLs

approximately $134 billion in UPLs from FY2020 through

FY2025, with total UPL value increasing 73% over the sixyear period when adjusted for inflation, with COCOMs

submitting a higher combined UPL amount than the

services in FY2025. GAO concluded that certain DOD

components “inconsistently addressed required statutory

reporting elements” and “used different methodologies to

prioritize and report their UPLs to Congress.” For

Congress, GAO recommended to consider revising 10

U.S.C. 222a “to clarify how unfunded priorities should be

prioritized.” For DOD, GAO made five recommendations

“to ensure that all statutory elements are addressed in future

submissions.”

Selected Legislative Activity

Some Members of Congress have offered legislative

proposals to authorize and appropriate funding to support

unfunded priorities. Other Members have offered proposals

to eliminate statutory requirements for UPLs. In the 117 th

Congress, during the House Armed Services Committee

markup of its version of the FY2023 NDAA (H.R. 7900),

Representative Mike Rogers supported an amendment to

increase appropriations authorized in the bill by $37.0

billion in part by saying, “The amendment funds critically

needed priorities from our service chiefs and combatant

commanders that were left unfunded by the President’s

budget.” In the 117th Congress, Senator Elizabeth Warren

wrote Secretary Austin to try to curtail the use of DOD

UPLs and introduced legislation (S. 5255) to repeal

statutory requirements for certain department UPLs.

Senator Warren said of the proposal, “The Department of

Defense’s priorities should be reflected in its budget.” In

the 118th Congress, Representative Pramila Jayapal

introduced legislation (H.R. 4740) to repeal statutory

requirements for certain DOD and Department of Energy

(DOE) UPLs. The bills were referred to, but not reported

out of, committee. In the 119th Congress, the Senate

Appropriations Committee-reported version of an FY2026

appropriations bill (S. 2572) recommended funding more

than $20 billion in UPLs, according to the accompanying

report (S.Rept. 119-52), though the enacted bill (Division A

of P.L. 119-75) “was unable to fully fund most of these

unfunded requirements and priorities.”

DOD unfunded priorities lists have typically lacked a

standard format. Some UPL lists have included a narrative

to describe each priority; others have provided line-item

lists in a spreadsheet. Most UPL lists have been

unclassified; some have been submitted with distribution

restrictions. Combatant commanders do not always submit

UPLs. In 2024, the heads of Transportation Command and

Cyber Command did not submit FY2025 UPLs for their

respective commands. The value of items on DOD

unfunded priorities can vary. Previous UPLs have included

items that ranged in cost from air defense activities valued

at approximately $100,000 to a Navy guided-missile

destroyer (DDG-51) estimated to cost $1.7 billion.

Following the inclusion of the destroyer on a UPL for

FY2022, some Members questioned whether the Navy’s

official budget request accurately reflected the service’s

most important priorities.

Potential Issues for Congress

According to a September 2025 Government

Accountability Office (GAO) report, DOD submitted

Cameron M. Keys, Analyst in Defense Logistics and

Resource Management Policy

How might DOD’s use of diverse methodologies to

generate unfunded priorities affect the level of effort

required for congressional oversight?

How might the upward trend in the combined value of

UPLs since FY2020 affect overall funding levels and/or

tradeoffs in the national defense budget?

What, if any, is the relationship between FY2025 and

FY2026 UPL lists and the programs, projects, and activities

funded by Title II of the 2025 reconciliation law( P.L. 11921)?

How might the classification level of certain unfunded

priorities affect congressional oversight?

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Defense Primer: Defense and Intelligence Unfunded Priorities

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