$381 Billion and Counting

The Cost of America’s Deterrence Collapse under the Biden-Harris Administration

Introduction

In four short years, the Biden-Harris Administration has presided over a historic collapse of American deterrence across multiple theaters.  After ushering the Taliban’s conquest of Afghanistan via its August 2021 retreat, the White House failed to prevent Putin’s brutal invasion of Ukraine while refusing to stop millions of illegal migrants from flooding across the Southern Border.  All the while, it appeased Iran with sanctions relief and cash inflows, culminating in its proxies launching the October 7 attack and striking against U.S. forces across the region.

These failures have made America less safe and our world more dangerous.  Most critically, they have produced tragic losses of life, paid by Ukrainian soldiers, Afghan refugees, Israeli hostages, and everyday Americans living in border communities.  These failures have also exacted a heavy financial cost on U.S. taxpayers, forcing major outlays to conduct damage control, salvage our interests, and to defend allies.  These failures have also resulted in federal dollars were used to directly undercut our own homeland security. 

The fiscal impact of these fiascos will be felt for decades, and this report examines the Biden-Harris Administration’s most severe deterrence failures in an effort to establish a baseline cost estimate.  We conclude these missteps have cost the United States upwards of $381.4 billion, not including many expenses that will continue to incur through January 2025.  Biden and Harris’ deterrence failures translate to an alarming cost of over $2,902 for each U.S. household.  Given that our estimates rely on public data and do not consider every policy failure, the true cost is likely significantly larger.

The lesson of our analysis is self-evident: We must learn from these blunders to prevent an imminent deterrence crisis in Taiwan.  The price of failure with China would be measured in trillions, not billions. 

Achieving peace through deterrence is expensive, but provoking our adversaries into war with appeasement is far more costly.  The American people deserve policies that will restore security at home and order abroad.

Failure #1: Southern Border Migration– $167.6 Billion

The United States has incurred unprecedented costs from the Southern Border crisis over the last four years.  The influx of millions of migrants has burdened the nation with new arrivals using welfare programs, public education, emergency medical services, and more.  While some illegal immigrants do pay taxes, these contributions do not come close to offsetting their received services.

It remains unclear exactly how many illegal migrants have crossed the Southern Border under the Biden-Harris Administration, but preliminary estimates suggest at least 7.5 million, and likely much higher.  According to data obtained by Congress, over 3.6 million illegal migrants have been released into the United States since January 20, 2021.  In addition to those released into the interior, there have been at least 1.7 million “got-aways,” individuals that were detected entering illegally but not stopped since the beginning of Biden’s presidency.  Notably, this figure does not include those who evaded Border Patrol’s detection.

Applying a modest estimate of 7.5 million, the financial burden imposed by illegal immigration since 2020 exceeds $167.6 billion.  This figure derives from a net cost estimate by the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which found each illegal migrant or their U.S.-born child costs taxpayers $8,776 annually.

Homeland Security statistics indicate that across the last four fiscal years, there were approximately 7.5 million illegal crossings at the Southern Border (1.7 million in 2021, 2.2 million in 2022, 2.1 million in 2023, and 1.5 million so far in 2024).  Aggregating this data, we apply the $8,776 annual per-immigrant cost estimate to these 7.5 million illegal migrants who crossed the Southern Border.  

Calculating the costs for each cohort of illegal migrants, we find that the FY2021 total cost approximates $14.92 billion.  That was followed by an additional cost of $19.31 billion in FY2022—due to the influx of 2.2. million more migrants—in addition to a recurring cost of $14.92 billion for the 2021 cohort in FY2022, leaving a total FY2022 cost of $34.23 billion.  Additionally, the FY2023 cohort added an additional expense $18.43 billion to the recurring expenses of the FY2021 and FY2022 cohorts, for a total FY2023 cost estimate of $52.66 billion.  Finally, the FY2024 cohort has brought a cost of $13.16 billion, for a grand total of $65.82 billion that year.  The total estimated financial cost of accommodating these migrants for three years alone thus exceeds $167.63 billion—not counting the coming costs from FY25 and the ongoing impact for subsequent years.

Failure #2: Iran-Led Middle East Terrorism – $15.2 Billion

Thanks to the Maximum Pressure campaign, Iran's exports were slashed, sending Hamas, Hezbollah, and its other terror proxies scrambling for funds.  However, the Biden-Harris Administration pursued a JCPOA return by lifting financial pressures and relaxing sanctions enforcement.  These policies resulted in at least $81 billion in Iranian oil revenues in addition to access to a $6 billion fund as part of its hostage ransom payments.  This cash influx has emboldened Tehran to attack U.S. troops and fund regional terrorism, setting the stage for October 7.

While U.S. taxpayer dollars were not sent to Iran directly, they were disbursed to its terror allies.  Since 2021, the Biden-Harris Administration provided $1.2 billion to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees, a Hamas- and Hezbollah-linked organization.  Ignoring concerns about its ties to the “pay to slay” program, it resumed U.S. contributions, which surged to $318.4 million in 2021, $364 million in 2022, and $371 million in 2023.  Worse, in 2024 they sent $122 million to UNRWA despite evidence of its employees’ complicity in October 7—knowingly diverting taxpayer dollars to Palestinian terrorism.

This sequence of decisions set the conditions for the Gaza war, which has forced additional costs.  While Washington was right to aid Israel, its deterrence blunder prompted $12.5 billion in assistance, including $3.8 billion from legislation in March and $8.7 billion from supplemental appropriations.  The White House also spent millions on aid for Gaza, much of which was stolen by Hamas.  It also launched a $320 million floating pier before discontinuing it amid logistical and weather problems.

After rescinding the Houthis’ terrorist designation, the White House failed to stop its terrorism in the Red Sea, imposing an additional cost of $1.16 billion to protect shipping lanes and defend U.S. forces.  The attacks required extensive warship deployments and hundreds of multi-million dollar missiles.  The Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group and related assets have fired some 770 munitions, including 420 air-to-surface missiles, 60 air-to-air missiles, 135 Tomahawk land attack missiles, and 155 standard missiles—many of which cost $2-4 million each—to eliminate $2,000 Houthi drones.  With 15% of global shipping travelling through the Suez Canal and shipping prices rising from $2,500 to $6,500 per container, the United States has also suffered an economic burden on the order of tens of billions.

Failure #3: Putin’s War on Ukraine – $175 Billion

Since March 2022, the United States has provided some $175 billion in military, financial, and humanitarian aid to Ukraine in its war against Russia.  This historic sum includes a $13.6 billion package approved in March 2022, a $40.9 billion package passed in May 2022, and $12.3 billion from September 2022 followed by $47.4 billion from January 2023 and $61.3 billion in April 2024.  

The need to expend much of this $175 billion to U.S. taxpayers could have been averted had swift action been taken to deter Russia’s invasion in the first place.  Senate Republicans proposed emergency legislation to do just that via the Never Yielding Europe’s Territory Act, which included $500 million in Foreign Military Financing, emergency lethal assistance, and mandatory sanctions on Nord Stream 2 as well as Putin’s cronies, enablers, and major banks.  These modest investments could have deterred Russia’s invasion.

Instead, the White House withheld hundreds of millions in military aid in 2021, sent envoys of appeasement to Moscow, and lobbied against legislation to sanction the Nord Stream 2 pipeline.  Worse, President Biden signaled that Moscow would face lesser consequences for a “minor incursion.”  These blunders and the White House’s refusal to bolster Ukraine’s defense capabilities during Russia’s build up along the Ukrainian border gave Putin all but the greenlight to invade.

Even after this initial failure to deter Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the White House had a second opportunity to mitigate the total cost of support by surging weapons shipments to Kyiv to prosecute the war and consolidate battlefield wins.  Instead, it repeatedly withheld weaponry and delayed the delivery of air defense, tanks, long-range missiles, F-16s and more.  These blunders prolonged the war by denying Ukraine the ability to reclaim its territory and cemented its intractability.  This “too little, too late” approach has only increased the cost of U.S. aid needed.

These two deterrence failures have driven massive expenditures that could have been averted with sound policy.  Of course, the greatest cost of these failures has been shouldered by Ukrainians, who have paid in lives and blood to defend their country.  Tens of thousands of Ukrainians troops and civilians have been killed, with communities and infrastructure destroyed by indiscriminate bombing—a catastrophe the World Bank estimates will cost an additional $486 billion.

Failure #4: Afghanistan’s Taliban Takeover – $23.6 Billion

The most shameful deterrence blunder of the Biden-Harris Administration’s foreign policy was its withdrawal from Afghanistan, which led to its rapid collapse and the Taliban’s takeover.  Despite repeated intelligence and military warnings that a precipitous withdrawal was unadvisable, White House leadership disregarded these concerns and forced a politically-driven timeline.

Most astonishingly, the Biden-Harris Administration abandoned $7.1 billion in U.S. taxpayer-funded equipment to the Taliban.  This includes $4.13 billion in defense vehicles including 12,000 military Humvees as well as $923.3 million in aircraft, $294.8 million in air-to-ground munitions, over 300,000 weapons, night vision and surveillance gear, communications equipment, and explosive ordinance disposal equipment.    

The U.S. government has also provided at least $17.2 billion in taxpayer-funded assistance to Afghanistan since the withdrawal, according to the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR).  This includes $8.7 billion spent on the evacuation of Afghans under Operations Allies Welcome; Congress provided an additional $5.53 billion to support the care of relocated Afghan refugees.  It also includes nearly $3 billion in humanitarian and development aid.  On top of these expenses, HHS and DHS committed nearly $3 billion and $284 million, respectively.  There is no doubt the Taliban has acquired a cut of these funds via local NGOs and other means.

As heavy as these costs are, the true costs of the Biden-Harris Administration’s misguided withdrawal will be incurred by Afghan women and girls subject to the Taliban’s repressive governance.  They may also very well be felt by Americans themselves, as the conditions are ripe for Afghanistan to once again become a safe haven for terrorism—and for the United States to be forced into more costly Middle East deployments to protect the homeland.

War with China: A Multi-Trillion Blunder in the Making

Thankfully, the United States has not yet suffered a deterrence failure in the Indo-Pacific and China has not fully tested America’s resolve in the Taiwan Strait.  However, all indications are that the CCP is preparing to conduct—and if not, be ready to conduct—a military operation invading Taiwan by 2027.  If Washington and Taipei fail to deter that attack, the United States could be forced into one of the most disastrous wars in human history.

The consequences would be severe.  A direct conflict with China could easily dwarf the costs of all recent wars combined or global crises like the COVID-19 pandemic.  For example, America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cost the United States some $4.5 trillion over two decades.  Bloomberg Economics estimates that a full-scale war over Taiwan could have a global impact of $10 trillion—a scenario in which the United States could suffer a major 3.3% GDP contraction.

Preliminary estimates suggest that $2-3 trillion in U.S. taxpayer dollars would be used to cover direct military spending, aid to Taiwan, and operational expenses for deploying U.S. forces.  That cost could soar as high as $5 to $6 trillion should the conflict become protracted or escalate.

However, the true cost to Americans would extend far beyond military expenses.  With Taiwan’s security lost, its role as a global semiconductor industry hub would be compromised, devastating U.S. industries reliant on its chips.  That would prompt hundreds of billions in economic losses from manufacturing slowdowns and rising costs, many of which would be passed to consumers.  A war with China would also disrupt global trade with tariffs, export bans, and trade restrictions that would hurt American consumers for years.  No sector of the U.S. economy would be spared from these knock-on effects, which would then spur inflation and unemployment.

The Biden-Harris Administration’s deterrence failures have cost the taxpayer billions.  However, the price of failure with China would be measured in trillions, with the costs incurred by American taxpayers for decades to come.  Getting Taiwan wrong would be one of the most catastrophic mistakes the United States has ever made.  We must learn from these examples to avoid a historic deterrence failure in the Indo-Pacific.