Pentagon Invites Governors to Bid for the First New US Military Base Since 1985, With Congress Still to Approve the Money
The Pentagon has asked every governor to compete to host a new joint base for 15,000 to 25,000 troops, the first since 1985. States must offer land and fast permits. Congress must still authorise and fund it, and three weeks on no plan for picking a site has been published.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced the “Next Great American Base” in a speech at Marine Corps Base Quantico on 30 September and in a memo the same day. The memo describes a hardened joint installation within the homeland, shared by more than one service, on hundreds of thousands of acres. Hegseth called it a self-sustaining power projection platform. It would run off the commercial grid on its own power, with modern air defences, new housing, health care and child care, and classical architecture.
The newest US military installation today is Schriever Space Force Base in Colorado, which opened in 1985.
What a state has to put on the table
Hegseth asked governors and adjutants general to show “why and how” they would host it. In the speech he spelled that out as cutting red tape, offering land and welcoming military families. Pitches would go to senior military leaders, and he said the deliberations would be recorded and made public to guard against political favouritism.
That turns base siting into something closer to a corporate site race. Governors already compete for factories with land, tax breaks and fast-tracked permits. Here the asks are land at a scale few states can assemble in one block, state and local permitting that moves quickly, and schools and services for a population the size of a small city. The memo sets no formal requirements, and none of those offers has a price tag yet.
No state has filed a public bid. Newsweek asked a Center for a New American Security analyst which states fit. She named Texas, Louisiana and Florida if the Navy is part of the base, and South Dakota, Wyoming and Utah if it isn’t. That’s informed guesswork. There is no official shortlist.
The process is already slipping. Axios reported that the memo gave the assistant secretary for energy, installations and environment two weeks to draft an evaluation plan and timeline. That window closed around 14 October, and the plan hasn’t been made public.
Congress decides whether it gets built
A governor can win the competition and still not get a base. Military construction needs authorisation in the NDAA and money in the military construction appropriations bill, and neither the memo nor the speech gave a cost. The Congressional Research Service puts typical military construction timelines at five to seven years or more.
The fiscal 2027 bills aren’t law. The House passed its NDAA in July. The Senate version has been stuck since a failed cloture vote, and the government is on a stopgap to 11 December, as covered in our post on the December cliff. A base of this size would be a multi-year line item competing with the rest of a $1.5 trillion request, much of which already depends on reconciliation, as our Golden Dome post shows.
Members whose states want the base will have every reason to write it into those bills. The memo names no location, cost or opening date.
A new command needs Congress too
The same speech announced an Autonomous Warfare Command, a combatant command under a four-star officer covering drones, AI and command and control systems. Hegseth said it would have service-like authorities. A memo says the Pentagon will work with Congress to stand it up by 1 October 2027, with an interim effort called Project Agincourt run through the Defense Innovation Unit.
Senators got there first. The Senate Armed Services Committee’s NDAA, approved 18 to 9 in June, permits a Robotic and Autonomous Systems Combatant Command led by a four-star. The provision allows the Pentagon to create it but doesn’t oblige it to, and gives it limited authority to buy drone technology straight from the commercial market. It would be the first new combatant command since Space Command was re-established in 2019. That text dies if the NDAA does.
For states the lesson is the same either way. The Pentagon can invite pitches and name commands by memo. Land deals, permits and family housing are things states can promise now. Whether the base gets built is decided in the lame duck, by appropriators.