Continuing resolutions have funded the Department of Defense in 37 of the last 49 fiscal years, and the delays they cause are not abstract: nearly half of 74 acquisition programs GAO surveyed reported schedule slips, and specific programs lost millions to foreign-exchange shifts, re-contracting, and idle production lines, according to a Government Accountability Office report reissued February 4, 2026.
What exactly is a continuing resolution?
A continuing resolution (CR) is a temporary appropriations act that keeps federal agencies operating at a prior-year "annualized rate" when Congress has not enacted a regular appropriations bill by the start of the fiscal year on October 1, according to GAO's report. It is not new money and not a policy reset — it is a legal freeze on the status quo, with a small number of statutory exceptions Congress writes into each CR.
For the Pentagon, that freeze has become closer to the norm than the exception. GAO found DoD has operated under at least one CR in all but 12 of the past 49 fiscal years, with 49 separate CRs enacted between fiscal 2011 and fiscal 2025, averaging roughly 123 days each. Eight of the last 15 fiscal years included a CR period longer than three months, the threshold GAO treats as material to program execution.
What can a CR actually stop the Pentagon from doing?
A CR carries three restrictions that matter most to acquisition, per GAO's report. It bars "new starts" — funding for programs or efforts not funded in the prior fiscal year. It caps production at the prior year's rate, so a program cannot ramp up manufacturing even if the pending budget requests more units. And it blocks new multiyear procurement contracts that rely on advance procurement funding, a financing tool shipbuilding and munitions programs depend on.
None of those restrictions require Congress to name a program. They apply automatically, across the department, for as long as the CR runs — which is why GAO's report treats CR duration, not any single funding fight, as the variable that predicts program harm.
How often do CRs actually cause delays, and what do they cost?
Of 74 acquisition programs GAO reviewed, 36 — about half — reported schedule delays in contract awards or equipment delivery tied to CR periods, and 22 reported financial disruption. The pattern also shows up in obligation data: in years with short CRs, DoD's research and development accounts had obligated 41% of annual funding by the second quarter, versus 31% in years with long CRs; procurement accounts showed a similar gap, 34% versus 24%. Long-CR years pushed over 9% of annual obligations into the fiscal year's final month, a compression GAO links to strained contracting capacity.
The Marine Corps' Amphibious Combat Vehicle program illustrates the mechanism. Delayed ordering tied to fiscal 2022-2024 CR periods exposed the program to shifting foreign-exchange rates, adding $17.7 million in cost, and the service was unable to place a full fiscal 2024 order of 40 vehicles — it received 36, per GAO.
| Program or activity | Documented effect | Fiscal year(s) |
|---|---|---|
| Marine Corps Amphibious Combat Vehicle | $17.7M added cost; order cut from 40 to 36 vehicles | FY2022-2024 |
| Space Force Next Gen OPIR Polar | $2.3M cost increase from delayed subcontracting | FY2023 |
| Joint Base San Antonio facilities sustainment | Contract estimate rose from $579,000 to $1,445,000 | FY2024 |
| Tooele Army Depot | Demilitarized 82% of planned ammunition; ~$500,000 in lost revenue | FY2024 |
| F-15 EPAWSS | Contract award delayed; GAO cites likely future parts shortages | FY2022 |
Figures per GAO-26-107065, attributed to the department's own program and financial data as compiled by the auditors.
Does a CR only hit hardware programs?
No — GAO's report also documents effects on training and staff time. U.S. Indo-Pacific Command canceled a fiscal 2024 iteration of Exercise Balikatan training events in the Philippines when funding for shipping equipment was unavailable during a CR period, GAO found. The Navy rescheduled USS Bataan maintenance from April to August 2024 specifically to work around CR timing.
The administrative cost is harder to see but persistent. On the F-35 program, GAO reports financial management staff spend an estimated 20% of their time adjusting budgets to manage through CR constraints, and the program's capability-development schedule slipped four to six months due to new-start limits. The Next Gen OPIR Polar effort processed six separate contracting actions during a fiscal 2023 CR that GAO estimates would have taken three without one — each action carrying its own paperwork and review cycle.
Did fiscal 2026 follow the same pattern?
It did, at least in timing. The fiscal year opened October 1, 2025 without enacted defense appropriations; a stopgap measure — the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2026, passed by the House 222-209 in November 2025 — kept the government funded into January 2026 but did not include a full-year defense bill, according to a Senate Appropriations Committee release. Full-year fiscal 2026 defense appropriations were not enacted until February 3, 2026, when Congress approved an $838.7 billion discretionary defense measure — $838.5 billion of it for defense accounts — covering $294.4 billion for readiness, $167.5 billion for procurement, and $145.9 billion for research and development, per the Senate Appropriations Committee.
That is a stopgap period of roughly four months — inside the range GAO's report associates with measurable schedule and cost effects, though GAO's own case studies run through fiscal 2024 and the report does not name specific fiscal 2026 programs affected. It is at minimum the department's tenth CR-opened fiscal year since 2016, continuing a pattern GAO has now measured across nearly five decades of appropriations cycles.
The fiscal 2026 defense request itself was unusually large and complicated to analyze, the Congressional Budget Office noted in an April 2026 assessment: the Pentagon's budget included $113 billion in additional funding from the 2025 reconciliation act on top of its base request, and no five-year Future Years Defense Program document was released alongside it — a planning document CBO normally relies on for its long-term cost projections. CBO also flagged that reconciliation money appeared to be substituting for, rather than simply supplementing, base-budget resources, which it said creates uncertainty about whether fiscal 2026 spending levels are sustainable in later years.
Has anyone proposed fixing this?
The Commission on the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) Reform recommended in March 2024 that Congress allow the Pentagon to start selected new programs and increase production rates during a CR, provided those programs were already included in the President's budget request and approved by the relevant House and Senate committees, GAO's report notes. That change would require Congress to write it into future CR legislation; GAO's report describes the recommendation without endorsing or opposing it, and no such carve-out has been enacted as of this report.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is a continuing resolution, in plain terms? It is a stopgap law that keeps agencies funded at the prior year's rate when Congress misses its October 1 deadline for regular appropriations, per GAO. It is not a budget cut or increase — it freezes spending at the old level until a full-year bill or another CR takes effect.
- Why can't the Pentagon start new programs during a CR? CRs carry a standard "no new starts" restriction barring funds for anything not funded in the prior fiscal year, GAO reports, along with caps on production rate increases and new multiyear contracts — restrictions that apply department-wide regardless of a program's priority.
- How long did fiscal 2026 defense programs operate under a CR? From October 1, 2025 through February 3, 2026, when Congress enacted full-year fiscal 2026 defense appropriations, per the Senate Appropriations Committee — a period of roughly four months.
- Which programs has GAO documented being harmed by CRs? Its report names the Marine Corps' Amphibious Combat Vehicle, the F-35, Space Force's Next Gen OPIR Polar, Tooele Army Depot, and the F-15 EPAWSS program among others, with cost and schedule effects tied to specific CR periods between fiscal 2022 and 2024.
- Has GAO recommended ending the practice? The report itself does not issue new recommendations; it describes a March 2024 proposal from the Commission on PPBE Reform to permit limited new starts and production-rate increases during a CR for programs pre-approved by relevant committees.
For a related aviation perspective, read Biden-Harris Administration Announces California’s Launch of First Phase of Federal Home Energy Rebate Programs to Help Lower Families’ Utility Bills.
For more context, read How the Pentagon Budget Cycle Actually Works, Year by Year.