The United States’ national debt has surpassed $40 trillion for the first time in history, marking a new milestone that is intensifying concerns about the country’s long-term fiscal outlook and the rising cost of servicing federal debt.
The latest figures released by the US Treasury Department show total federal debt reached $40.047 trillion on Tuesday. Of that amount, about $32.2 trillion is debt held by the public through Treasury securities owned by investors around the world, while roughly $7.8 trillion is debt owed between government agencies.
The milestone comes less than a decade after Donald Trump first entered the White House in January 2017, when the national debt stood at approximately $19.95 trillion, meaning it has more than doubled during that period.
A large share of the increase occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, when both the Trump and Joe Biden administrations borrowed trillions of dollars to support households, businesses and the broader economy during the public health crisis.
Since then, additional borrowing has been driven by tax cuts, higher federal spending, infrastructure investment, clean-energy programs and expanding entitlement programs, according to budget analysts.
The Congressional Budget Office has warned that current fiscal policies will continue pushing debt higher over the coming decade. Its projections estimate that President Donald Trump’s current tax-and-spending package could add about $4.7 trillion to the national debt over the next 10 years.
Reuters reported that the national debt increased by about $7.8 trillion during Trump’s first term between 2017 and 2021, with more than half of that increase occurring during the pandemic.
During Joe Biden’s presidency, federal debt rose by approximately $8.4 trillion, reflecting pandemic-related spending, infrastructure investment and other major government programs.
Since Trump returned to office in January 2025, the debt has increased by another $3.8 trillion, according to Treasury data. One of the fastest-growing pressures on the federal budget is the cost of paying interest on existing debt.
The US government now spends around $1.1 trillion a year on interest payments alone. During fiscal year 2025, interest costs exceeded the Pentagon’s budget for the first time.
In the first ten months of fiscal year 2026, interest payments became the second-largest category of federal spending after Social Security, surpassing Medicare spending, according to budget data cited in the report.
The United States currently spends about $7 trillion annually, with nearly 60 percent of the federal budget devoted to mandatory programs such as Social Security, healthcare and veterans’ services.
As the population continues to age and interest costs rise, policymakers face growing pressure to decide whether to reduce spending, increase revenue or pursue a combination of both to stabilize the country’s long-term debt trajectory.
