President Donald Trump thinks Air Force One is impressive—but not when it’s parked next to planes owned by Middle Eastern royals.
Trump issued a fresh defense of the $400 million “flying palace” he plans to accept as a gift from Qatar in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, who has been following the president’s tour of the Middle East.
The plane in question is due to be given to the Pentagon by the Qatari Defense Ministry. The planned gift has provoked security and ethics concerns on both sides of the aisle.
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“The plane that you’re on right now is almost 40 years old,” Trump told Hannity aboard Air Force One while en route to the Middle East. The Fox host flagged his interview with the president in a Monday X post, posing next to Trump on the plane.
“When you land and you see Saudi Arabia, and you see UAE, and you see Qatar, and you see all this, and they have these brand new Boeing 747s mostly, and you see ours next to it, this is like a totally different plane,” Trump said.
“It’s much smaller. It’s much less impressive—as impressive as it is,” he added. “We’re the United States of America, I believe that we should have the most impressive plane.”
Trump—who has a long history of defending the size of his own hands and mocking others’ for being too small—has set off alarm bells with his decision to accept a lavish gift from Qatar.
Multiple Republican lawmakers, including staunch Trump supporters Rick Scott, Ted Cruz, and Josh Hawley, have raised their eyebrows over what they view as possibly “significant espionage and surveillance problems” tied to a Qatari jet.
Rep. Joe Courtney, the top Democrat on the House Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee, also pointed out that “retrofitting a plane from Qatar would create huge costs and a security nightmare that would impede the work underway to deliver the actual Air Force One by 2027.”
Even in MAGAworld, Trump’s most ardent cheerleaders felt queasy.
“I would take a bullet for him. But, I have to call a spade a spade,” MAGA firebrand Laura Loomer said on X. “This is really going to be such a stain on the admin if this is true… I’m so disappointed.”
But the president has consistently maintained that there is nothing wrong with accepting a “free” plane.
“Some people say, ‘Oh, you shouldn’t accept gifts for the country.’ My attitude is, why wouldn’t I accept the gift? We’re giving to everybody else?” Trump told Fox News.
The president doubled down on his defense in a Tuesday evening post on Truth Social, describing the Qatari gift as a “reward” for “a job well done.”
“The Boeing 747 is being given to the United States Air Force/Department of Defense, NOT TO ME! It is a gift from a Nation, Qatar, that we have successfully defended for many years,” he wrote. “It will be used by our Government as a temporary Air Force One, until such time as our new Boeings, which are very late on delivery, arrive.”
Trump has long been frustrated with Boeing’s failure to meet the initial delivery date of 2024. In February, he said he was “not happy” with the plane maker over the long delays.
Air Force acquisition official Darlene Costello told Congress last week that the new planes could be delivered in 2027, if Boeing and the government can agree on trading off certain requirements to speed up the process.
Trump has repeatedly insisted that the plane from Qatar will come “free of charge,” but the cost of retrofitting and maintaining the aircraft to make it safe and secure enough to transport the U.S. president can easily add up to millions of dollars, according to experts.
“This gift could become a very expensive asset to own and operate,” former Air Force acquisitions chief Andrew Hunter told Politico. “You might even ask why Qatar no longer wants the aircraft. And the answer may be that it’s too expensive for them to maintain.”
