The $400 Million Air Force One Gift Has a Catch Americans Didn't Expect

[00:00:00]President Trump and his staff just a few hours ago said goodbye to Air Force One, at least these Air Force Ones. And that's because President Trump's brand new Air Force One, the $400 million gift from the Qatari Royal family is now ready to go thanks to your tax dollars.

[00:00:19]In case you didn't know, last May, President Trump announced that the Qatari royal family had gifted him a 7478 jumbo jet, also known as the Flying Palace.

[00:00:30]>> I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer. I mean, I could be a stupid person, say, "No, we don't want a free, very expensive airplane." Uh, but it was I thought it was a great gesture.

[00:00:43]But why would Trump need the Qatari jet if he already has a perfectly capable Boeing Air Force One? Well, Air Force One, of course, is a specially ducked out plane considered to be the White House in the sky for the use of the president of the United States. Air Force One is owned by the US government and is paid for by you and me, the American taxpayers. Because these current Air Force Ones are about 35 years old, the US government finalized a deal back in 2018 to replace the old jets with two more modern Boeing VC25B planes. At the time, the cost for those retrofitted jets was about $4 billion.

[00:01:24]Of course, that includes not just the cost of the plane, but also includes all the special retrofitting to include the security and the technology it needs to fly the president around the world. But because of delays and supply chain issues, those Boeing jets have ballooned in costs to more than $5.5 billion and still aren't expected to be delivered until mid 2028. And President Trump has been angry about that since his first term. Now, I want to be clear. No US government or military official has ever suggested that the current Air Force One is unsafe or not capable of flying pus around the world. But Trump has said very publicly that he doesn't want to fly on an old plane. He has talked about how embarrassing it is for the United States that its president flies on an old plane. He basically said it's not a good look for our country on the world stage. So, when the Qataris offered the Palace in the Sky, Trump was like, "Yep, I'll take it." Now, there are a whole bunch of ethical and legal questions surrounding this Qatari gift, but for purposes of this video, I am setting those aside because what you really need to know is there are three big catches to this arrangement. Catch number one.

[00:02:37]It's true American taxpayers didn't pay for the actual Qatari jet because it was a gift. But American taxpayers did pay for the retrofitting of that Qatari jet to turn it into Air Force One. How much did taxpayers pay? I wish I could give you an exact answer. The truth is the Air Force has not given any specifics to the public or even to Congress on how much it costs. All they've said to Congress is the retrofitting has not exceeded $400 million. Catch number two, the American taxpayers are still on the hook for those other two Boeing jets that will become Air Force One, the ones that are delayed. Yeah, we're still paying for those two. And catch number three, according to this announcement from the Air Force in May of 2026, the Qatari jet is a bridge, which means this newly retrofitted Qatari jet is just a placeholder until the new Boeing jets come online in mid 2028. So, the president will fly on this Qatari jet for 2 years and then what what's going to happen to the Qatari jet that American taxpayers have dumped hundreds of millions of dollars into? According to Trump last year, it's going with him.

[00:03:44]>> Do you plan to use the plane after you leave office?

[00:03:47]>> No, I don't. No, it would it would go directly to the library after after I leave office. I wouldn't I wouldn't be using it. No. Now, it's unclear when President Trump will take his first trip on his new bridge, Air Force