In the spring of 2025, we learned how President Trump wasn’t happy with the state of the Air Force One fleet, which consists of modified Boeing 747s that are referred to as the Boeing VC-25. While a new Air Force One fleet is under development, there have been huge delays, and Trump wanted a new jet during his term. Well, that’s now one step closer to becoming a reality, as this plane will soon be entering service.
Trump’s new Boeing 747-8 has now been delivered!
On Friday, June 19, 2026, Trump showed off his new “toy” at Joint Base Andrews, which has just been delivered. This is a Boeing 747-8 that was previously owned by the Qatari royal family. The plane will now undergo some commissioning flying, before it’s able to carry the president. However, the Air Force notes that the plane is already “safe, secure and equipped with the most advanced technologies necessary to meet the requirements of the presidential mission.”
The Air Force claims that it prioritized operational readiness over aesthetics, leaving the “interior layout minimally changed.” That’s funny, because the interior is way nicer than in the old Air Force One, and for that matter, I think a Middle Eastern royal and Trump have similar interior design preferences. During the unveiling, Trump even bragged about how “this plane was transformed into a flying White House at a level of luxury that nobody’s ever seen before.”
The plane has also received Trump’s preferred red, white, and blue livery, a huge departure from the historic white and baby blue livery that was on Air Force One. Trump also talked about how “a normal president wouldn’t do this, a normal president wants to stay away from aircraft, but our country has to be represented properly.”
The timing of this delivery is no coincidence, as it comes just ahead of the 250th birthday of the United States, and the plan is for the plane to do a flyover of Washington DC on July 4.
Of course it’s not the plane as such that’s the story here
What makes this most interesting isn’t that there’s a new plane that’s going to act as Air Force One, but instead, how it was acquired, and what happens with it after (if?) Trump leaves office.
Trump promotes how he got the best deal imaginable for our country, as the $400 million jet was a gift from Qatar, which had some spare “royal” planes sitting around. As he wrote on social media at the time:
“why should our military, and therefore our taxpayers, be forced to pay hundreds of millions of Dollars when they can get it for FREE from a country that wants to reward us for a job well done. Only a FOOL would not accept this gift on behalf of our Country.”
Now, let’s ignore the conflict of interest of having a foreign (let alone non-democratically elected) government making a gift like this to the “country,” and the potential conflict of interest that creates.
Was this really a “deal” for taxpayers? Well, let’s look at the facts. First of all, hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent updating the plane, so that it has the equipment required to carry the president. As you’d expect, Air Force One isn’t just a typical plane in terms of the safety equipment onboard.
Okay, but that’s a long term investment in our country, right? Not so much, due to what happens after he leaves office, which should be in early 2029. This isn’t a gift to the United States, but instead, it’s a gift to Trump. So the idea is that he’ll get to keep the plane, and it will go into his presidential library. Now, I’m not sure what exactly a new plane is going to do there, and I can’t help but wonder if he really won’t devise a way to fly on this plane after he leaves office. But maybe that’s just a conspiracy theory.
Either way, if we actually care about America and its taxpayers, you’d think the plane would stay around with the Air Force, so that it could be used by future presidents, right? If nothing else, there’s huge value to the engines and other spare parts, which taxpayers will otherwise be on the hook for. After all, we also recently saw the Air Force purchase two former Lufthansa Boeing 747-8s, which will be used for presidential fleet support. Those are costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, when this plane could otherwise serve that function in the future as well.
For what it’s worth, the long term plan is for there to be two purpose-built planes that can act as Air Force One. However, those are years behind schedule, and billions over budget. While the current timeline is that they should enter service in 2028, that’s far from a sure bet. One certainly wonders what will happen if they’re delayed beyond early 2029, and Trump takes his plane with him…
Bottom line
President Trump is clearly overjoyed to be getting “his” new Air Force One, a $400 million gift from Qatar, with hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars also being spent on the retrofit to get it ready for flying the president.
It goes without saying this is controversial — not only is this a gift from a foreign government, but it’s also going to Trump’s presidential library when he leaves office, rather than staying with the Air Force. Americans might be struggling to make ends meet, but at least we can be happy knowing that the plane has a “level of luxury that nobody’s ever seen before,” and that therefore our country will be “represented properly.”
To my fellow Americans, how are you feeling about this — proud, or really super duper proud?