President Donald Trump has said that Qatar is “donating” its Boeing 747 to the U.S. and not to him personally, as the fallout from the potential transaction continues.
Why It Matters
On Sunday, reports emerged that Trump was to accept the Boeing 747-8, which will be retrofitted with state-of-the-art security and communications to serve as Air Force One.
Qatari officials said the $400-million plane was being given by the Qatari Ministry of Defense to the Pentagon. However, Trump said the Boeing 747-8 jet will be used as the official presidential plane, and, according to multiple reports, after he leaves office, it will be transferred to the Trump Presidential Library Foundation.
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What To Know
Writing on his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump hit out at news reports about the plane and called Qatar, which he just visited as part of a tour of the Middle East, a “wonderful country.”
He said that he was not being gifted the plane, but rather the United States Air Force and Defense Department were receiving it as a donation.
He wrote: “The wonderful country of Qatar, after agreeing to invest more than 1.4 Trillion Dollars in the United States of America, deserves much better than Misleading (Fake!) News. Everyone, including their lawyers, has been told that ABC must not say that Qatar is giving ME a FREE Boeing 747 Airplane, because they are not. Instead, and as Fake News ABC fully knows and understands, this highly respected country is donating the plane to the United States Air Force/ Defense Department, AND NOT TO ME. By so doing, they are saving our country, and the American Taxpayer, hundreds of millions of dollars. ABC Fake News is one of the WORST.”
What People Are Saying
Attorney Bradley P. Moss previously told Newsweek that accepting the gift was “illegal.”
“Let’s be clear: it is illegal. Full stop,” he said. “The president cannot accept a personal gift from a foreign government. If the Qatari government wants to donate a jet, it immediately becomes the property of the U.S. government and remains that way after Mr. Trump leaves office, unless he agrees to personally reimburse the U.S. government the full market value of the jet.
“Designating it for his ‘presidential library’ is not a special loophole to this constitutional limitation. And this is without even touching on the obvious national security risk of having a foreign jet used as Air Force One.
Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, told reporters: “I understand that we may need a new Air Force One, but I’d love to have a big, beautiful jet that’s built in the United States of America. That seems to me to be the way to go.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Fox & Friends on Monday: “The Qatari government has graciously offered to donate a plane to the Department of Defense. The legal details of that are still being worked out. But, of course, any donation to this government is always done in full compliance with the law, and we commit ourselves to the utmost transparency, and we will continue to do that.”
Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani told CNN‘s Becky Anderson in an interview: “I know there were a lot of speculation about this topic. I don’t know what is the reason that instigates this. This is a very simple government-to-government dealing.”
What Happens Next
Whether Trump accepts the gift remains to be seen. Meanwhile, bipartisan concerns in Washington over the ethics of the transaction remain and could spark legal challenges.
