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Donald Trump renegotiated a deal with Boeing for a new Air Force One during his first term as president.
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Production delays and his re-election mean Trump will see the new plane come to life.
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Boeing says it lost more than $2 billion building the Next Air Force One.
After years of delays, billions of dollars and his return to the presidency, Donald Trump will fly on the new Air Force One after all.
The existing presidential aircraft – a military version of the Boeing 747-200 known as the VC-25A – are more than thirty years old. In 2015, the Air Force again chose Boeing to build two new aircraft, this time based on the larger 747-8. The VC-25B project is known as the “Next Air Force One.”
After Trump was elected in 2016, he said the Boeing deal did not ignore fears of rising costs.
He met with then-CEO Dennis Muilenburg and threatened to cancel the program if it exceeded $4 billion, sources told Defense One. To cut costs, Boeing agreed in 2018 to use two planes originally destined for a Russian airline that was going bankrupt. The contract announced at the time was worth $3.9 billion.
Trump showed off his red, white and blue design for the plane to ABC in 2019. “I do that for other presidents, not for me,” he said.
He seemed enthusiastic: After all, Trump has his own Boeing 757 and once ran a short-lived airline called Trump Shuttle.
The Next Air Force One was initially expected to be delivered in 2024. So if Trump was re-elected in 2020, he could theoretically have boarded the plane before the end of his presidency.
However, delays mounted and the time frame was pushed back to 2027.
It seemed Trump had little chance of flying the new planes.
Still, Trump’s victory in 2024 means he will now witness the realization of his deal, especially as Boeing continues to suffer production delays.
“Our team is fighting through a very, very challenging program – two very complex aircraft,” Boeing’s then head of aerospace and defense told Reuters in June about the project.
Light blue
However, it will look different from his original plans.
Last year, President Joe Biden selected a new light blue color palette, similar to every other presidential aircraft since the Kennedy era.
The red, white and blue color scheme would have caused more delays. The Air Force said a thermal study found the dark blue would require additional testing because of the added heat in some environments.
Joe Biden opted for a different paint scheme, in line with previous presidential aircraft.Thanks to the Air Force
While the government is paying $3.9 billion for the new planes, Boeing has suffered from the Next Air Force One.
In a 2022 earnings call, then-CEO Dave Calhoun called it “a very unique set of risks that Boeing probably shouldn’t have taken.”
That came after the company announced losses of $660 million. Boeing has since lost more than $2 billion building the VC-25B.
Last year, the company announced a $482 million charge due to technical changes. In the second quarter of this year, it increased that by $250 million due to further changes related to wiring and other structural requirements.
“The risk remains that we will incur additional losses in the future,” Boeing said in its latest earnings report.
In 2022, The Wall Street Journal reported that production problems included trying to place one of the jets on a jack that was not designed to support that much weight.
The report added that one Boeing employee did not have the proper qualifications to supervise the work, and another failed a routine drug test.
Mini bottles of tequila were also found aboard one of the future presidential planes, The Journal reported.
Air refueling
The current Air Force One is a special aircraft. It has 4,000 square meters of floor space on three levels, can feed 100 people at a time and always has a medical suite with a doctor on board.
The aircraft can refuel in mid-air for unlimited flight, and the onboard electronics are designed to withstand an electromagnetic pulse. In the event of an attack on the United States, it can function as a mobile command center.
The Next Air Force One will be more modern and even bigger. At 250 feet and 2 inches long, the 747-8 is the longest aircraft in the world.
Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
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