Renovating Trump’s ‘Free’ Qatari Jet is going great, just don’t ask about the mysterious transfer of $ 934 million that nobody wants to talk about – Jalopnik

It may feel like it has been for years, but in reality the news that President Trump has decided to accept a “free” Boeing 747 from the Natie Qatar is only a few months old. It is no secret that, to use the aircraft as Air Force One, it requires an expensive and thorough renovation. However, how much taxpayers actually spend on Trump’s “free” aircraft? Well, that is classified, but it also sounds like early estimates of nearly a billion dollars may have been pretty accurate, The New York Times reports.

Apparently the Pentagon mysteriously transferred $ 934 million from its nuclear rocket modernization budget to “a public classified project” that “Congressional Budget Sleuths” almost certainly the renovation of “Trump’s alleged free aircraft. We cannot be sure that money will be used on Trump’s plane, and even if so, they cannot use the entire $ 934 million to renovate the aircraft, but according to the Times, air force officers have previously mentioned to use money that has already been assigned to nuclear modernization to change the Qatarese Jet into a usable air force.

It is also important to remember that the current plan is not for the US government to keep the plane. Instead, it will be supposedly transferred to the Presidential Library of Trump (which still still does not exist in particular) when Trump leaves the office. So although the work on the plane is said to start soon, it will probably take at least a year, if not two, to prepare it for the service. That leaves very little time for Trump to use it as Air Force One. After all, he is not eligible to serve a different period as president, at least if you say the words in the Constitution on the basis of what the words say.

When he was asked about the ethics of the entire plane thing in May, Trump said: “I could never be anyone to reject such offers. I mean, I could be a stupid person and say:” No, we don’t want a free, very expensive plane. “” That is great, except for the part where the American taxpayer cannot even keep the federal government. As the Times expressed:

It is free in the sense that a used car that is transferred by a neighbor who wants to get it from his driveway is free. In this case, one of the many changes will be hardened communication, antimissil systems and motorcycle opportunities to quickly bring the president to safety, because one of the older Air Force that did on 11 September 2001, when QAIDA attacked the United States. And there is the delicate issue of freeing the ray of hidden electronic listening devices that American officials suspect they may be embedded in the walls.

Then it must of course be filled with the luxury and golden finish – with which the 47th president surrounds himself, whether in the Oval Office or in the air. The upper deck of the jet has a lounge and a communication center, while the large bedroom can be converted into a flying sickness bay in a medical emergency.

After having spent all that money on re -making the Qatarese jet for Trump to use Air Force One for a year or two, the federal government will still have to pay for the two Air Force One planes that are already in order. You know, because Trump’s plan is to take the Qatarese jet with him when he leaves the office. So every dime spent on this plane is an extra costs for taxpayers to make Trump happy.

Last month Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink said that the congress was not worried about the costs of the “free” Qatari jet. “I think a number have been thrown around in the order of $ 1 billion, but many of those costs associated with the costs are the costs that we had experienced,” Meink told Wetgevers. “We will just experience them early. So it would not be nearby anywhere. We believe that the actual retrofit of that aircraft is probably less than $ 400 million.”

That does not follow exactly, since we have to pay again for the other two air force that is already on order, and the federal government will not keep the Qatari jet after Trump has left the office. But The Times also quotes “engineers and air force experts who have experienced similar projects” and that budget estimate is still not buying. And when he was pressed for more information last week, the Air Force said it could not discuss the costs of the project because it was classified. Time However, it points out: “The Air Force is willing to discuss the costs for building a new generation of intercontinental ballistic missiles, but not the costs for renovating the president’s plane.” Curious.

Such as Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat participating in the Armed Services Committee, De Times said“ “The more we learn about this deal, the more disturbing it becomes. The safety implications of accepting a private plane of a foreign nation such as Air Force one and the resulting ethical concerns that a gift of that size creates were already considerable.” Furthermore, however, Shaheen said that they are worried: “This administration turns funds from the nuclear modernization budget to finance expensive renovations to this aircraft,” and that “we weaken our credibility to finance a vanity project for President Trump.”