Agenda 2027: Taking back Trump’s biggest bribe

The ways in which companies and individuals have fed money into Donald Trump's open maw is almost endless. Whether it's donors seeking misuse of the presidential pardon, tech bros shoveling billions into Trump's crypto furnace, or the mad scramble to support his ballroom obsession, saying the increase in corruption is exponential doesn't begin to capture the quantitative or qualitative explosion.

There's no doubt that all of this money is unethical, and much of it is bluntly illegal. If nothing else, violations of the Constitution's emoluments clause are legion. However, actually wresting away most of these dollars and restoring them to the public coffer would require many years of action in both Congress and the Courts.

But there is one line item in Trump's long list of payola that can be halted in its tracks by an incoming Democratic Congress. That item is both the largest single bribe that Trump has received and the most visible: the luxury 747 plane gifted to him by the government of Qatar.

While a standard Boeing 747-8 freshly delivered to the airlines goes for around $400 million, a custom version like that given to Trump can easily cost upwards of $615 million. Before being gifted to Trump, the Qatari 747 was advertised as "the most luxurious plane in the world."

Trump snapped up the jet as soon as it was offered in May of 2025, saying that it would require a "stupid person" to turn it down. In addition to stating his intention to make the gold-crusted plane into the new Air Force One, Trump repeatedly said that when he leaves office, it will go with him to become the centerpiece of his new presidential library. Eric Trump has since posted a video of an enormous "library" conspicuously free of books, but making room for a gaudy display of the plane.

Meanwhile. experts warned that it would take "years" to rework Trump's big gift to meet the standards set for Air Force One and the cost could exceed $1 billion. Republicans in Congress made it clear that they were perfectly fine with allowing Trump to tap this money from public funds so he could enjoy a cushier ride.

Defending Trump's big pay day was the then semi-conscious Sen. Mitch McConnell. According to McConnell, what Trump did with the plane and the funds it took to patch it into Faux Force One was of no concern to him, and Senators should not "marinate on rumors and speculation about what could happen years from now.” Don't worry. Be greedy.

The true cost of upgrades to Trump's pet plane are currently unknown. The eventual total could easily be more than $1 billion.

That's because the plane used as Air Force One is not a standard 747. Instead, it is a specially-produced model known as the VC-25. The VC-25 is loaded with over three dozen encrypted military-grade electronics systems that allow the plane to act as a "flying command center" in the case of a national emergency. It has in-flight refueling capability, allowing it to stay airborne indefinitely. It has an entire suite of defensive countermeasures including radar and GPS jammers, multiple layers of electronic shielding, and flare systems usually found on military planes. None of these things are found on a 747–even one decked out with an elevator lobby.

There is a reason that Boeing's contract for two new VC-25Bs, which are slated to be delivered in 2028, totals almost $4 billion. The planes are built from the ground up for this one, singular purpose.

It's unclear if it's even possible to fully upgrade an existing 747-8 to include all of the features of a VC-25. But, despite the warning of experts that it would take years and untold funds to upgrade the Qatari grift jet, Trump was so eager to show off the "ultra luxury" of the his biggest bribe, that he climbed on board the unfinished plane for a trip to visit his fellow autocrat at a NATO summit in Turkey.

That led to the international embarrassment of having to ditch the plane after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu got Trump nervous about supposed Iranian death threats, causing him to scurry back to a ride that was actually secure. The ridiculousness of the situation was compounded when Trump declared that he hadn't abandoned his luxo-jet, he had only sent it off to visit the troops .

“We just landed and met up with our new Air Force One, which was sent earlier to RAF Mildenhall, so we could show the wonderful Servicemembers, as per the entire Base’s request."

Sure. Nothing could be more important to the folks putting their lives on the line than glimpsing the outside of the boss's sky yacht.

To justify the idea of taking his prize home with him, Trump has frequently cited the version of Air Force One found inside the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. But there are a few important things to know about that plane.

First, and most shocking, it wasn't an ultra luxury plane gifted to Reagan personally by a foreign government. Instead, this in older, and much smaller, Boeing 707 that was first used during the Nixon administration. By the time it was gifted to Reagan's museum in 2001, he had been out of office for over a decade and was deep in dementia after acknowledging his Alzheimer's in 1994.

Reagan never flew on the plane after his presidency. In fact, the plane was chopped up, transported, and delivered to the Reagan library in pieces after having all of the security equipment removed. It was reassembled by Boeing. The cost of the entire project isn't clear, but it certainly exceeded $100 million.

Trump's 747 is 100 feet longer, 75 feet wider, and 650,000 pounds heavier than the plane in Reagans' library. Simply stripping it of its military gear could easily add another half a billion to the swelling price tag.

While the total cost of retro-fitting this sweet ride isn't clear, one thing is: Democrats can stop Trump from taking this plane home.

Soon after Trump announced that he was accepting the bribe, Democrats moved to do just that by amending the budget to block any spending on retrofitting a foreign plane as Air Force One. That amendment was put forward by no less a left-wing radical than Sen. Chuck Schumer.

Republicans, ever eager to show that they would roll the Constitution up and smoke an ivermectin doobie if that's what it took to please Trump, shot down the amendment. Democrats also tried to block the plane deal with an amendment to Trump's big ugly bill. Republicans killed that one, too.

In the months since those votes, Trump approval rating has dropped almost 20 points to reach historic lows. A June survey from the Brennan Center for Justice shows that over 90% of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents see corruption as a "big problem" in government. In that same survey, two-thirds of Americans viewed Trump as corrupt. (Over 80% view Congress as corrupt).

If Democrats put forward a bill in January, either as an amendment or a stand-alone, requiring that the gifted plane remain in national service, either as Air Force One or in an alternative role, and not be gifted to any person, company, or foundation for a period of at least twenty years, that bill would pass. Hell. It might pass now.

The Qatari jet might not be at the top of anyone's list of most important items for the incoming Congress, but blocking Trump from taking this biggest of toys home with him would be a powerful signal that the days of open-ended corruption and bribery are over. Since being called out for this bribe, Trump has insisted that it was "not a personal gift." All Democrats need to do is to put that in writing