The United States Department of Defense and the Qatari Ministry of Defence are negotiating a gift of a former Qatari royal B747-8(BBJ) as a US presidential jet, colloquially known as Air Force One, in the wake of ongoing production delays at Boeing that have seen the delivery of new VC-25Bs slip to 2027 at the earliest.

According to multiple US news reports, the aircraft, P4-HBJ (msn 37075), will be available for President Donald Trump's use until he leaves office. Once the news broke, Trump said on his Truth Social network that the US government would receive the aircraft as "a gift, free of charge [...] temporarily, in a very public and transparent transaction." He also told the media that it would be "stupid" not to accept such a gift, and pledged that the aircraft would be decommissioned at the end of Trump's term and donated to his presidential library foundation.

Trump told reporters at the White House that he would not use the jet after leaving office. "It’s not a gift to me; it’s a gift to the Department of Defence," Bloomberg quoted him as saying.

The arrangement is expected to be formally announced while Trump is in Qatar during his state visit to the Middle East, starting May 15. However, Qatar's media attaché to the US, Ali Al-Ansari, stressed that the reports were "inaccurate" and that the two countries are still evaluating the legal basis for such a deal.

Some Democratic lawmakers have criticised the deal, with New York representative Ritchie Torres calling for an investigation into whether the gift violates ethics rules, Bloomberg reported. White House lawyers, however, have reportedly concluded that the donation is "legally permissible" if its ownership is transferred to the presidential library before the end of Trump's term.

The 13.1-year-old aircraft was first delivered to Qatar Amiri Flight in April 2012, the ch-aviation Commercial Aviation Aircraft Data module shows. The Qatari royal entity operated it as A7-HJA and A7-HBJ until December 2023 when it was ferried from Doha Hamad International to New York JFK. It is now operated by Global Jet IOM. The VIP-configured jet is equipped with General Electric GEnx engines.

The president previously inspected the aircraft while it was in the country in February. He told reporters at the time he was frustrated with the ongoing delays in the programme to supply the B747-8-based VC-25Bs to replace ageing B747-200(VC-25A)s as the presidential aircraft.

Defence officials told a House Armed Services subcommittee hearing on May 7 that Boeing is looking at ways of delivering the first VC-25B by 2027. The two units, ordered in 2017 during Trump's first term, were originally due for delivery in 2024. Supply chain issues, however, saw the date slip to 2029.