Rubio, Bessent took decoy Air Force One, Hegseth flew on secret flight with Trump

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent were on a decoy flight last month when President Trump secretly took a different plane from the publicly identified Air Force One aircraft from the NATO summit, according to sources familiar with the situation. 

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was on the secret flight with Mr. Trump out of Turkey. White House aides Natalie Harp, Walt Nauta and Dan Scavino were also on the catering truck and the flight with Mr. Trump. 

Rubio and Bessent, who separated and maintained the line of succession, were aware the president was on another, secret plane. Several other White House aides were on the decoy flight, including Stephen Miller, Will Scharf, Steven Cheung, Mike Needham, Ross Worthington and Monica Crowley. 

While the plane the president is traveling on is supposed to be identified as Air Force One, the decoy flight was publicly identified as Air Force One.

On July 8, Mr. Trump announced he would leave Ankara in the old Air Force One rather than a newer Qatari-donated jet that he had taken to the NATO summit. The president said he was switching planes “for old time’s sake,” and U.S. forces stationed at a British refueling stop would be able to check out the new plane, but CBS News has reported that the Secret Service advised he take the older plane for security reasons. 

With the help of a catering truck, Mr. Trump covertly moved from the publicly identified Air Force One to the other plane.

Mr. Trump told CBS News’ Nancy Cordes on Tuesday night that the decision to take the secret flight was made by the military and Secret Service, who “wanted me to go in a different flight.”

Mr. Trump said it was in response to a threat, which he called unsurprising, noting that he gets “a lot of threats.”

“Any consequential president has a lot of threats,” Mr. Trump told reporters.

Asked why it was too dangerous for him to fly on Air Force One, but not members of the press, he said: “I think, actually, the plane that I flew on was at greater risk.”

Video footage captured by the press showed the president walking up the stairs of the old Air Force One and disappearing into the plane, with a catering truck visible on the other side of the jet. Several minutes later, the truck pulled away and drove off to another U.S. government plane, which The Washington Post reported was an Air Force C-32A. The Washington Post first reported the secret plane trip, which had not been publicly disclosed until then. 

Mr. Trump then flew from Ankara to a refueling stop in the United Kingdom on the separate plane while members of the press and the president’s staff traveled the same route on Air Force One — and believed they were on board the same aircraft as the president.

While in Ankara, members of the press were told to keep the window shades in Air Force One’s press cabin closed, reporters said at the time. Asked why the shades needed to be closed, Mr. Trump later told reporters they were “probably on a dangerous flight because of the sleazebags that we have to deal with.”

In the U.K., Mr. Trump switched to the newer Air Force One, which was donated by the government of Qatar last year and retrofitted by the U.S. Air Force to serve as the new presidential plane. Mr. Trump spoke to members of the press while they flew across the Atlantic toward Washington, D.C.

The White House said in July that the Qatari-donated plane would be undergoing security upgrades, which Mr. Trump said would be “maxed out.”