Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Wednesday, January twenty first, and
Speaker 1: a developing story while you were sleeping overnight. Air Force
Speaker 1: one forced to turn around mid flight because of an
Speaker 1: issue with the plane. And with that, welcome to this
Speaker 1: episode of Amy and TJ.
Speaker 2: Robes.
Speaker 1: This happened late last night. I was up late enough
Speaker 1: and saw it happening late. You had gone to bed
Speaker 1: a little early. But it's scary anytime you hear that
Speaker 1: there is an issue with any plane, the one carrying
Speaker 1: the president certainly sets off some alarm belts.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: I mean you can say it was, oh, a minor
Speaker 3: electrical issue, but I would feel like any electrical issue
Speaker 3: you can call it minor, sounds pretty important to me
Speaker 3: when it comes to flying a plane, and certainly flying
Speaker 3: a plane with the President of the United States.
Speaker 2: Yeah, tell, this was.
Speaker 1: Not a This wasn't an I immediately, I mean it
Speaker 1: took less than fifteen seconds when I saw this story
Speaker 1: that I immediately thought about Harrison Ford in Air Force.
Speaker 2: One, right, like, what's going on the plane?
Speaker 1: There's an emergency. But so they didn't use the word emergency.
Speaker 1: We should say that first and foremost. But yes, their
Speaker 1: term in quotes is minor electrical issue with Air Force.
Speaker 1: One will tell you in a lot of you all
Speaker 1: know as we are recording this, actually the flight is
Speaker 1: still in the air. The president is running a little behind.
Speaker 1: He's supposed to be at the World Economic Forum in Dabbles, Switzerland.
Speaker 1: That's where he was headed. But Robes he took off.
Speaker 1: The flight took off at about nine to forty last night,
Speaker 1: and it was back in the United States not too
Speaker 1: long after.
Speaker 3: Yes, the minor electrical issue happened thirty to forty five
Speaker 3: minutes into the flight.
Speaker 2: Reporters said that the lights flashed off.
Speaker 3: That's got to be a scary moment at any point
Speaker 3: when you're on a plane, and so they said the
Speaker 3: decision was made out of an abundance of caution to
Speaker 3: turn the plane around. They landed in Maryland, I believe
Speaker 3: at eleven and think about that. Then they had to
Speaker 3: switch planes, actually get on a smaller plane that's typically
Speaker 3: used for domestic flights. But this is a seven and
Speaker 3: a half hour flight, so it looks like they took
Speaker 3: back off around midnight. That would put him in Davos
Speaker 3: around seven thirty am Eastern time. But wasn't he supposed
Speaker 3: to give a speech at eight thirty am Eastern time.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's possible he could shower on the plane,
Speaker 1: be fresh, walk right off and head to where he's going.
Speaker 1: But it's possible that's not the case. So as we
Speaker 1: are recording this, folks, there is uncertainy about exactly how
Speaker 1: the schedule is going to go for a speech today
Speaker 1: that is a really really really big deal for what
Speaker 1: is going on in the world, what he's expected to say,
Speaker 1: and also ropes who his audience is exactly.
Speaker 3: Look, any one of us know what it's like to
Speaker 3: be three hours late when you thought you were going
Speaker 3: to rie versus when you actually arrived. But were any
Speaker 3: of us going to give a speech, be delivering a
Speaker 3: speech of this significance with the world watching? And frankly,
Speaker 3: we saw him yesterday touting his accomplishments, celebrating his years
Speaker 3: since he was inaugurated. He looked tired at noon yesterday,
Speaker 3: and he was talking and working obviously up until the
Speaker 3: moment he got on that plane. And so to have
Speaker 3: this disruption and to have what's at stake happening today,
Speaker 3: that's a tall order.
Speaker 1: Or is he like the rest of us, the only
Speaker 1: time you really get good rest is win your own plane,
Speaker 1: because well he has a little different But I like
Speaker 1: to of us like what.
Speaker 2: I sleep terribly on planes?
Speaker 3: Well, no, the.
Speaker 1: Idea that you're away from the world a little bit.
Speaker 1: Nobody's coming by his office constantly, where there's some limits.
Speaker 1: At least, maybe he gets great sleep. Maybe he'll step
Speaker 1: off that plane fresh as a daisy and ready to
Speaker 1: give the best speech. Maybe he has an awakening and
Speaker 1: it's changing his speech. Who knows what this does, but yes,
Speaker 1: he is three hours behind schedule as we speak. So
Speaker 1: we'll keep an eye on and see exactly what's going
Speaker 1: on in dabbles for this all important speech. The plane itself. Now,
Speaker 1: a lot of reports last night robes I was watching,
Speaker 1: and we have known. We've never been a part of
Speaker 1: a White House press corps, but they do this. They're
Speaker 1: on these planes all the time. They know how this works.
Speaker 1: A lot of them came out immediately that yeah, this
Speaker 1: happens all the time. These really are old, old planes,
Speaker 1: and we regularly have some kind of mechanical issue, a
Speaker 1: technical this have to switch planes before these planes are
Speaker 1: forty years old.
Speaker 3: That seems surreal when you think about, first of all,
Speaker 3: how often they're used, how important the people are who
Speaker 3: they are carrying, and the fact that we wouldn't have
Speaker 3: newer planes for air Force one is kind of mind blowing.
Speaker 1: I heard a politician explain it this way, like, we
Speaker 1: need them. But what president wants to submit a budget
Speaker 1: request that says, hey, I want a new plane. It's
Speaker 1: going to cost this many hundreds of millions of dollars.
Speaker 1: And what is the other side of the aisle going
Speaker 1: to immediately do at him? You're suffering at home, you
Speaker 1: can't afford this, but the president wants a fancy new
Speaker 1: plane to fly around it. They actually say that's a
Speaker 1: part of the calculus here, and that nobody wants to
Speaker 1: ask for a new one.
Speaker 2: That makes a lot of sense. It also makes a
Speaker 2: lot of sense why Trump is the person who.
Speaker 3: Absolutely would do that give zero ss doesn't care. And
Speaker 3: you also think maybe perhaps a president on his second term,
Speaker 3: any president in his second term might be bold enough
Speaker 3: or wouldn't care as much about asking for that. And
Speaker 3: it is actually when you look at an incident like
Speaker 3: last night, and there are several other to others to
Speaker 3: talk about, it makes sense. Like a lot of times
Speaker 3: when we're asked to have American taxpayers pay for something
Speaker 3: that seems ridiculous.
Speaker 2: This doesn't seem that ridiculous.
Speaker 1: It's necessary. Yeah, he should have the nicest car, whatever
Speaker 1: you want to put on it, the best security. That's
Speaker 1: not I'm not going to argue with you exactly on
Speaker 1: any of those points. Now, the ballroom.
Speaker 2: No, but seriously, that's a really good point.
Speaker 1: That bring up the ballroom. But no, this needs to
Speaker 1: be taken care of. He has two planes, they say,
Speaker 1: robes that serve as air Force one. Mind you, if
Speaker 1: the President goes to Atlanta Hartsville Jackson Airport today and
Speaker 1: gets on a Delta flight in first class, that plane
Speaker 1: becomes air Force one. Whatever plane is carrying the president
Speaker 1: does become air Force one. But they use two in
Speaker 1: particular as air Force one. These are custom made Boeing
Speaker 1: seven forty sevens. You can only imagine robes. How these
Speaker 1: things have to be retrofitted.
Speaker 3: What you have to do to security, I can't even
Speaker 3: get my head around it. What has to be installed
Speaker 3: on that plane and outfitted to serve as air Force
Speaker 3: one has to be astronomical. And we've heard about how
Speaker 3: long it takes. And President Trump has expressed frustration about
Speaker 3: how long it takes to make a plane ready to
Speaker 3: be Air Force one.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned the I mean the security features, the
Speaker 1: tech that has to go into it, the communications features,
Speaker 1: but you also have to consider, Yeah, we have to
Speaker 1: build a presidential suite onto this thing, to build the
Speaker 1: cabin for the press a certain way, we have to
Speaker 1: have this many bathrooms on those, so it's a it's
Speaker 1: a a conference room that's in the damn thing. So
Speaker 1: it takes a while. However, robes these planes were supposed
Speaker 1: to be replaced two years ago, and now we're being
Speaker 1: told it'll be another possibly two years before it gets replaced.
Speaker 1: So it's been pushed back and back and delay after delay,
Speaker 1: and you know what, God forbid. But something like this
Speaker 1: is a warning. Can you imagine who is going to
Speaker 1: take the blame if something happens with Airforce? No, obviously
Speaker 1: they're going probably, but they got everything in place. But
Speaker 1: how can I get mad at the Boeing's What are
Speaker 1: they gonna say, we didn't tell y'all to use the
Speaker 1: thing for sixty years?
Speaker 2: Yeah that's true.
Speaker 3: But it's funny because President Trump has recently thrown Boeing
Speaker 3: under the bus multiple times, saying why is this taking
Speaker 3: so long. Yeah, exactly where is my plane? Because it,
Speaker 3: like you said, it was supposed to be here. Now
Speaker 3: they're saying twenty I saw twenty twenty eight for both
Speaker 3: of them. Now, you know how it is when you
Speaker 3: have any sort of remodeling project or any sort of
Speaker 3: estimation on construction, it's like, go ahead and double whatever
Speaker 3: they tell you. The timeline's going to be. That, for
Speaker 3: whatever reason, always seems to be the case. And apparently
Speaker 3: it also is the case for air Force one or
Speaker 3: outfitting planes.
Speaker 1: Air Force one cost overruns, time delays. Anyone who's ever
Speaker 1: done anything having to do with a contractor.
Speaker 2: No, just getting them to show up half the time
Speaker 2: is hard.
Speaker 1: Going to have that, bro. So the planes we're talking
Speaker 1: about now, the planes that Donald Trump is using, the
Speaker 1: plane that had to turn around and bring him back
Speaker 1: last night, is the same plane that carried George Herbert
Speaker 1: Walker Bush.
Speaker 3: That's insane crazy, Since nineteen ninety the same planes Herbert
Speaker 3: walker Bush, George Herbert Walker Bush, all right, Clinton and
Speaker 3: then George W. Bush and then President Obama and then
Speaker 3: President Trump and then President Biden and now President Trump again.
Speaker 3: That does seem like we are due for another Can
Speaker 3: you imagine what Trump said. I mean, maybe he was
Speaker 3: totally calm and cool as a cucumber, but you know
Speaker 3: how frustrated you get late at night when your plane
Speaker 3: gets delayed. And again, never had anything as important as
Speaker 3: he has in terms of the world stage and Davos.
Speaker 2: But like you gotta think he was probably.
Speaker 3: A little peeved that almost an hour into his flight
Speaker 3: he is to turn around, get off the plane, go
Speaker 3: to another plane.
Speaker 2: Donald Trump, do you think he has tolerance for that?
Speaker 1: You know what I think, And you know what I
Speaker 1: think he's figuring out how he can use this now
Speaker 1: as an example to get what I want. See Tojoe,
Speaker 1: we need new planes, boom, let me have them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I think he will use this to his advantage.
Speaker 1: And you know what the other thing about Davos, he's
Speaker 1: probably thinking.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, wait, actually he'll take a rand entrance this way,
Speaker 3: wait on me right, fashionably late.
Speaker 1: Yes, but folks, stay here though. When we come back,
Speaker 1: we'll explain why there might be a jet already waiting
Speaker 1: in the wings to become the new Air Force one,
Speaker 1: and why this isn't the first time and he isn't
Speaker 1: the first president who's had to turn his plane around.
Speaker 1: All right, we continue here on this early morning Amy
Speaker 1: and TJ overnight stories that Air Force one had to
Speaker 1: make a turnaround just thirty minutes or so into its flight.
Speaker 1: President was heading to Dabbos, Switzerland for the World Economic Forum,
Speaker 1: had a not a mechanical but an electrical issue is
Speaker 1: what they called it, on the plane and they had
Speaker 1: to turn around out of an abundance of caution. The
Speaker 1: President's switched planes. He is on his way as of
Speaker 1: this recording, were not exactly sure when he's going to
Speaker 1: land and if he's going to have to push back
Speaker 1: his eight thirty Eastern time speech he was supposed to make.
Speaker 2: Yes, it's about a seven and a half hour flight.
Speaker 3: The reports show that he finally took off at around midnight,
Speaker 3: so that would put him landing in Davos just about
Speaker 3: an hour before his speech.
Speaker 2: That seems like a pretty tight turnaround.
Speaker 3: But you know, if anyone can do it, he's got
Speaker 3: probably a very effective presidential motorcade to get him where
Speaker 3: he's going once he lands.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's the other thing. It never stops so
Speaker 1: that some presidential travel, if any people may know this,
Speaker 1: the president never stops moving when he's in a car.
Speaker 1: He's not stuck in a red light ever. Okay, so yes, they.
Speaker 3: Can get them there quick sailing to wherever this speech
Speaker 3: is actually.
Speaker 2: But it's funny this.
Speaker 3: There was so much talk last year about air Force
Speaker 3: one and a lot of controversy about where that new
Speaker 3: plane or that next plane might come from. Because yes,
Speaker 3: as we mentioned before the break, Boeing has been a
Speaker 3: little delayed in bringing him his plane and his second plane.
Speaker 2: Correct, two planes coming.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's had place, I mean this was oh yeah,
Speaker 1: here you go. The deal was put in place for
Speaker 1: those planes when Obama was president. This is where we are.
Speaker 3: Yes, I forgot about that is that is insane. I
Speaker 3: understand a delay. I understand it takes some time, but
Speaker 3: that's a lot of time.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess it takes time, right to build
Speaker 1: a plane, and to build a presidential one. I assume
Speaker 1: it takes we're up to fourteen years now, no, twelve
Speaker 1: twelve years, that's when it was twenty fourteen. I think
Speaker 1: it is.
Speaker 2: How long did it take to build the World Trade Center?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 2: I don't know, but I feel like less time. How
Speaker 2: long does it take to build a plane.
Speaker 3: We should do a deeper die here, but yes, there
Speaker 3: is a plane that was much talked about, a Katari Jet.
Speaker 2: Correct.
Speaker 3: We remember the gift that was given that was so
Speaker 3: controversial that you said, I will take it. I will
Speaker 3: take it. And it's funny. Actually, Carolyn Levitt, according to
Speaker 3: reporters last night, as they had.
Speaker 2: To turn around d plane get on.
Speaker 3: A smaller plane, she joked aboard Air Force one that
Speaker 3: that Katari jet sounded much better at the moment.
Speaker 1: And that's fair, and it's a beauty. There are pictures
Speaker 1: of it out there. There was a big controversy you mentioned.
Speaker 1: Is it a gift? Can he accept it? He says
Speaker 1: he wants to use it after he leaves the White
Speaker 1: House for donated to his presidential library and use it
Speaker 1: for his travel afterwards.
Speaker 2: Sounds lovely, It sounds awesome.
Speaker 1: Somebody gave me a plane. So that's still that plane
Speaker 1: is sitting there, ready to go, but not ready to
Speaker 1: go because it has to be updated with all of
Speaker 1: this tech, all these communications, all of this anti missile equipment.
Speaker 3: And defense make sure that there was nothing already on
Speaker 3: the jet or inside the jet. A lot of people
Speaker 3: pointed to that the royal family donated this jet to
Speaker 3: the president and not to throw any shade on the
Speaker 3: royal family of Cutter, but they have to make.
Speaker 2: Sure that it's doesn't have any spyware.
Speaker 3: I mean, think about that doesn't have anything that could
Speaker 3: be on that plane that could.
Speaker 2: Jeopardize national security. So that all has to happen.
Speaker 3: However, with all of that said, President Trump, you remember,
Speaker 3: as I I think as recently as August of twenty
Speaker 3: twenty five, maintained that that plane from the Qatari royal
Speaker 3: family was going to be ready to go by February
Speaker 3: of twenty twenty six. So according to the President, and
Speaker 3: we haven't heard I'd checked to see if he's made
Speaker 3: any other statements on the timeline of this plane. No,
Speaker 3: the last we heard from the President that Beauty was
Speaker 3: going to be ready to fly next month. So that'll
Speaker 3: be really interesting to say, see if it actually is
Speaker 3: ready to fly.
Speaker 1: Maybe he's sabotaged Air Force one so he could use
Speaker 1: this to make his point that he needs that Katari
Speaker 1: plane immediately.
Speaker 3: The timing is quite interesting with all the controversy. Now
Speaker 3: he has to turn around, there's an electoral issue. The
Speaker 3: whole press corps has to get off the plane. You know,
Speaker 3: everybody was inconvenience and wooh, in just a few weeks
Speaker 3: a shiny new jet from Cutter will be ready to go.
Speaker 1: And I hope everybody going to understand this is all
Speaker 1: dripping in sarcasm. We are just joking. We are not suggesting,
Speaker 1: for Rio, that the president's sabotage an electrical issue on
Speaker 1: Air Force one. Just kidding. But he is not the
Speaker 1: only one. Marco Rubio had an issue last year, had
Speaker 1: to turn his plane around. Kamala Harris had an issue once,
Speaker 1: had to turn her plane around. Yes, it happened to
Speaker 1: Obama as well during his presidency that there was an issue,
Speaker 1: had to turn around. None of these were qualified emergencies.
Speaker 1: I don't believe, just an abundance of caution type thing.
Speaker 1: But they will tell you, and certainly the ones who
Speaker 1: fly on these things all the time, this is nothing new.
Speaker 1: And I guess world is just like folks who fly
Speaker 1: all the time. Commercially, this happens if you fly enough,
Speaker 1: you get stuck. The pilot says, wait on some paperwork.
Speaker 1: They're just checking something out on the right engine. Da
Speaker 1: da da, You hear something. It happens.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, sometimes the bathroom, the toilet won't
Speaker 3: flush and you have to turn around and get on
Speaker 3: a new plane. So yes, anything can happen, and when
Speaker 3: you travel enough, you will experience sitting on the plane,
Speaker 3: getting off the plane, waiting for a new plane. The
Speaker 3: good news is his pilots didn't time out his flight attendants.
Speaker 3: They didn't have to find new ones like he didn't
Speaker 3: deal with all the other commercial issues that happen when
Speaker 3: you have a mechanic a issue more an electrical issue.
Speaker 3: So it's good to know that they were ready with
Speaker 3: another plane.
Speaker 1: But yeah, folks want to hop on and give this
Speaker 1: update developing story overnight. Certainly, keep an eye on our
Speaker 1: feed today there will be a lot of developments and trials.
Speaker 1: Also keeping an eye on the president's speech when he
Speaker 1: does eventually make it. As always, top right corner of
Speaker 1: your Apple podcast app, where you see our show page,
Speaker 1: a button says follow click that make sure all of
Speaker 1: our updates will come directly to you. But for now,
Speaker 1: we appreciate you spending some time with us. The morning
Speaker 1: run will be ready for you here and just a
Speaker 1: couple of hours look for it on the feed. But
Speaker 1: for now, I'm TJ. Holmes on behalf of my Jeremy robot.
Speaker 1: We'll talk to you out