Trump Fled NATO in a Catering Truck
The White House flew reporters home aboard a decoy Air Force One — and told them the president was on it.
Donald Trump fled his own NATO summit hidden in a catering truck — and the White House kept the escape secret for a month. The Washington Post revealed the operation Monday, citing documents and an official familiar with it: Trump's July 8 departure from Ankara, the exit the White House filmed, narrated, and flew a planeload of reporters home to vouch for, was a staged decoy built to slip the president past a credible Iranian assassination threat.
Television cameras caught Trump boarding the familiar 747 on the tarmac. Minutes later, Secret Service agents walked him out a far-side door into an airport catering truck raised planeside on hydraulics. The truck carried the president and a handful of aides across the tarmac to a C-32A, a smaller military 757, which flew him to RAF Mildenhall in England — where he boarded the Qatari-gifted 747 for home. Reporters and much of the staff took off aboard the decoy believing Trump sat up front; aides ordered them to close their window shades. The empty 747 left Ankara with no call sign, then assumed "AF1" midflight — with no president aboard. The Washington Post published video Monday tracing the truck's full journey across the tarmac. Trump later told his press pack, "If I go, you go."
The White House has now told two false stories about the same flight. On July 8, the New York Times reported — from White House officials — that Trump flew home aboard an older Air Force One over security concerns. He was never on the plane. Asked about the ruse Monday, the Air Force called the president's aircraft "safe, secure." The Secret Service declined to comment.
