Reporters and Democrats (as always, pardon the redundancy) are still somewhat triggered by the fact that the Secret Service covertly moved President Trump to a different airplane to leave Turkey amid what was deemed a credible threat from Iran. The original plane took off carrying reporters and a couple Cabinet members, which caused Dems and journalists to head for their fainting couches.
🚨🎥 If the threat was serious enough that President Trump wouldn’t fly on the original Air Force One, why was the plane allowed to take off with reporters, White House staff, and crew onboard? pic.twitter.com/Evkf8cMFX7
— TMZ (@TMZ) August 11, 2026
It's "stunning to think that all those on the [regular] plane were sort of a decoy, and were not told that the president wasn't on board, and that the deception was continued even after he was safely returned to Washington. And that's hard for me to understand." —@davidaxelrod pic.twitter.com/V0TWp3fUkr
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) August 11, 2026
So the USSS thought the threat against the president was strong enough to surreptitiously remove him from AF1.
— Jake Tapper 🦅 (@jaketapper) August 11, 2026
And then proceeded to let the plane full of White House staffers and reporters take off and fly back to the US.
It sounds like they learned the hard way that the Secret Service's job is to protect the president and not assorted propagandists who travel with him.
Ari Fleischer had some reality checks and a reminder for the media traveling with the president:
Air Force One is not a civilian airline. It’s a military mission. The crew executes a mission to move the president.
— Ari Fleischer (@AriFleischer) August 16, 2026
No one is forced to board. The press can fly commercial if they prefer. Stop complaining about the military doing military things.
https://t.co/h25inrTIHy
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"Stop complaining about the military doing military things" is great advice for multiple reasons.
Ari, as is always the case, is spot on. This is how AF-1 works.
— Buzz Patterson (@BuzzPatterson) August 16, 2026
Yep.
They knowingly get on a plane, with someone that is one of the world's biggest targets for planned assassination, and then bitch about being in danger.
— longhawl (@longhawl) August 16, 2026
The field of "journalism" contains some of the most self-centered people on the planet.
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