Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani said Qatar’s gifting of a Boeing 747 jet to the U.S. government has become “politicized.”
“Unfortunately, I see this story is taking a different direction, and it’s being politicized while it’s a normal government-to-government deal,” Sheikh Mohammed told Fox News’s Special Report with Bret Baier on Wednesday.
“We bought this airplane from an American company,” the prime minister told Baier. “It’s basically part of a cooperation that we have been doing together between Qatar and the United States.”
On Monday, President Donald Trump announced that the United States was set to accept the jet from Qatar, with the aircraft becoming his newest Air Force One. The deal has drawn scrutiny over national security questions from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers.
While Trump was in Qatar on Wednesday, the Qatari government signed an agreement to receive 160 planes from Boeing at a contract valued at $200 billion.
TRUMP CELEBRATES BOEING-QATAR DEAL AMID AIR FORCE ONE GIFT CONTROVERSY
The Boeing 747 plane being given to the U.S. is set to be transferred to Trump’s presidential library foundation once he leaves office. “Only a FOOL would not accept this gift on behalf of our country,” Trump wrote in a social media post on Tuesday.
