As they struggle to defend President Donald Trump’s plan to accept a luxury 747 from the nation of Qatar, the administration and its allies appear to have settled on one of the silliest talking points in history.
Here’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on CNN today, explaining that it’s fine to take a free jumbo jet from a petrostate because the Statue of Liberty was a gift from France.
As Jake Tapper pointed out in response, one key difference (among many) between those two “gifts” is that Congress actually passed a resolution authorizing the administration to accept the “colossal statue” of “Liberty enlightening the world.”
This is more than just a fun bit of historical trivia. Some legal experts (and even a few GOP senators) have argued that the transfer of Qatar’s “flying palace”—which would apparently serve as Trump’s new Air Force One before being donated to his future presidential library—may constitute an “emolument” from a foreign state. The Constitution prohibits US officials from accepting such gifts, unless explicitly authorized by Congress. President Ulysses S. Grant sought, and obtained, approval for the Statue of Liberty in 1877. But as modern-day lawmakers have pointed out, Trump appears intent on finalizing his “corrupt” 747 deal without first obtaining congressional consent.
Incredibly, Bessent’s ridiculous historical analogy isn’t even new. Trumpworld has been trying, and failing, to make it work all week. Here’s Ann Coulter, tweeting on Tuesday:
I’m not actually certain whether Coulter—one of the few hard-right figures frequently willing to criticize Trump—meant this sincerely or sarcastically. Regardless, by Wednesday, Trump himself was busy re-truthing his fans’ astute observations that the Lady Liberty was a “gift from a foreign nation.”
That same day, Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer told Fox Business that Qatar’s offering was even “more generous than the Statue of Liberty, to be honest.” Cramer said he didn’t share Trump critics’ “negative guttural reaction” to the gift, though he allowed that concerns about the “image” it presents were legitimate.
“On the other hand, it’s a free airplane, for crying out loud,” Cramer continued. “The United States gives away a lot of stuff to other countries. If it’s a gift of appreciation for what the United States has done lately, or is doing, rather than a quid pro quo, I’m not all that concerned about it.”
