Footage has surfaced of US President Donald Trump speaking to reporters shortly before using a decoy vehicle to switch planes due to safety concerns. Reports indicate that Trump was smuggled out of Turkey after the NATO summit, concealed in an airport catering cart, before boarding a classified military flight. A senior US official told the New York Times that there were fears for his safety following assassination threats from Iran.
Prior to this incident, Trump had announced plans to fly home on an older plane, which reporters boarded. However, the aircraft reportedly flew to a US military base in the UK without him. Instead, he was transported using a modified food cart to a separate aircraft, an Air Force C-32A, bound for the UK.
CNN aired footage showing Trump boarding Air Force One at 8:24 PM local time, with the modified food cart departing shortly after at 8:30 PM. A White House communications director, Steven Cheung, suggested that the situation may have been related to threats against Trump, stating that the administration uses various methods, including distraction and misdirection, to address such threats. This incident coincided with intelligence shared by Israel regarding a potential Iranian plot to assassinate Trump, according to two sources speaking to CNN.