President Donald Trump‘s Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth announced on Friday at the Pentagon, “I’m also proud that today we’re signing a letter of acceptance to build a Qatari Emiri air force facility at the Mountain Home Airbase in Idaho.”
The SecDef added that the location will “host a contingent of Qatari F-15s and pilots to enhance our combined training, increase lethality and interoperability. It’s just another example of our partnership.”
Pete Hegseth: “I’m also proud that today we’re signing a letter of acceptance to build a Qatari Emeri air force facility at the Mountain Home Airbase in Idaho.”
WTF
pic.twitter.com/sk0GpuG2UM— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) October 10, 2025
On Sunday, Trump’s Vice President JD Vance was asked on Fox News by Maria Bartiromo, “What is the function of this Qatar facility? People are wondering, is it an air base? What is Qatar going to be developing in Idaho?”
Vance replied that he “saw some reporting” on it and had spoken with Hegseth that morning. The Vice President purported that, despite Hegseth’s direct quote, it was “largely a fake story.”
He added, “The story that there’s going to be a Qatari base on U.S. soil is just not true.” Vance added “we’re not going to allow a foreign country have an actual base on American soil. So there’s a little bit of misreporting on that.”
Q: What exactly is this Qatar facility in Idaho?
Vance: This is largely a fake story… It’s not true that we’ll have a Qatari airbase on U.S. soil.
Pete Hegseth on Friday: “We’re signing a letter of acceptance to build a Qatari Emeri air force facility”
pic.twitter.com/PCOFePdiXG— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) October 12, 2025
Note: Qatar would not be the first foreign country to send pilots to a U.S. military base for training — pilots from Singapore and Germany are also hosted at training facilities in the U.S.
Still, a swell of Americans on social media — including MAGA uber-influencer Laura Loomer — are voicing opposition to the idea of a foreign nation having a presence at an American military base, with many MAGA adherents transparently objecting because Qatar is a Muslim country.
Note: This military partnership has been in the works since at least 2016. At the end of the Obama administration, the State Department approved Qatar’s request to purchase seventy-two (72) F-15 fighters with weapons and to receive training in the U.S. The estimated total program cost was $21.2 billion in 2016.