President Donald Trump revealed that he doesn’t sleep on flights and instead looks out the airplane windows, focusing on more than just the clouds.
“I don’t like sleeping on planes,” Trump, 79, said during his speech at the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday. “I like looking out the window, watching for missiles and enemies,” the president added.
Trump made the remarks while recounting his first meeting with his now–chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine, 57, whom he met years earlier in Iraq, where the general introduced himself by his military call sign, “Razin,” a detail Trump lingered on as he laughed during Thursday’s breakfast.
“He said, ‘Sir, if you’d like, you can go and sleep,’” Trump recalled, referring to Caine mentioning that he was about to embark on a 20-hour flight. The president said he responded, “No, no, I don’t have to sleep,” adding in surprise, “I mean, sleep on a plane?”
Trump’s comments about his lack of sleep on Air Force One echo concerns previously raised by staffers, as well as his own claim that he has “never been a big sleeper.”
In a The Wall Street Journal report on the health of the oldest inaugurated president, aides said Trump keeps his advisers awake during flights and laughs at those who doze off, with someone always remaining awake to keep him company.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told New York Magazine in January that he hides under a blanket when on Air Force One to avoid being woken up by Trump.
“What I do is I cocoon myself in a blanket. I cover my head. I look like a mummy,” he said. “I do that because I know that at some point on the flight, he’s going to emerge from the cabin and start prowling the hallways to see who is awake.”
Though it is not clear exactly what the commander-in-chief meant by saying he watches for “missiles and enemies,” his comments come amid a string of forceful statements and actions toward other countries.
On Christmas Day, Trump announced on Truth Social that U.S. forces had conducted strikes in northwestern Nigeria targeting what he described as “ISIS terrorist scum.”
In January, in response to threats from Iran to target U.S. military or commercial bases, Trump warned that “the whole country’s going to get blown up” if “anything happens.”
Earlier that month, he boasted about having captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife and “successfully carried out a large scale strike” against the country.
Trump also pushed to bring Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, under U.S. control. While he appeared to back away from using military force, he declared that he would “remember” if Denmark refused to hand over the land.
Yet, while the commander-in-chief allegedly watches for “missiles and enemies” outside his airplane window and skips sleep, he has also reportedly dozed off during what he described as “boring” Cabinet meetings—a claim he has denied, saying he only closed his eyes.
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House for comment.
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