President Donald Trump announced plans for a new class of heavily armed US Navy ships, saying construction of the first vessel, the USS Defiant, would begin soon. He described the proposed Trump-class ships as battleships and placed them at the center of a wider effort to expand American naval capacity.
Speaking at Mar-a-Lago in Florida alongside Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Navy Secretary John Phelan, Trump said he had approved two ships initially and envisioned a fleet of as many as 25. Renderings displayed at the event showed the concept, but the announcement did not establish that construction contracts had been awarded or that a final design had completed the Navy’s normal acquisition process.
Trump said the vessels would be built in the United States, carry hypersonic and other advanced weapons, and serve as Navy flagships. He also predicted that the first ships could be operational within two and a half years and said their construction would create thousands of jobs. Those statements were presidential projections rather than independently verified assessments, and details about cost, shipyards, technical specifications and congressional funding were not provided in the supplied reporting.
The proposal was framed as part of a “Golden Fleet” that would include both crewed and uncrewed vessels, larger missile-equipped warships, and smaller ships. It followed a separate Navy announcement on December 19 concerning vessels derived from the Coast Guard’s Legend-class National Security Cutter. Chief of Naval Operations Daryl Caudle said the service needed more capable small surface combatants so destroyers could remain focused on higher-end missions.
The plan comes amid persistent concern in Washington about the United States’ ability to build ships at the pace achieved by China. More than 60 percent of global ship orders during the year went to Chinese yards, according to the BBC report, while China already operated the world’s largest navy by number of vessels. Trump has repeatedly promised to revive domestic shipbuilding since returning to office.
Recent US procurement difficulties provide an important backdrop. The Constellation-class frigate program, approved during Trump’s first term, was cancelled in 2025 after delays and cost overruns, with roughly $2 billion reportedly spent and only two deliveries expected. The administration had also reached an October agreement to acquire 11 Finnish-designed icebreakers, seven of them to be built domestically with Finnish expertise.
Whether the USS Defiant progresses from a presidential concept to an operational warship will depend on detailed design work, industrial capacity, appropriations and testing. The announcement established the administration’s ambition, but not a completed procurement timetable.
