Donald Trump has managed to get his once-grounded Cessna jet back in the air, by selling it — to himself.
The private jet that Trump has been using to get to and from many campaign events was grounded last week by the Federal Aviation Administration, after The New York Times reported that its registration had expired on Jan. 31.
The paperwork snafu threatened to ground the 1997 Cessna 750 Citation X for weeks, if not more. But Trump found a way around this.
On Friday the plane was registered to a new owner, DT Endeavor I, according to records kept with the FAA. DT Endeavor I is a limited liability company that was registered in Delaware in early January, and is controlled by Trump.
He then submitted a new registration from the new company, a move that cleared the way for the Cessna to fly almost immediately.
"I haven't flown it, but I can," he said in an interview Saturday. Trump did not mention the sale of the Cessna to the new company but did say the registration issue had been "100 percent" cleared up.
Registering a plane as a new owner is a different process than re-registering an aircraft, and new owners are often given a temporary registration that would allow immediate flight.
The wait Trump avoided could have been lengthy; the FAA's aircraft registry website says that the agency is still processing documents it received in mid-March.
Indeed, a Cessna used by a narcotics enforcement team of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department in California had its registration expire, like that of Trump's Cessna. The department filed the paperwork to renew it in early January, but the plane's renewal came through Friday, according to a spokeswoman for the sheriff's department, Jodi Miller.
Trump's legal maneuver seems in character. The Republican front-runner prides himself on his ability to work the system. In a Forbes article in 2011, he described his companies' bankruptcies in a positive light, "Basically I've used the laws of the country to my advantage."
The Cessna, which was designed to seat eight people, flew to Rhode Island and Pennsylvania on Monday afternoon before Trump's rallies in Warwick, Rhode Island, and West Chester, Pennsylvania, in advance of the primary elections in those states Tuesday. Until then the plane had not flown since returning to La Guardia Airport from Trump's rally in Buffalo on April 18, according to flight records archived on a flight data website and reviewed by The Times.
Trump explained that the plane's registration lapsed because DJT Operations CX, the LLC that until Friday owned the plane, did not receive the FAA's original renewal notices. Instead, they were sent to an incorrect address, he said.
The plane's new registration expires April 30, 2019. And in case the FAA might have cause to send out another renewal notice, it should take note: The plane's new owner shares the same Delaware address as the old owner.