Trump orders review to fix broken Navy ship-building
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President Donald Trump has initiated a comprehensive review of U.S. military shipbuilding operations, signing an executive order that directs the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to examine current procurement practices.
The directive gives DOGE a 90-day window to evaluate vessel acquisition procedures within both the Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security. Following this assessment, Elon Musk’s advisory group will present Trump with recommendations for enhancing operational efficiency.
This evaluation will run parallel to another review focusing on acquisition strategy improvements. This separate assessment involves input from multiple department heads, including Defense, Commerce, Transportation, and Homeland Security secretaries, along with the National Science Foundation director. These officials have been allocated 45 days to analyze government shipbuilding practices and develop strategies to expand industry participation while reducing delays and cost overruns across surface, subsurface, and unmanned vessel programs.
1/ @CAForever is answering the call to propel American shipbuilding for the next century. With today’s @POTUS Executive Order and the bipartisan SHIPS Act, we’re offering 3 miles of our waterfront to build the Solano Shipyard, the largest shipbuilding complex in America. 🧵 pic.twitter.com/rOnkdId0Ap
— Jan Sramek 🇺🇲 🌁 ⛰️ (@jansramek) April 9, 2025
The findings will contribute to a Maritime Action Plan (MAP), which must be presented to Trump within seven months. The plan will include specific recommendations for the Army, Navy, and Coast Guard, aiming to strengthen domestic maritime industries and workforce development.
The executive order highlights concerning trends in U.S. shipbuilding, noting that “The commercial shipbuilding capacity and maritime workforce of the United States has been weakened by decades of Government neglect, leading to the decline of a once strong industrial base while simultaneously empowering our adversaries and eroding United States national security.”
It further emphasizes America’s diminishing role in global shipbuilding, stating that “Both our allies and our strategic competitors produce ships for a fraction of the cost needed in the United States. Recent data shows that the United States constructs less than one percent of commercial ships globally, while the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is responsible for producing approximately half.”
Trump’s new Shipbuilding Office will be a game-changer!
The naysayers claim we need massive drydocks that take years to build – wrong.
Here’s the billion-dollar ship my team and I built in S Korea with just a parking lot, floating pier and a crane barge. 🇺🇸🚢👇 pic.twitter.com/tZOA53hyLy
— John Ʌ Konrad V (@johnkonrad) March 5, 2025
Despite previous Navy commitments to accelerate shipbuilding and improve vessel design efficiency, Politico reports that these efforts have largely fallen short. Currently, every Navy shipbuilding program faces delays, including the Constellation-class frigate project, which has experienced multiple design modifications and is now five years behind schedule and exceeding budget allocations.
At the Sea Air Space conference, Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Va., who heads the House Armed Services Committee’s tactical air and land forces subcommittee, expressed serious concerns about the program, stating, “We are at a tipping point with Constellation. Are we at a point where we either quickly recover and get back on track with this? Or do you say maybe we’re too far along with this and we go in a different direction?”
