President Trump meets with sailors and shipbuilders aboard the U.S.S. Gerald R. Ford Thursday at 2:30 p.m. ET in Newport News, Va. to promote his plan for building up the U.S. military. The event follows the president’s proposal to add $54 billion to defense spending.
Trump repeatedly promised to build up the nation’s military over the 2016 presidential campaign. In his first address to a joint session of Congress on Feb. 28, the president said the U.S. military needs tools to “prevent war and — if they must — to fight and to win.”
“I am sending the Congress a budget that rebuilds the military, eliminates the Defense sequester and calls for one of the largest increases in national defense spending in American history,” he said.
Watch the speech live above.