Resolution Criteria

The Trump-class battleship will resolve YES if at least one ship of this class is constructed and launched into service by the U.S. Navy. Resolution will be verified through official Navy announcements, commissioning ceremonies, or confirmation from the Department of Defense. The market resolves NO if no Trump-class battleship is built by December 31, 2035.

Background

President Trump announced on December 22, 2025, that he will oversee the development of a new class of Navy "battleship" named after himself. The Navy will start by purchasing two ships and eventually purchase 10, with a goal of 20 to 25 in total for the class with the start of construction planned for 2030. The first ship will be named the USS Defiant and will be longer and larger than World War II-era Iowa-class battleships, armed with hypersonic missiles, nuclear cruise missiles, rail guns, and high-powered lasers. The ship is set to be roughly the same size as Iowa-class battleships but only weigh about half as much, approximately 35,000 tonnes, with crews between 650 and 850 sailors.

Considerations

The Navy has struggled to field some of the technologies Trump says will be aboard the new ship, having spent hundreds of millions of dollars and more than 15 years trying to field a railgun before abandoning the effort in 2021. Deploying nuclear cruise missiles on ships may also violate non-proliferation treaties that the U.S. has signed with Russia. Many of the Navy's existing projects are delayed, and the shipbuilding industry is operating in a "perpetual state of triage," according to the Government Accountability Office.

• Update 2025-12-23 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): The market will resolve based on ship specifications (similar displacement, weapon types & numbers, and use case) rather than the name of the ship class. A ship matching the announced specs but with a different class name would still resolve YES. The creator will provide clearer boundaries for what constitutes YES/NO resolution.