Donald Trump aboard USS George Washington claims water can disable magnet

Donald Trump, during a speech aboard the USS George Washington aircraft carrier on October 28, 2025, repeated his incorrect claims that water can disable a magnet. He was addressing the U.S. Navy just off the coast of Japan. He was pushing for an aircraft carrier to use “steam for the catapults” and “hydraulics for elevators”.

“You know, the new thing is magnets. So instead of using a hydraulic that can be hit by lightning and it’s fine. You take a little glass of water, you drop it on magnets, I don’t know what’s going to happen,” said 79-year-old Trump.

“So, you know, the elevators come up in the new carriers—I think I’m going to change it, by the way—they have magnets. Every tractor has hydraulic, every excavator, every excavating machine of any kind has hydraulic. But somebody decided to use magnets.”

Trump then went on to ramble that he will sign an executive order to use “steam for the catapults” and “hydraulics for elevators” when the US builds an aircraft carrier. He then started asking around the crowd what they preferred, water or a magnet. Observers have noted that it is part of Trump's long-time conspiracy theory that China made everyone believe that they needed magnets.

“You know, China intelligently went and they sort of took a monopoly of the world’s magnets, and nobody needed magnets until they convinced everybody 20 years ago, ‘Let’s all do magnets.’ There were many other ways that the world could have gone,” said Trump.

Magnetism is a fundamental property of certain compounds which can not be damaged by water. However, it is a fact that Aircraft carriers earlier used hydraulic instead of magnetic systems, but magnetic launch and recovery systems represent a major leap in precision, speed, and durability. While the hydraulic catapults are cheaper for up-front cost, durability, and life span maintenance make the magnet a better choice. All modern aircraft carriers are moving away from hydraulic systems.