On Friday at Joint Base Andrews, President Donald Trump was asked about families raising concerns over conditions on the USS Abraham Lincoln. He dismissed the question before the reporter could finish.
“No, they’re not,” Trump said.
Asked whether the carrier’s deployment, now stretching past its ninth month, had gone on too long, the president leaned toward the press corps for emphasis before answering. “No, no, no,” he said. “Not nearly long enough.” Then he turned and boarded Air Force One.
However, records going back to April tell a different story. These include the Navy’s own admissions, a letter from the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and two town hall meetings where about 200 family members spoke directly to the acting Secretary of the Navy.
What Families Have Actually Said
The Lincoln has about 5,000 sailors and Marines on board. For months, their families have described a deployment that fell apart around them.
Family members and crew have talked about food rationing, water shortages, and going over a week without being able to do laundry. They said the ship’s store ran out of basics like soap and toothpaste, and there were moldy showers, broken toilets, and weeks without hot water in the sleeping areas. Sailors also worked long, tough shifts during what the Navy says was 40 days of nonstop combat operations against Iran.
One mother said her son’s mood grew darker as the deployment went on. She compared life on the ship to a horror story where everyone is already dead but doesn’t realize it yet.
At a San Diego town hall on August 6, one woman tearfully told Navy leaders that her husband had messaged her that day saying he hoped he would not wake up tomorrow. Another person told acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao and two vice admirals that the leadership had lost the trust of the families present.
Reporting based on interviews with relatives describes multiple sailors who attempted to go overboard, including one man now held in medical status whose wife says he fears a 13 year career will end in a dishonorable discharge because he burned out.
A separate account describes a sailor on watch who spotted a shipmate at the rail and pulled the person back onto the deck before anyone else arrived. A U.S. official has since confirmed that a sailor did go overboard in early August and was recovered, with the incident now under investigation.
Stars and Stripes did not name the spouses and active-duty sailors it interviewed because they were afraid of retaliation.
The Timeline the White House Is Now Denying
The Lincoln left San Diego on November 21 for what was supposed to be a routine Pacific deployment, less than a year after finishing a 162-day mission. The ship was then sent to the Middle East and arrived there in January. During a short stop in Guam in December, most people on board did not get a chance to leave the ship.
The first public warnings appeared in April, when families shared photos of nearly empty meal trays and reports that sailors on the Lincoln and USS Tripoli were rationing and sharing food. The Navy quickly denied these claims. The chief of naval operations’ office called the reports false on social media.
A few days later, Adm. Daryl Caudle said the ships had at least a 10-day supply of food and that nutritional needs were always met, dismissing the photos as being from a facility on land. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called the reports fake news.
The deployment was expected to end in May. May came and went with no announced return date.
By early July the carrier had passed 200 consecutive days at sea without a port call, a modern record. Carriers normally pull into port every 30 to 45 days for resupply, maintenance, and crew rest. A short stop in Oman that month brought fresh fruit and vegetables aboard for the first time in months, though sailors who were allowed off were confined to a secured compound inside the port.
By August, the crew had been deployed for over 250 days and had spent more than 200 days without going ashore.
On Wednesday, Sen. Richard Blumenthal wrote to Hegseth and Cao, citing reports of supply shortages, water contamination, plumbing problems, and worsening mental health on the carrier and he questioned whether the Navy could keep up with the pace set by the administration Sen. Ruben Gallego called for a bipartisan Senate group to visit the ship, and Rep. Debbie Dingell said parents of sailors had reached out to her office directly.
On Thursday, Hegseth responded from Panama, saying that reports about conditions on the Lincoln were completely misrepresented, though he did not specify what he disagreed with. He said every ship, crew, and captain gets all the support the Pentagon can provide at all times.
Then on Friday, the president told reporters that the families bringing up these issues are simply not concerned.
The Story Keeps Changing
The Navy has not given a clear or consistent answer about who will relieve the crew or when it will happen.
At the San Diego meeting, Cao told families that the Theodore Roosevelt strike group was getting ready to take over. But by Thursday, the USS George Washington had been sent from Vietnam instead. On Friday, Trump only said the Lincoln would be replaced by a similar ship, without naming it.
Even in the best-case scenario, relief is still weeks away. The George Washington needs to arrive, the handover must be finished, and then the Lincoln will take about two more weeks to get back to San Diego. Officials have not given families a date, saying it’s for security reasons.
Regarding mental health, the Navy has said it has not seen any rise in suicidal thoughts or attempts on the ship. It has also refused to say how many sailors have tried to go overboard or harmed themselves during this deployment, and did not directly answer questions about the incident that crew members say was announced to everyone on board.
It’s hard to accept both of those statements at once.
What This Actually Is
The president, who often talks about honoring the military, had a clear chance to say he heard these families, that the Pentagon was investigating, and that the crew would be home soon.
Instead, he told the country that people who have spent months asking the Navy for help are not worried, and that the longest continuous deployment by a modern American carrier is not long enough.
Shelby Sanders, whose mother is on the ship, is starting her senior year of high school without knowing if her mom will be home for homecoming, her birthday, or Christmas. She said not knowing is all she can think about.t.
But the president says she has nothing to worry about.
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