The Golden ‘Trump Phone’ Will Begin Shipping This Week After Repeated Delays, Trump Mobile Says

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Updated: May 13, 2026 9:01 PM CUT

Published: May 12, 2026 7:37 PM CUT

In this photo illustration, an iPhone displays the website for The Trump Organization's mobile phone service and a Trump-branded smartphone on June 16, 2025 in Miami, Florida.

In this photo illustration, an iPhone displays the website for The Trump Organization's mobile phone service and a Trump-branded smartphone on June 16, 2025 in Miami, Florida.Joe Raedle—Getty Images

Rebecca Schneid

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Updated: May 13, 2026 9:01 PM CUT

Published: May 12, 2026 7:37 PM CUT

At a glitzy event at Trump Tower on June 16, 2025, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump announced the launch of a new “all-American” cell phone service called Trump Mobile, with a flagship golden phone soon to follow.

The T1 Phone, priced at $499, received $100 deposits from an estimated 600,000 people and was slated to launch in August 2025.    

Nearly nine months later, no one has yet received the phone. The Trump Mobile website pushed its release date back from summer 2025 to November, to December, to mid-March of this year, and then to removing a release date altogether. But now, Trump Mobile says the first phones are about to be shipped out after the repeated delays.

CEO Pat O’Brien told TIME in an email on Wednesday that pre-ordered phones will begin to deliver “this week” and “all [orders] will be completed within the next several weeks.”

“The technology business is more difficult that some may realize as parts must be tested for quality assurances,” he said. “We have experienced delays during a variety of steps in getting the T1 to completion, but those delays were worth it in our minds as we are delivering an amazing product."

Read more: All the Things Trump Has Put His Name and Face on as President

Prior to that news, in addition to pulling the release date for the phones from its website, Trump Mobile had updated its “Preorder Deposit Terms and Conditions” on April 6, 2026. The page now makes clear that a preorder deposit “provides only a conditional opportunity if Trump Mobile later elects, in its sole discretion, to offer the Device for sale.”

The terms continue, “A deposit is not a purchase, does not constitute acceptance of an order, does not create a contract for sale, does not transfer ownership or title interest, does not allocate or reserve specific inventory, and does not guarantee that a Device will be produced or made available for purchase."

And while the terms do say that Trump Mobile will issue a refund of the deposit if it cancels a product outright, they also state that the company is not liable for delays caused by “parts shortages or hold-ups with regulators.”

The phones, when they come, may also not actually be made in the U.S.

Will it be ‘Made in the USA’?

The two Trump brothers emphasized in their announcement that Trump Mobile products would be “all-American”—with the phones manufactured in the United States and the Trump Mobile customer service headquarters based in St. Louis.

“We don’t want to do that overseas. We don’t want to do that in India,” Eric Trump, who serves as executive vice president of the Trump Organization, told Fox Business in June.

Trump Mobile did not specify where or how these phones would be made, confusing experts and consumers since the only phone made in America at the time, the Liberty Phone, cost $2,000.

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Since then, Trump Mobile has dropped the made in America claim, adopting a more subdued description of being "designed with American values in mind," an "American-proud design," and "shaped by American innovation."

Trump’s family venture announcement came as his Administration implemented a massive tariff regime, which he said at the time was to fight back against “unfair” trading practices with our allies abroad, and to restore U.S. manufacturing.

“Remember the army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones?” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on “Face the Nation” in April 2025. “That kind of thing is going to come to America.”

What does the phone look like?

The T1 Phone design advertised on the website is a gold phone running Android, adorned with an American flag and the Trump Mobile logo.

It is still advertised as a phone with a “fingerprint sensor and AI Face Unlock,” a 6.78-inch touchscreen display, quick charging, and a 50 megapixel main camera.

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While the current design looks slightly different from previous iterations of the gold phone, the website still directs customers to the same waitlist to pay a deposit.