Turkish Kaan Fighter F110 Engine Deal Bypasses Congress, Lawmaker Says

The State Department skipped months of promised briefings before notifying Congress of a $700 million-plus F110 engine sale to Turkey, the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s top Democrat says.

The State Department bypassed months of promised briefings before notifying Congress on June 24 of a $700 million-plus sale of F110 jet engines to power Turkey’s Kaan fighter program, a senior lawmaker said.

Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., the ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said the administration gave his office no advance justification for the deal, which would send “dozens” of GE Aerospace F110 turbofans to Turkey for its indigenous Kaan fifth-generation fighter jet. The sale, first reported by Reuters, comes as the Trump administration works to smooth relations with Turkey ahead of a NATO summit it is hosting July 7-8 in Ankara.

“Late yesterday, the administration informed me it would once again bypass Congressional review for more than $700 million in defense articles to the Turkish military in yet another deeply troubling example of this administration’s open contempt for Congress’s oversight authority,” Meeks said.

Under the Arms Export Control Act, large arms sales to a NATO ally like Turkey trigger a mandatory 15-day congressional review window once formally noticed. Administrations typically brief relevant committee members informally well before that formal notice, giving lawmakers a chance to flag concerns before the clock starts. In this case, the State Department skipped that informal step entirely, proceeding directly to the formal June 24 notification. A Trump administration official, however, told Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency that the administration maintained a “maximally transparent relationship with Congress” and that Ambassador Tom Barrack and War Department and State Department officials had personally briefed lawmakers on the matter.

Meeks said his committee had sought that briefing for months without success.

“In this case, the State Department did not even attempt to justify its decision. It did not invoke any emergency authority, did not present a written rationale, and for months refused to make a good-faith effort to brief me on implications of the sale for the U.S.-Turkey relationship, Turkey’s continued possession of the Russian S-400 system, and other regional security concerns. It simply informed my office that it would immediately proceed with a formal notification of the sale,” he said.

The State Department declined to comment on the specifics of the engine sale or the status of the deal.

“We are restricted under federal law and regulations from confirming the licensing status of US companies or entities or speaking to specific details on individual defence trade export licensing cases,” the agency told FlightGlobal.

In its formal notification to Congress, the State Department said it was “prepared to license the export of these items, having taken into account political, military, economic, human rights, and arms control considerations.”

Meeks argued the engines’ delivery timeline undercuts any case for urgency.

“These items will not be delivered for years, and the administration repeatedly ignored persistent requests for information and clarification on key aspects of U.S. policy. There can be no pretense that this was urgent or unavoidable. This was a deliberate choice to shut Congress out and to treat legitimate oversight as an inconvenience to be brushed aside,” he said.

Other lawmakers contacted about the sale, including the chair of Meeks’ committee and the chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate armed services committees, did not respond to requests for comment.

The Kaan, developed by Turkish Aerospace Industries, is Turkey’s twin-engine, fifth-generation stealth fighter, intended to eventually replace the country’s F-16 fleet. Turkey already holds 10 F110-GE-129E engines received in September 2025 for use in Kaan prototypes now in flight testing and has been negotiating to acquire 80 additional powerplants for early-production aircraft. The F110 will power the Kaan’s Block 10 and Block 20 variants; Turkey’s own engine in development, the Tusas Engine Industries TF35000, is not expected to power the jet until Block 30/40 variants arrive around 2032.

Turkey already assembles F110 engines domestically under license from GE Aerospace and the U.S. government through Tusas Engine Industries to support its F-16 fleet, giving Ankara existing manufacturing infrastructure for the engine.

The sale follows years of strained defense ties between Washington and Ankara. The U.S. ejected Turkey from the Lockheed Martin F-35 program in 2019 after Turkey acquired the Russian S-400 air defense system, a move Washington said posed a security risk to F-35 technology. Turkey then pivoted toward buying Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70/72 jets, a sale the Biden administration approved in 2024 for 40 new-build aircraft. Turkey later dropped separate plans to buy 79 F-16V upgrade kits for its existing fleet, shifting priority instead to its domestic Kaan program.

Lawmakers have repeatedly used their authority to slow or block arms sales to Turkey in recent years, citing the S-400 purchase, Ankara’s temporary blocking of NATO membership for Finland and Sweden, and the domestic policy record of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. A Congressional Research Service report updated in May found the administration has been using its emergency authority “not as a last resort but as a routine instrument” and that “Congress has never successfully blocked a proposed arms sale through a joint resolution of disapproval.” Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., has said she will introduce such a resolution against the F110 sale, though any resolution would still require a presidential veto override to succeed.

The engine sale is expected to feature in the backdrop of the NATO summit in Ankara, where Trump, Erdogan and leaders from the alliance’s 32 member nations are due to discuss expanding defense investments, strengthening domestic defense industries and continued support for Ukraine’s war against Russia’s invasion.