Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump are investing in a drone company that’s positioning itself to cash in on a $1.1 billion Pentagon spending push—a spending push created by their father’s administration.
The company, Powerus, is a West Palm Beach-based drone firm that plans to go public on the Nasdaq through a reverse merger with a Florida golf-course holding company, according to The Wall Street Journal. The Trump sons are invested through American Ventures, one of the family’s investment vehicles.
Here’s how the grift works: The Trump administration banned new Chinese drone models and launched the Pentagon’s “Drone Dominance” initiative, which is earmarked to spend $1.1 billion on American-made drones by 2027. That created a massive commercial opportunity. And wouldn’t you know it, the president’s sons just happen to have money in a company perfectly positioned to fill that gap.
It gets more incestuous. Donald Jr. also holds shares and sits on the advisory board of Unusual Machines, a drone component maker that is also an investor in Powerus—and Powerus is already one of its customers. Dominari Securities, the Trump-backed investment bank that has helped facilitate the family’s cryptocurrency deals, is also involved.
Powerus CEO Andrew Fox, a facilities management guy with no background in the drone industry, was refreshingly blunt about the appeal: “The drone market is certainly going to grow faster than, say, golf courses are.”
The timing is particularly grotesque given that hundreds of people have been killed in Trump’s war in Iran, including at least 165 schoolgirls. While Americans die and foreign civilians are slaughtered, the Trump boys are lining up to profit from the weapons that will keep the carnage going.
This is just the latest cash-in for the Trump heirs. Forbes put Don Jr.’s net worth at around $50 million just before his dad’s second inauguration. By the end of 2025, it had grown sixfold, driven by crypto ventures and a venture capital firm whose portfolio companies received at least four federal contracts from the Trump administration.
Eric’s rise has been even more obscene. Forbes valued him at around $40 million before his father returned to power. His cryptocurrency mining company’s Nasdaq debut briefly pushed his stake to nearly $950 million. Even after the stock cooled, Forbes puts his net worth at around $400 million—a roughly tenfold increase.
Powerus co-founder Brett Velicovich told The Daily Beast the company is “excited to execute on our plan for American drone dominance.” The Trump Organization did not respond to requests for comment.