WASHINGTON, D.C. — The nominee to serve as the next top civilian in the Navy criticized the delayed Constellation-class frigate program and stressed that shipbuilding is the Trump administration’s top priority for the sea service.
Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday for his nomination hearing, financier John Phelan vowed to evaluate the program’s problems if confirmed to the job.
“This program is a mess from what it looks like,” Phelan told the panel. “If confirmed I plan to dig into this very quickly and understand the issues. And we’ll come back to this committee very fast with the knowledge that we have as soon as we get to the root cause of the problem.”
Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), whose home state of Michigan borders the Wisconsin yard that’s building the frigate, questioned Phelan about the program underway at Fincantieri Marinette Marine. Peters asked Phlelan if he would support the program as a “long term cornerstone of the fleet” during the hearing.
“As I’ve said, I will look at this and work with the secretary of defense and the deputy secretary of defense to understand all of the programs we have and how they all fit and how this important program fits in,” Phelan replied. “And so once I’ve had an opportunity to do that, I look forward to coming back to you to discuss it.”
The Navy inked a deal with Fincantieri’s Wisconsin shipyard in 2020, during the first Trump administration, to build new frigates that are meant to fulfill the anti-submarine warfare mission in the surface fleet.
But difficulties hiring and maintaining a workforce at the yard, which sits on the Menominee River and faces harsh winters in northern Wisconsin, and ongoing challenges altering the parent design have delayed the lead ship by potentially three years as of a spring 2024 Navy study.
The program could be on the chopping block as the services reallocate eight percent of the budgets they’ve been building for Fiscal Year 2026 in accordance with a Defense Department-wide effort to shift money toward the Trump administration’s priorities. A memo directing the funding reallocation specifically called out “executable surface ships” as platforms that the Pentagon should not cut.
In his opening remarks, Phelan described what he saw as systemic failures in the Navy.
“The U.S. Navy is at a crossroads, extended deployments, inadequate maintenance, huge cost overruns, delayed shipbuilding, failed audits, subpar housing, and sadly, record high suicide rates are systemic failures that have gone unaddressed for far too long, and frankly, this is unacceptable,” he said.
Overall, Phelan said Trump is invested in adding new construction ships to the Navy’s inventory.
“I don’t think I could say shipbuilding enough times,” he told Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) in a response to a question on what Trump’s priorities are for the service.
Earlier in the hearing Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) stressed that China delivered more than 30 warships in 2023 and the U.S. delivered two.
“The Chinese Communist Party’s [People’s Liberation Army] is on pace to surpass a 400 ship Navy this year, and by the end of 2030 is on pace to have about 120 more ships compared to our very weak ship building attempts,” Sullivan said.
“That’s going to define the tenure of your time as Secretary, whether it’s success or not, if we can start to address this challenge.”
Sullivan solicited a pledge from Phelan to look at foreign yards to support shipbuilding and more opportunities to cooperate with allies.
During his testimony, Phelan promised to take a holistic look at Navy contracts to understand the incentives for shipbuilders and other defense contractors.
“I intend to sit down day one, and we are going to go through every contract that we have and understand what exactly they say and what flexibility they do or do not give us, what contract needs to change or not change, and why,” he told the panel.
“I intend to do the same thing as it relates to an audit. I need to understand why the Navy cannot pass an audit.”
At multiple points during the hearing, Phelan said Trump has voiced concerns to him about corrosion on Navy warships.
“President Trump has texted me numerous times, very late at night, sometimes after one in the morning [about] rusty ships or ships in a yard, asking me, ‘What am I doing about it?’ And I’ve told him, ‘I’m not confirmed yet and have not been able to do anything about it, but I will be very focused on it,’” Phelan recounted.
During the hearing, Phelan also affirmed the importance of the Columbia-class nuclear ballistic missile submarine. The first hull, the District of Columbia (SSBN-826), submarine is estimated to deliver more than one year late.
“The Columbia submarine program is incredibly important … it’s the most important nuclear deterrent we have, the most resilient, survivable one that we have,” Phelan told lawmakers. “I think that I need to really get in there and dig in and take a look at what exactly is causing the delays.”
