President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced a $22.5 billion effort to modernize Washington Dulles International Airport, describing the facility as “one of the worst airports anywhere in the world.”
The proposal calls for replacing aging concourses, adding a new parking garage, modernizing security screening and baggage-handling systems, expanding the airport’s AeroTrain network, and improving pedestrian access throughout the terminal complex.
Transportation officials said the project would take years to complete and would create thousands of jobs.
Trump said he expected the effort to draw bipartisan support.
“Whether you’re Republican or Democrat, you don’t want to go and be subjected to this airport,” he said.
According to The Daily Wire, the federal government plans to partner with United Airlines and the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA), though officials have not disclosed how the project’s costs would be divided.
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby described Dulles as “the gateway that connects the nation’s capital to the world” and said the modernization would make the airport a “showcase for the nation’s capital.”
The Department of Transportation said it reviewed more than 30 proposals before selecting the design that was unveiled Wednesday.
Dulles is in Northern Virginia, about 26 miles west of downtown Washington, and it opened in 1962. MWAA has said 2025 was a record year for passenger traffic across the region’s two-airport system, serving roughly 54 million travelers at Dulles and Reagan National combined.
