In March 2026, a rumor spread that Eric Trump, the son of U.S. President Donald Trump, had invested in a drone company just before the start of the U.S.-Israel war on Iran, which began on Feb. 28, 2026.
The rumor spread on Facebook, with one post calling the claim "almost unbelievable" (archived):
The post read, in part:
So let's recap:
The President oversees the U.S. military.
The U.S. military is increasing drone warfare spending.
The President's son invests in a drone warfare company with Pentagon contracts.
That company is about to go public in a billion-dollar deal.And we're supposed to believe this is all just coincidence?
As we outline below, the rumor was true. According to an official statement on the website of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Eric Trump invested in the merger of Israeli company XTEND, which produces artificial intelligence-driven drones, and JFB Construction Holdings, a U.S. construction company. The companies announced the merger, which was not yet complete at the time of this writing, on Feb. 17, 11 days before the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran began.
In other words, two of Trump's children were involved in the merger. We reached out to both of them seeking to determine how much they knew about Israel and U.S. plans to attack Iran before the merger was announced and we will update this report should they respond.
XTEND and JFB announce merger
On Feb. 17, 2026, a joint statement from JFB and XTEND announced that the two companies were combining "to establish a Nasdaq-listed US leader in AI-driven autonomous defense robotics." Once the merger is effective, it will take a new name — which the announcement said was expected to be XTEND AI Robotics — and trade under the XTND ticker.
XTEND published the same statement on its website, as did JFB Construction. (JFB currently trades on Nasdaq; its stock fell 35%, from $28.26 to $17, on the day of the announcement.)
The merger's value was of $1.5 billion, the statement said, and strategic investors included Eric Trump as well as Unusual Machines, a drone maker in the U.S. with ties to Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump's brother. In November 2024, Unusual Machines announced that Donald Trump Jr., who was already one of the company's investors, was joining its advisory board.
A March 20, 2026, statement announcing the company was seeking to raise capital through a new public offering was evidence that Donald Trump Jr. was still involved with the company at the time the merger was announced. The statement quoted him as saying, "I am proud of the work Unusual Machines has done to attract world-class investors as it rapidly expands the drone supply chain in the United States."
We could not ascertain whether the Trump brothers were privy to Israel's and the U.S.' plans to attack Iran when the merger was announced.
The announcement came months after XTEND announced it had won a "multi-million dollar" contract from the U.S. Department of Defense for drones it said it would "purpose build" for the U.S. military.
For further reading, Snopes examined a rumor that Barron Trump, the U.S. President's youngest son, had bought $30 million in oil before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran.