Politics
Our political journalists are based in the Maine State House and have deep source networks across the partisan spectrum in communities all over the state. Their coverage aims to cut through major debates and probe how officials make decisions. Read more Politics coverage here.
Bath Iron Works sits at the center of a widening debate over the future of American naval shipbuilding, with politicians raising the specter of layoffs and reduced demand even as Pentagon leaders pledge to strengthen the domestic maritime industrial base.
Lawmakers have called on Pentagon officials to consider upping their 2027 budget request beyond a single destroyer from the Maine shipyard. The request is down from prior years and undermines pledges to bolster the shipyard and wider industry, members of Maine’s congressional delegation have argued in recent hearings with military leaders.
It’s common for politicians here to champion more of the Bath-built destroyers. But the Trump administration also is exploring new ship designs, including nuclear-powered battleships that can’t be built here as well as the possibility of building vessels in Japan and South Korea.
General Dynamics, Bath Iron Works’ parent company, could be forced to lay off workers as soon as next year without a more steady demand signal from the government, U.S. Rep. Jared Golden, a Democrat from Maine’s 2nd District, said in a hearing last week. Allied shipbuilding has become almost as much of a nonstarter with the delegation.
“That is the worst idea since the Red Sox traded Babe Ruth to the Yankees,” King told the Navy’s acting secretary in a hearing on Capitol Hill Tuesday. “It just doesn’t make sense to be handing over that level of technology even to our allies.”
The shipbuilding plan came a few months after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth visited BIW and said the Pentagon intended to “max out” production of the DDG 51 destroyers.
Collins and King visited BIW in early April, pressing the Pentagon for a long-term, multi-ship contract and saying Maine’s workforce, defense and associated industries required a steady schedule. Golden recently proposed an amendment to the defense spending bill that would bar any federal funds from producing American warships or parts overseas.
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The Navy has offered a measured explanation for the lean budget request. Acting Secretary Hung Cao told lawmakers BIW currently has 11 destroyers on contract and seven under construction, with fabrication not yet begun on the remaining four.
“I would love to put 10 destroyers in the budget, but the fact is I need for the industrial base to catch up,” Cao said.
BIW quietly marked a milestone Tuesday, announcing it had begun fabrication of a new destroyer, the future USS J. William Middendorf, at its Brunswick facility. The shipyard declined to comment on the record about the broader contract picture or potential workforce impacts.
The Navy’s own shipbuilding plan acknowledges the Bath-built destroyer “is the most capable surface combatant anywhere at sea,” while also conceding the U.S. has “reached the limits of its capacity.”
It is touting a nuclear-powered battleship class named after President Donald Trump, though the plan notes the ship “is not a destroyer replacement.” Those vessels aren’t slated for construction until the 2030s, and where they’ll be built hasn’t been decided. BIW threw its hat in the ring in December, with its president arguing the yard has the “capacity, capability and engineering expertise” for the job.
Collins, the delegation’s only Republican, told Hegseth she was “particularly puzzled” about investments in overseas shipbuilding when only one American-built destroyer was requested for the next fiscal year. King argued Tuesday the Navy’s wait-and-see approach gets the logic backward.
The way for the industry to catch up “is to provide the demand signals so that the shipyards can make the additional capital investments, along with the Navy, in order to increase productivity,” he said.
In the meantime, at least 10 BIW-built destroyers are deployed in the Middle East amid a tenuous ceasefire with Iran in a reminder of what the shipyard produces and why the debate over its future carries national implications.
BIW is unlikely to disappear, Craig Hooper, a former vice president at BIW competitor Austal USA who is now an analyst covering the defense industry, said. But he said the yard needs a stronger demand signal to justify the capital investments required to grow and that the U.S. must do a better job allowing its own military shipbuilding innovations to be marketed overseas.
“We’ve used overseas suppliers to help relieve transient industrial challenges,” Hooper said. “America certainly wants to build ships in the United States, but, if we take too rigid an approach, we risk cutting ourselves off from maritime innovation.”
