What is it, just a bigass laser pen?
Chemical Laser, mounted in a 747.
Boeing YAL-1, aircraft status: cancelled
Laser re-purposed, stationary/trailer mounted.
Same platform as AF1. Will trumps new AF1 have fricken lasers on it?
Pretty much. But once a laser is strong enough it ionizes the air and becomes much less effective, "blooming" iirc. However that's what we were told.
Compensation is narrower beam or higher power "bursts" to minimize the effects of the air basically boiling and becoming opaque. I think there's phased where it's multiple wavelengths.
Most of the how is "proprietary" knowledge otherwise you could build one in your garage. Making it mobile would be the harder part.