Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2025
June 10, 2025
The President. Hello, everybody. I thought that was incredible—the Army, which is 1 year older than our country—how are you?—1 year older than our country. I thought it was incredible, the display. I don't know if you got to see it—I think you did—but that was some great display.
So, incredible force, incredible people, and it was an honor to see it.
Governor Gavin C. Newsom of California
Q. Mr. President, is there something you think you can do to deescalate tensions with Governor Newsom?
The President. Not with the Governor, but there is—I mean, I've always had a good relationship with him. He just doesn't do a very good job. He should have never been allowed to start. And if we didn't get involved, Los Angeles would be burning down right now, just like the houses burned down.
Deployment of National Guard Troops to California
Q. Are you concerned about anything that could go wrong by having the military there? They're trained for different circumstances.
The President. Yes. No, it can only go right. By having the military, it deescalates. I mean, that was the only way. These people are agitators. They're troublemakers. I believe many of them are paid. I watched them breaking up the sidewalks with a big hammer, handing pieces——
Q. Who paid them, sir?
The President. ——of the concrete to other people.
Political Protests in Los Angeles, California
Q. Who do you think is paying for that? Some would—some say—[inaudible]——
The President. Somebody is paying for it.
Q. ——[inaudible]—might have something to do with it.
The President. Thank you. Thank you for saying that. Somebody is paying for that. I watched total professionals. He's banging the curb, banging the granite, banging the concrete.
And he had a whole group of people. They lined up, like, totally professional; grabbed the big chunks; and they dropped it on the soldiers, they dropped it on the Los Angeles police. These are insurrectionists, they're agitators—or troublemakers. At a minimum, they're troublemakers.
Governor Gavin C. Newsom of California
Q. Mr. President, Governor Newsom says he did not speak to you a day ago, as you said—
—
The President. Yes.
Q. ——in the Oval Office earlier. What's your response to that?
The President. Well, I gave him—it wasn't a day ago. It was a little longer than that. And I
presented the phone conversation to Fox News—John Roberts and Molly Line at Fox News— because they were the ones that said it. And we actually spent 16-point-something minutes on the
phone. And I told him he's got to get his act together, because you're going to have some bad times in Los Angeles if he doesn't.
We had a pleasant conversation. The proof was from the phone company. It was from the phone company. So I spoke to him at a certain time. I'm sure you all saw it. You saw it, though. You saw it.
Q. Yes.
The President. But why would you ask me that question if you saw it? You know, I mean, he asks——
Q. Sir——
The President. ——he asks me a question, and then he says, "Yes, I saw that you spoke to him." Yes, I spoke to him——
Q. You spoke to him on Friday.
The President. ——I spoke to him for over 16 minutes. I spoke to him for over 16 minutes, and I told him to get his act together. But he hasn't been able to do that. I mean, the man, really— we could have a great—you know, we have an Olympics coming up. We have to put the right foot forward. We have to do a job. We have a lot of people all over the world watching Los Angeles. We've got the Olympics—so we have this guy allowing this to happen.
Let me tell you, when you watch these agitators break up concrete and hand it out to people as they stood on line to get it, these have to be paid troublemakers.
Political Protests in Los Angeles, California
Q. Mr. President, you appeared to say that the Governor and the mayor paid them. Do you believe that the Governor and the mayor paid the agitators?
The President. No, I don't say the Governor or the mayor. I said somebody's paying them, I think. And if they're not, they're just troublemakers. What can I tell you? But I believe somebody's paying them.
I mean, when you—I've never seen somebody with a big hammer, so professional. Now, they took the bricks away from them. So they say, "How do we get in"—the military did—"How do we get in and what do we do?" They said: "I have an idea. Let's break up the concrete, and that's even better than bricks." And that's what happened.
Military Demonstrations at Fort Bragg, North Carolina
Q. Yes. You just witnessed an amazing spectacle, a flex on our military. What impressed you the most?
The President. I think the total love for the military. I mean, I was with the generals. They're explaining the different maneuvers. And the love they have for the Army and the military is beautiful. They're really great people.
And I've never seen anything quite like that. I don't think any other President has either. You know, they really put on a good show. I asked them, "Did you do that for Biden?" They said no, they didn't do it for Biden. I wonder why.
Political Protests in Other U.S. Cities
Q. There could be some pretty big protests this weekend——
The President. I don't know. I mean, I don't know.
Q. [Inaudible]—what is—what is your message——
The President. I know this: As long as we have the military there, the protests won't mean anything. Last night, if we weren't there, they would have burned down the city. But they did not a lot of damage other than they broke up a lot of concrete looking for weapons. You know, those are weapons. If that hits somebody on the head, the person is dead. You know that, right?
Q. Yes, sir.
Q. Are you planning——
The President's Approach to Responding to Further Political Protests
Q. What did you mean by "a very heavy force" will be met with the protesters on——
The President. Oh, the military will be very heavy force. That's—I'm very proud to tell you that. They might as well turn around. They're wasting their time. Some of them will end up in jail for a long period of time. They use weapons—that concrete is a weapon—a dangerous weapon— worse than a brick, heavier than a brick. And they were dropping it off bridges and throwing it at soldiers and police. They're not doing that.
You know, I went—in my first term, I waited for Governors to call in the military, and they didn't want to do it. And I watched Minneapolis and other places burn for a long time. And I said: "When are you going to call? When are you going to call?" And I said, "If I ever do this again, if they're not responsive"—at the beginning, not at the end.
You know, I called in the military in Minneapolis, but it was 7 days. I waited for this guy— the same guy that ran for Vice President, who's a very dumb person. He's a very dumb—he's a low-IQ individual, like many Democrats are. But I waited for him to call them in. I kept waiting. I'd call him every day and say, "When are you calling them?" And finally, I called them, because I'm not going to wait. They were destroying the city. The whole city was burning down. Horrible.
Okay.
Border Security/Political Protests in Los Angeles, California/Transgender Athletes
Q. [Inaudible]—a hearing for Thursday on—from Governor Newsom's lawsuit. Do you think your administration will be successful Thursday for the hearing?
The President. Well, even Senator Fetterman said very strongly that this is horrible what they're doing and that the Democrats are making a big mistake by not talking about it.
And I agree with that. I think this is in a league with—and maybe even worse, in a true sense—what they're doing is now worse than men playing in women's sports. I think that's a ridiculous thing.
Open borders—you take a look at open borders. Open borders is what caused it. Many of these people—many of them—not all of them, I guess, but many of them—came through the Joe Biden, stupid, open borders. Really sad to watch. It's very sad to watch this being our country.
Now, with our National Guard and our, you know, fairly low number of marines, they had no chance. And if you look, they were a little bit rougher than the police were. Did you notice that?
The police are trained not to do it. You know, they're really trained. They're under tremendous political constraint. They're great police. I know the police in L.A. I know the force. They're very good, but they're not allowed to do their thing. They're just not allowed. They're restricted by radical-left politicians who are pretty—pretty shameful.
Use of National Guard Troops in U.S. Cities/Governor Gavin C. Newsom of California
Q. As Commander in Chief, sir, what rules of engagement do you want for the military? What limitations on their use?
The President. A very simple rule of engagement: If they're dangerous, if they're throwing concrete or bricks, if they're spitting in the face of the police or whoever is in front of them, if they're punching people, if they're doing all of the things that you see done for the last three nights—that, I would say, is engagement.
We need to keep our city—I want to save Los Angeles. And Newsom is totally incompetent.
He's not going to—look at the fires he had. He had fires where half the city, it seemed, burned down. What was it—25,000 houses? All because he wouldn't take water. I released the water from the Pacific Northwest, and it came down millions of gallons a day. And it's right there right now. They'd like to send it back.
There's something wrong with these people. All I want in terms of engagement—I just want to see peace. If there's peace, we get out. If there's even a chance of no peace, we stay there until they have peace.
And a lot of people are being arrested. The rioters or whatever you want to call them—they better know a lot of people are being arrested. They're going to be in jail for a long time.
Thank you very much.
NOTE: The President spoke at 6:30 p.m. on the tarmac prior to boarding Marine One. In his remarks, he referred to Mayor Karen R. Bass of Los Angeles, CA; Gov. Timothy J. Walz of Minnesota; and former President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. The transcript was released by the Office of Communications on June 11.
Categories: Interviews With the News Media : Exchanges with reporters, Joint Base Andrews, MD.
Locations: Joint Base Andrews, MD.
Names: Bass, Karen R.; Biden, Joseph R., Jr.; Fetterman, John K.; Line, Molly; Newsom, Gavin C.; Roberts, John; Walz, Timothy J.
Subjects: Border security; California, Governor; California, political protests in Los Angeles; California, wildfires in Los Angeles area; Maryland, Joint Base Andrews; Maryland, President's visit; Minnesota, Governor; National Guard; News media, Presidential interviews; North Carolina, Fort Bragg; Sports, efforts to restrict transgender participation; Transgender athletes, efforts to restrict participation; U.S. Army, 250th anniversary.
DCPD Number: DCPD202500681.