Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2025
November 18, 2025
President Trump. Well, thank you very much, everybody. We have a extremely respected man in the Oval Office today and a friend of mine for a long time, a very good friend of mine.
And I'm very proud of the job he's done. What he's done is incredible, in terms of human rights and everything else. And he's the Crown Prince, the future King. And I just want to pay my greatest respect to your father, King, who is an amazing man.
I met him early on. He greeted me at the airport at an age that was pretty high up there—[laughter]—and it was about 117 degrees—[laughter]—and he was standing on the red carpet as I came out of the plane. And he was—he's amazing.
And when I met his brilliant son, it was at the Oval Office. Shortly thereafter, you came in, representing the country, and I called the father, I said, "This guy is fantastic." And I don't know if that helped you or hurt you, but obviously, it couldn't have hurt too much, because here you are, right?
But we had a great meeting, and the office has changed quite a bit, and we inherited a mess. You actually told me you thought the country was in big trouble. I'm not going to use the exact word that you use. I refuse to say that you thought our country was dead a year and a half, 2 years ago, but our country was in trouble, and now we have the hottest country in the world.
You said that also. And we do. We have the United States is, right now, the hottest country in the world. And between the tariffs and the election—November 5 election—it—we've done things that nobody can believe.
Twenty-one trillion dollars will be the amount invested in the United States, or committed to invest, in 1 year. So I'm here 9 months. We're up to almost $18 trillion.
Biden—as an example, the Biden administration—if you call it that; it's not—to me, it was the Biden lack of administration—they were less than $1 trillion for 4 years. We're going to be
$21 trillion for 1 year. I think that's hard to believe. The biggest in history was a certain country,
$3 trillion. We're going to be $21 trillion.
On top of that, prices are coming down. We inherited a mess with high prices, the worst inflation in the history of our country. We had inflation that was a single full—4 years, the worst inflation in the history of the United States. Gas prices through the roof. And that's after destroying our petroleum reserve, which was meant for wars and big emergencies, not to try and win an election.
They opened up the reserve, so the people get $3—$3 less in gasoline, and it didn't work.
They got about three cents less, because as big as those reserves are, they're peanuts when you're talking about that kind of traffic. And we're rebuilding the reserves. We're doing all of this, and we're—we've done a job.
We're also bringing down prices very substantially, and we've already brought them down very, very substantially. Gasoline is way down. I think you'll be seeing $2 gasoline. But we're now at $2.50, $2.45, some are lower than that. It was $4.50, $5, $6, $3.50, $3.75 under Biden—all different numbers, but way high—and we have energy way down.
But the biggest thing to me—because I know what it means in jobs—is the fact that we're at over $17 trillion, Scott, and we expect to be around $20-, $21 trillion in 1 year. And that's many times bigger than—in history, the highest number was $3 trillion, and we're going to be at $21 trillion. That means new plants, new AI, new auto plants.
We have auto plants coming in from Canada, from Mexico, from Germany, from Japan.
Toyota just agreed to invest $10 billion on new auto plants, all American workers.
We've never been in a position like this. You can go back to the beginning. Our country has never been in a position like this, and it really is because of the fact that we use tariffs to bring all this money in.
And you're going to see the results in a year when these plants start to open up. We have more plants under construction now than at any time in the history of our country. And these are big plants. These are the biggest plants anywhere in the world.
And I want to thank you, because you've agreed to invest $600 billion into the United States.
And because he's my friend, he might make it a trillion, but I'm going to have to work on him. But it's 600—we can count on $600 billion, but that number could go up a little bit higher, Yasir, I don't know. We'll see, but we appreciate it very much.
So Saudi is going to be investing at least $600 billion, and that means investments in plants, in companies, money on Wall Street. And what it really means for everybody that really counts is jobs, lot of jobs. We have a lot of jobs.
So I just want to thank you. We've been really good friends for a long period of time. We've always been on the same side of every issue.
I think we've done a great job in wiping out the nuclear capacity of Iran. Nobody else could have done that. No other President would have done it.
And we had the pilots in the Oval Office right here. We were celebrating a very successful attack. So I had them in with that beautiful B–2 bomber that's over there. And they said: "Sir, for 22 years, we practiced this attack. Our predecessors"—these were very young guys. So, 22 years—they said, "Our predecessors and us practiced the attack on Iran, but no President ever gave us the go-ahead."
Three times a year, they went out and they practiced the attack. "Nobody let us do it until you came along." And I let them do it because it was the right thing to do. You can't have a nuclear Iran, and so we put you in a very good position.
But I just want to say it's an honor to be your friend, and it's an honor that you're here. And if you'd like to say a few words. But thank you very much.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Well, thank you, Mr. President. This relation—we've been in relation for about nine decades, and we've been working together for a long time. But today, it's very important time in our history, because there's also a lot of things that we're working on in the future.
We believe in the future of United States of America. We believe what you're doing, Mr. President, is really creating a lot of good things and good foundation to create more economic growth, more business in America, and through, also, your work for the world peace.
I believe, Mr. President, in the—today and tomorrow, we are going to announce that we are going to increase that $600 billion to almost $1 trillion for investment—real investment and real opportunity—by details in many areas. And the agreement that we are signing today, many areas in technology and AI and rare earth materials, magnets, et cetera, that would create a lot of investment opportunities between our both countries.
President Trump. So you are doing that now? You're saying to me now—[laughter]—that the $600 million will be $1 trillion?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Definitely, because what we are signing, it will facilitate that——
President Trump. Good.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. ——and we will—we will—[inaudible].
President Trump. I like that very much. [Laughter] Go ahead.
Minister of Energy Abd al-Aziz bin Salman bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia. We worked hard for this.
President Trump. No, that's great. That's—I appreciate that. That's great.
It's—no, we're doing numbers that nobody's ever done. And in all fairness, if you didn't see potential in the U.S., you wouldn't be doing it.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Definitely.
President Trump. You don't want to lose money.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. As you said, Mr. President, it's the most hottest country in the planet. But what you're creating is not about opportunity today. It's about also long-term opportunity in United States of America that will affect American economy positively in the next coming decades, preparing the right foundation of emerging technologies. That's a game changer for America, in a good way, and we want to be part of it.
President Trump. Yes, we're doing really well. And this—you know, you don't see what we're doing so much because we have—although, the construction industry sees it. If you look at Caterpillar, who's been incredible, the—you know, the tractors, everything else, the numbers that we're doing in construction are—are unbelievable.
You know, some of the plants that were building—AI—and they're building their own electric with the plant. I gave them the right to build their own electric with the plant, because no country, frankly, will have this.
China is working very hard to produce enough electric, but we're beating China substantially at AI, which is a big thing. And we had a great meeting 2 weeks ago with President Xi.
But on AI, we're—we're doing well. And I have a man, David Brumell [Broomwell; White House correction].
GE Vernova Manufacturing Technology Manager David Broomwell. Yes, sir.
President Trump. David—
Mr. Broomwell. ——Mr. President.
President Trump. ——could you say a few words about what you're seeing on the job front and all of the—some of the assets? And also, how we've been helped by the Saudis in terms of the kind of investment they've made? Please.
Mr. Broomwell. Yes, most certainly. Thank you for the opportunity. I am a facility leader for GE Vernova. And if you look at the landscape for GE Vernova investment, over $750 million in the U.S. focused on true manufacturing jobs here stateside.
We're looking at tripling the output of our Greenville, South Carolina, facility, where we make the gas turbines that are supporting U.S. needs as well as the Saudi Arabia needs.
President Trump. Right.
Mr. Broomwell. So real jobs. Three-hundred million dollars in gas investment, resulting in over 500 pieces of new equipment being installed in the Greenville, South Carolina, facility. That translates into roughly 1,800 jobs across the board for GE Vernova as we try to scale capacity to be able to meet this demand.
Along with that, we're partnering with local communities to build the skill set that's required to meet these capacity needs. So, that talent pipeline is incredibly important. So it's real jobs in the manufacturing space.
President Trump. Well, you've been great. And thank you very much.
And we love that State. I won that State by record numbers. I won a lot of States by a record. [Laughter] Texas. A lot of them by—Indiana. We're working with Indiana on something right now. We won that. We won a lot of them by records, but that was one of them.
I want to thank you very much. Say hello to everybody.
Mr. Broomwell. Will do. Thank you, sir.
President Trump. Great job. You're doing a great job. Thank you.
Mr. Broomwell. Appreciate it, Mr. President. Thank you.
President Trump. So, just in wrapping up, we'll take a couple of questions, but I want to just tell you what an honor it is to be your friend. And I very much appreciate the investment of now
$1 trillion. Okay? [Laughter] That's—I'm glad you got that out. That was—I didn't want to be the one to tell them, but that's great news.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. We keep increasing, Mr. President.
President Trump. I know. I know.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. You know, each time, the opportunities are just increasing more and more.
President Trump. Yes, good. Well, the opportunity is right.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Yes.
President Trump. Yes, we're doing better. If—even if you look back 6 months ago, I mean, all of a sudden, you feel even better. So—and I think we're only going to go in one way.
Does anybody have any questions? Please go.
Saudi Arabia/U.S. Export Licensing
Q. Mr. President, have you approved the export licenses for advanced chips to Saudi Arabia—the export licenses?
President Trump. We are working on that. We're negotiating that right now. Marco, do you want to talk about that, or Scott?
U.S. Secretary of State Marco A. Rubio. Well, I mean, that's part of what—we may have announcements on that later today, but that's what we've been working on, is the mechanics by
which something like that can be achieved. And it's part of the broader process, part of this broader engagement and cooperation between our two countries.
President Trump. Certain levels of chips, yes.
Q. For the Crown Prince. Your Royal Highness, you're talking about a trillion dollars of investment. Could the kingdom continue to do that with oil prices in the mid 60s?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Yes, it's—we are not creating fake opportunities to, you know, please America, please President Trump. It's real opportunities.
For example, when you ask about the AI and the chips, Saudi Arabia have a huge demand of unique computing power, and we're going to spend, in the short term, around $50 billion by consuming those semiconductors for our needs in Saudi Arabia. And with the agreement that we're going to have with United States of America, that will allow us to focus that consuming power, in the short term, by $50 billion from the United States of America and, long term, with hundreds of billion dollars in the long term.
So there's a lot of real opportunities that fit to our need in Saudi Arabia and fit to our business strategy.
Saudi Arabia/Trump Organization Business Investments/2018 Death of Saudi Journalist Jamal Khashoggi
Q. Mr. President—Mr. President—is it appropriate, Mr. President, for your family to be doing business in Saudi Arabia while you're President? Is that a conflict of interest?
And, Your Royal Highness, the U.S. intelligence concluded that you orchestrated the brutal murder of a journalist. 9/11 families are furious that you are here in the Oval Office.
President Trump. Who are you with? Who are you with?
Q. Why should Americans trust you?
President Trump. Who are you with?
Q. And the same to you, Mr. President.
President Trump. No, who are you with?
Q. I'm with ABC News, sir.
President Trump. You're with who?
Q. ABC News, sir.
President Trump. Fake news, ABC Fake News. One of the worst——
Q. But the question is legitimate, sir.
President Trump. One of the worst in the business. But I'll answer your question.
Q. Thank you.
President Trump. I have nothing to do with the family business. I have left, and when I've devoted 100 percent of my energy. What my family does is fine. They do business all over.
They've done very little with Saudi Arabia, actually. They could—I'm sure they could do a lot. And anything they've done has been very good.
That's what we've done. We've built a tremendous business for a long time. I've been very successful. I decided to leave that success behind and make America very successful. And I've
made America more successful by far than it ever was and that it ever could have been, no matter who was President. There would be nobody bringing in $21 trillion. That I can tell you right now.
As far as this gentleman is concerned, he's done a phenomenal job. You're mentioning somebody that was extremely controversial. A lot of people didn't like that gentleman that you're talking about. Whether you like him or didn't like him, things happen, but he knew nothing about it. And we can leave it at that. You don't have to embarrass our guest by asking a question like that.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. It's okay. Since she asked, Mr. President, I——
President Trump. But please, go ahead.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. If you'll allow me to answer.
You know, I feel painful about, you know, the families of 9/11 in America. But you know, we have to focus on reality. Reality, based on CIA documents and based on all the documents, that Usama bin Laden used Saudi people in that event for one main purpose: is to destroy this relation, to destroy the American-Saudi relation. That's the purpose of 9/11.
So whoever buying that, that mean they are helping Usama bin Laden purpose of destroying this relation. He know that strong relation between America and Saudi Arabia is bad for extremism, it's bad for terrorism. And we have to prove him wrong and to build our relation—continue the work on our relation. It's critical in the safety of the world. It's critical against extremism and terrorism.
About the journalist, it's really painful to hear, you know, anyone that been losing his life for, you know, no real purpose or no—not in a legal way. And it's been painful for us in Saudi Arabia. We've did all the right steps of investigation, et cetera, in Saudi Arabia, and we've improved our system to be sure that nothing happen like that. And it's painful, and it's a huge mistake, and we are doing our best that this doesn't happen again.
President Trump. Please.
Gaza Conflict/Syria/Lifting of U.S. Sanctions
Q. Thank you, Mr. President. The Crown Prince has been instrumental in helping lifting the sanctions on Syria. Will be——
President Trump. That's true.
Q. Will there be any joint investment between the U.S. and Syria? And will you visit Damascus——
President Trump. Are you from Syria?
Q. No, but—
President Trump. Where are you from?
Q. I'm from Palestine.
President Trump. Oh. Making a lot of progress, huh? [Laughter] Very good. Well, they like
me.
Q. And I have a question for——
President Trump. The Palestinians like me.
Q. ——the Crown Prince, as well, after you, sir.
President Trump. The Palestinians are doing very well, actually. I think we're working very closely with a lot of people that make everybody happy, including Israel, the Palestinians, and everybody. That's very interesting.
No, I think that—I will tell you, the Crown Prince called me, and he specifically asked me if I would lift the sanctions on Syria because he wants to see Syria make it.
As you know, the leader of Syria was just here. We had a great meeting, and he's a strong guy, and I guess you need a strong person to run it. And I think Syria has made tremendous progress. And we did lift the sanctions at the request of the Crown Prince. Also, the President of Turkey, Erdoğan, called me specifically. He said: "You know, if you don't lift the sanctions, Syria doesn't have a chance. If you do, they have a very good chance." And between the two of them and some others, I lifted the sanctions.
And the results so far have been pretty good. Yes, please.
South Africa/Saudi Arabia
Q. Mr. President, can I ask you a question about the F–35s that are being sold——
President Trump. Sure.
Q. ——to Saudi Arabia? Are these the same ones that the—are being used by the Israeli military? And, if so, how does that allow for the qualitative military edge for Israel?
And then I want to ask you, because you brought up the plight of Palestinians, are you aware of relocation flights to South Africa that are taking place right now? Is——
President Trump. Which flights?
Q. They're relocation flights that are taking place right now. Some Palestinians are being charged up to $2,000 a seat.
President Trump. I'm not going to South Africa for the G–20 because I think their policies on the extermination of people are unacceptable. So I'm not going. So I won't refer to anything having to do with South Africa. South Africa has behaved extremely badly.
But I will say that when you look at the F–35, and you're asking me is it the same, I think it's going to be pretty similar, yeah.
Q. How will that affect——
President Trump. You know, this is a great ally, and Israel is a great ally. And I know they'd like you to get planes of reduced caliber. I don't think that makes you too happy.
They've been a great ally. Israel has been a great ally. And we're looking at that exactly right now. But as far as I'm concerned, I think they are both at a level where they should get top of the line.
Yes, please.
Q. And can I just quickly ask—for the Crown Prince——
Q. Have you reached an agreement on——
President Trump. No, go ahead. Go ahead.
Q. If I could just ask about the——
Q. Mr. President, have you reached an agreement on a defense——
Q. ——direct talks between U.S. and Iran——
President Trump. It's all right. I'll—Steve [Steve A. Holland, Reuters], 1 second. Go ahead.
Middle East Peace Efforts
Q. Have you reached an agreement on a U.S.-Saudi defense treaty today? And are you going to bring up the Abraham Accords in your discussion?
President Trump. I already brought them up.
Q. What did you say?
President Trump. I think I got a positive response. Would you like to respond?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Yes, so——
President Trump. I'll put you on the spot. [Laughter]
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Yes. So, definitely, we believe having a good relation with all of these countries is a good thing. And we want to be part of the Abraham Accord. But we want also to be sure that we secure a clear path of two-state solution.
And today we have a healthy discussion with Mr. President that we're going to work on that to be sure that we can prepare the right situation as soon as possible to have that.
President Trump. I think we're—you know, I don't want to use the word "commitment," but we've had a very good talk on the Abraham Accords. We talked about one state, two state. You know, we talked about a lot of things. In a short period of time, we'll be discussing it further too.
But I think you have a very good feeling toward the Abraham Accords.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Yes, definitely, Mr. President. We want peace for the Israelis. We want peace for the Palestinians. We want them to coexist peacefully in the region.
And we will do our best to reach that day.
Q. And a defense agreement, have you reached agreement on that?
President Trump. We pretty much have.
Q. Quick question for the Crown Prince, if I could just finish.
President Trump. We have reached agreement on that, yes.
Q. Okay.
Iran/U.S. Diplomatic Efforts
Q. I wanted to ask you about the direct talks between the United States and Iran. Have you been fully briefed on that? And are you concerned at all about how this might impact Saudi security interests?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Well, we're—we've been—we are close aligned. We'll be working closely together on that issue, and we will do our best to help to reach a deal between the United States of America and Iran. And we believe it's good for Iran future to have a good deal that will satisfy—satisfies the region and the world and United States of America. So we will do our best to see that day happen.
President Trump. And by the way, Iran does want to make a deal. I can say I think they very badly want to make a deal. I am totally open to it, and we're talking to them, and we start a process. But it would be a nice thing to have a deal with Iran. And we could have done it before
the war, but that didn't work out. And something will happen there, I think. But they would very much like—I mean, they may say something else, but they would very much like to have a deal.
Q. Do we have a timeline?
President Trump. Yeah, please.
Q. Mr. President, you announced that you are going to sell 35——
President Trump. Could—could move quickly.
Q. ——F–35 jets——
President Trump. Say it.
Q. You are planning—you said you are planning to sell the F–35 jets to Saudi Arabia.
President Trump. Yes.
Saudi-U.S. Defense Cooperation
Q. Is it part of the security agreement? And how you assess the defense partnership between Saudi Arabia and the United States?
And a question for His Royal Highness——
President Trump. Well, no, I just said it, though. I mean, I'm going to—we're going to sell them F–35s. That's the end of the question, I guess.
Q. Is it part of the security agreement or no?
President Trump. No, we're going to have—no, we're going to have a deal. They're going to purchase F–35s. They're buying them from Lockheed. And it's a great plane.
We make, by the way, the best military equipment. You saw that during the Iran little skirmish. We make the best planes, the best missiles. We make the best defensive missiles. We make the best military equipment in the world.
Q. Now I—for His Royal Highness, I would like to ask you about how you see the cooperation between the United States and Saudi Arabia and the technological—advanced technological field, especially AI, and how it will support Saudi Arabia to set its goals to achieve the vision of 2030.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Well, I will try to answer that in short, but definitely, there's a lot of interest in many industry between Saudi Arabia and America, and we are signing a lot of agreement in different areas that will really add value to American economy, but also it will add value to us in Saudi Arabia.
And AI, it's critical for us, because one of long—the long-term problems that you could have is lack of workforce. As you've seen the past few years, some of them reached 30 percent of the global—[inaudible]—Saudi Arabia. So we know that to assure the Saudi Arabia GDP growing with the lack of workforce that we have, we need to use a lot of computing power to replace job in the long term. So that's huge demand in Saudi Arabia, and we want to link it to American private sectors and help getting the supply from America. So there's a lot of opportunities in that area.
President Trump. And we're also involved in AI in Saudi Arabia. So we're working. And we're—again, we're leading by a lot on AI, by actually a lot. China would be in second place, but we're leading by a lot.
And—and I have to say this: And our relationship with China has been very good. And as far as they're buying our farm products, they're pretty much on schedule.
Scott, I'd like you to call them, see if they could speed it up. It would be good.
U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Scott K.H. Bessent. I will, sir.
President Trump. Okay. But they're pretty much on schedule.
Q. Question from Saudi Arabia, please.
President Trump. Yes, please.
Q. If I may, I have a question for both the crown prince and president.
President Trump. It's all right. Go ahead. Who are you? Where are you from?
Q. Faisal Abbas from Arab News, Saudi Arabia——
President Trump. Okay.
Q. ——Your Excellency.
President Trump. You should be a friendly question. [Laughter]
Transparency Efforts
Q. Your Royal Highness, just picking up on something you've just mentioned about how some people tried to destroy the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States. Perhaps, you know, since the launch of the vision, we've been used to having the bigger picture and that everything fits into the bigger picture. Might you want to elaborate a little bit about where is the relationship, the bilateral relationship, the strategic partnership between Saudi Arabia and the United States heading? And what's the big picture there?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Well, I don't think it's a relation that we can't replace it. From the Saudi side or the American side, it's a critical relationship for our political attempt, for our economical attempt, for our security, for our military, for many things. And being there for nine decades, and the opportunities, to me, that we have today—it's huge. And seems that it's going to be get deeper in the next few decades. And what we are having today and tomorrow with President Trump, it's really a huge new chapter on this relation that will add value to both of us.
President Trump. You know, when you think about it, I'm just sitting here, you're with the future King, a man who's respected by everybody, a man that doesn't have to be doing this, really. I don't have to be doing it either. And yet we're sitting here taking questions, any questions—we didn't say, "Oh, you can't talk about this thing." And there's never been transparency like this.
Even in his country, but there's never been—in our country, that's been acknowledged. But we didn't put restrictions.
And I'm saying it's sort of wonderful to be taking questions from all over the world.
Everybody's here. This is just a small group representative of tremendous numbers of media that are outside that are very jealous that these people were so selected. [Laughter] But they're representing a lot of people that are outside.
I think it's terrific that we can be sitting here being this open, and you know, I think it's really a wonderful thing.
Yes.
The President's Schedule and Personal Habits
Q. If you don't mind, I have a personal question for you, Mr. President.
President Trump. Uh-oh. Okay. Here we go. I shouldn't have said that. [Laughter]
Q. So, apart from everything you mentioned in your opening remarks, you forgot to mention that you've deescalated seven wars since you've started. At least in our part of the world, you are seen as a peacemaker. And adding that to all the Executive orders and everything else you've mentioned, I really have to wonder, you—in your speech in Saudi Arabia—I was there—you said that His Royal Highness does not sleep at night thinking how he does things better. We wonder—we wonder in Saudi Arabia: How do you manage your own time? And what's your formula for managing——
President Trump. He does not sleep much, and I don't sleep much. I think we have the same schedule. [Laughter] We're thinking about our countries. And if you sleep a lot and you're President—we just had one that slept more than any President. [Laughter] He broke every record. He sleeps all the time: during the day, during the night, on the beach. The only guy who could fall asleep on the beach with the press watching.
No, he's not a sleeper. I'm not a sleeper. We don't—we talk at night. We can talk—I can call him almost any time. He goes, "Hi, how you doing?" It's, like, the craziest times. But no, when you love your job, when you love your country, and when you're in a position like we are—future King, highly respected Crown Prince; and, in my case, President—you're thinking about your country. You're thinking about making America great again. We're thinking about keeping Saudi Arabia strong and vital in a pretty tough part of the world. Tricky part, right? Tricky part. A lot of tricky people.
But they—he thinks about his country, and I think about my country. I don't want to sleep.
Saudi Arabia/Civil Nuclear Cooperation
Q. President Trump, do you expect a formal civil nuclear deal to be reached soon? Can you talk to us about that aspect of today's——
President Trump. With who?
Q. With Saudi Arabia.
President Trump. I can see that happening, yes.
Q. Do you think that that will—an agreement will happen today?
President Trump. I don't—it's not urgent. You know, it's always—when you have civil nuclear, but you have more oil than almost anybody else. We actually have more oil and gas than they do, but I refuse to say that.
Q. And on that——
President Trump. We have more than—is it—we have more than anybody. Can you imagine? [Laughter] Huh?
Q. And on the F–35s. Are those sales—Israel had reportedly wanted those sales to be conditioned on Saudi Arabia moving to normalize relations——
President Trump. Israel will be happy. Israel is going to be happy.
Q. Is that a condition of the F–35 sale?
President Trump. Israel is aware, and they're going to be very happy. Okay?
Q. Crown prince?
President Trump. Yes, please. Hello.
Saudi-U.S. Cooperation
Q. Hi, hello. My name is Amal al-Hazzani from Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper. I'm from Riyadh, of course.
President Trump. Good.
Q. I have question for the crown prince and for you, Mr. President. Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, what—how much you expected from developing the cooperation with the United State in the field of new energy, AI, supply chains? How much you expected from that?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. No limits. Just continue pushing forward. There's no limits. So we just push forward for all the opportunities that we have.
Q. Okay. Mr. President——
President Trump. This is—you have to understand, this is really a great ally.
Q. Yes.
President Trump. Just the fact that they're now doing—I came in here at six. I did not know that—I was pushing for the $1 trillion, but he didn't tell me that. Now, he told me. This is a great ally of ours.
You know, when you invest a trillion dollars, that's national security for us too, because it creates jobs, it creates a lot of things. And I would say, Scott—right?—when you hear one country is putting a trillion dollars into the United States, that creates national security.
And you know, I think that they don't have to say that, but I think a big part of that is also the fact that tariffs are in play. But even beyond tariffs, that's a real ally that will do that. It creates a lot of power for the United States.
Q. Mr. President, we are also, in Saudi Arabia, very happy for this much of Saudi——
President Trump. Right. For the relationship.
Q. ——money is—[inaudible]—here. And of course, it's come back for us for benefits. So it's complementary interest. So this is the, I think——
President Trump. Well, yeah.
Q. ——what a different—friend and ally do.
President Trump. Well, look, I love the country of Saudi Arabia. I know the people very well. The level of treatment that we go—when we go to Saudi Arabia, is something that is incredible. And the people like us, and I think they really like America, especially when I'm President. I mean, I don't think they liked America so much, maybe, for 4 years recently. I think Obama treated Saudi Arabia very, very badly. Very badly, as you know. But—and I think Biden didn't have any idea where the hell he was.
Q. How would you describe the——
President Trump. I don't think Biden knew the difference.
Saudi-U.S. Relations
Q. How would you describe the future relationship with Saudi Arabia? I mean, the—from the strategic aspects, how would you describe the——
President Trump. How would I say the relationship is with—
Q. Yes. Yes. A little bit of economic politics and the leadership, please.
President Trump. I would say top of the line. It's as good as it can—I don't think it can get much better. We have—look, we have a country that trusts us, and that's why they make that investment. If they didn't trust us, they couldn't make that investment. And we trust them. They've been very reliable.
You know, we—you know, we are—I rebuilt our military in my first term, and we spent trillions of dollars, and we gave away some of it in Afghanistan stupidly, because we had stupid people running our country. But we gave away—but that's—as much as it was, it's a tiny fraction of what we—what we put here. And we're again—we're bringing our military to a new level, the highest level ever. We're—we have those—those plants are going out. And, again, it's all American jobs and everything, so it's good for a lot of reasons.
But as far as Saudi is concerned, no, I—I don't think our relationship could be better. I don't think they had a great relationship under Biden, and I don't think they had a great relationship under Obama, but they have a great relationship under Trump. When we did the Presidential Walk of Fame—you saw that right?—and we're walking, and I asked the Crown Prince, "So, outside of Trump—outside of Trump"—because I blow everyone away—"who was the best president for Saudi Arabia?" And you could maybe it's an interesting answer. I don't know.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Yes. [Inaudible]—Roosevelt, who started it.
President Trump. Roosevelt.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Which he's Democrat. And Reagan, he's one of the historical President that have close ties with Saudi Arabia.
President Trump. But does Trump——
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. But we've worked with all Presidents.
President Trump. Does Trump blow them all away?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Certainly, Mr. President. [Laughter] [At this point, several reporters began asking questions at once.]
President Trump. And Trump doesn't give a fist pump. I grabbed that hand. I don't give a hell where that hand has been. I grabbed that hand. [Laughter]
When—remember Biden? He travels for 20 hours, gets out, and he gives a fist pump. No.
When you get out of the plane and you got the future King and a man who's one of the most respected people in the world, you shake his hand. You don't give him a fist pump, right?
We don't want to ask you about that, but I can't imagine you were thrilled. You were, like, a little bit surprised. He's a fantastic guy. You don't do that.
Yes, please.
Federal Reserve System Leadership
Q. We're getting closer to the end of the year. Have you started the interviews for the Fed Chair?
President Trump. Yes.
Q. Who have you interviewed?
President Trump. I think I already know my choice.
Q. Who is it?
President Trump. Well, I liked him——
[The President gestured toward Secretary Bessent.] But he's not going to take the job. He refused.
You like Treasury better, right?
Secretary Bessent. Much better, sir. [Laughter]
President Trump. So we are talking to various people. And the—I mean, frankly, I'd love to get the guy currently in there out right now, but people are holding me back. He's done a terrible job. Hurting housing a little bit.
The truth is, we've been so successful, we've blown past his interest-rate stupidity. He's been wrong. That's why I call him "Too Late." He's too late. Jerome "Too Late" Powell. He was recommended to me by a guy that made a bad—you know, bad choice, and that's too bad.
But despite that, it's having very little impact, because we have—you know, we have all of these things happening. But it has an impact on housing to a certain extent.
He's a fool. He's a stupid man. But we have some very good people.
Secretary Bessent. Yes, sir. You'll be sitting down with them in the near future. And——
President Trump. We have some surprising names, and we have some standard names that everybody's talking about. And we may go the standard way. You know, it's nice to, every once in a while, go politically correct. But we have some great names.
Steve, please.
Venezuela/Border Security
Q. Have you talked to President Maduro of Venezuela yet? Are you——
President Trump. No.
Q. ——still open to that?
President Trump. He wants to talk.
Q. Yes, sir.
President Trump. Yes, I'm open to talk. I talk to everybody. But no, he wants to.
They treated us very badly. They sent all of their prison population into the United States, and we're getting them out rapidly. But he sent all of his—and he sends drugs into the United States and other things. No, he treated us badly. He was dealing with a bad president, and he was able to get away.
We have—now, I think we have the strongest borders anywhere in the world. Nobody's coming in unless they come in legally.
And you know, we've taken very weak borders where millions of people came in.
For the last 6 months—I mean, I don't do these reports—they say zero people have been able to come in. Is that pretty good?
I don't know if that number is right, but it's pretty good.
News Media/Department of Justice Files Concerning Deceased Convicted Sex Offender Jeffrey Epstein
Q. Mr. President, why wait for Congress to release the Epstein files? Why not just do it now?
President Trump. You know, it's not the question that I mind. It's your attitude. I think you are a terrible reporter. It's the way you ask these questions. You start off with a man who is highly respected, asking him a horrible, insubordinate, and just a terrible question. And you could even ask that same exact question nicely.
You're all psyched to—somebody psyched you over at ABC, you're going to psych—you're a terrible person and a terrible reporter.
As far as the Epstein files is—I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein. I threw him out of my club many years ago because I thought he was a sick pervert. But—and I guess I turned out to be right.
But you know who does have—Bill Clinton; Larry Summers, who ran Harvard, was with him every single night, every single weekend. They lived together. They went to his island many times. I never did. Andrew Weissmann, I hear. All these guys were friends of his. You don't even talk about those people. You just keep going on the Epstein files.
And what the Epstein is, is a Democrat hoax to try and get me not to be able to talk about the
$21 trillion that I talked about today. It's a hoax.
Now, I just got a little report, and I put it in my pocket, of all the money that he's given to Democrats. He gave me none. Zero. No money to me. But he gave money to Democrats.
And people are wise to your hoax, and ABC is—your company—your crappy company is one of the perpetrators. And I'll tell you something——
Q. But you said you'll sign it if it reaches your desk——
President Trump. ——I'll tell you something——
Q. ——so why not just sign it now? Why not just release them now?
President Trump. I think the license should be taken away from ABC, because your news is so fake, and it's so wrong. And we have a great Commissioner, the Chairman, who should look at that, because I think when you come in and when you're 97 percent negative to Trump and then Trump wins the election in a landslide, that means, obviously, your news is not credible, and you're not credible as a reporter.
So I've answered your question. You should go and look at the Democrats who received money from Epstein, who spent their time—Larry Summers was with him all the time. That creep of—the fund guy was with him all the time. What's his name?
White House Chief of Staff Susan Wiles. Reid Hoffman.
Secretary Bessent. Reid Hoffman.
President Trump. Who?
Chief of Staff Wiles. Reid Hoffman.
President Trump. Reid Hoffman. I don't know Reid Hoffman, but I know he spends a lot of money on the radical left.
Reid Hoffman, in my opinion, should be under investigation. He's a sleazebag, and those are the people—but they don't get any press, they don't get any news, and you're not after the radical left because you're a radical left network.
But I think the way you ask a question with the anger and the meanness is terrible. You ought to go back and learn how to be a reporter. No more questions from you.
Who else has a question?
Gaza, Palestinian Territories/ U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities/The President's Foreign Policy/White House Renovation Projects
Q. A question for the Crown Prince very quickly. I want to ask you, how much money is Saudi Arabia giving for Gaza reconstruction?
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. Well, we are—we have a discussion about that. Still, there's no amount being——
President Trump. It will be a lot.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. ——named. But——
President Trump. It will be a lot.
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. ——but we will definitely help.
President Trump. Yes, he's going to—he——
Q. And——
President Trump. It's very important to him.
Q. And a quick follow-up, the International Security Force. Given your pledge there would be no U.S. boots on the ground, what is the U.S. role going to be in that, and how do you sort of ratify the allegations that this could undermine Palestinian sovereignty, and even the path to statehood?
President Trump. I—look, I think we're going to get along great with the Palestinians. And we—you know, we know their leadership.
We just had a very—you hate to say "war," but it was a war. Very, very successful. And you could say, really, it was on behalf of everybody. We did that on behalf of everybody. And the outcome was extraordinary, because we had the best pilots, the best equipment, the best planes, the best everything.
And Israel bought the best equipment. They bought it from us. Everything's from us. It all starts here, this office.
I was talking to the Crown Prince a little while. You walk into this office, for somebody from the outside, the Oval Office, it's the most powerful place in the world. You're standing right now in the most powerful place in the world. And no matter how big you are—these are the biggest people, the richest people, they walk into this office, it's special. Isn't it? Look at him.
He's so happy to be here. [Laughter]
But you walk into this office, it's the Oval Office. And we've done a lot of good with this office. I've stopped, actually, eight wars. I appreciated your question before. But I've actually stopped eight wars.
I have another one to go with Putin. I'm a little surprised at Putin. It's taken longer than I thought.
But we stopped India and Pakistan. We—I could go through the list. You know the list better than I do. I'm very proud. And I stopped one that was almost ready to start again. You know, there was one that was ready—
Q. Do you have an update on where things are with Putin?
President Trump. ——to start, and they're doing very well.
So—and it all took place right here in the Oval Office, whether by telephone or whether by they came in—many of these leaders have come in. And you know, they signed their peace deals right here in the Oval Office.
So, no matter if it's the biggest businesspeople in the world or the greatest leaders in the world, the biggest leaders in the world, like the gentleman on my right, everybody walks into the Oval Office and they say, "Wow."
And now, by the way, the Oval Office is in the kind of condition that it should be in, whether you look at the walk or the marble floors or anything—down the road, we're fixing the White House, and we're building the—one of the greatest ballrooms ever to be built.
You know, we have an event tonight, and we're going to have about 118 people, because we have a very small room. For 150 years, they've wanted a ballroom, and now you're going to get a great ballroom.
And I have to say, I probably made a lot of enemies, because in your honor, we're having a dinner tonight, a beautiful dinner tonight, and we have a very small room, right? It's called East Room, and it's beautiful. It's lovely. But it's like for a little cocktail before you go into a ballroom. It's a very small room.
They've wanted a new ballroom for 150 years. We could have sold the big ballroom out three times in honor of this gentleman.
So I made a lot of enemies, because I have a lot of people that aren't invited tonight or are unable to come because of the size constraint. But you know what we'll do? Before I leave office, we'll have another dinner, because we'll have it ready long before I leave office, and it's going to be beautiful.
It's—you know, it's a very popular thing, what we're doing. And by the way, no Government funds. It's all put up private money. All private money.
And in the case—I think it's—there's a restriction on foreigners. Otherwise, I could have asked you just for a check. Okay? [Laughter] But there's a restriction.
These are all private individuals that put up a lot of money to build the ballroom. Not one penny is being used from the Federal Government. So it's really a nice thing.
But I look forward to it, and I just pointed it out. If—this would be a perfect night to have that ballroom open, Susie. If we had that open, we'd have a lot of people very happy. Right now we have a lot of unhappy people because they all want to be with us tonight to honor this great man.
Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you.
NOTE: The President spoke at 12:29 p.m. in the Oval Office at the White House. In his remarks, he referred to King Salman bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia; Governor of the Saudi Public Investment Fund Yasir Al-Rumayyan; President Ahmad Husayn al-Shara' of Syria; former President William J. Clinton; former Secretary of the Treasury Lawrence H. Summers; Andrew B. Weissman, retired partner, WilmerHale; Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr; Reid Hoffman, cofounder, LinkedIn; and President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia. The transcript was released by the Office of Communications on November 19.
Categories: Interviews With the News Media : Exchanges with reporters, White House; Meetings With Foreign Leaders and International Officials : Saudi Arabia, Prince Muhammad bin Salman.
Locations: Washington, DC.
Names: Abd al-Aziz bin Salman bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud; Al-Rumayyan, Yasir; Bessent, Scott K.H.; Biden, Joseph R., Jr.; Broomwell, David; Carr, Brendan; Clinton, William J.; Erdogan, Recep Tayyip; Hoffman, Reid; Maduro Moros, Nicolas; Muhammad bin Salman bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud, Crown Prince; Obama, Barack; Powell, Jerome H.; Putin, Vladimir Vladimirovich; Rubio, Marco A.; Salman bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud, King; Shara', Ahmad Husayn al-; Summers, Lawrence H.; Weissmann, Andrew B.; Wiles, Susan; Xi Jinping.
Subjects: 2024 Presidential election; ABC News; Artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies; Automobile industry, strengthening efforts; Border security; China, President; China, relations with U.S.; Department of Justice files concerning deceased convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein; Economic improvement; Electricity capacity, expansion efforts; Federal Communications Commission; Federal Reserve System; Gasoline costs; Gaza, reconstruction efforts; Group of Twenty (G–20) nations; India, relations with Pakistan; Inflation; Iran, diplomatic engagement with U.S.; Iran, U.S. airstrikes on nuclear facilities; Israel, relations with U.S.; Job creation and growth; Middle East, regional integration and security; News media, fairness and accuracy; Nuclear energy, expansion efforts; Pakistan, relations with India; Russia, President; Saudi Arabi, trade with U.S.; Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince; Saudi Arabia, King; Saudi Arabia, Minister of Energy; Saudi Arabia, relations with U.S.; Saudi Arabia, security cooperation with U.S.; Saudi Public Investment Fund; Secretary of State; Secretary of the Treasury; Semiconductor manufacturing; South Africa, relations with U.S.; Syria, President; Syria, withdrawal of U.S. sanctions; Tariffs; Turkey, President; U.S. diplomatic efforts, expansion; Venezuela, President; White House Ballroom construction project; White House Chief of Staff.
DCPD Number: DCPD202501130.