Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2026
March 26, 2026
The President. So thank you to the incredible members of my Cabinet. They're doing a phenomenal job—everybody pretty much agrees to that—including our newest member, Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin. Thank you, Mark, very much.
Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin. Thank you, sir.
The President. And we all know him very well, and he was a very popular Senator, very effective Senator—"effective" probably being the more important word. J.D., don't you think?
Vice President James D. "J.D." Vance. Yes, sir. The President. And we wish you a lot of luck. Secretary Mullin. Thank you. [Inaudible]
The President. I think you'll do fantastically well. Congratulations too. You have an amazing family that were here yesterday in the Oval. Sworn in. His family's amazing. So thank you very much.
We're now on day 41 of the disgraceful Democrat shutdown of Markwayne's department.
Congratulations. [Laughter]
Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins. Welcome to the team.
The President. You came into a department that was shut down—shut down by the radical Democrats. Right?
But Democrats are really punishing the American people. I saw it today on one of the shows where they were interviewing people at the airport, and they were all angry at the Democrats.
They're saying—they were actually angry at Schumer. I didn't think anyone knew his name.
One woman said: "That Schumer is disgraceful. He's a disgrace to our country." But they're angry at the Democrats. They know what's happening.
But they're punishing the American people, including travelers at airports, all in the quest to return to open borders and give amnesty to illegal alien criminals.
They want to give amnesty to some of the criminals that came into our country—just about all of them, actually, if you look at it. They love sanctuary cities, which is a sanctuary for criminals. They want to make sure they're taken care of.
That's what we're fighting about. That's really what they're fighting—they don't talk about that, but that's what they're fighting about. They want to protect criminals.
In many—11,888 murderers. Many of them, I will say, are gone now because of us. We got them out, but still have some left. Should have never happened. Should have never been allowed to come into our country.
But we're not going to let it happen. We're not going to let the Democrats get away with this stuff, and people are wise to them. So they need to end the shutdown immediately, or we'll have to take some very drastic measures.
This morning I want to give an update on the Operation Epic Fury, which is an appropriate name because we are absolutely obliterating them.
Over the past 3 weeks, we've been hitting Iran's military capabilities at a level that few people have ever seen before. People never knew there was such a capability.
We have the strongest military anywhere in the world by far. I built it during my first administration, and I used it during my second administration—unfortunately, because I'd rather not have to use it.
But it's a display of force and precision and skill like nothing the world has really witnessed. Although, you got a pretty good witnessing of it in Venezuela also. That was a smaller version of what we're doing now.
We're crushing their missiles and drone stockpiles, destroying their defense industrial base.
We've wiped out their navy completely, their air force completely. We've—wiped out a large percentage of their missiles and the missile launchers. Without the launchers, you can't—the missiles don't do any good. And we've knocked out probably close to 90 percent of the launchers, probably more than 90 percent of the missiles themselves—between some they fired and—more than they fired, we knocked out.
We've also destroyed a lot of the factories. We're continuing to do that. But a lot of the factories where they manufacture the drones and the missiles.
The drones too are way down, but the reason they're down is, they go one way, and they don't come back because, for the most part, we're shooting them down. But we also are able to—we've really done tremendous damage to the places where they make them.
And just so we set the record straight—because I've been watching The Wall Street Journal's fake news and all these stories that get printed like, oh, I want to make a deal—they are begging to make a deal, not me. They're begging to make a deal. And anybody that saw what was happening over there would understand why they want to make a deal.
But they say, "Oh, we're not talking to them." Anybody would know they're—and only a total fool—and they're not fools. They're very smart, actually, in a certain way. And they're great negotiators. I say they're lousy fighters, but they're great negotiators. And they are begging to work out a deal.
I don't know if we'll be able to do that. I don't know if we're willing to do that. They should have done that 4 weeks ago. They should have done it 2 years ago. Or they should have done it when we first came into office, because 2 years ago, they had free reign under Biden—Sleepy Joe. Worst President in the history of our country, what he allowed to happen to our country at the borders and even with a thing like this.
But not just him. Every President. For 47 years, every President should have done this. They should have done it a long time ago because you cannot give lunatics a nuclear weapon, and they would have had a big one.
It stopped, really, when we did the B–2, but even before that, the—Barack Hussein Obama, what he did where he gave them the Iran nuclear deal, gave them free will toward a nuclear weapon. Basically, he chose Iran over Israel and others that didn't want him to do it.
But I terminated that deal. Had I not terminated that deal, you would have had a nuclear weapon years ago, and it would have been used, guaranteed.
And one of the reasons you know about the guarantee is because their neighbors were sort of like bystanders. They weren't involved very much. They didn't choose heavy sides. They didn't want to, because people were concerned with Iran.
In other words, there was a big black cloud over the Middle East. They were concerned.
But all of a sudden, the war starts, and they start shooting at these five—in particular, five countries. They start shooting at Qatar, Saudi Arabia, U.A.E., Kuwait, Oman. They start shooting at them. And they were—everybody was shocked, including us. You know why? Because they're sick, and they had a plan to take over the Middle East.
And some of those missiles that were shot at them were locked long before we even started this process. They were locked and loaded and aimed at those countries. They wanted to take over the Middle East, but we happened to come along, so it wasn't so easy.
So right now their navy is sunk in the largest elimination of a foreign navy that has taken place maybe ever, but certainly, since World War II. Their air force is gone. Their antiaircraft and communications capabilities are totally dismantled.
And one of the problems they do have when they deal with us is, we deal with people and the people aren't able to communicate with anybody else, so—you know, because all of their leadership has been gone. The first level is gone, and they met to pick a new level, and they're gone. They're all gone because they didn't make a deal and because they're sick people.
They're really sick. They're really sinister, sick people. And if anybody thinks it was okay to have a group of people like this to have nuclear capability, nuclear weapons—and if we didn't attack with the B–2 bombers, they would have had a nuclear weapon within 2 weeks of that, maybe 4 weeks.
But between 2 and 4 weeks, they were planning to have a nuclear weapon. If we didn't hit them at that time with the B–2 bombers in one of the great air raids in history, maybe the greatest. Dark at night, no Moon, no light. Every single bomb hit its mark and just obliterated that place.
So it's now buried deep under earth, and it was an amazing thing.
But they would have a nuclear—and they would have used it, without question. And you know that, because why did they shoot all these countries that weren't even really involved with them? They weren't involved. They had no big problems. Because they're sick. Because they wanted to take over the Middle East, not just Israel.
Certainly, Israel would have been the first on their list. They would have used nuclear weapons—a nuclear. You don't need too many of them, but they would have used a nuclear weapon on Israel, and they would have used it on the other—their neighbors. And then they would have come after us.
And if we had a weak President, they would have done great damage. But fortunately, you don't have a weak President. I knew what was happening, and I think we've been proven right.
You know, they took—one missile, it went 2,500 miles. They supposedly didn't have a missile like that. They had no missile with that capability. But they shot the now famous Ireland—the island that the U.K. was very afraid to give us because they didn't want to get dragged in.
Well, we don't want to get dragged into their wars either, you know? It's one thing: We're very disappointed. I'll say it publicly, we're very disappointed with NATO, because NATO has done absolutely nothing.
And I've always said—25 years ago, I mean, I was somebody that wasn't a politician, but I was always involved in politics and I understood politics. I said 25 years ago that NATO is a paper tiger. But, more importantly, that we'll come to their rescue, but they will never come to ours. And I want you to remember that we said this. They didn't come to our rescue.
Now they all want to help, when they're annihilated—the other side is annihilated. They said, "We'd love to send ships." They actually made a statement, a couple of them, that: "We want to
get involved when the war's over." No, you're supposed to get involved with the war is beginning or even before it begins.
We had the U.K. say that "We'll send"—this was 3 weeks ago—"We'll send our aircraft carriers," which aren't the best aircraft carriers, by the way. They're toys compared to what we have. But: "We'll send our aircraft carrier when the war is over." I said: "Oh, that's wonderful. Thank you very much. We—don't bother. We don't need it." And we don't need it, and we don't need them.
We estimated it would take approximately 4 to 6 weeks to achieve our mission, and we're way ahead of schedule. If you look at what we've done in terms of the destruction of that country, I mean, we're way ahead.
Think of it. They have no navy. And they had good ships. A hundred and fifty-four ships have been shot down and are resting very nicely at the bottom of the sea. And we did that in a matter of less than a week, because we have the greatest military in the world by far. Nobody even close.
So we estimate it would take approximately 4 to 6 weeks to achieve our mission. Twenty-six days in, we're extremely—really, a lot ahead of schedule.
The Iranian regime is now admitting to itself that they have been decisively defeated.
They've—they're saying to people, "This is a disaster." They know it. That's why they're talking to us. They're only—they wouldn't talk otherwise. But they're talking to us because they've got a disaster on their hands. They're defeated. They can't make a comeback.
We're free to roam over their cities and towns and destroy all of their crazy nuclear weapons and missiles and drones that they're building, and we're doing that. They now have a chance to make a deal, but that's up to them.
And they'll tell you: "We're not negotiating. We will not negotiate." Of course they're negotiating. They've been obliterated. Who wouldn't negotiate? They are begging to make a deal. We'll see if we can make the right deal.
And if they make the right deal, then the Strait will open up—Hormuz Strait will open up.
And even now, we don't know if there are any mines.
You know, we—they have 22 mine—they call "mine droppers." Think of it. Who would have 22 mine droppers? This is a boat that drops mines. Who has 22 mine droppers, except for people with very evil intention?
So every one of those mine droppers has been struck with the same weapon we used to stop drugs from coming into the United States of America. When we hit those boats, it's the exact same weapon. Extremely effective. We have unlimited supplies, and extremely effective. But they have no more mine droppers.
By the way, speaking of drugs. We're 98-percent down drugs coming in by water, by the ocean, by the sea. Ninety-eight percent. And we're trying to find out who are the 2 percent, because we think they're the bravest men anywhere in the world. [Laughter] Maybe women. But whoever's on those boats is very brave or doesn't watch television. [Laughter] But we're—drugs coming in by sea, coming in by water are 98-percent down, and now we'll stop the drugs coming in by land.
The land is the easy one. You had to stop the water. A lot of it came in through water. Now, it's all pinched, and these people are trying to come in by land. And we will—that's the—that's the easy one. But we had to take care of the water first. Nobody's coming in. Very—virtually nothing is coming in anymore.
It was hundreds of millions of dollars a week were coming in by water.
But they now have the chance—that is Iran—to permanently abandon their nuclear ambitions and to charter a new path forward. We'll see if they want to do it. If they don't, we're their worst nightmare.
In the meantime, we'll just keep blowing them away unimpeded, unstopped, where there's not a thing they can do about it. They can't do anything about it, you know?
I'll tell you, if they could—if they could, you'd be hearing about it. You'd be hearing about it.
You don't hear anything about it. They can't shoot our jets. We have the best—we have the best military equipment in the world, no—not even a contest.
You see that with Venezuela. They had other equipment. They didn't have ours. It didn't work. Didn't work. Think of it. We did a—the situation in Venezuela, it was a great military operation: getting a very, very dangerous man who's killed a lot of people, forced people into our country. Incredible.
He emptied his prisons in Venezuela—emptied his prisons into our country, and I hope that charge will be brought at some point, because that was a big charge that hasn't been brought yet. It should be brought.
He emptied his prisons into our country and was a major purveyor of drugs coming into our country, and he's now been captured, and he'll, you know, I guess, be given a fair trial. But I would imagine there are other trials coming, because they have just the—they've really sued him just on a fraction of the kind of things that he's done. Other cases are going to be brought, as you probably know.
In the meantime, with Iran, we're going to keep doing what we've been doing. And nobody's a match for the United States, but they're not a match for the United States. It's small potatoes.
That's why I'm so disappointed in NATO, because this was a test for NATO. This was a test. "You can help us. You don't have to, but if you don't have—you know, if you don't do that, we're going to remember." Just remember. Remember this in a number of months from now.
Remember my statements.
They have an expression—a great expression: "Never forget." You can never forget.
So, as we end threats to America abroad, we're focused here at home on building the greatest economy in the history of the world.
Now, before this started, the Dow hit 50,000. The S&P hit 7,000. Both of those achievements were not achievable. They—every one of you—most of you, I guess, said, "You'll never hit 50,000 during a 4-year period" because it was too high a number.
Well, we hit it in our first year. And I said, "Well, now we have to take an excursion to Iran, and we have to stop this maniac," who's no longer with us. The Supreme Leader wasn't so supreme. No longer with us. It's very sad. "But we have to stop him from blowing up the world, blowing up the Middle East, and blowing up our country," and we did that.
And I thought—frankly, I thought the oil prices would go up more, and I thought the stock market would go down more. Hasn't been nearly as severe as I thought. I think they have confidence in maybe the—American President and maybe the people sitting around this table.
But Americans filing their taxes this year are receiving record-setting refunds. It's been a very big story. Well, it should be a big story. I don't think you write about it that much, but I speak about it. You know, I speak about it because if I speak about it, at least people hear. You don't write about it.
You don't write about the drug prices going down. They'll be going down 30, 40, 50, 60 percent, 70 percent. Favored nations. Called most favored nations. We're going to be paying the lowest price anywhere in the world.
Before, we paid the highest price in the world, Bobby. Right? And now we're going to pay the lowest price in the world. That's quite a difference. It's a difference of from 40 to 70 and 80 and even 90 percent. That's pretty big difference.
But we're slashing regulations, and investment is pouring in from all over the world. We have—the most investment of any country in history has been put into our country in the last year.
And again, we had to take a little detour. Won't be long. Going to end soon. We had to take a little detour, go to Iran, and we had to put out a fire. Very dangerous fire that could have blown up big portions of the world, if not the whole thing.
So tomorrow we'll be announcing a variety of actions that we're taking to support American farmers, who we never forget. We love the farmers.
We gave them $12 billion out of tariff money. We had a tremendous amount of tariff money come in, and we continue to have. We've gone—as you know, the Supreme Court gave us a very unfortunate, foolish ruling—a ruling that gives the people that have ripped off our country for many years—gives them some money back. But it's one of those things.
It's a terrible, terrible, horrible mistake they made. But it's okay, because we have another method that's just as good. We'll use the other method.
But because the tariff money has been so substantial, we gave our farmers, who have been mistreated by some countries—we gave them $12 billion, and they're extremely happy, and they deserve it.
They've been great. They never complain. They just go out, and they farm, and they wouldn't do anything different.
They wouldn't trade jobs with any of you, except maybe some of the fake media. I don't know. [Laughter] Somehow, I don't see that. I like their job better, actually. I love the farmers. So we gave them $12 billion.
So, in just a few moments, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will discuss the actions that we're taking to address energy prices, which have not gone up as much as I thought, Scott, to be honest with you. And I—you know, it's not over, so maybe it will go up a little bit more. It's all going to come back down to where it was and probably lower.
And my predictions have been right. Trump was right about everything. They have a new hat: "Trump Was Right About Everything." [Laughter] It's pretty right.
But Scott's going to address that.
And I think before we go very much further, I want to ask Vice President J.D. Vance to say a few words about where we are with the situation. He's involved with Steve and with Jared on negotiations.
And then some of the others will speak. We'll have Marco say a few words. Pete Hegseth, who's—who was born for this role. I mean, he's doing a great job. They gave him a hard time. And now, people—I'll tell you, somebody came up to me yesterday—gave you a very hard time—said: "You know, I made a mistake. Pete Hegseth is doing a good job."
Secretary of War Peter B. Hegseth. Thank you, sir.
The President. So, when I tell you who, you're not even going to believe it. [Laughter] He said, "Hegseth's"—he gave you such a nasty, hard time, but you're doing great.
And then Steve is going to speak, and Scott will speak last.
And if we have any questions, we'll take some questions. All right? You may have questions.
I doubt it, but you may have some questions. [Laughter] So, J.D., please.
Vice President Vance. Yes, sir.
Well, thank you. It's good to see everybody. Proud to be part of this team. Proud to be serving the President and the country.
Let me just say a couple of things. The—first of all is: The President summarized this very ably, but look, the Iranian conventional military is effectively destroyed. They don't have a navy. They don't have the ability to hit us like they could have even a few weeks ago. And what that does is that gives us options, Mr. President.
[At this point, Vice President Vance continued his remarks, concluding as follows.]
And so I want to say to all of my fellow American Christian, but particularly, those serving in the Gulf that I wish you all a very blessed Easter, a very blessed Holy Week, and we continue to stand behind you and continue to support you every step of the way.
Thank you, sir.
The President. Thank you very much. Marco.
Secretary of State Marco A. Rubio. The most important job any President has is to keep the American people safe. And every President says it, but we have a President that means it and does something about it.
As the President outlined very clearly to the world on the night this operation began, Iran has been at war with the United States for 47 years. For 47 years, Iran has been killing Americans and attacking Americans across this planet.
[Secretary Rubio continued his remarks, concluding as follows.]
And frankly, I think countries around the world, even those that are out there complaining about this a little bit, should actually be grateful that the United States has a President that's willing to confront a threat like this and not allow it to continue to persist, because these people will kill as many Americans as they have a chance to do. And if they have a nuclear weapon, as the vice president pointed out, they could kill millions of Americans in the future. And that is a risk that was not going to continue to exist as long as we had this President.
The President. Thank you, Marco. You know, it's very interesting, because yesterday I was watching—is it Anthony Blinken? And he was saying that they should have done it, but they didn't do it. Nobody did it. Nobody did it. For 47 years, Marco. That's the number. Forty-seven. I guess now it's 48 because we've been saying 47 for a long time.
Secretary Rubio. Yes.
The President. It's probably 48. But for 47, 48 years, every President should have done this.
And some are saying now that they made a big mistake in not doing it, but we're taking care of business.
Steve Witkoff, please.
U.S. Special Envoy for Peace Missions Steven C. Witkoff. Mr. President, it is my distinct honor to be a member of your Cabinet, and to report to you and your team on our negotiations with Iran.
Mr. President, you directed Jared and I to pursue a diplomatic resolution with Iran prior to Operation Epic Fury, which we did.
[Special Envoy Witkoff continued his remarks, concluding as follows.]
Iran is looking for an off-ramp following your powerful threat on Saturday. Your indications that you are willing to listen to peace proposals have been well received. You have instructed us that your preference is always peace and that we should make that our priority. We have delivered that message, sir, along with the 15 points for peace.
Finally, we have told Iran one last thing: Don't miscalculate again.
The President. Good. Thank you very much, Steve. Good job. Doing a great job. Everybody around this table has done a great job.
Pete Hegseth, please.
Secretary Hegseth. Mr. President. I'll start kind of where you left off, Mr. President. Thank you for doing the work of the free world and having the courage to step up and stop the Iranian terror regime from holding the world hostage. That's really what it is.
And 27 days ago, Iran had a modern military. Never in recorded history has a nation's military been so quickly and effectively neutralized. Operation Epic Fury is not an endless war. It's a decisive campaign with clear objectives to destroy Iran's military—offensive military capabilities and ensure they never obtain a nuclear weapon.
[Secretary Hegseth continued his remarks, concluding as follows.]
And finally, I want to thank our incredible troops—our pilots, crews, sailors, refuelers, air defenders. The absolute best of America, the real 1 percent of our country. This President, President Trump, has your back. And I know this Cabinet prays for you every single day, and we ask the American people to do the same as they continue in this mission.
God bless. Thank you, Mr. President.
The President. Thank you very much. That's great.
I think before I ask Scott to say a couple of words, it would be great if people like the mayor of Chicago and the Governor of Illinois would say, "Please come in and stop the crime."
A beautiful young lady was killed the other day, and the father was a very good friend of Dan Scavino. And he took it very hard. Dan took it very hard. He liked the father. Friends. They grew up together.
And it's a young lady who—whose life would be saved if we had—if we did what we did, as an example, in Washington, DC, which is now a safe city. All the time, people come up to me in the building—people that work here—they say, "Thank you so much." I know immediately what they're talking about. They're able to walk to work. They walk to work. You all walk to work.
Some of you were mugged. I know—you told me stories. Some of you were mugged. One person, in particular, was viciously mugged, in the group right here.
It's not happening anymore. You have a safe city.
Louisiana—the Governor of Louisiana called me, "Could you help me with New Orleans?" They just had the Mardi Gras. He said, "It was the safest Mardi Gras we've ever had." It sounds terrible to say: No murders. You know, it sounds like—who would say this? No murders. But they always had murders. They had a lot of crime during Mardi Gras. He said, "Virtually no crime." We had the troops down there.
Memphis, Tennessee, I just got back. We were there. Crime is down 75 percent in a short period of time. We were there 5 months.
We could do that for Chicago. We could do that for New York. We could do that for L.A.
And we could do that for, frankly, San Francisco. I know they have a mayor who's trying very hard. He's a Democrat, but he's trying very hard. But we could do it much more effectively, because he can't do what we do. He can't take people out from the city and bring them to—back to the country from where they came, where they were in prisons. They were allowed to go in prisons. They were drug dealers—the highest level of drug dealers. Murderers—11,888 murderers. We do things that they can't do.
I had friends calling me up from San Francisco, "Could you give him a chance?" I said: "Absolutely. If you want, I mean, we'll give him a chance." And he's trying. He's doing okay, but we could do much better. We could make it a lot safer than it is. San Francisco—a great city. Was a great city. Could quickly become a great city again. But you know, they're going very slowly.
I tell my friends—they're very substantial people. They're in a certain business where people have made a lot of money. I don't know, I hope that lasts, but they have a tremendous—tremendous potential. It was one of the greatest cities in the world. Now, it's got a lot of crime.
And the mayor is really trying. Again, a Democrat trying. And I spoke to him. He just wants to have a chance. And I said, "We'll give you a chance, but we can solve it very quickly."
This young lady would be around today if we were around, because we have nobody coming through our border. I mean, literally for 9 months, it's zero. I—I'm—it's hard to believe that that number can be possible, because millions of people came in through Biden. But nobody even tries.
We don't have the caravans of thousands—25-, 30,000 people pouring into our border. They come up in caravans. We don't have caravans anymore. There's no such thing anymore.
It was a name that I think I developed, but somebody developed it. But I think it was me. I thought it was an appropriate—thousands of people would come up and just barge into our country totally unchecked, totally unvetted.
And this man came in—Dan—right? And he came in through the ridiculous open border of Biden. If we were there—the election was rigged. What are you going to do? Came back. Big comeback. But if we were there, we wouldn't have had people coming through.
It's amazing. You know, it's so easy now because everyone knows they're not getting through. We don't have any caravans once they know that. When it was easy to come through—
When I heard that they had an open border policy, I said, "Boy, this is going to be"—I couldn't believe it, but when it was actually—
You know, it dawned on me, because I had built a thousand miles of wall, and we were finishing up some, and he didn't want to finish it up—Biden. I said, "They really do want to have an open border." And we got it finished.
But that young lady would be alive today, and she'd be alive for another reason: because we would have the National Guard in Chicago and in New York and in other places. And they love doing it. It's like training, to be honest. [Laughter] It's actually training.
I never want to take them out of DC I mean, maybe somebody later on will do it, but I never want to take. You know, the people—they look—they say: "We feel so good. We feel so safe. We see these beautiful, strong people, and they're so nice." They help—they open the doors for people. They carry bags. They pick up paper when they see paper on the ground.
I looked at DC the—last night, I drove to make a speech, and I drove through, and I said, "Take me this way. Take me that way." The city's clean. The fences are down. You don't have homeless all over your parks. I mean, we had parks you couldn't—there was no room for anything else other than homeless. It's all clean and nice. And it's—and it will be even more beautiful in a year from now.
And we have some projects that are great. This ballroom is going to be something that's so beautiful for this city, so desperately needed by Presidents. I mean, now it's no secret. The military wanted it more than anybody. It was supposed to be secret, but it became unsecret because of people that are really unpatriotic saying things, but doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It's going to be great.
We're building an arch, a triumphal arch, which will be incredible for the city. Incredible.
We're fixing up the—what was the Kennedy Center. Now we're going to—we—I was honored when the board changed the name a little bit. Actually, it shows that the Republican and the Democrats—they worked together. It's really something—we worked together. So I think it's a great symbol, actually.
But we're doing a lot of work. That building's ready to fall down. It's in terrible shape. We're closing it. We're going to open it with a bang in less than 2 years. It will come in under budget, ahead of schedule. That's what I do.
It won't be like the Federal Reserve that's costing $4 billion or something thereabouts. Think of it: $4 billion. You know, it's amazing—I said to the group before, I said, "Everything I do, I get sued." I build under budget, ahead of schedule. I get sued over a ballroom that's going to be the most beautiful ballroom in the country, so desperately needed. You won't have to have tents sitting on the wet White House lawn—if it rains, you get wiped out—to honor the President of China or the President of France or the President of somewhere.
Going to have the greatest—we get sued by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
They don't know what they're doing. Then I just found out we got sued by that group and another group, I guess, on the—fixing up of—again, I'll use the old name, Kennedy Center, because they're not fixing up Trump Kennedy—what—it's going to be beautiful when you add the name Trump.
But we got sued, and all I'm doing is fixing it up. We're fixing broken marble. We're putting on a roof because it leaks like a sieve. We're fixing steel that's broken. It's the same building—same exact building. We're fixing. It's going to be beautiful. It's going to be so beautiful—and safe. It's actually unsafe.
You had some of those columns on the outside that were painted a fake gold. Now we painted them a beautiful white color. A beautiful cream white. It's beautiful. Everyone say it's so much more beautiful now, instead of a cheap—you can't imitate gold. See, I'm a gold person. It's all real stuff. [Laughter]
You can't imitate it. They've—someday, they'll discover a paint that will look like gold, and the guy's going to be the richest man in the world. [Laughter] But you can't imitate real gold. It just doesn't—that's 24 carat, which is what this building deserves.
But think of it. I get sued because I'm fixing up the Trump Kennedy Center. We're going to make it gorgeous and safe. We're fixing new windows, new this, but just all fixed up. I got sued by preservationists.
But you know who they didn't sue? The man that took this beautiful Federal Reserve building. That's small—much smaller than the hotel I built. I built the Waldorf Astoria Hotel down the road, and it was a beautiful job, for $200 million—$201 million. It's bigger, I think, than the Federal Reserve building. And it's got rooms and bathrooms, and it's not, like, just an open office space, which is much cheaper to build.
Think of this. I hear he's going to be over $4 billion for a little building. He doesn't get sued by anybody but me. I sue because it's either somebody that's very crooked—which has to be, because what happened to all that money? You can't sue—I would have done that building for
$25 million. It's going to cost maybe $4 billion.
And we have a great new person coming in to take over the Fed. And Kevin may not ever have an office because I don't know if they're going to be able to build. I passed that building the other day. It's a see-through. You know what see-through means? There's no walls up, and they're going to spend—but the National Trust for Historic Preservation—which is a joke, by the way—they didn't sue that building. They didn't sue anybody, but they sue me, and I build—and by the way, my building is—it's all donations. Rich people and people are putting up the money. Zero taxpayer dollars. Is that right, Scott?
Secretary of the Treasury Scott K.H. Bessent. Yes, sir.
The President. Zero taxpayer dollars. This stuff is all done for free, and I get sued. This can only happen to Trump. [Laughter]
But they don't sue the guy whose interest rates are too high. That's why we call him "Too Late." His name is Jerome Powell. We call him Jerome "Too Late" Powell. And done a terrible job.
He suffers from Trump derangement syndrome, as he probably should because I hit him pretty hard, but—so I don't blame him.
But they don't sue a man who has taken this gorgeous building, ripped it down from the inside, taken ceilings that are as beautiful as you've ever seen—taking the ceilings down, instead of leaving them; taking walls down that were 2 feet thick of solid concrete and plaster, replacing them with 6-inch walls with no insulation.
I said, "Let me ask you: Are you going to put insulation in?" "No, it's not in the budget." "Oh." Insulation costs $5. [Laughter] Now you're going to hear the guy next door. If he's next door to me, I'll be able to hear his military plan. [Laughter] I'll know exactly. If Lutnick is in there, I'll say, "Oh, I know exactly what Lutnick's got planned." It's the craziest thing I've ever seen.
They've ripped this gorgeous building apart, and you can never build it again. You can—I could, but it's—would cost a lot of money. But a normal person can never build.
So you're going to have crummy little walls, a flat little ceiling, eventually. But right now you don't have anything.
And nobody sues this guy. And then when Jeanine Pirro, working with Pam and others, has the courage to sue to find out what happened to maybe $4 billion and a building that may never be occupied by Kevin Warsh—he may never get there. We're going to have to find him some space in the White House. We'll put him in the basement of the ballroom. [Laughter]
But—when—no, think of it. When Jeanine Pirro and Pam and the group, when they bring a suit, it's like, oh, this—terrible thing. And then we have a judge that attacks us. Attacks us.
So we've got to get our priorities straight. You know? It's a very sad thing that's happened with the Fed.
And then, just one other thing very quickly. You have Gavin Newscum in California—a railroad that's a hundred times over budget. It's out of control. It was supposed to go from the middle of San Francisco to the middle of L.A. Well, now it stops way short of both. It now goes into areas that nobody ever heard. It's billions and billions of dollars over budget, years and years, maybe decades, late.
And that's why we have a country that has a lot of problems. You know? We have incompetent people. It's all people.
Think of it. Federal Reserve. I would have had that building done for $25 million. I would have—if I did it, if it was up to—somebody else would have done it for more. So maybe 50. But you could have done that building—if it was properly done and planned, you would have done that building for—I would have done it for $25 million, and it would be better. It would be better.
See this pen right here? This pen is an interesting example. It's the same thing. So this pen is very inexpensive, but it writes well. I like it. But I can't have the pen the way it was. You know what it is? I don't want to give them too much publicity, but they do treat me well—Sharpie. [Laughter]
So I came here, and they have thousand-dollar pens. And you know, you hand pens out. You're signing, and you're handing them out. You're handing them. There's all these people. Sometimes you have 30, 40 people. And they were $1,000 apiece. Beautiful pen. Ballpoint. A thousand. It was gold, silver, gorgeous. But I'm handing it out to kids that don't even know what the hell—"What is this, Mommy?" There's—it's kids. They're getting a pen for $1,000. They have no idea what it is.
And I'm—and I feel guilty because I'm, like—you know, I'm—by nature, I don't—you know, it's the Government. I love the Government like I love myself. Economically, I want to save money. So I'm saying, "This is crazy."
And it had another problem: They didn't write well. So I take it out, and I sign, and there's no ink. And I've got all you people looking, and you're saying, "There must be something wrong with Trump." [Laughter] And I'm signing, and there's no ink in the pen, and it costs a thousand dollars.
That's when I call the guy. I said, "I'd like to use your pen, but I can't have a gray thing with a big "S" on it saying 'Sharpie' as I'm signing a—trillion-dollar airplane contract to buy brand-new fighter jets, band—brandnew B–2 bombers"—of which we just ordered plenty. "I can't do that with the press—use your pen. But I like the pen the best."
But I'll sign it. I could do like Biden did, you know? Give it to somebody else to sign or an autopen, or maybe sign it separately in another room.
"But I can't use your pen." He said, "Well, I can make it nicer." I said, "What can you do?" He said, "I'll paint it black." I said, "That's nice." "And I could even paint the White House on it, sir, if you like, in gold." Almost real gold. Not bad. "And I could even do your signature, sir."
And by the way, this was not staged. I just saw the pen sitting there, and I thought of this as an example of how $25 million spent by me at the Federal Reserve building would be a better job than $4 billion that they're spending.
And you know, one of the things that Kevin Warsh told me? He said, "They ripped down the nicest building." I don't know what building they're talking about. They ripped down a building, Scott, right? Kevin Warsh said, "It's the most beautiful building in Washington." He said, "The most beautiful space, they ripped it down." Why did they do that? I don't know. Do you know what he's talking about? Is it true?
Secretary Bessent. Yes, sir.
The President. They ripped it down. We have a moron at the Fed. Who wouldn't be lowering interest rates right now?
But I want to thank Jeanine Pirro and Pam and her group for having the courage to bring this suit. And I believe that the contractor on that job—he's probably one of the richest men in the country right now. I believe that. It's not possible to spend that kind of money—$3 billion, $4 billion. Nobody knows. Nobody has any idea what it is. But it's over $3 billion, and it's probably going to be over $4 billion by the time they finish. And it may never get finished, unless I take it over. I'll get it finished. But it can never be what it was.
It's never going to have those beautiful ceilings. It's never going to have those incredible walls. The walls were a foot and a half thick of solid masonry. They ripped them down for no reason.
And I just give you the story—and just to finish on this one. [The President held up a signing pen.]
So I told that story to somebody that said, "Yes, but, I mean—but it's not the same thing." I said: "You're right. This one is better." It writes.
So the guy said to me: "You don't have to pay me, sir. I'll give them to you for nothing." I said: "No, I don't want that. Let me pay you. I want to pay you." "No, sir, you don't have to.
You're the President of the United States." He was shocked. The head of Sharpie gets a call—[laughter]—I don't even know who the hell he is. [Laughter]
He said, "Is this really the President?" He said: "No, you don't have to pay me, sir. This is such an honor." I said, "Nope, I want to pay you." And he said, "What would you like to pay?" I said, "How about five bucks a pen?" I said—he said, "That's all right"—whatever the hell we agreed to—peanuts—as opposed to a thousand. And these were thousand-dollar pens, and we were giving them out sometimes—you know. You were there for signings. I'd have 30, 40 people standing behind me. I'd give out 40 pens to people. Then somebody would say, "Could I have a couple extra?" [Laughter] So I'd go like this: "Here, you want five? Here, take five." [Laughter]
But the bottom line is: They're better pens. It's a business story. So, for $5—could be zero—but for $5, I get a much better pen than for a thousand dollars. And I can hand them out. And actually, they've become hot as a pistol. So what can I tell you?
With that, could I give it to, please, a man who's done a great job at Treasury? Scott. [Laughter]
Good luck. Good luck, Scott. [Laughter]
Secretary Bessent. Well, sir, as always, you're a tough act to follow, but that is very illustrative. Your economic leadership has made our military mission possible.
Mr. President, national security, as you always say, is economic security. Your leadership has shown the American people that there is no prosperity without security, that our mighty military on one side, but the U.S. economic strength the—is fighting off this evil regime.
[Secretary Bessent continued his remarks, concluding as follows.]
Efforts to reprioritize economic security are ensuring the United States remains secure, resilient, and prepared for the challenges ahead.
As we approach the 250th anniversary, America will never be safer and more secure militarily and economically. Thank you.
The President. I just want to ask you a question. Is this guy central casting? [Laughter] I'm looking at him. I mean, Treasury. He might not be so good for War. I don't know. [Laughter]
Secretary Hegseth. You'd be pretty good. You'd be pretty good.
The President. No, I'm looking—pretty good too.
I'm looking at this guy. He's central casting. He's—even the glasses are perfect. Where did you get those glasses? [Laughter] I think I'm going to get glasses like that. [Laughter]
That's beautiful.
Secretary Bessent. Thank you, sir.
The President. Great job. That's really good.
No, he's done a great job, and you all have. Proud of you all. Do you have any questions?
Iran/Nuclear Weapons Development
Q. Yes. Mr. President, are you going to go in for the uranium? Like, how do you secure Iran and prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon?
The President. Let's assume I was or I wasn't. Why would I ever answer a question——
Q. Can you accomplish your goals without it?
The President. What kind of a question—am I going to go in for the—oh, yes, I'm going in.
We're going in tomorrow at 3 o'clock. [Laughter]
How could you possibly ask a question like that and expect an answer? I don't know. But—I don't know. I think you're a friendly person too. It's just such a ridiculous question.
Who——
[Several reporters began asking questions at once.] Go ahead, please.
U.S. Military Aid/Munitions Supply/Ukraine/Russia
Q. Thank you, Mr. President. There's been a report that potentially the U.S. is looking at diverting some munitions, air defenses that were meant for Ukraine to the Middle East. Is there any accuracy to that? Is that something you're considering?
The President. Well, I'd have to ask Pete. But we do that all the time. You know, we have tremendous amounts of ammunition. We have them in other countries, like in Germany and all over Europe. We have—you know, we're packed. And we take—sometimes we take from one and we use for another.
We helped Ukraine. It's—Biden started, and he gave $350 billion away. Too much. Way too much. And we sell it now to NATO. We sell it to NATO, and they probably give it to Ukraine—mostly, I think. They give it to Ukraine. But we get paid for everything that we—we don't give anything anymore.
It's a tough situation, that whole Ukraine situation—very, very tough. We're working very hard on getting that one solved. It doesn't have any impact on us, virtually nothing. In fact, if—if anything, I mean, we sell a lot of equipment for that unfortunate war.
Twenty-five thousand people died last month. Twenty-five thousand—mostly soldiers. Some in the towns, but for the most part soldiers. They're dying. And nobody's seen anything like it since World War II.
It's—a terrible situation. And hopefully, that's going to get settled.
You know, I settled eight wars. And many of them, I think, were more difficult than this one.
In theory, they were more difficult. But there's tremendous hatred between President Putin and President Zelenskyy. Tremendous hatred. I've seen it before, but I've never seen maybe to this extent.
And I think that's calming down a little bit. And I think we have a chance of getting it done.
But we—it—doesn't affect us. Thousands of miles away.
That's why it—when I heard the head of Germany say, "This is not our war" about Iran, I said, "Well, Ukraine's not our war. We helped, but Ukraine's not our war." I thought it was a very inappropriate statement to make. But he made it. He can't erase it. But he felt that way.
I said, "Well, you know, Ukraine's not our war." But—and it's not, but I would like to see all those young people stop being killed. I mean, they're being killed. It's like a slaughterhouse.
What's happening there is horrible. Twenty-five thousand—on our—last—2 months ago, it was 31,000 people died in 1 month, Marco, right? I looked—I said: "It's getting crazy. It's getting worse."
Think of it: 31,000 soldiers, both Russian and Ukraine, died 2 months ago; 25,000 last month. And if I can solve that, it would be a great honor to do it. I wish it could have gone faster.
The—you know, I solved other ones in 1 day that had been going for 32 years. We solved—we stopped one that was starting—it was already started: India and Pakistan. And the Prime Minister of Pakistan, a very fine gentlemen, said, "President Trump solved something that was going to cost 10 million lives." That was going to cost a lot of lives. Two—nuclear nations. And those were complicated, but we got them done quickly.
This one is a—it's a shame. And the only reason I'm doing it, frankly, is because I want to stop death. I want to stop the death from happening.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
I think I'll going to go with a man that I've missed. Brian [Brian Glenn, Real America's Voice], I haven't seen you in a long time.
Q. Mr. President, thank you so much.
The President. I missed you. He's been in a very strange location. I don't know. [Laughter]
Q. I'm in a different position.
The President. He's been—he's had a strange thing happen. But anyway, go ahead, Brian.
Gasoline Prices/Stock Market
Q. Well, good to see you too. Actually, good to see the entire Cabinet here. Linda, good to see you too.
You talked about gas prices coming down.
The President. Yes.
Q. Obviously, they will. But would you ever consider suspending the Federal gas tax in order to kind of temporarily alleviate some price——
The President. Well, some people should do that. As an example, in California, every time prices go down, his prices go up because the—you know, the gas tax is bigger than the tax itself—bigger than the product itself.
It hasn't—I mean, we've thought about it, I guess. But honestly, when I did this, I knew it was going to be a little bit—we had the greatest economy ever. We had the greatest stock market in history.
I said: "We're going to take a little bit of a hit, a short-term hit. It's going to end up going much higher than it was," in my opinion. I said—we're going to have a great stock market.
Nobody thought we could get to 50,000 or 7,000 in the respective indices. Nobody thought that that was going to happen. But it did in the first year. They said it couldn't happen in 4 years—that you wouldn't hit 50 in 4 years, but you could maybe get close. We hit it in the first year.
And I said, "This is a good time to solve a problem that you have to solve." And that's what I
did.
Q. And if I——
Commercial Driver's License/Fraud Enforcement
The President. But—the gas tax, you know, people have talked about it. It's something we have in our pocket if—if we think it's necessary.
Q. Wonderful. And if I can follow up real quickly. You just recently took off, Secretary Duffy—17,000 truckers off the road that could—quite frankly, could not speak English, which is a safety issue.
The President. Yes.
Q. Could we ever extend that to Uber drivers, Lyft drivers, cab drivers? For someone who takes a lot of Ubers, a lot of my drivers can't speak English.
The President. Oh, wow. That's not good. I didn't like that. Go ahead, Sean.
Secretary of Transportation Sean P. Duffy. So the—that's a really good point. The problem is that our States are the ones that issue these licenses.
So, with commercial driver's licenses, we do have some Federal control. But again, we have thousands of people who can't speak the language—long-standing rule—and it's a safety issue, right?
If you can't understand road signs, if you can't communicate with law enforcement when you're pulled over and communicate what's on your rig—huge problem.
But the last administration, Mr. President, they let truck driving schools self-certify that—they were qualified to train truck drivers.
And so this is like the "Learing" Center. [Laughter] So you pay $800, and you get a certificate that you passed a CDL driving school. And again, they have no skills. They never—they don't have the knowledge, and they don't have the skills. They haven't gone through any of the testing. And then they get licenses, and they're killing Americans on our roads.
So it's remarkable the rot that the last administration allowed to take place. We are ending that. And I need partnership with our States.
Even California started to come on board. Even Gavin has started to play ball with us, which is surprising.
The President. Shocking.
Secretary Duffy. Not all the way. A little bit of ball.
The President. Shocking. [Several reporters spoke at once.]
You know, it's interesting because I just saw something that the nursing home business and the day care centers, in particular—they went out and inspected them in Minnesota, and they didn't exist. They're knocking on—happens to be a young man. Nick. Nice, young man. He's done a very good job.
They're knocking on doors, and it's, like, homes, and they're getting hundreds of thousands of that. They didn't exist.
And in California, it's worse. It's even worse.
And I saw—I spoke with Russell Vought. I said, "Russell, don't send them any money." He said, "But we have a court order that we have to." Can you believe it? A judge.
The judges are really hurting this country. Our judges—Justice Roberts doesn't like when I say it. But the judges are really hurting this country. And frankly, the Justices—the Supreme Court has really hurt our country too.
Yes.
Iran/U.S. Diplomatic Engagement
Q. Mr. President, do you have a new deadline, given that there are some talks now? Do you have a new deadline before taking drastic action?
The President. No, I'll announce it. I mean, right now—you're talking about a deadline for doing some pretty big damage? Even bigger than we've done. Well, we'll see.
Look, we have very substantial talks going on with respect to Iran, with the right people.
You know, I told you about a present, right?
Steve, can I reveal the present?
Special Envoy Witkoff. You can do anything you want, sir. [Laughter]
The President. Thank you. They said, "To show you the fact that we're real and solid and we're there, we are going to let you have eight boats of oil." Eight boats. Eight big boats of oil. This was 2 days ago. "And they'll sail up tomorrow." That was 3 days ago.
And I didn't think much about it. And then I watched the news, and they said—a very good anchor, actually. Happened to be Fox. But I watched it, and he said, "Something's unusual happening. There are eight boats that are going right up the middle of the Hormuz Strait. Eight big tankers are going, loaded up with oil right through."
And I said, "Well, I guess they were right." And they were real. And I think they were Pakistani flagged.
Special Envoy Witkoff. Yes.
The President. And I said, "Well, I guess we're dealing with the right people." And actually, they then apologized for something they said. And they said, "We're going to send 2 more boats," and it ended up being 10 boats. All right?
I hope I haven't screwed up your negotiations. [Laughter] But I thought it was appropriate to say, because I did taunt you the other day by saying they're going to give us a present, that it was coming.
[Several reporters spoke at once.] Yes, please. Go.
U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement/Minnesota/Fraud Enforcement Efforts
Q. Mr. President, there were two—Mr. President, there were two illegal immigrants who were arrested at San Francisco Airport for ignoring deportation orders at the same time as you highlighted really great reception from American travelers for ICE agents. Is there a PR aspect of this that can allow future deportations to go on with less protesting, less outrage?
The President. Yes, our—it's amazing, because by putting ICE there—look the press was very unfair to ICE. So was everyone else. These are great American patriots.
They have a tough job. They have to find murderers and take them out of our country. I wouldn't want to do it. You wouldn't want to do it. Most people wouldn't want to do it. They do it.
And you know, 11,888 murderers. And that's murderers. That's not drug dealers. That's not lots of other things. It's not people from mental institutions. Entire jail populations were released from major countries and let into our country through the open border.
And ICE has done an amazing job. I wouldn't want that job. It's a tough job, dangerous job.
But——
Q. And just——
The President. So what happens is, by putting them at the airport—and I did say, "Do me a favor. Take off your masks." And they did, for that—not for when they're looking for some, you know, cold-blooded killers and they're in the—but for that. And they did. They took them off.
And the passengers, I see the interviews of people. They're saying, "These are nice people." One person said: "He's a very strong man, but he's a nice guy. He grabbed my bag." He helped a woman with a bag that she couldn't lift. And I'll tell you—I don't want to use the word "rehab" because there was nothing to rehab, but rehab from the press. You know, because the press is so tough on them.
And these crooks in Minnesota—these crooked politicians and dirty cops—they're dirty cops. They're dirty politicians. Walz is a dirty, crooked politician. The attorney general's a crooked guy. He's—no investigations.
And I hope J.D.'s going to do a great job. He's in charge of it now with somebody who's very talented.
But I think it's easy stuff. They say $19 billion—think of it—is missing. Nineteen billion.
Do you know, if we would solve half of the fraud problem, Pam, in this country, we would have more than a balanced budget.
We'd have—[laughter]—we'd have a surplus.
And in the case of Minnesota, it's a lot—it's very Somalia-oriented. Think of it. These people come from a crooked country, disgusting country, one of the worst countries in the world—acknowledged to be one of the worst countries in the world. Some people say it's the worst. They have no money. They have nothing.
They come to our country, low IQs, and they rob us blind. Stupid people, and they rob us blind because we have crooked politicians and we have dirty cops.
The attorney general's a dirty cop. It's my opinion. It's only my opinion. And something should be done about him.
Let's see what kind of a job we can do.
Q. Mr. President, yesterday you said——
Commercial Transit Through the Strait of Hormuz
Q. Mr. President, do you think Iran should be able——
Q. ——that you hate mail-in ballots——
The President. Excuse me?
Q. Should Iran be able to charge a toll for the Strait of Hormuz? They're charging some vessels to go through.
The President. Oh, yes. Well, should they be able to? You know, I mean, they shouldn't be able to, but they're doing it a little bit. I don't—look, their capability is a lot less than it was 2 weeks ago. And with every week and every day, frankly, it gets less and less.
All I can tell you is, they're begging to make a deal. So let's see what happens. We may make a deal.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
The President's Use of an Absentee Ballott/Election Reform
Q. Mr. President, yesterday you said that you hate mail-in ballots, but you recently——
The President. Tell me about mail-in ballots.
Q. ——you recently voted——Go ahead. I—yes, you mean I——
Q. ——with a mail-in ballot.
The President. ——used a mail-in ballot, you're probably saying? Yes, I did.
Q. Why did you use that?
The President. You know what?
Q. Is it a reliable——
The President. Because I'm President of the United States. And because of the fact that I'm President of the United States, I did a mail-in ballot for elections that took place in Florida, because I felt I should be here instead of being in the beautiful sunshine taking——
Q. But you were in Palm Beach, sir, the last few weekends.
The President. That's right. And I—yes.
Q. Could you have gone in person?
The President. And I decided that I was going to vote by mail-in ballot because I couldn't be there because I had a lot of different things.
But, you know, we have exceptions for mail-in ballots. You do know that, right?
So, if you're away, we have an exception. If you're in the military, we have an exception. If you are on a business trip, we have an exception. If you're disabled, we have an exception. And if you're ill, if you're not feeling good, we have a—so, I was away, mostly in Washington, DC, so I used a mail-in ballot. But I appreciate the question because I know——
Q. And you consider it reliable?
The President. ——I know it was so well meaning. Yes.
Q. Mr. President, yes, I just—actually just looked up the company that owns Sharpie and they—stock turned positive after you mentioned it. But a question on—[laughter]—a question on Iran. Question on Iran.
The President. By the way, they deserve it.
Q. Yes. Question on Iran.
The President. It's a good product.
Commercial Transit Through the Strait of Hormuz
Q. So, you gave a 5-day deadline. With oil tankers going through the Strait of Hormuz, is that a condition to move that 5-day deadline?
The President. Well, we want—we don't want anything impeded. We want ships to go through.
We don't know that they've dropped any mines, by the way, because we blew up all their mine droppers, right? We blew up every one of them. They're going to have to take them out on a rowboat or something. I don't know how the hell they get them out there. But we don't really know
You might speak to it.
[The President gestured to Secretary Hegseth.]
We don't know. There could be a few of them out there, but that's a lot. You know, if you have a billion-dollar ship and you get hit by a mine, it's not the greatest thing in the world.
So, if you think—the problem with that—that's not like you've decimated a military. If you think there may be a mine, that's a bad thought, and it stops things up.
How are we doing in that regard, Pete?
Secretary Hegseth. We—Mr. President, you're right. We have so heavily degraded their coastal defense capabilities and their naval capabilities that any strategical operational attempts to do those types of things are extremely limited. And we continue to move over the top of that.
Now, whether Iran makes a wise choice or not to try to execute that is part of how this deal comes together. But with every passing day, the military pressure that we're putting on them lessens their ability to really hold that militarily at issue.
The President. I mean, the problem with the issue of the Hormuz Strait is this: We've decimated them as a military. No air force, no navy, very few rockets left. We blew up so many. Hard to manufacture them. Same thing with drones. The leadership is gone.
The problem with the Straits is this. Let's say we do a great job. We say, "We got 99 percent." One percent is unacceptable because 1 percent is a missile going into the hull of a ship that costs a billion dollars. Right? So 1 percent is—we can't—if we do a 99 percent decimation, that's no good.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
So it's, really, you know, a little—bit—but I have a feeling it's going to clean up pretty quickly.
Q. How close are you to a coalition?
The President. I could just say this. They want to make—they want to make—and I—I probably hurt our little negotiation. It gives them a little impetus to say, "Well, I wish you didn't say that." But they said yesterday that we weren't negotiating with them, and now they admit that we were negotiating with them.
So they want to make a deal. The reason they want to make a deal is they have been just beat to shit.
Iran/U.S. Diplomatic Engagement/Oil Supply and Refining/Venezuela
Q. Are you thinking of taking control of Iran's oil?
The President. It's an option. I mean, I wouldn't talk about it, but it's an option.
Q. Is that something you've thought about?
The President. Well, in Venezuela, we've done very well working with Venezuela, certainly.
And we've taken in billions and billions of dollars.
And by the way, Venezuela's doing better right now than they've ever done in the history of their country. And sort of like a joint venture, but the United States has made a lot of money—Marco, right?—with it. Do you want to talk about that for a second?
Secretary Rubio. About Venezuela?
The President. Yes.
Secretary Rubio. Yes. I mean, I think Venezuela, in the first 2 months of this year, generated more revenue from oil sales than they had in most of all of last year. But the money's not being stolen anymore. And it's being held in a U.S. Treasury blocked account. And to the extent it's flowing to the Venezuelan government, it's going to help people, like fund hospitals, pay teachers. It's not being stolen.
The President. And we get a lot of it. And they got more than they have in many years.
Secretary Rubio. Yes.
The President. Think of it. We get a lot of it. We have a deal. We get a lot of it.
We had a hundred million—think of this—a hundred million barrels we took in in the first 2 weeks. A hundred million barrels. That's a lot of oil. It's a lot of ships. And we got some and they got some. We paid for the ships. A lot of money left over.
And Venezuela has done—better now with us. Call it a partner. Call it whatever you want.
We've made a lot of money, and they've made a lot of money. We've paid for the cost of that military hit many, many times over. And we've only just started.
Our relationship with Venezuela has been amazing. The people—actually, I'm the highest-polling person. In—other words, after the Presidency, I think I may go to Venezuela and run for President against Delcy. [Laughter] I may run against Delcy. It's an option. No, I—they like me in Venezuela.
But that's an option for me. It's a wonderful option. Yes, please.
U.S. Military Operations in Iran
Q. Mr. President, there are some reports that Gulf allies are concerned about winding down the war too soon and potentially leaving Iran——
The President. Well, they'd probably like us to stay, but——
Q. But the concern——
The President. If we don't stay—look, that's a beautiful thing about airplanes that go 2,000 miles an hour is you can get back there very quickly.
If we don't stay, we're going to be protecting them. We know we—you know, they've been very good. Hey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia—in particular, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, U.A.E., the three of them—Kuwait, Bahrain—they've been a hundred percent.
Now, in all fairness, you know, they could have gone the other way. They were surprisingly missiled. They were shot at. Nobody ever thought they'd be shot at. U.A.E. had 1,400 missiles aimed at them. Fortunately, they had the greatest antimissile weapon in history called the Patriot. Almost every single missile was shot down.
You know, we had an incident recently where 101 missiles were shot at a certain thing that we own that's very valuable. Hundred and one missiles going 2,000 miles an hour. Out of the 101 missiles, every single one of them was shot down in midair and fell into the ocean. It's amazing technology. There's—nobody has equipment like we have.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
Q. Is it even possible, though, to wind down the war? While Iran still has that enriched uranium, is it even possible to wind down?
The President. Well, you're going to have to see. But you know, I think we'll be—we're in just very good shape. We're roaming—you know what we're doing? You know the word "roaming free"? We're over their skies with the most beautiful planes you've ever seen, roaming free. There's not a damn thing they can do about it.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
And it would be nice if, like, the fake news New York Times, which writes so fake—and The Wall Street Journal is terrible. Terrible. I mean, I read a story today that I'm desperate to make a deal. I'm not—I don't—if I was desperate, he'd be the first to know.
"Pete, let's get the hell out of there."
Secretary Hegseth. Nope.
The President. I'm the opposite of desperate. I don't care. I want to—in fact, we have other targets we want to hit before we leave. We're——
Q. The uranium?
The President. ——hitting them on a daily basis.
No, I—don't talk about—I can't talk about specifics. A lot of people said that wouldn't matter. Maybe it does matter. Who knows? But I wouldn't talk.
It's like the question this young lady asked. Sorry about—I embarrassed her. I don't want to embarrass you because I think you're of—I think she's a friendly reporter, so I'm sorry.
But you know, I can't say what we're going to do because if I did, I wouldn't be sitting here for long. They'd probably—what is it called? The 25th Amendment. Huh? [Laughter] They'd institute the 25th Amendment——
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
——which they didn't do with Biden——
Secretary of Commerce Howard W. Lutnick. Amazing.
The President. ——which is shocking. [Several reporters spoke at once.]
Q. The heart of the question is, when will it feel safe enough to leave the region? Because Steve said that they've got enough uranium to make 11 bombs. That's a very scary thing. So, when people hear that——
The President. Well, it's—again, I can't talk to you about that.
Q. Okay.
The President. You're asking me a question. You're essentially saying: Will I go in and do something? I can't talk to you about that.
Commercial Transit Through the Strait of Hormuz/Domestic Oil Production
Q. Mr. President, you're looking at a coalition of ships to help—warships to help——
The President. Yes.
Q. ——protect tankers. How close are you to getting that coalition?
The President. Well, we have a coalition formed, but they should have been up here a long time ago. And you know, they're affected.
The amazing thing is, we don't need the Hormuz Strait. We don't need it. We don't need it at all. We don't—we have so much oil. Our country is not affected by this. We have more—we have twice the amount of oil as Saudi Arabia or Russia, and soon it'll be three times the amount.
Chris, do you want to speak to that for a second?
Secretary of Energy Christopher A. Wright. Yes, that's correct. Our total oil production is greater than Saudi Arabia's plus Russia and more than we consume in the United States. We're the largest——
The President. Pretty good. Pretty good.
Secretary Wright. Yes. Pretty—that's——
The President. You know what they call it? Drill, baby, drill.
Secretary of the Interior Douglas J. Burgum. Yes.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
The President. Anything else you want to say?
Secretary Wright. Well, it's same thing for natural gas. We—before your first term, we were the largest exporter of natural gas in the world. Today, we're just by far the largest—I mean, we're the largest importer. Now we're by far the largest exporter.
And it's growing rapidly this year. New facilities are coming online.
The President. We're doing an amazing—
Secretary Wright. New production's ramping up. So——
The President. We're doing an amazing job. We're getting a lot of help from that man right over there. He is getting approvals done quickly and—and very environmental—he's an environmentalist, actually. He's—he does a great job. But he gives you a fast approval or rejection.
Do you have anything to say?
Secretary Burgum. Well, back on Venezuela, we're—Chris and I have both had a chance to be there. I literally think they're going to put a—statute to President Trump. And I'm not being—it's not a political statement. It's an actual thing.
The President. I hope so. That would be a great honor. [Laughter]
Secretary Burgum. No, because it's, like, they view President Trump like Simón Bolívar.
He's the liberator of a country. And this is a country where they—you know, they love American baseball. You look on the street, they're wearing NBA jerseys. And Delcy and her team, working with us, getting back—Chris and I both experienced: It was the first time in Venezuelan history that they had the free press allowed to come onto the—essentially, what's their—White House, the Palacio of Miraflores.
The President. Yes.
Secretary Burgum. And it was, like—it was an emotional thing for people that had been—for 20 years had never had a chance to be there.
So whether it's the—and then production. It's showing up in production. The American companies that are coming back, most of those American companies have many American Venezuelan team members. One company in Houston's got 600 Venezuelan Americans that know more about reviving that industry.
So their GDP went—is at one-fourth of what it was before. They want to get back. They remember what it was.
Their production on—oil production is going to—is climbing towards 50 percent increase just in the 3 months we've been here. That flows to American refineries on the Gulf Coast, lowering the price of gas in America.
So it's a——
The President. Forget that. When are they going to do the statue? [Laughter] To hell with the others.
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
Prime Minister Keir Starmer of the United Kingdom/North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Q. Thank you. You've been really honest about how disappointed you are in Sir Keir Starmer, particularly in relation to Iran. So I'm curious about your phone calls with him, how easy they might be. And also, were you surprised by how——
The President. Are we talking about Starmer?
Q. Yes.
The President. Oh.
Q. And are you surprised by how weak military——
The President. I think he's a lovely man. I do. I think he's a lovely man. But I think he did something that was shocking. He didn't want to help us. And maybe, in particular, that country. You know, we were the longest bond, the longest ally.
Australia too. Australia was not great. I was a little surprised by Australia.
I wouldn't say anybody was great, other than the five countries in the Middle East. We were—we never really had very much support.
You know, we spend trillions of dollars supporting countries, and this is little league. This isn't the big-league deal. This is sort of little league pool for us. This was an easy—this was—look, we decimated them in a period of a week. The—in the first week, it was over. In the first few days, it was over. I think their navy took us 3 days to essentially annihilate that it—they weren't there. So, if there's ever a big one, which I hope there's not—but if there's ever a big one, I don't think they're going to be there.
Q. And could he explain his reluctance?
The President. And that's not fair. And we have to remember that as a country, because we spend trillions of dollars protecting Europe, protecting the countries of NATO.
They weren't there for us for small-time. This is small-time. You know what? Venezuela is a big deal, but it's not the big one. They weren't there. So, what makes you think they'd be there if we needed them for something?
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
And your Prime Minister was not there, as you know.
Q. Yes. Did he give you any——
The President. He was there after we won. He said, "We'd like to send some ships." I said, "We already won." [Laughter] "We don't need them anymore."
Q. But could he explain why he was reluctant to help?
The President. Why he what?
Q. Why he was reluctant to help with Iran.
The President. He didn't have to. I didn't ask him. I just said, "Just tell me no." I mean, we're always going to be there—at least we were. I don't know about anymore, to be honest with you. I would have to be honest. We were always there when they needed help. We always would have been there when they needed help.
I mean, think of it. We're there to protect Europe from Russia. In theory, it doesn't affect us. We have an ocean—big, fat, beautiful ocean. But we're there to protect NATO, to protect them from Russia. But they're not there to protect us. It's a ridiculous—it doesn't make sense.
I'll tell you, a lot of people were big NATO people. I was never big. I was okay. I got them to pay 5 percent. By the way, they haven't paid it yet. You know that. You know, I got them to pay 5 percent—from 2 percent to 5 percent. They didn't pay it yet. I got them to pay up to 2 percent because they weren't paying the 2 percent. Then I got them to pay 5 percent, which they should be at. And we had a lot of: "Oh, that was great, great. Oh, only Trump could do it." But the problem is, they haven't paid, because if you look at the numbers, they haven't paid yet.
So we were there for them, but they were not there for us. Did we need them? No. I never thought we needed them. I was more doing a test. I said: "I really would love to have you come up. Bring your boats. You can sail through the beautiful Hormuz Straits, and you can protect people that are being shot at." They didn't do it. And that's small potatoes.
Q. Yes.
The President. Do you understand what I'm saying?
Q. Yes, I do.
The President. Go ahead. [Several reporters spoke at once.] Go ahead.
King Charles III of the United Kingdom/U.S. Defense Relationship With the United Kingdom
Q. I was just going to say: Does it affect the state visit with the King that you're going to have in April? Are you looking forward to that?
The President. With the King? No.
Q. With the king from England.
The President. No. He's a friend of mine. He's a great gentleman. As you know, he honored me and our country. He really honored our country. But we had an amazing time. I've known him as Prince Charles. I know him as King Charles. I'm proud of him. He's fighting a tough battle.
He's tough. I think he's a fantastic—it has nothing to do with that. It's different. But—and we're going to—he's going to be here very soon, as you know. We're going to have a state dinner. It's going to be great.
But I was very disappointed when the Prime Minister said, "I won't be able to." It started with the island. The island that the Indigenous have claimed away from your country. And for some reason, you went for it. And all of a sudden, Indigenous people that never saw the place—they never saw it. He was afraid that we would do something to insult—because he's so liberal. That's the way they think. [Laughter]
[Several reporters spoke at once.]
And when we needed the island to land that beautiful B–2 bomber, we were told we can't use it. We'd have to fly back to Missouri, which is a 17-hour flight, as opposed to a couple of hours. And I said, "You've got to be kidding." Not good. They made a big mistake.
Iran/U.S. Diplomatic Engagement
Q. Is the Friday deadline for Iran, is that pushed back now? Or—and if not——
The President. I don't know yet.
Q. ——what do you need to say——
The President. I don't know.
Q. ——you haven't decided yet?
The President. I'll—Mr. Witkoff and J.D. and Jared will tell me whether or not they think it's going along. And if it's not going along, maybe not. And we have a lot of time.
You know what? It's a day. In Trump time, a day—you know what it is? That's an eternity. [Laughter]
Europe/Migration Issues/Democratic Party/2024 Presidential Election/The President's Mental Acuity
Q. Mr. President, European Parliament just passed a major deportation——
The President. Say it. What?
Q. European Parliament just passed a major deportation plan. Some of the tenets of it are that member states can deport rejected asylum seekers to third countries regardless of whether they have a connection to it. It allows for—detention periods of up to 2 years and also offshore return hubs or detention centers similar to ours. The vote——
The President. Who did this? Who just—which country?
Q. European Parliament. And the vote was not close. It was 389 in favor——
The President. Good.
Q. ——to 208 against.
The President. I'd vote——
Q. So Europe is——
The President. I'd vote with them, yes.
Q. Europe is where you are now. Do you think that will move the needle with Democrats?
The President. I don't care about the Democrats. The Democrats hate our country. The Democrats are in chaos right now, and they have no common sense. You know, they have one quality that's amazing: They stick together. And it's harder because they stick together on ridiculous policy, like men playing in women's sports. Open borders for everybody, including murderers and anybody else that want to: "We're open to you. Come in, murderers."
You know why they do that? They do that for a couple of reasons, but they do it for votes because they think they're going to vote for the Democrats.
Even though I did great with the Hispanic vote. Tremendous with the Hispanic vote. We—you know, I turned that whole thing around. The Hispanics like me, and I like them.
And, you know, it's interesting with Hispanics. When I built the wall, everybody said, "Oh, that's going to ruin us for the Hispanic." It was just the opposite. They know all about immigration, and they all about death and crime, and they're smart people, and they have common sense. They wanted to be protected from the people that were coming into our country.
So, you know, I won the election with a very tremendous Hispanic vote, and I think it's higher now than it was then.
So we're a party of common sense. The Democrats are a party of insanity. They're a party that will destroy our country. If I didn't win this election, I believe our country would've been destroyed by now. One year, that's all it would've taken. If you had Kamala or Sleepy Joe—either one, it wouldn't have mattered. They're the same thing. Two sleepy people. Two stupid people.
I believe—and by the way, Gavin Newscum, who is one of the candidates, I believe he took himself out of the running when he says he is—he suffers from mental disability. And a reporter said it was terrible that I talk that way about somebody with mental disability. I said, "I have no problem with it, but I don't want a person with mental disability to be my President." I mean, you don't want to have a person with mental disability being a President. And Gavin Newsom said that he can't read a speech. He can't do almost anything.
And then he said he's as dumb as all the people in the room. And he got accused of being a racist, which was an amazing—I thought it was the worst interview I've ever seen anybody give.
He's actually a very stupid person. So I believe he's out of the running. I think that that statement, that interview—he admitted that he's a stupid person. I don't want a stupid person being President.
You know, I'll say it right now. I say it because no press ever reports it. I'm the only President that ever took a cognitive test. I took it three times. It's actually a very hard test for a lot of people. It wasn't hard for me. But it's a cognitive test. It starts off with an easy question. And by the time you get to the middle, it gets tougher. By the time you get to the end, very few people can answer those questions. They get very tough. Mathematical equations and things.
I took it three times. I aced it all three times in front of numerous doctors that I have no idea who they all—who are—who they are. And I was told when I went in, I—they said—Doc Ronny told me this. My current doctors are fantastic doctors. They said: "Well, if you take it, you know, it's Walter Reed. It's essentially a public hospital. And if you do badly, it's probably going to get out." But I aced it. I got them all right.
And one doctor said, "I've never seen anybody get them all right. I've been doing the test for 20 years."
I want people—I would love to see anybody that's a President or a Vice President or anybody that has any chance of being a President—I would like to see them take a cognitive test, because we had a man in this office that had no clue what was happening. And let me give you a little secret: He wasn't a smart man 30 years ago.
And I'll tell you about President Obama. He wasn't a smart man either. I know all about him.
He wasn't a smart man. Highly overrated. He was a great divider, and our country can't go through that anymore. Can't go through.
We have done an amazing job. I had to do a little stopover. I call it an excursion. I had to do a little stopover in Iran, and we had to knock the hell out of them because our country would not have been safe. The world wouldn't have been safe.
I've done a great favor for the world. The world has not been—it has not been reciprocal, because when I told NATO—where we give billions and billions of dollars, trillions over the years—I said, "Do you mind coming up and giving us a little hand with the straits? Send up some"—they didn't want to get involved. And I believe that's going to cost them dearly.
Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you. Thank you. [Several reporters spoke at once.]
Thank you very much.
NOTE: The President spoke at 10:36 a.m. in the Cabinet Room at the White House. In his remarks, he referred to Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer; former President Nicolas Maduro Moros of Venezuela, who was captured, along with his wife Cilia Flores, in a U.S. military operation in Caracas, Venezuela, on January 3 and exfiltrated to the U.S. for criminal processing
in New York City; Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.; former Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken; Mayor Brandon Johnson of Chicago, IL; Gov. Jay R. "J.B." Pritzker of Illinois; Thomas Gorman, father of Sheridan Gorman, a Loyola University Chicago student who was killed in Chicago, IL, on March 19; White House Deputy Chief of Staff Daniel J. Scavino; Gov. Jeffrey M. Landry of Louisiana; Mayor Daniel Lurie of San Francisco, CA; Jose Medina, suspect in the shooting of Ms. Gorman; Chairman of the Federal Reserve System Board of Governors Jerome H. Powell; Kevin M. Warsh, the President's nominee to be Federal Reserve Chairman; U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro; Attorney General Pamela J. Bondi; James E. "Jeb" Boasberg, chief judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia; Gov. Gavin C. Newsom of California; President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia; President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine; Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany; Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan; independent journalist Nicholas Shirley; Gov. Timothy J. Walz and Attorney General Keith M. Ellison of Minnesota; Andrew Ferguson, Chairman, Federal Trade Commission; Acting President Delcy Rodriguez Gomez of Venezuela; Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee M. Zeldin; former Vice President Kamala D. Harris, in her capacity as the 2024 Democratic Presidential nominee; and Rep. Ronny L. Jackson, in his former capacity as Chief Physician to the President. He also referred to his son-in-law, U.S. Special Envoy for Peace Jared C. Kushner. Reporters referred to Secretary of Education Linda E. McMahon; and Angelina Lopez-Jimenez and her daughter Wendy Godinez-Lopez, who were arrested at the San Francisco International Airport in California on March 22.
Categories: Addresses and Remarks : Cabinet meeting; Interviews With the News Media : Exchanges with reporters, White House.
Locations: Washington, DC.
Names: Bessent, Scott K.H.; Biden, Joseph R., Jr.; Boasberg, James E. "Jeb"; Burgum, Douglas J.; Charles III, King; Duffy, Sean P.; Ellison, Keith M.; Gorman, Thomas; Hegseth, Peter B.; Jackson, Ronny L.; Johnson, Brandon; Kennedy, Robert F., Jr.; Kushner, Jared C.; Landry, Jeffrey M.; Lurie, Daniel; Lutnick, Howard W.; Maduro Moros, Nicolas; Medina, Jose; Merz, Friedrich; Mullin, Markwayne; Newsom, Gavin C.; Obama, Barack; Pirro, Jeanine; Powell, Jerome H.; Pritzker, Jay R. "J.B."; Putin, Vladimir Vladimirovich; Roberts, John G., Jr.; Rodriguez Gomez, Delcy; Rollins, Brooke L.; Rubio, Marco A.; Scavino, Daniel J.; Schumer, Charles E.; Sharif, Shehbaz; Starmer, Keir; Vance, James D. "J.D."; Vought, Russell T.; Walz, Timothy J.; Warsh, Kevin M.; Witkoff, Steven C.; Wright, Christopher A.; Zeldin, Lee M.; Zelenskyy, Volodymyr.
Subjects: 2024 Presidential election; Absentee ballots; Attorney General; Australia, defense relationship with U.S.; Border security; Cabinet meetings; California, Governor; California, high-speed railway connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco; Department of Homeland Security, appropriations legislation; District of Columbia, law enforcement improvement efforts; Economic improvement; Election security and integrity, strengthening efforts; Environmental permitting process, improvement efforts; Environmental Protection Agency; Europe, migration issues; Farmers, Federal assistance; Federal Reserve System; Fraud enforcement, strengthening efforts; Gasoline costs; Germany, Chancellor; Illegal drugs, interdiction efforts; Illegal immigration; Illinois, Governor; India, relations with Pakistan; Iran, commercial transit through Strait of Hormuz; Iran, diplomatic engagement with U.S.; Iran, nuclear weapons development; Iran, U.S. airstrikes on nuclear facilities; Iran, U.S. military operations; John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; Louisiana, Governor; Louisiana, law enforcement improvement efforts in New Orleans; Minnesota, Governor; Minnesota, Somali immigrants; National Guard; National Trust for Historic Preservation; North Atlantic Treaty Organization; Office of Management and Budget; Oil and natural gas, domestic production; Pakistan, Prime Minister; Pakistan, relations
with India; Prescription drug costs, reduction efforts; Russia, conflict in Ukraine; Russia, President; Secretary of Agriculture; Secretary of Commerce; Secretary of Energy; Secretary of Health and Human Services; Secretary of Homeland Security; Secretary of State; Secretary of the Interior; Secretary of the Treasury; Secretary of Transportation; Secretary of War; Senate minority leader; Stock market; Supreme Court Chief Justice; Suspected drug-trafficking vessels,
U.S. airstrikes in Caribbean Sea and Eastern Pacific; Tariffs; Tennessee, law enforcement improvement efforts in Memphis; U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; U.S. military readiness, improvement efforts; U.S. servicemembers, service and dedication; U.S. Special Envoy for Peace; U.S. Special Envoy for Peace Missions; Ukraine, President; Ukraine, Russian invasion and airstrikes; United Kingdom, defense relationship with U.S.; United Kingdom, King; United Kingdom, Prime Minister; Venezuela, Acting President; Venezuela, oil supply and refining; Venezuela, U.S. military capture and exfiltration of President Maduro; Vice President; White House Ballroom construction project; White House Deputy Chief of Staff.
DCPD Number: DCPD202600208.