Donald Trump (00:00):
So if you look up at the top, you'll see some interesting things and I'll show that to you in a second. You want to grab that please? I'll show that to you in a second. It's the facade of the building. There will never be another building like this built, that I can tell. I built a lot of great things, but there will never be anything like this built. And what we have is the roof is dead flat with absolutely nothing but strength on it. It's very strong steel. It's drone proof and it's meant for our military to be able to stay on it. You get a view of Washington.
(00:35)
Also for the drone building capacity, some of that takes place right down here. You can see the very large piping and the other things that, it's a very complex building. It's all knit together. The roof goes with the ground floor. The ground floor goes with the roof. The roof also goes down into the basement. Everything is connected, intertwined, elevators, heating, air conditioning. It's one building. That's why we're trying to explain that. This is one well knit building. One thing doesn't work without the other.
(01:12)
Very importantly though, in terms of the beauty, probably the closest thing to this would be the US Supreme Court, the facade of the US Supreme Court. So here's a couple of things you can look at. How are you? All right? There will never be another thing like this, I don't believe, built from a cost standpoint. This is all my money and donor's money. This is tax-free. So everyone's talking about they're going to give money, they're going to give money. The money they're going to give is really for the security of that and the whole White House premises. And I guess you probably need that nowadays.
(01:54)
We've done the fencing on the outside of the White House. It's all titanium. You see the black fencing. That's been just done recently and it was approved originally by me and it's been completed and it's very powerful, very powerful. A tractor, a bulldozer cannot knock it over. It goes down deep and it's titanium, which is the strongest of all of the metals. Much stronger than steel as an example. The ballroom is all ... It's going to be a tremendous thing.
(02:22)
As an example, what happened a couple of weeks ago at the White House Correspondents' Dinner could not happen here. One thing that we have is we don't have people living above it. We don't want that. That's no good. They have a thousand units above it with the elevator coming right down next to where the convention or whatever it may be is.
(02:42)
So this is a room that's been wanted for 150 years by presidents. We have no room to have an event. The only way you can have an event is if you build a tent on the lawn and the tent would not do the job. And by the way, if it rains here, because this is built on a wetland, the lawn is impossible to deal with. The water goes over everybody's shoes. It literally goes over the shoes. And they've had a lot of catastrophes with the tent.
(03:11)
So we have this and if you take a look at this section, this is the different facade. So this is a Greek, more or less, it comes out of Greece. This is the ultimate facade for Greece. This faces the Treasury Building. This faces, this is a different facade, that's Rome and that faces the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, et cetera. So you have two facades. Primarily you have two entrances. You have here, you have here, but the primary entrance is through the White House, directly through the White House. And it's really something.
(03:51)
I think you can see the complexity. All of these columns go directly up to the roof and the roof is a barrier. It's a shield because it's made out of ... The side walls are steel, impenetrable steel, and also impenetrable glass. The glass is approximately four inches thick and yet it's amazing. You can see through it as though it didn't exist. It's amazing. And it can stop just about anything, just about anything. On the other side of the glass, we have steel and concrete so that the glass is very powerful. What's holding the glass is equally as powerful. And that's here.
(04:33)
You can see they're just about ready to go up to the top. All of these columns, they go directly right to the roof of the building. And again, we call it a drone port. It's set up for unlimited numbers of drones. Purposefully, we don't have any air conditioning equipment up there because we don't want anything coming down through the pipes if anybody gets ... Normally you'd have a lot of air conditioning equipment on the roof. We built it all inside the building, inside the case of the building, because we don't want to have anything having to do with air or air quality or any problems playing with the air. So you'll notice it's a dead flat roof with no equipment on it. All of the equipment is inside of the building and that's for safety reasons. Normally you'd do it a lot less expensive. You'd do it a different way.
(05:23)
So all of this was paid for by myself, because I keep hearing like I'm not ... We are making a gift of this port. This is a gift. This is not going to be paid for by the taxpayer. We have a judge that thinks it's a terrible thing that we're making a gift. He said it's terrible that we're making a gift; it should be paid for by the taxpayer. That's one I've never heard before. I'm sure maybe, I don't know, maybe he doesn't understand. This is a gift to the United States of America. And more than a gift, it's going to be one of the most beautiful buildings that's ever been built in the country or in Washington DC.
(05:59)
So here's the other facade you see over here. And again, this is taking these great classical buildings. They're taken out of different parts of the world from very glamorous times. This is Rome. They like the flat roof. Greece likes the ... they call it the triangles and you see that. This is a porch that looks out over the city. Also, it's developed in such a way that we can have military there, but the entire roof is developed for military. They're very high. They're higher than just about anything else. They have a 360 degree vision of Washington DC. They have a massive drone capacity. Not only is it drone proof, if a drone hits it, it bounces off; it won't have any impact. But it's also meant as a drone port so it protects all of Washington, the roof of the building.
(06:56)
Okay? Now does anybody have any questions?
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Mr. President-
Donald Trump (07:01):
If you want, you can take ... I think you can bring your camera down, but you might want to take a look at the complexity. These are all different rooms down here. They're building a hospital. It's a military hospital. They're building all sorts of research facilities. Also meeting rooms and rooms that go hand in hand for the military using the ballroom. And the ballroom is really a shield and protecting all of the things that are built here. This goes, as you see, it's already up to the ground. This goes down very deep. You get a better view right over here. This is down because we've already done these floors, but these are already down two floors. It's down about six stories deep. That's big stuff. Normally when you build a ballroom, you build it flat. You just build a ballroom. It would have been built.
(07:55)
The complexity of this, and again, it's all knit. It's all knit together. Between the drone proofing, the missile proofing we have and the drone capacity upstairs, we can have all sorts of military up, whether ... I hate to use the word snipers, but we have great sniper capacity. It's built for our snipers, not the enemy snipers, our snipers. And because of the height, we get a very clear view of everything all over Washington. Yeah?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Mr. President, you mentioned that this has been paid for out of pocket, but why is Congress then [inaudible 00:08:32] worth a billion dollars?
Donald Trump (08:32):
Well, they're not. Yeah. Congress is approving money for security. Some of it may go here for additional security, I don't know. But Congress is approving money. But this building, I mean, I put up the money to build this building along with a lot of great patriots. People have put up a lot of money to build the building and we have a building that is going to be ... I think it's going to be potentially the most beautiful building in all of Washington and with that is great military capacity. We're building it in conjunction with the United States military and the Secret Service.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
[inaudible 00:09:07] if Congress doesn't approve that [inaudible 00:09:12]
Donald Trump (09:12):
Well, they have a budget in Secret Service and the military to do some of the work that you see right here. So the answer is I think they want to enhance what you see. It's very powerful and you see what's happening. It's a very powerful concrete. It's 9,000 pound concrete. If you know anything about contract, it's very, very strong. That's very strong concrete. But they probably want to enhance the area. They're going to spend money. This is a very sacred piece of land. This is the White House and they want to do things, but everything that you see and the money that's being put up to build the ballroom and again, the ballroom, it's necessary for the ballroom to be built with what you see over here.
(09:57)
It's all knit in, the air conditioning, the heating, the drone capacity, the shield. The ballroom becomes a shield for everything that you see right here. Without that, they couldn't have this. They couldn't build the lower floors. Without that shield over the top of it, it's a shield that will totally protect what's downstairs. They have a lot of things going on downstairs and some of it you see. This goes down six stories. You see three stories because it's already been built. This will be very shortly, this will be in the form of ... The roof goes along these lines. Basically it goes outside. You see where the wood is? You're going outside of that line and then it goes straight up, and it's all protection and everything's together. You can't build one without the other. And what we have is we have the safest building ever built in my opinion. And the other thing is we're right on budget, we're right on plan. The-
Donald Trump (11:00):
We're right on budget. We're right on plan. The only budget change would be that at the request of the military, we doubled the size. But we're right on budget, right on plan. And originally, we were going to build a much smaller room and it wouldn't have done the job. It just wouldn't have done the job. You have too many events. Like if we have President Xi coming here, we have no place to put him. We had the King and the Queen the other day, and we had a thousand people wanted, and we ended up having a hundred people sitting in a very small room. So they've been after this for a long time.
(11:34)
But maybe more important is the safety element. This is a shield that protects everything that's inside, everything that's on top. Obviously, the White House was built in 1792. It's awfully hard there... It's awfully hard to do that kind of capacity that we did here. So this will give future presidents... But you have to understand when this is finished, my term ends shortly after that. This is really for other presidents. This is not for me. This is my gift to the United States of America. I'm going to be able to use it very little, because when it's finished, we're talking about six or seven months. But it'll be used for hopefully hundreds of years for other presidents. And there will never be anything like this built again. There'll never be a room built with this safety. As an example, if we had the White House correspondents' dinner here, there would have been no problem.
Group (12:30):
[inaudible 00:12:33]
Danny (12:43):
Sir, sir. You said when it opens, you'll have six, seven months. Around that time frame, have you thought about the first event you will have?
Donald Trump (12:44):
I have. I have. I better not tell you about that, Danny. But everybody wants to be here for the first event. We're talking about heads of nations. So we have some very special places that it could happen for them. Literally, if the King and Queen were... We had this finished, we would have had an event that would have been 10 times such. I mean, we literally were in a little room in the White House. Now, we're not even talking about safety. Presidents have been asking for this literally for the time the White House has been built. But on record, for 150 years, they've said, "What about a big room?" And you all know, you probably attended, they have some where they use tents. If it rains, it's a disaster.
Group (13:29):
[inaudible 00:13:31]
Interviewer 2 (13:40):
You mentioned that this is going to be a gift for America, for future presidents of the country. What is your hope for America?
Donald Trump (13:40):
We have to have a safe country. We have to have a great country. We have to make sure that Iran doesn't get a nuclear weapon. All of the things that you see me fighting for so hard. And it's always tough, when negotiating with Iran, and then you have the Democrats... I call them the Dumbocrats, putting in a bill that Trump should immediately stop. You know how it is to negotiate with a country where you're beating them badly, they come to the table, they're begging to make a deal? Because they're begging to make a deal. I hope we don't have to do the one, but we may have to give them another big hit. We may have to give them another big hit. I'm not sure yet. You'll know very soon.
(14:15)
But how do you feel when you're negotiating, you're winning every point, and they say... But in Washington, they want to stop you from negotiating. They want to stop you, and it's only political. It's the Dumbocrats. They're dumb. It's a new name. It's a very accurate name. So I'm in the middle of a negotiation, I'm saying, "You cannot have a nuclear weapon," and it comes over the wire that the Dumbocrats want to stop Trump from further negotiations. They want to stop Trump from, if he has to, giving them another slap. They want to have a nuclear weapon to blow up the Middle East and to blow up, frankly, the world. It's not going to happen. Nice to see you, by the way.
Group (14:56):
[inaudible 00:14:58]
Interviewer 3 (15:00):
How close were you striking Iran? You said [inaudible 00:15:02].
Donald Trump (15:03):
I was an hour away. We were all set to go. You're talking about yesterday?
Interviewer 3 (15:08):
Yes.
Donald Trump (15:08):
We were going to be striking very... It would have been happening right now.
Interviewer 3 (15:11):
Were plans in place?
Donald Trump (15:12):
Yeah, it was all done. The boats, the ships were all loaded, they were loaded to the brim, and we were all set to start.
Group (15:18):
[inaudible 00:15:21]
Interviewer 3 (15:18):
[inaudible 00:15:19]
Donald Trump (15:23):
They said that they feel they've had for the first time in almost 47 years. Iran's been the bully of the Middle East for 47 years. I mean, literally, the bully of the Middle East. They're nasty. Very nasty. Very dangerous. They wanted a nuclear weapon. Had I not terminated Barack Hussein Obama's Iran nuclear deal, had I not terminated... And see, that's the wind. That can't happen with the real structure.
Interviewer 4 (15:50):
Mr. President, on Cuba, what do you want to see from [inaudible 00:15:58].
Donald Trump (15:58):
Are you talking about Cuba? Well, we're going to see. Look, Cuba's calling us. They need help. Look, Cuba is a failed nation. Cuba needs help, and we'll do that. Just hold them. It's like an exercise game. Give that to me. I'll hold it. I'll hold it. It's so beautiful. See, I look so thin. They'll say, "Oh, he's gotten so thin" because I'm holding this. You don't have to look at my waist. You can look at this. You saw enough of my waist along with President Xi.
Interviewer 4 (16:27):
Are you confident that you can reach a [inaudible 00:16:32].
Donald Trump (16:32):
With Cuba? I think so. Yeah, I think so. I am very prone toward the Cuban Americans. They've been incredible people. Many of them have lost family members. They've been very badly hurt themselves. They've been in prison. They've come to this country and they've been very successful. The Cuban American people in Miami, I mean, they are amazing people. Most of them are in Miami, in Florida, but mostly in Miami. I'm very, very prone to helping them. I think I got 97% of that vote. I want to help them.
(17:04)
Now, they have family members in Cuba. They've been treated very, very badly, they've been treated extremely badly, and we're going to get that solved. That's not going to be hard for us to solve.
Interviewer 4 (17:14):
You can do that without changing the regime?
Donald Trump (17:17):
Well, I don't know about changing the regime. I can do that whether you change a regime or not. It's been a rough regime. They've killed a lot of people. But it's a country that really needs help. It has nothing. They can't turn on the lights. They can't eat. We don't want to see that.
Interviewer 5 (17:34):
Mr. President, how much noticed did the Gulf Nations have that you were going to do these strikes before they actually called?
Donald Trump (17:44):
They called me over the last two days to say they've made a lot of progress. Because we have them negotiating with us, and primarily Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Kuwait a little bit, Bahrain, and some of the others, and we have them negotiating with us. We're all working together. It's like a team. And Israel, of course, and Israel's been a great partner. And so, we are negotiating together.
(18:09)
I got a call from numerous of these people. They know the people in Iran. Don't forget, when you talk about regime change, I think it's the ultimate regime change, because the first level and the second level are no longer with us. They're someplace, but they're no longer with us. So we have real regime change. But I got a call yesterday, "Sir, could you wait? We think we're close to a deal." And that's okay.
(18:33)
Now, I've heard it before with these people and they changed their mind. I made deals with them, "No nuclear." We immediately get the nuclear dust. And they said, "You're the only one who can get it." Because the bombers did such an unbelievable job that the mountain literally collapsed on top of it. They said us, and they thought China would be the only two countries that could even get it. But I think it's important to get it, maybe psychologically more than anything.
Group (18:58):
[inaudible 00:18:59]
Interviewer 5 (19:00):
How long did they know that you were planning these attacks, the Gulf Nations?
Donald Trump (19:05):
They knew I was getting ready to attack. I didn't tell them. I'd never tell anybody when.
Interviewer 5 (19:09):
You're in constant contact with them?
Donald Trump (19:10):
I never tell anybody when, but they knew that we were very close. I would say I was an hour away from making the decision to go today. And we would probably not be talking about a beautiful ballroom today, we'd be talking about that. I had made the decision. So they called up, they had heard I made the decision, they said, "Sir, could you give us a couple of more days? Because we think they're being reasonable."
Group (19:37):
[inaudible 00:19:39]
Interviewer 6 (19:38):
How long [inaudible 00:19:39] for Iran to come to the table?
Donald Trump (19:41):
Well, I mean, I'm saying two or three days, maybe Friday, Saturday, Sunday, something, maybe early next week. A limited period of time. Because we can't let them have a nuclear weapon. If they had a nuclear weapon, they would start with Israel, they would blow it up, and they would blow it up fast, but they'd blow it up. And I'll tell you what, they'd go after Saudi Arabia, they'd go after Kuwait, they'd go after UAE, they'd go after Qatar. I think they'd go after the entire Middle East, and it would be a whole different negotiation. It would be nuclear Holocaust.
(20:20)
And there's no question in my mind that they'd use it. There's no question. And I deal with these people. They're extremely radicalized. These are not people like when I deal with you. You're a very nice guy. These are people that are seriously radicalized. They would use it. The only question, would it be the first minute, the first hour, or the first day?
Interviewer 7 (20:43):
[inaudible 00:20:44] has there come a point where [inaudible 00:20:48].
Donald Trump (20:51):
I'm not doing this politically. Look, everyone tells me it's unpopular, but I think it's very popular. When they hear that it's having to do with nuclear weapons, weapons that could take out Los Angeles, could take out major cities very quick, when they hear that... When they're explaining... I'll tell you what, when we explain it to people, I don't really have enough time to explain to people. I'm too busy getting it done. When they understand, I think it's frankly very popular. But whether it's popular or not popular, I have to do it, because I'm not going to let the world be blown up on my watch. It's not going to happen.
Group (21:28):
[inaudible 00:21:28]
Interviewer 8 (21:28):
Mr. President, [inaudible 00:21:31] Thomas Massie and your endorsed candidate, do you think your candidate can beat him, and what are you seeing?
Donald Trump (21:36):
Yeah. Thomas Massie's a terrible congressman. He's been a terrible congressman from day one. Dealing with him is just a horrible... I don't think he's a Republican. I think he's actually a Democrat. He's not a libertarian. Sometimes they say he's... He's really a Democrat. He votes against us all the time. He voted against the border wall. He voted against men playing in women's sports. He voted against transgender for-
Donald Trump (22:00):
... in women's sports. He voted against transgender for everybody, the mutilization of your children. He voted against, again, open borders. We have the best border we've ever had right now. Nobody's coming in. A report just came out. In the last 11 months, literally nobody has been allowed into our country illegally. We're taking people legally, they go through a process, but nobody's come into our country. But we've taken out hundreds of thousands of people. We had 11, 888 murderers, many of these murderers allowed into our country from prisons. They were in prisons. Many of these people killed more than one. More than 50% killed more than one person. This was gross malfeasance.
(22:49)
This was on behalf of the Biden ... I don't know, Biden, because I don't think he knew he was alive. But she, Kamala, was the border czar. She never called, not one time, she never called the border patrol. She never called ICE. She never called law enforcement. She never went to the border. Think of it. I used to call every single day, and that's recently. Now I call less. We have nobody coming through. We had caravans coming through with tens of thousands of people pouring into our country. We had no idea who they were. I'll tell you what, our country would have been destroyed. If they won this election, our country would have been ... We have now the hottest country anywhere in the world. If they had won the election, our country would have been destroyed. Our country was a dead country two years ago, and now we have really the hottest country in the world. And this is the ballroom, and it's going to be something incredible. You see the quality of it.
(23:45)
And those columns go right into the roof. And on top of the roof, we're going to have the greatest drone empire that you've ever seen, and it's going to protect Washington. Thank you all very much.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
One more, Mr. President.
Donald Trump (23:57):
We have a little breakfast for you.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
Really?
Donald Trump (23:59):
Yeah. Where is the breakfast? I'd have it. Where is it?
Speaker 3 (24:02):
That's so kind of you.
Donald Trump (24:03):
Oh, it's right over here.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Can I ask you one more on the ballroom?
Donald Trump (24:06):
We have a little bit of a breakfast. I figured I'd be nice to you for a change.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
... [inaudible 00:24:12] rededication. Thousands of people gathered here.
Donald Trump (24:08):
It was great.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
Wasn't that something?
Donald Trump (24:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
You spoke by a video.
Donald Trump (24:08):
I did. Scripture.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
[inaudible 00:24:22] see that happen, and are you [inaudible 00:24:25]?
Donald Trump (24:24):
Well, I think that it was great. Thousands of people showed up, and it was a beautiful everything, beautiful day. I did Scripture. You think it's easy to read Scripture? It's not easy to read Scripture. That's a whole different ball game. That's not like reading a speech, "We will build the wall." This is a whole different deal, but I did it proudly, and I guess it was broadcast. We had tremendous crowds. I think religion's very important for a country. I think having ... This country was built largely on religion, if you look, it was built. And when you have strong religion, you have less crime. It's just a fact. Whatever it may be, it's like, "Gee, I want to go to heaven so I'm not going to do this or that." Who knows?
(25:09)
But we have a country that was based on religion, and I'm very proud of that. And if you look and you see all of the polling, polling is so fake, but on this, it's not fake. Religion is really going up in the last year. And during the time, really during the time I first got elected in 2016, it's a much different thing. I'm very proud of that. Religion is a good thing. Christianity, it's a great thing for our country. The things that we've done, the successes that we've had, have been based on Christianity and religion. So I'm very proud of that. Religion is taking off like our country has taken off. Our country's hotter now than it's ever been. And I'll tell you, religion is making a tremendous comeback. You look at churches today, they're full. You go back two, three years, nobody was going. So we're very happy with it.
Speaker 4 (26:05):
Mr. President, what do you think about the hate crimes that we see happening [inaudible 00:26:07]?
Donald Trump (26:07):
Yeah. No, I'm always concerned. I see things happening. Look, from the beginning of mankind, you've had that. You've had the good and you have the bad. I'd like to get rid of the bad, but somehow that's going to be there. But the good has been many times what it was, really many times what it was.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
Mr. President, the ballroom. If Congress is not open to $1 billion for your security funding, would you be willing, or would you be willing to go to your donors to ask for that money?
Donald Trump (26:32):
Well, this is money for the whole premises, including the East Wing. This is the East Wing section. But the ballroom, as you see, it's going up. It's ahead of schedule. It's larger because they wanted more military capacity. They wanted more drone capacity. They needed a larger roof, and frankly, we needed a larger facility. And so we're doing that. And we've done this in strict coordination with the military and with the Secret Service, and they've been great to work with. The money that they're talking about is the surrounding areas and maybe enhancing some security aspects of the building.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
But, so Congress-
Donald Trump (27:10):
But the building, as you see, it's a very active site, and a lot of people are amazed. And by the way, that floor goes down three floors, just so you understand. You're seeing almost the top floor. That floor goes down three floors, and there are many things in there having to do with security. And many of those things are going to be taken from there and put onto the roof of the building, and that has to do with drone and missile capacity.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
A lot of Presidents have done renovations to the White House, to all these things. Why do you think people are so mad about your renovations that-
Donald Trump (27:42):
Because I'm doing it.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
The Meridian Hill Park, you got the water flowing again, all of it, and they just seem to hate you for it.
Donald Trump (27:48):
Yeah. Well, it's a sad thing, actually. It's very nice, I appreciate the question. First I said, "Oh, this is going to be a negative question." She's really saying, "Why do they hate you for fixing the water fountains?" So we have-
Speaker 3 (28:01):
You're the President, construction worker.
Donald Trump (28:01):
I know, because I want to see Washington be beautiful. To me it's very important. But as an example, you mentioned the water fountain. We didn't have one water fountain. I think we have 40, we didn't have one in Washington that worked, and soon they'll all be working. Many of them work right now. I think one of the best things, President Obama, President Biden spent much more than $100 million on the reflecting lake between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument. They spent much more. They spent, some people say $200 million. You know what they got out of it? A closed lake. It never opened. And when it did, it shut right away. It leaked, it was a disaster. I'm doing a job on the reflecting lake for a fraction of what they paid.
(28:50)
Now, I've upgraded it very ... I got so into it, I've upgraded it like you wouldn't believe. I'm doing all the walkways outside. I'm doing it properly. But it's a much bigger job. But you see it's happening now. It's going to be beautiful. It's going to be waterproof, it's going to be reflecting again. I took over a dirty, filthy thing that wasn't open, and it was disgusting. And friends of mine would come to the Lincoln or the Washington and they'd say, "Sir, it's disgusting." I said, "What's disgusting?" "The reflecting lake." So I drove down, I looked with Secretary Burgum, who's fantastic, of Interior. He's fantastic. And we got together, and we have ... It's under construction right now. I want to get it open before July 4th, which we'll easily be able to do. It'll be open before that, but easily be able to do, July 4th being a very special day, and it is going to be beautiful. Beautiful blue color, dark blue color. It's very reflective.
(29:48)
I put a thing out yesterday showing the reflection. We did a little test. We wanted to see it. It's like a mirror.
Speaker 3 (29:53):
Yeah, did it look good? Did it work?
Donald Trump (29:54):
Well, it's like a mirror. It's beautiful.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
And I saw there was guys out there almost like, are they hand painting it? Is that how they're doing it?
Donald Trump (30:00):
Yeah. Well, they're fixing the stone outside and they're sandblasting the stone. We're doing a much bigger job than we wanted to do. Think of it. Obama and Biden spent over $100 million, and you know what? They got nothing. They opened it up and it leaked like a sieve, and they closed it and it stayed closed. They've been working on it for years. I've been working on this for a couple of months. When it's finished, it's going to be incredible. But we have other fountains, beautiful fountains. They haven't worked in 30 years. They're just sitting there rotting. And most of them are now open. And right across the street, I made a donation and I'm building Lafayette Park.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
Are you really?
Donald Trump (30:39):
And it's going to be beautiful.
Speaker 3 (30:44):
How much is it?
Donald Trump (30:44):
I like her.
Speaker 3 (30:44):
How much was the donation? How much was the donation to Lafayette?
Donald Trump (30:46):
About $10 million.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Wow. Are you happy with American flag blue?
Donald Trump (30:49):
Well, I put up the American flag.
Speaker 3 (30:50):
No, the American flag blue, are you happy with the color?
Donald Trump (30:52):
I think so. I mean, I'll let you know. I wanted a lighter color blue. The person that really knows this stuff said no, dark is much better. You don't see the leaves, and things will get in there.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
[inaudible 00:31:04].
Donald Trump (31:04):
But most importantly, the dark reflects much better.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
Mr. President, why is the establishment media claiming so desperately that MAGA is divided?
Donald Trump (31:13):
Well, I think it's the strongest it's ever been. You take a look at what happened in Louisiana two nights ago with a certain Senator that was very disloyal to me and to the Republican Party. He's not even allowed to run for office. We have another big race. This guy Massey is terrible. Let's see what happens. It's not easy beating incumbents, but we have a great guy running against Massey. Massey's a terrible ... I think the worst Congressman the Republican Party's ever had. That'll be tonight. That'll be good television, and we'll see what happens there.
(31:43)
But I think MAGA's never been more together, actually. I'm going to be making an endorsement today in Texas. I'm going to be putting out an endorsement in a little while in Texas, the great state. I won Texas all six times, meaning primaries and the race, and I got the highest vote in the history of Texas. I love Texas, but I'm going to be making a endorsement at about 12:30, 1:00 today for the big race, the Senate race in Texas. And I hope you find it good.
(32:16)
I appreciate the question, because even CNN, they did a poll two, three weeks ago. They said, "Trump is at 100%." That's Harry Enten. I like Harry Enten, got a lot of energy. I like him. But he did a poll, and he's a good pro, and he gives the good and the bad. But I think he's an honorable guy, because we've got a lot of good. He predicted I was going to do great with the Muslims in Michigan and win Michigan, and I did. I did good and I won Michigan by a lot. He made a lot of good predictions. But he did a poll two weeks ago that said Trump is ... I mean, this is up, you can check, 100% popularity with MAGA. MAGA is most of the Republican Party. The RINOs are gone, to a large extent. A few of them are still left-
Donald Trump (33:00):
The RINOs are gone to a large extent. A few of them are still left, so hopefully we get rid of one tonight in the form of Tom Massie, who's horrible, but no, it's been amazing. But I'll be making a statement in a little while as to who I'm endorsing in Texas for the Senate, and there are those that say whoever I endorse is going to win. I don't know if that's true, but historically that's absolutely true. I just don't like to say because I don't like to brag.
Speaker 5 (33:24):
Mr. President have you found anyone to run against Lauren Boebert?
Donald Trump (33:29):
Well, I've had my mind made up for a long time, but I just think it's going to be... I just think it's appropriate.
Speaker 6 (33:34):
I have a question. There's [inaudible 00:33:35] that President Xi told you during your meeting that perhaps Russian president Vladimir Putin was comfortable invading Ukraine. Did he say that to you?
Donald Trump (33:51):
No, he didn't. No. Never said that.
Speaker 7 (33:51):
Mr. President, you mentioned that the ballroom was your gift to the country.
Donald Trump (33:55):
It's a gift. It's a gift from me and from incredible successful companies and patriots and they put up close to $400 million and you see what's happening and it's beautiful. And again, it's ahead of schedule, unlike the Fed building. Think of it. This building had 400 million, the Fed building had 4 billion and it's a tiny little project by comparison.
Speaker 7 (34:20):
And you spent a lot of time renovating the White House, the Rose Garden, the colony-
Donald Trump (34:25):
I do. Putting up the American flags, the flag pole. On each side. Nice.
Speaker 7 (34:30):
Why was this so important to you to be part of your legacy?
Donald Trump (34:34):
Well, this is the most important because number one, security and number two was so needed just on a social basis for presidents. And again, I'll be here for a very short period of time. When this opens, I'll be here for a very short period of time. This is really being built for other presidents. It's not being built for me. I'm a really good builder. The thing I do best in life is build. I'm a great builder and I build beautiful product. There will never be anything like this. I always admired the facade of the Supreme Court. I said, "I wonder if that can be duplicated or better." Even not to say better, but even better. And we've actually bettered it. What we're doing is something that will... You'll never see it again.
Speaker 7 (35:13):
Mr. President, one more honor, if I may. When you were having your discussions with the regional partners, regional leaders, did they express to you any concern about Iran's ability to still retaliate in the event of US-
Donald Trump (35:26):
Sure. They have a little ability. Their missiles are 82% gone, we estimate. Their capacity to build is very little right now because we hit all of their manufacturing areas. Same thing with drones, largely gone, but they still have a little capacity. Yeah. Not much, but they have a little. Their Navy is completely gone. Their Air Force is completely gone. President Xi has promised me that he's not sending any weapons to Iran. That's a beautiful promise. I take him at his word. I appreciate it. We had an amazing time in China. Look, we got along very well before this, but President Xi and I had really an amazing time. I think he'd say the same thing, but he promised that he's not sending any weapons. And if you think about it, he gets 40% of his oil. He's not sending oil folks in. Tankers in with 20 Destroyers alongside of it. No, he does want it open like me. I want it open and we'll get it open. But Iran has used the Strait as a military weapon for 47 years, really much more than that. And that's not their Strait. That's international waterways. That's not for them to do. And look, they've learned their lesson.
(36:41)
If I left today, it would take them 25 years to rebuild, but we're not leaving. We're going to do it right so that in 5 years, 10 years, if you have a bad president who doesn't want to do what's right to do... This should have been done by Obama. This should have been done by Biden. It should have been done by other presidents long before me. And everybody agrees to this. They agree to it.
Speaker 8 (37:03):
Mr. President, when you [inaudible 00:37:05] Federal gas tax. Are there other initiatives that you're-
Donald Trump (37:09):
Well, there may be. It's very temporary. Yeah, there may be. Anything to keep it down. Look, as soon as this war is over, gas is going to... I had gas lean down to $1.85 in Iowa. I was in Iowa and the stations had it at $1.85. But I was down to, in many cases, less than $2 a barrel, a gallon. And then I said to myself, "This is great. We just hit a new high in the stock market. Everything's going good." I'm sorry, but we have to go down and take a little journey down to... We have to do something with [inaudible 00:37:45]. We cannot let them have a nuclear weapon. You want to see the world exploded? You want to see a problem? And this is peanuts and I appreciate everybody putting up with it for a little while. It won't be much longer, but you're going to have...
(37:59)
And frankly, there is so much oil out there. One of the things that is happening is these big ships are coming up to Texas, Louisiana, and Alaska and they're loading up. But I don't even think about that. What I think about is you can't let Iran have a nuclear weapon and they won't have a nuclear weapon and they fully understand it.
Speaker 9 (38:17):
Mr. President, I once asked you how do you feel [inaudible 00:38:28] sometime ago, during your first time, you told me success to bring it back.
Donald Trump (38:38):
Success.
Speaker 9 (38:38):
Based on that, why do you continue to do what you do knowing that so many people are criticizing? [inaudible 00:38:38] every day to try to bring up success primarily.
Donald Trump (38:38):
Well, you have some people disagree with the Iran thing. To me, it's no question. To me, you have to have borders. You have to have walls and you have to let people in legally, but you have to have borders. Some people think you don't have borders. You should let anybody, murderers, drug dealers, you should let them in. But I said to you once, I remember it. The greatest healer of our country... When we had, just before COVID, we were so successful. We had the best economy we've ever had in my first term. This term is going to blow it away, I think. And you see all the numbers. Even during the war, we have the highest stock market we've ever had. I thought the market would go down 25%. And I was okay with that to get rid of a nuclear potential Holocaust. It would have been a nuclear Holocaust.
(39:25)
So going down 25% is okay if you're going to get rid of a nuclear Holocaust. So most people agree with me. When I'm with people and they, let's say, "Oh gee, why do..." And I say, "Here's the problem. Is it okay for Iran?" And they are very volatile people. I'm being nice. "Is it okay for Iran to have a nuclear weapon?" Everybody says no. I said, "Then we have nothing further to discuss." It's like one of those things, that they will never have a nuclear weapon, not going to happen and probably that's going to be very soon. So one way or the other, whether it's military or an agreement, that'll start opening up very soon.
Speaker 10 (40:03):
Mr. President, why did you wait so long [inaudible 00:40:06], just because now both of their names are going to be on the ballot.
Donald Trump (40:10):
No, I waited... I've pretty much always known who I was going to endorse, but I just thought this was a good time. The voting starting and I thought this was a good time. I'm going to be doing that very shortly.
Speaker 11 (40:27):
Mr. President, have you put any thought into potentially endorsing someone to run against JB Pritzker like Darren Bailey or-
Donald Trump (40:29):
Well, I like Darren Bailey. JB Pritzker's a slob of a governor. He could call me and I'd send the National Guard and Chicago would have no crime. Look at Washington D.C. Did you see the crime stats is down to like nothing? People go to restaurants now, new restaurants. Restaurants were all being closed in Washington. Now they're building new restaurants. It's a hot city. We have a beautiful city. We have very little crime, almost no crime. And we could have the same thing in Chicago. All he'd have to do is say, "President, I don't want to have any crime in Chicago. Can you help me?" Within three months, Chicago would be a different place.
Speaker 12 (41:05):
What about the mayor, Brandon?
Donald Trump (41:08):
What can I say? He's so bad. He's so bad.
Speaker 13 (41:12):
Mr. President, you're going to [inaudible 00:41:15] on Friday.
Speaker 14 (41:14):
[inaudible 00:41:15] years, I talked about making healthcare more affordable. You've done that. And you made a major announcement yesterday-
Donald Trump (41:20):
That was a big announcement. Got no coverage. I reduced drug prices by 50, 60, 70, 80% and it gets no coverage. I think it's maybe other than medical itself, like a cure. I think it's the biggest thing to happen in healthcare ever, maybe. I brought the price... We paid the highest price in the world. Now we're paying as of now, we're paying the lowest price in the world. Prices of drugs have gone down 70, 80, 90%. For 28 years they never went down. In my administration, I got it down one eighth of 1% that I thought it was great. The first time, the only time in 28 years that it went down. Now I got them down 50, 60, 70, and even 80%. And that has a huge impact on healthcare. Listen, go have breakfast. Have a good time. Have breakfast. Enjoy your site. You can shoot down there but it is... The next time you come here, those columns will be standing even taller.
Speaker 15 (42:19):
How long did it take to design the underneath? Like you said, kind of the military... What was the architecture?
Donald Trump (42:24):
Actually, the underneath part, it's a good question. It's far more complex than the upper because what you don't see are the floors that are beneath here and they have very, very important rooms down there. The most important. And this was the one opportunity for the military to do something. They came... Normally I'd build a ballroom on flat land. I wouldn't have any of this. It would have been built... I'm very fast. I'm a very fast builder. We're way ahead of schedule here, but we went down six stories.
Speaker 15 (42:54):
It's unheard of.
Donald Trump (42:56):
It's actually far more complex than what's... The easy part is up. But again, we have a drone-proof roof. It's all sealed and all of this that you see is totally sealed and we use it as a drone pour. We can have unlimited drones up there and drones are what's happening right now. Thank you all very much.
Speaker 15 (43:14):
Thank you, Mr. President.
Donald Trump (43:14):
Thank you. Thank you very much. Don't eat too much.
Speaker 16 (43:14):
What do you give us? What do you serve?
Donald Trump (43:23):
[inaudible 00:43:22] see. Where is it? You're right over here.