[Begins in progress]
Mr. President, is that the culmination of ongoing conversations you've had with your counterparts, this particular executive order?
Which one? last or --
The one --
[Crosstalk]
No, they're -- the digital taxes is taking place all over Europe, they're taxing us, and they're doing other things. They're suing all our companies, and uh, if that's going to happen, we want to be the ones that sue, not them. And they use it almost as a form of running European countries and the EU, in particular, has been very violent in its lawsuits against our companies and frankly, very violent and very bad to our airlines. I've gotten calls from the heads of airlines saying they stop in Europe and they're getting charged all sorts of taxes that they never even heard of. They stop and they're getting fined and charged and they do it only with American companies.
They're not doing it to other countries, so we're stopping it. And we have another thing. We have another step to go and if they don't shape up, as an example, Apple has had to pay like $17 billion in a lawsuit that nobody thought was worth anything. And I won't get into the judge or the decision or how the decision was arrived, but I'm pretty good at this stuff and I think it's disgraceful.
And Google's being sued, Facebook's being sued and many others are being sued by their so-called government, if you call it a government, EU. And they don't treat us right. They don't treat us right as a country. So we're going to protect our companies. We have to protect our companies or we're not going to have any companies left anymore.
I also want to thank Apple, though, for announcing they're going to invest $500 billion in our country. That's the biggest investment anybody's probably made to this date, and they're going to do it very quickly and that's because of tariffs. They don't want to pay the tariffs, and they feel very strongly about the country.
Now, they wouldn't have done it without us. Without the Trump administration, they wouldn't have done it, but they feel very strongly about the direction of the country. The polls have shown that too. The polls are coming out showing the direction of the country is the best they've ever seen, actually, the best they've ever seen.
So I just want to thank Tim Cook and Apple for the confidence, $500 billion. That's the biggest investment anyone has made in a short period of time.
Mr. President, have you spoken today with the House republican holdouts who said they would not be supporting the budget resolution [Inaudible]?
Well, I'm not involved in that. They know what I want and the Senate knows what I want too, and the Senate's got a bill that's very strong, having to do with the taxes because the taxes is what's bringing all these companies in. And without it, by the way, you'd have to double your own taxes. Everybody would be doubled up and you'd have the biggest tax increase ever.
So the House has a bill and the Senate has a bill, and I'm looking at them both. And I'll make decisions, but I don't know where they are in the vote. I know the Senate's doing very well and the House is doing very well. But each one of them has things that I like, so we'll see if we can come together.
Mr. President, can you clarify hopefully once and for all what your expectations are with this email to federal employees? What are you going to use that information for and do you see it as voluntary like OPM has said or mandatory?
Well, it's somewhat voluntary, but it's also, if you don't answer, I guess you get fired. What it really is --
I'm still lost on that.
What it is, is do people exist? We have this massive government with millions of people and nobody knows who's working for the government, who's not. So what they're doing is they're sending out a letter to everybody and they're saying, what were the things you did last week? I guess they ask for five. And if people are working, it's easy.
I could tell you five things I did last week. I could tell you five things I did six weeks ago, right? If they're there and they're working, they're able to say they did five things during work and that means they're working and they're with us and they have no further obligation. If they're not, it could be there's no such person.
It could be that the person is no longer working, they're no longer living at that address. They may be moved. Maybe they moved to a different country or maybe the person doesn't exist. And we then take that person off the payroll and we save a lot of money by doing that. But that's one of the only ways.
I think it's a very smart thing. And it says if you don't answer, essentially, there's a penalty to pay, like that's the end of the job.
Well, Musk has said that. The order itself doesn't say that. I think that's part of the confusion. Is he speaking for you when he says you'll be terminated?
Yeah, yeah. Everybody speaks for me. I'm the one. I'll take responsibility. You know the old statement, the buck stops here, right, famous statement. Well, I can say the same thing. The buck stops here. No, we have to find out if people are getting paid and they're not working and they have a problem. Let's say they have another job and then they write in false statements.
It's a big problem if they write in false statements. They may be working for somebody else but getting paid by the US government. And that would mean that they're not allowed to be doing that. They're not allowed to be working for us and be working for somebody else. We're paying them; a lot of money we're paying them.
So we'll see. That solves that problem. Most people aren't willing to say that we're doing this, this, this and this and this for the US government and yet they're at another job because that's a big problem for them if they do that. So in some cases, they're not writing back. And if they don't write back, they end up eventually losing their job.
We give them extensions, but that was something we thought about a long time ago. We gave them extensions, but we'll see. We have to make sure, number one, that we have people, number two, that they're working; and number two, they're working for us, not for another company.
Is it true that President Zelenskyy is coming on Friday to meet with you? And is the mineral deal sorted out?
Yeah, I hear that. I hear that he's coming on Friday. Certainly, it's OK with me if he'd like to and he would like to sign it together with me and I understand that it's a big deal, a very big deal. And I think the American people, even if you look at polling, they're very happy because Biden was throwing money around like it's cotton candy and it's a very big deal.
It could be $1 trillion deal. It could be whatever. But it's rare earths and other things. And look, we're spending hundreds of billions of dollars on Ukraine and Russia fighting, a war that should have never ever happened. That's a war that would have never happened if I were president, and it didn't happen for four years.
People say, how do we know that? It didn't happen for four years, would have never happened. And nevertheless, this guy went into this situation and he spent money like nobody's ever seen, $350 billion. The other thing that we don't like is that Europe has spent $100 billion. We've spent $350 billion. Europe gets their money back because they spent it in the form of a loan and we just gave them, whether it's $300 billion or $350 billion, nobody really knows.
They can't even tell me the answer to that, means probably more than that. So what we're doing is now we're saying, look, we want to be secured. We want to get that money back. We're helping a country through a very, very big problem, a problem like very few people have had. Shouldn't have had this problem because it shouldn't have happened, but it did happen so we have to straighten it out.
But the American taxpayer now is going to get their money back, plus.
Mr. President, yesterday with Emmanuel Macron, you said you had spoken to Putin about the idea of peacekeepers in Ukraine, that Putin was fine with it. The Kremlin, I guess, has said that that's actually unacceptable to them. What's real here?
That's not what I was told, but you're going to need some form of peacekeeping. So something will be done that's going to be satisfactory to everybody. We need peacekeeping too.
Any situation where it's American troops involved?
It's actually something I did discuss, but a form of peacekeeping that's acceptable to everybody. Ultimately, we'll be able to agree on something, I'm sure.
With Ukraine and this mineral deal, what does Ukraine get in return, Mr. President?
$350 billion and lots of equipment and military equipment and the right to fight on and originally, the right to fight. Look, Ukraine, I will say, they're very brave and they're good soldiers, but without the United States and its money and its military equipment, this war would have been over in a very short period of time.
In fact, I was the one that gave the Javelins. Do you remember the famous Javelins? That was me. That wasn't Obama, it wasn't Biden, it wasn't anybody else. It was me, and they wiped out a lot of tanks with those Javelins and they -- especially ones that Obama gave sheets and I gave the Javelins. That was a big deal at the time.
It wiped out. That was the beginning when people said, wow, that's something. Well, that was American equipment. Without American equipment, this war would have been over very quickly and American money too. I mean, a lot of money.
Mr. President, that war fighting equipment and the ammunition, is that sustained going forward for Ukraine and how long is it sustained?
Well, it could go forward for a while and maybe until we have a deal with Russia. Look, we need to have a deal with Russia, otherwise it's going to continue. But now when Americans put up their money, the taxpayer money and the president approves it, we're getting our money back in some form. But it could go on for a while or it could be settled quickly.
I think it's going to be settled quickly. I spoke with President Putin. I think he wants to settle it and wants to get on with life. It's horrible. What's happening, horrible. Thousands of soldiers a week are being killed and others too, but especially on the battlefield. Thousands a week are being killed and we want that to end.
Mr. President, when you spoke to --
Yeah, Brian.
Yes. OK. Real quickly. Karoline Leavitt, your press secretary sent an earthquake through that briefing room earlier today announcing that the WHCA would not have any control over placing media in the seats, the briefing room. I just want to get your thoughts on that. And also on Air Force One, it's trending on X. People are talking about it, get your thoughts.
Well, we're going to be now calling those shots. As you know, we won that lawsuit right there. See, the Gulf of America, which is a beautiful name. Most people agree, I don't know. It's -- AP has been terrible. I think they're radical left. I think they're third-rate reporters. I know the specific young lady that works on the account is terrible.
She's a radical left lunatic as far as I'm concerned. They don't treat us fairly. That's number one. And number two, they had no right to do that. This is the Gulf of America. And if you look at that shoreline -- look at that shoreline. Look from Florida, all -- most of it is -- it's called America and vast majority, like big numbers.
So, I'm just admiring it as I look at it. I'm getting teary eyed, but I don't want you to say Trump broke down and started crying. No, how beautiful is that? Look at the shoreline. Look at that, that's America.
Can I shift your attention to Canada real quick?
Yes, please.
Last week I spent some time with two government officials from Canada and was asking them how realistic is it that Canada would be the 51st state. And they told me there is a path, Alberta is first and if they sign on Saskatchewan would follow. And then you go west to British Columbia. There is a movement in Canada to join us. I want to get your thoughts on that and how that's proceeding right now?
So, it's true. Thank you, Brian. It's true. A lot of people in Canada are liking becoming our beautiful cherished 51st state. They'll have to pay much lower taxes. They'll have the ultimate security. You know, they don't pay very much for security right now because they rely on us, which is really unfair to us. They make cars that we could make, and they send them back into the United States.
They make a lot of things, including the sending of oil and everything. We don't need their oil. We don't need their lumber. In fact, we're going to be freeing up. And I've asked Howard Lutnick to get that done with Lee and everybody, Lee Zeldin, environmental. We're freeing up our forests. We're going to be able to take down trees.
Right now, we're so restricted environmentally, we're going to be freeing it up with an emergency order. We have an emergency order and we're going to be freeing up our forests. We have more forests than almost anybody and great lumber, great trees. We don't need anybody's trees. We don't need trees from Canada or anybody else.
In fact, we have to put the slits as they call them, the area, you know, 50-, 60-yard area in between areas of trees. It stops the fires. And frankly, California should have been doing that for years. It's almost getting late. They're going to run out of forests the way they're going, what a shame, and by the way, the water is flowing in California.
I hope you people have seen it, but the water is flowing. Do you have a picture of that? I'd hold it up. Do you have a picture of that, get a picture of it, please? You know, he had a little skirmish in California. I can't believe we had to do that, but we opened up the water in California. The water was flowing into a place called the Pacific Ocean, which for the Pacific Ocean is only a drop.
But for us, it's more water than we can use in California. So, I'll get you some photographs, but it's a beautiful site. The water is flowing in California, beautiful water from the Pacific Northwest and beyond and it flows down and, instead of being routed out to the Pacific Ocean -- and this has been going on for 20 years more -- in order to take care of a certain species of fish, which wasn't doing very well without water, I can tell you.
So, that's a big deal. It's like not reported, it's incredible. But California has a lot of water. That's going to take care of farmers. It's going to wetten up the land, and it's going to go all the way down to Los Angeles where they have curfews on water, where they have all sorts of blocks on water. You can only use so much.
We're going to put a -- until just recently they were going to put a number of gallons per person living in a house in Beverly Hills on water. You're not going to have that problem anymore. Do you have a picture? Let me just see what that looks like, how beautiful is that? Look at that beautiful water flowing.
That's coming in the -- the dikes and other means of transportation? The environmental problem with clean water, if this water were there, you wouldn't have had those fires. You had sprinklers, they make people put sprinklers in the ceiling of a home and they had no water in them, with this they would have had a lot of water in them.
They would have all been full. That would have had a -- you would have had a whole different deal down there. You probably wouldn't have had a fire, but if it was, it would have been small, would have been put out. You had the fire hydrants not working in California. So it's a beautiful sight. These are canals that were built.
These were all built and you saw them for years. They were empty concrete, they call them the V shapes or the pipe half pipes and they're shaped different forms, but -- and they rush down through the farm areas where the farmers can take it and down to Los Angeles. And they were sitting empty for years and now look at that, look at that way, it looked -- it wasn't easy.
We had to be very unfriendly to get into those areas. We opened it up.
Mr. President. Mr. President.
I essentially attacked California, can you believe it? I attacked I attacked California. Let's go.
At the outset of your administration, sir. You committed to ending the weaponization of government to holding those accountable who participated in the weaponization of government.
Hold it, this is a good one is everybody listening? Deranged Jack Smith, we're going to call it the deranged Jack Smith signing or bill. Go ahead.
One law firm that provided pro bono legal services to the special counsel's office under Jack Smith's leadership was Covington and Burling. As a result of those actions, we're now going to be suspending and putting under review the security clearances for the attorneys and employees at that firm who worked with Jack Smith's team.
And we're going to continue holding the people who were responsible for the weaponization of government and who supported it accountable for what they did.
And you'll be doing this with other firms as time goes by, right?
We're looking at at sort of the whole panoply of options. The --
The weaponization of our system by law firms, even pro bono work, they're doing just in order to clog up government and stop government and nobody knows about it more than me and hopefully that'll never happen again.
So that's Covington and Burlington?
Covington and Burlington.
Mr. President, may I ask you a question about Europe. So long-term, do you plan to maintain the number of US troops?
I just want to savor this one please, who would like this pen? Hey, why don't you send it to Jack Smith? [Laughter] A deranged person.
What do you say to people who were targeting an individual firm or individuals who aren't Jack Smith for his actions?
I've been targeted for four years, longer than that. So you don't tell me about targeting. I was the target of corrupt politicians for four years and then four years after that. So, don't talk to me about targeting. Yeah, go ahead.
Mr. President. There are approximately two million federal employees right now. By the end of your term, what do you expect that number to be? What would you like that number?
Well, it'll be lower, but I can't tell you we -- Everybody knows I ran on downsizing government but making government better. I ran on tariffs and making our country rich and that's what's going to do. We're going to be doing something else. It's going to be very, very good. We're going to be selling a gold card, you have a green card, this is a gold card.
We're going to be putting a price on that card of about $ 5 million, and that's going to give you green card privileges plus it's going to be a route to citizenship and wealthy people will be coming into our country by buying this card. They'll be wealthy and they'll be successful and they'll be spending a lot of money and paying a lot of taxes and employing a lot of people.
And we think it's going to be extremely successful and never been done before or anything like this. But it's something that we're going to be putting out over the next, would you say two weeks, Howard?
Two weeks.
Or do you want to say a couple of words about it?
Sure.
Mr. President [Inaudible]
Wait a minute [Inaudible] yeah, exactly.
So the EB-5 program was really -- you lend some money, but it was all -- it was full of nonsense make believe and fraud and it was a way to get a green card that was low priced. So the President said rather than having this sort of ridiculous EB-5 program, we're going to end the EB-5 program. We're going to replace it with the Trump gold card, which is really a green card gold.
So, they'll be able to pay $5 million, to the US government. They'll have to go through vetting, of course, we're going to make sure they're wonderful world class global citizens. They can come to America, the President can give them a green card and they can invest in America and we can use that money to reduce our deficit.
Why do we give out lotteries of green cards? Why do we give out EB-5 for green cards? The President of the United States understands that the right answer is why don't we eliminate the deficit of the United States of America instead.
The gold card, the gold card -- well millions, but the gold card will bring in with it people that create jobs, very high level people. I think companies will pay to get people in. For instance, you -- today graduate from the Wharton School of Finance or Harvard or Stanford or -- or any college, and nobody knows if you can even go to work for a company.
So, Apple and all these companies that want to get people to be working for them will be able to buy a card. And for the people that are number one in their class at top schools, I see that as one of the things. But generally speaking, it'll be people with money and people that create jobs and they won't have to pay any tax on income outside of the United States, which they're not paying right now.
They're not citizens. But they'll have to pay, if they create jobs in the United States, they'll pay full taxes like everybody else. So, you're getting big taxpayers, big job producers and we'll be able to sell maybe a million of these cards, maybe more than that. And if you add up the numbers, they're pretty good.
As an example, a million cards would be worth $5 trillion, $5 trillion.
Wow!
And if you sell 10 million of the cards, that's a total of $50 trillion. Well, we have 35 trillion in debt. That would be nice. So we'll see, but it could be great. Maybe it will be fantastic. We have it all worked out from the legal standpoint. It's totally legal to do. It hasn't been done before. It's been done in many different forms.
We give them away. Why should we give them away? We shouldn't give away. And I think it's something very exciting. I think it's potentially just something that we're all very excited about. So it's a gold card. It's somewhat like a green card, but at a higher level of sophistication. It's a road to citizenship for people.
And essentially, people of wealth or people of great talent where people of wealth pay for those people of talent to get in, meaning companies will pay for people to get in and to have long-term status in the country. And I think it's something we're very, very happy about. You have anything to say about that?
Well, many other countries, by the way, do this, including of course your 51st state does that.
And the money is earmarked for deficit reduction?
It may be earmarked for deficit, but it actually could be more money than that. I mean, if you did 10 million, you'd have $ 15 trillion left over, but generally, it's going to be paid down debt. Yes.
Do you need Congress for this? Do you think you need them to pass a law?
No, we don't need Congress, no, because we're not doing citizenship. We're doing the card.
I see.
It's a path to citizenship, a very strong path to citizenship, but we're not doing the citizenship. For that, I'd have to get Congress.
And would all countries be eligible for this gold card?
It depends. The countries, largely -- the people will be vetted very carefully.
Mr. President, in Ukraine, would you provide military support for Ukraine in the future under a peace agreement?
Say it again, louder.
Would you provide military support for Ukraine in the future as part of a peace agreement?
You mean like security?
Yeah.
Well, people are going to do it. I think Europe will largely be responsible for that. European countries will be responsible.
But Macron asked for a US backup --
Well, we'll see. I mean, right now we're just in the process of negotiating. We've pretty much negotiated our deal on Rare Earth and various other things. We'll be looking at that security. You're talking about general security for Ukraine later on. I don't think that's going to be a problem. There are a lot of people that want to do it. And I spoke with Russia about it, they didn't seem to have a problem with it. So I think they understand.
They're not going back in. Once we do this, they're not going back in.
[Inaudible] aircraft? Would the US provide, for instance, air defense?
Well, I just told you, right now, we're not providing anything. You know, it's about Europe too. Europe put in $100 billion, and we put in $350 billion. It's not a fair thing. We would normally say and I say it now anyway, but we want equalization. They should put up actually more money than us because they're right there.
We have an ocean in between. But we've had very good talks with Russia. We've had very good talks with Ukraine, and we think it maybe will come to an end and we'll stop killing young people all over the battlefield and elsewhere.
On Europe, so do you plan to maintain heavy military presence in Europe in the long-term, like tens of thousands of troops --
We'll be involved. Yeah, yeah, we'll be involved in Europe. We're involved in Europe now. Europe is our friend. They take advantage of us on trade. We don't like that. What the EU does, we don't like that. But we'll solve that the old-fashioned way. We'll give them the same reciprocal numbers. We're talking about a reciprocal tax, you know that.
And if they charge us, we charge them. Right now, they charge us much, much more than we charge them and they have non-monetary taxes also in tariffs and we're going to change that. It's all changing. It's all changing. We're not going to be the people that we were. We had people in this office sitting right at this desk or another model of this desk, because as you know, the other desk is right now being refurbished.
Is Steve Witkoff delaying his trip to the Middle East and --
No, no, not that I know of. No. Steve and the Middle East has been great. Saudi Arabia has treated us really well. They really have. And I think Qatar has treated us very well too. They want to get that whole mess ended in the Middle East. We don't even talk about that anymore. You guys haven't asked one question about the Middle East, but the Middle East seems to be doing relatively well.
May I ask about the Middle East? Sir, about the Middle East. For months, even before you were elected in November, you've spoken about your desire to free all of those hostages that have been held by Hamas since October the 7th, a year and a half ago. And just a few weeks ago, you gave an ultimatum. You said if they're not all released by noon on February the 15th, there would be hell to pay.
Is Hamas thumbing their nose at you, Mr. President?
No, I think the opposite. So as you know, they weren't going to release any more hostages and I said, there's going to be hell to pay and then they agreed that they were going to release the hostages that they had agreed to release, plus an extra one. And so that you could say that was a big difference, but I said it from that point, it's up to Bibi Netanyahu and Israel.
I may have taken a different stance, but they did release. They went back to releasing the hostages. But if you remember, they said we weren't going to release any. They've totally ended it. And I said, well, they're not going to release any, there'll be hell to pay. But the rest is really up to him. I may have done it differently than him.
It's not my decision, it's his decision, but they did release all of those hostages so --
Mr. President, when you spoke to Vladimir Putin, did he raise or did you discuss at all the possibility of a minerals deal on the Ukrainian land that Russia now controls, striking a deal with Russia?
I didn't discuss that, no. I'd like to buy minerals on Russian land too, if we can, the Rare Earth. They have very good Rare Earth also. They both do. I would say that, and oil and gas. Look, it's a great thing. If we sell this, it's great for Russia too, because we can do deals there. They have very valuable land that isn't utilized.
So something like that could take place. Yeah.
Have you put lifting sanctions against Russia on the table as --
No, we haven't lifted any sanctions on anybody.
Is it on the table as part of any negotiation?
I guess it will be at some point, but right now --
[Audio gap]
-- oligarch be eligible for a gold card?
Yeah, possibly. Hey, I know some Russian oligarchs that are very nice people. It's possible. They're not quite as wealthy as they used to be. They're not as wealthy as they used to be, but I think they can afford $5 million. No, a lot of people are going to want to be in this country and they'll be able to work and provide jobs and build companies and pay taxes.
All of those things, it's an incredible thing. I mean, this is the group that is the first to hear it. Nobody's heard about it. Nobody ever thought about it. But we've been thinking about it very, very strongly over the last week. And I was going to announce it sometime next week. And I figured, why not?
We have a lot of cameras blazing right now. We might as well do it now. We'll have Karoline announce it the next time. No, it's a great thing. The gold card, remember the words the gold card. Somebody said, can we call it the Trump gold card? I said, if it helps, use the name Trump. I'll give it to you for free.
[Inaudible] you probably just launched 10,000 stories. Do you want to elaborate a little bit more on what Russian oligarchs you know or don't know?
Isn't it interesting how many stories we do tell, and they all turn out to be true, and they all turn out to be ultimately correct. Trump was right about everything. Do you have one of those Trump was right about everything hats? I'm going to give it to this gentleman. Get me one of them.
They're all going to be vetted. Everybody who comes in gets vetted. OK? They get vetted. So you got to -- you know?
When does it begin?
We're going to begin in two weeks.
About two weeks. The sale will start in about two weeks.
Mr. President, do you see a more active role for Zelenskyy now, given the status --
I hope so. I mean, look, I think that we want to get that country back on its feet. Right now, it's been destroyed. Here. Give me this. Here. Give me all of them. Look. See that? Trump was right about everything. It just came in. Somebody said it. I said, this was sent in by a fan, I said, I think we should make some of them, right, but we were pretty much?
You want one?
I'll pass on that.
Are you allowed to take one?
Probably not.
Because he'll consider it. I know him well. He's sort of a stiff. Brian, you're not a stiff. He's sort of a stiff guy. He'll take other things, but not a free hat.
Always say yes to the president, always say yes to the president.
Would anybody like one?
Mr. President, an easy question perhaps for you -- maybe it's difficult. I'm going to ask you this question about the --
Who do you work for?
I work for two news organizations.
Who?
I work for two news --
[Crosstalk]
Yeah, who are they?
I work for Gray Television, America's second largest broadcaster, and I work for iHeartRadio. So, there you go. Let me ask you the easy or tough question, Mr. President. The Philadelphia Eagles won the Super Bowl. Are they being extended an invitation?
They will be, we haven't yet but we will be. I thought it was a great performance by them and absolutely they'll be extended that invitation. Would you do that right away, by the way? We'll do it right away. We're going to do it sometime today and they deserve to be down here. And we hope to see them. We have a lot to do. We just had the great hockey team, as you know, Florida, come here.
I have many of the great athletes come that win things.
What's the main obstacle holding up this PGA tour, LIV Golf?
Well, they have to get together. You know, they've had a lot of discussions back and forth. They both are meaning well, and a deal will ultimately happen. I think it will happen pretty quickly. It would be nice to see the golfers, the best golfers be able to play against each other.
What's your role been in this whole --
[Crosstalk]
Just to help expedite it. Tiger was here, Adam Scott was here, Jay Monahan was here the other day -- just to really help expedite it. We had Yasir here from Saudi Arabia. A great guy. These are all great people, and they want to work it out. So, if I can help them work it out. I don't get anything out of it. If I can help them work it out -- I just think golf -- it's very much of an individual sport and you want to see the best players playing against each other, not playing in two different locations, right?
What's going to be more challenging, a PGA/LIV deal or a Russia-Ukraine deal?
I think the PGA deal is much more complicated [Laughter].
Sir, may I ask a Middle East question, if I may? What's your take on what's happening in the West Bank and allowed Israel to --
[Crosstalk]
Well, it's some movement up there that a lot of people are concerned about. And there's been a lot of Israeli movement up there for a reason, all of a sudden maybe they're not feeling so good about that. So, that would be terrible; I hope that doesn't happen. But there is movement up there that nobody knew about, right?
You know that, right?
Yeah, and when you say -- are you concerned about it as well?
I'm concerned about everything. I want the world to be peaceful. You know, when I left here, we had no war, we had defeated ISIS in less than four weeks. In fact, I took the general that defeated ISIS and I put him in charge of the whole ball game because that's what we want. We want winners Razin Caine, you know?
Raising -- when I heard that name, I said I like that name, that's the kind of general I like. So, we'll see, but he was great. He's a great soldier, not a politician, a soldier, a real soldier. You know that, Brian, this guy was the real --
I've heard that story a million times.
Yeah, this guy is the real deal.
He is.
And I think he's going to do a great job. But think of it, we had no wars, we had no problems. We had no inflation; we had no problems. And then all of a sudden you have October 7th, in Israel, which was horrible. And then you see what happened with Ukraine would have never -- Russia would have never gone in if the election weren't rigged, it was a rigged election.
The 2020 election was rigged, and we got out of it and you see what happened. You see what happened to our country inflation, Afghanistan, that horrible withdrawal from Afghanistan. I think when Russia saw what happened in Afghanistan, they said, wow, it's a paper tiger. We're not a paper tiger. We are the strongest military force in the world.
And by the way, Pete Hegseth is doing a great job. But we didn't have wars, we didn't have inflation, we had a strong border. We had everything going good, and then Biden got in and he's, my opinion, the worst president in the history of our country. I think Jimmy Carter was a very happy man when he passed away two weeks ago.
What are you expecting at the cabinet meeting tomorrow?
It's going to be a cabinet meeting and I'll preside -- unlike Biden, I'll preside over my own cabinet meeting [Laughter].
Mr. President, how would you compare -- how would you compare your cabinet in your second term to your cabinet that you had in your first term?
Well, I had some great people my second term, I think this is deeper. I think it's better because it's deeper. I had some people that I didn't really like too much in my cabinet, but I didn't know Washington that much. I was a New York person. I knew New York intimately, but I had to rely on people. I had great people.
Look, we got the biggest tax cuts in history. I rebuilt the military. I mean we did so much. We did unbelievable, even Right to Try. Somebody was saying today they were saved by Right to Try. We did right to try medically. We did transparency medically, that was a big thing, but Biden canceled that one. He didn't cancel Right to Try, which is interesting.
He didn't cancel Space Force; he was going to cancel Space Force. Space Force is turning out to be invaluable, amazing. We created Space Force. But think of it, we rebuilt our entire military and now we're going to have to patch it up a little bit again because of what's happened. Now, this was a grossly incompetent administration.
The only thing they were good at was cheating in elections and the weaponization of government. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you.