Interview: Donald Trump Calls In for an Interview on C-SPAN's Washington Journal - November 9, 2026

And it looks like we've got a call from the White House. Um, Mr. President, welcome to "Washington Journal Primetime".

Well, thank you, Mimi, and good luck with the show. I've watched you numerous times and you do a great job, but good luck with the show.

Thank you. We appreciate you calling in. Uh, Mr. President, we --

Sure. My honor.

-- we, uh, we heard that you like to watch, uh, C-SPAN. What, what do you like to watch?

Well, I like to watch the call-ins because it gives me a little bit of an indication of where we are. I do okay in there. W- -- we have some great Republicans calling in, and I'm not so sure the Democrats are thrilled, but the Republicans seem to be.

And we have all kinds of people calling in, sir. And, uh, you know, we aired your press conference in its entirety live today. And, uh --

Good.

-- you were asked about immigration, and I wonder, you know, in, in the "60 Minutes" interview, you talked about the, the workers, the farm workers, the hotel workers, honest people who are paying taxes who have been in this country --

Right.

-- for a long time. And, um, you indicated that there might be a deal. Do you, do you think those people should still be deported? Will you be halting those deportations?

Well, first of all, we stopped the worst inflow of people coming from all over the world, from prisons, from gang members, uh, drug dealers, uh, people ne- -- never saw mental institutions, and they were pouring in by the millions under Biden, and we stopped it, and we're getting an A+ for that. And, uh, we've also taken large numbers of the worst, the worst of the worst, the killers, the murderers, of which there were many, many, many.

And we took them out and we got them out. In some cases, they were so violent, we put them in jails. We didn't want them to come back even though, as you know, we've gone now 17 months without one person coming in illegally through the border. So it was the exact opposite. I believe the real number is 25 million over four years with Biden.

But, but Mr. President, those --

So we've done a great job, but --

-- th- -- those people that --

-- but, you know, those --

-- that you mentioned, do you, do you think that they should still be deported or will there be a shift? Will you say, "You know what? We're gonna make a deal. We're gonna halt those deportations"?

Well, the people that I mentioned, you're talking about the murders, the drug dealers --

No, no, no.

-- the rapists, the --

No, no. I meant --

-- those --

-- the, the hotel workers --

-- those are the people I'm talking about.

-- the, the waitresses, the farm workers, the, the honest people who, um, you know, are, are just kind of trying to make a life and, uh, paying their taxes.

Well, we certainly haven't put the same push on them as we have on the, the murderers or the, uh, the drug dealers. Frankly, a big problem we had is the mental institutions being dumped into our country. Some very dangerous people were released into our country, to put it mildly. So we have not put the same, uh, pressure, obviously, and, you know, the, uh, we call them the worst of the worst.

We haven't put the same pressure on waitresses and, and on farm workers, et cetera. Not even close.

And the, um, uh, Mr. President, the, uh, the impeachment vote on Secretary Hegseth could come as early as tomorrow. Do you expect all the Republicans to vote, uh, against that impeachment? What, uh, you know, Fox News is indicating that there might be Republicans voting in favor. What would your reaction be to that?

Well, I'd be disappointed in them. Look, Pete has won two wars. I mean, he's been the head person in two wars. We had General Caine and great people and warriors. But we've, uh, won tremendously Venezuela in 48 minutes, as you know. Literally, it was over in 40 minutes. So let's say one day. And we've taken out hundreds of billions of dollars and millions and millions of barrels of oil, and it's a gold mine, and we're doing very well there, and we, you know, don't forget, China was nibbling at the edges and so was Russia.

They both wanted it and I said, "Nope, you gotta get out. You gotta get out." And, uh, we have great control, great control. In fact, they gave us a million barrels of oil last week free as a sign of friendship, which was quite nice. It's a lot of money. It all goes to the country and goes to the Treasury, and we have a lot of oil coming.

As you know, it's, uh, it's one of the, one of the top two or three. And by the way, the United States now is the number one producer of oil and oil and gas in particular, but of oil, anywhere in the world. It's Russia and Saudi Arabia. Times two, we do more. So, and especially when you add, uh, Venezuela, now you add Venezuela and we have the American companies are, uh, building tremendous rigs in, right now in Venezuela.

When they kick in, it's gonna be something special.

And --

So we won Venezuela and we won Iran. Well, we wiped out their navy, we wiped out their air force, we wiped out everything, their antiaircraft, we wiped out their leaders.

And, uh --

We wiped out everything, and they wanna make a deal. They don't say that, you know, publicly. They're very good with public relations. They, they spin a message, but, uh, they're, uh, they've got 301% inflation. They have no money. They haven't paid their military. They don't pay their guard, their, their [Inaudible] guard.

And, and Mr. -- Mr. President, how much longer do you expect that war in Iran to go?

Well, it depends. I mean, we could knock it out fast or we could knock it out over a short, not a long period of time. You know, I said I was gonna knock out their nuclear quickly and I did. I knocked it out with the B-2 bombers over a year ago. And I could have quit then, but, uh, we were concerned that they'd just build it back.

They'd figure it out, and they'd build it back over a couple of years. Uh, right now, there's, you know, thou- -- hundreds of thousands of tons of rock sitting on top of the so-called nuclear dust, the three sites. We may have to hit Pickaxe Mountain if they're gonna do something there. We don't see that.

We have, we have the eye in the sky on it very strongly. We don't see it. But we, uh, we, the bottom line is we can't let Iran have a nuclear weapon because they'd use it. I saved Israel. If I didn't do the B-2 bombers or if I didn't do the JCPOA, the Obama, the Obama disaster deal, I call it the disaster.

It was a disaster what it was. It gave -- it was a path for -- short-term path for a nuclear weapon for Iran. I terminated that in my first term, killed Soleimani, who was the general and the mad genius behind all of this stuff, including the roadside bomb where thousands and thousands of American soldiers and many other people were killed.

That was his pet. He loved the roadside bomb. And, uh, no longer with us.

And, and President Trump, we --

And the thing that frankly that set us up great for this victory that we've had. And, and now, it's a question of I could do it quickly or not. The reason I'm doing it this way is because in speaking with Qatar, as you know, the prime minister was in the Oval Office today, in speaking to Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, basically the neighbors who were attacked pretty violently by the way, but in speaking to them, they'd rather do it this way rather than a, uh, another hit, which would be app- -- approximately five times bigger than the first hit, which basically decimated them.

So, uh, I'd like to do it this way, too, and I think, you know, I can tell you that Iran would like to make a deal, and we'll find out --

And --

-- whether or not that'll happen.

And Mr., uh, President Trump, we so appreciate you calling to congratulate us. Uh, you can call us anytime. You can, uh, you have an open invitation to come on the program and, and be our guest.

Great.

Okay, sir?

Well, you, you do a great job and, uh, good luck with everything. It's my honor to be one of your early calls. [Laughs]

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Take care of yourself. Goodbye.

Bye. And, uh, we will go back to your calls now. We'll go to Margot calling us from Portland, Oregon.