Interview: Marc Caputo Interviews Donald Trump for The Axios Show - June 18, 2026

Mr. President, welcome to The Axios Show.

Thank you.

We wanted to make this more of a conversation than a typical interview where we're just gonna hop around from topics-

Okay.

-- to topic. And we wanted do, Axios likes to do "one big thing."

Okay.

And so the one big thing we want to talk about is power, and how you think about it, and how you wield it. A decade ago, you first became president --

Mm-hmm.

-- and you've had loads of experience since then. In that span of time, what is the one big thing you've learned about wielding power?

Well, I think you have to do it judiciously. I think that, uh, experience is good. I always say that potential is far more important. In other words, having ability is far more important than experience, but having both is very good. And I learned a lot during the first administration, and I was told just the other day, because, you know, we had a tremendous, uh, G7 and very dominant G7. We got what I wanted.

And somebody said the other day that this is a far more powerful administration, or term, than the first one. And we had a good first term. You know, we had the best economy. We had a lot of good things happening. We, we built the military. We did a good job. But I feel it's a more powerful term than the first one.

Now, that comes with experience. It also comes by having somebody precede you who was a disaster. I mean, the man was a disaster. And so when you're compared to somebody like that, you look maybe better than you are. That's possible. But, but, um, I feel that it, it's a very powerful administration right now.

But that's because you've applied lessons. You've done some things differently. What are some of those things you did differently, or better than you did before?

Well, it's a terrible answer, actually, but I don't think about it. I just do what I have to do. You know, I wanna get something done. I don't th- -- say, "Oh, I'm gonna do it a little bit differently this time." I, I probably say that, uh, down deep, but I don't think about, like, "Gee, what can I do differently?" I just wanna get the job done.

And I've always gotten the job done. That's how I got elected the first time, [Laughs] and that's how I got elected the second time. But, uh, the second Trump administration is a more powerful, and it feels more to me. I mean, I may be wrong. You would know maybe better than I would because I don't give it a lot of thought, but I think it's a more powerful administration.

And I think the first one was really good. You know, I rebuilt the military in the first one. I did, uh, Space Force. I did so many things. We had the best economy. We had a great economy. Uh, we had the best job numbers. We had everything. First administration was good. We got hit by COVID. That's not my fault.

But, uh, at the end, but we had a great administration, but this one is, I think, better.

You mentioned the G7, uh --

Yeah.

-- you saw a number of world leaders. You walked in and you said, "I'm the boss."

Yeah.

Uh, how many of them believe that?

All of them. But I was just being funny.

Uh-huh.

What happened is, they were all sitting, and then I walked into the room and it was just, sort of, funny because there's a very long table, but there's only seven of them. The table was meant for, like, 30 people. So the whole end of the table looked like almost the perfect podium type setup, right? And I saw them all siting, and they're all well-known figures, right?

The heads of countries. We had a couple of others in there too, as you know. Some, like, as an example, uh, Modi of India, gate- -- great guy. A lot of, a lot of people came. Uh, they're allowed to come if they want and sit. But I walked in there, these leaders, and I just looked at them. I said, "I'm the boss and you remember." And you know that was done as a joke.

This thing got carried all over the world. I can't believe it. I was just being cute, funny. I wasn't trying to be the boss.

You have experience, obviously, with the world leaders for, from your two terms. Wh- -- ho- -- what's your definition of a great leader? How do you define --

Well, you, you have so many different types of leaders. Yesterday, as an example, I'll mention the name again, because pretty great. You know, all my life I've watched India, they just kept changing, changing, changing. Somebody would there, be there for six months and then a year. And then all of a sudden, uh, Prime Minister Modi ends up there.

He's been there for more than 12 years, very solid. And he does it through, like, there's a great calmness and yet he's not a calm person. He's a very tough guy. [Laughs] I know him very well. And you have such different leaders. Uh, I watched Brazil, the leader who I know a little bit, we have some, he's a very volatile person, you know.

You're not a fan of Lula, if I'm not mistaken.

I'm not a fan or not a fan. I don't think about him, to be honest with you. I don't really think about him. I couldn't care less, but he's a different kind of a person now, very volatile. I watched, uh, as he made a speech, and it was a very vola- -- and, and it's fine. It's all different types. So when you say about leaders, when you say about, you know, what do they all have in common?

Look, uh, they're all smart. You can't get to that level without being smart. You know who's very smart, is President Xi of China. He's a very smart man. Uh, you don't get to those levels where you're running a country, even if it was a small country. You have something special. Now, in some cases, it doesn't work out, but you need something special.

It's not an easy thing to do.

What is it about Xi that you find most admirable?

Well, we have a very good relationship and you probably heard me say yesterday, I said, "You know, I wanna thank him because he didn't get involved with the whole thing with Iran." He could've gotten involved. He could've sent a nice oil ship surrounded by 12 destroyers and see if he could blast his way through the blockade, which was an unbelievable military, I think it's gonna go down.

It was one of the great military maneuvers. It was, it was every bit as important as all the bombing we did. It really, uh, they, they were dying. They had no money, no nothing for months. But President Xi asked him, I said, "I'd really appreciate you not getting involved." And he was great. He didn't get involved.

And I think if somebody else would've said that, I don't think somebody else would've even asked him that, but I did. I get along with him well. He's a strong man. He's no games. He won't sit down and say, "Oh, what a beautiful day. This is a wonderful day, Marc. Look how beautiful. Look at the, look at the sunshine." There's none of that stuff.

It's like all business, which I like. I think it's great.

Is there something about the Chinese system that you think advantages him and his country that you wish you had here?

Well, it, it's actually supposed to be a disadvantage. You know, we have the entrepreneurship and all the things you read about, but they're there just about as quick as we are. You know, you go to a l- -- something's hot and we get there and the Chinese are standing there before us. Or we beat them by a little bit, but we're, I'll tell you, we're beating them on AI. We have the strongest military in the world.

We have the most powerful military in the world. He admitted to me, "You have the most powerful... " We had, I did a great job. I rebuilt our military in the first term and did it well. Look, take a look at Venezuela. 48 minutes, the whole thing was over. 48 minutes. And by the way, now we have a great relationship and we're, we've paid for that war with Venezuela many, many, many times.

Uh, we're taking out millions of barrels of oil and we're making them more money than they've ever made before. All the big oil companies are moving in. It's amazing. There's no place with that kind of oil, I guess us maybe we have the most, uh, and they're probably second or third.

Obviously, I, if I ask you who are the two greatest or leaders you like the most n- -- on the world stage, I'd assume one of them is Xi.

Yeah. I, I think in terms of leadership, I think that's true.

Who's the other? When you think, when you think of power and leverage and the ability to execute on that.

Well, I think Modi is --

Modi?

-- very good. Yeah. They've had some very good numbers announced. He stays out of wars, which is smart. He's, uh, 1.5 billion people. He's actually the biggest. India's actually the biggest. Uh, Modi's a great leader and we do a lot of business with them, but now we do fair business. They used to really rip us off.

I don't blame them for that. You know, we had stupid politicians, but, that allowed that to happen. But now we, we do a lot of business. They're not that happy about it because they used to do a lot better. So, but Modi's great. Uh, President Xi is great. Classics, you know, I mean, if you were gonna make a mo- -- movie about either one of them, you, uh, you wouldn't be able to find the man in Hollywood, I'm telling you it's, uh, As, as like, as an example, the look of, Xi's got a great look, you know?

Looks don't matter, right? You know, we don't like that. They say, "Don't talk about looks." But he's, uh, you know, he's tall, he's six-foot-two, he's, he's, uh, got a great stature, he's got great confidence and he's smart. Uh, Modi in a very different way, just highly respected. I've seen, you know, I know the, the real Modi is a very tough cookie.

Um, I'll tell you, you have, I got to know some that I didn't know very well in Pakistan. You have the Field Marshal --

Munir?

-- who's, uh, great. Munir. He's great. And you have the, and the Prime Minister and they just get along great. I figured, well, maybe the military guy would be, He totally respects the Prime Minister. It's a beautiful thing to see. But they really helped us with this deal. They were, you know, they knew the Iranians, they knew the people and they were good.

You have leaders in, uh, I mean, you have so many different types. For the most part, if you're a smart person, you can understand, you know, you, you, to be in these positions, you have to be smart, you have to be tough, uh, maybe smart even more so, but the combination is probably better. But we have, there are a lot of great leaders out there and there are a lot of really bad ones.

Who, Okay, well let's talk about that. Who --

I know. Who's the bad one?

Who are the two, who are the two weakest?

Well, I, I, I can't say that because --

Yeah, you can. You're the president.

I can't say. I will tell you though that, uh, this couple of days was interesting. It was held in France and Emmanuel Macron of France who won't be there that much longer, he's the president and he, uh, he was, I'll tell you what, he did a great job of hosting the G7 really good, no games, no nothing. And he invited me about a week before, he said, "Would you do me a favor?

Would you come into Paris? We'd like to honor you." I, I view it as honoring the nation. But he said, "I'd like to honor you." And he had the biggest people in Europe there and beyond. I mean, some people in Versailles and I was sort of not gonna do it, but he knew my weakness because I think Versailles is one of the great places. [Laughs]

What's your weakness?

Uh, uh, like places like Versailles, but no, it's incredible. So, and it's not something they do. I understand that they don't do that. They don't do dinners at Versailles. And we had a fantastic dinner. I think he did a fantastic job, I'll tell you, with the G7. I've seen, uh, G7s. I've been to a lot of G7s. And used to be G8s.

Mm-hmm.

They should have kept the G8. You probably wouldn't have the war with Russia and Ukraine if they did, but Obama didn't want Putin there. I guess one or two others also, but they wanted Putin out. It used to be the G8. Would have been much better if they kept it that way.

Speaking of Putin, who do you admire more on of the two of them? Putin or Zelensky?

Well, I think it's, uh, amazing what's happened actually. You have a war that should have been over very quickly. You know, I don't know if you know the story, but when that started, Putin had hundreds of tanks that were driving up a highway. There's a highway, concrete, very good highway, solid as a rock right into Kiev.

And about halfway there, He would have been there in three hours going at 51 miles an hour, which is about the max speed for a tank. And they had, you know, remember the big line of tanks, right? And they had some general who probably is no longer with us. He decided rather than going right into Kiev and ending the war on the first day, I don't think anyone even knows this story, that he would go through the farmland and through the dirt and the mud.

And they had a record setting rainstorm a couple of days before and those tanks got stuck in that mud. And I gave them javelins and they took out the tanks. I gave it before this happened. But, you know, there's an expression because they say, "Oh, you're so nice to Russia." I'm not nice to Russia. I've been very tough in Russia.

I've been very tough on China, tougher than anybody. That's why they respect me. I have good relationships with these people. But I gave them javelins. A javelin is an anti-tank weapon. And those tanks were obliterated. And everybody said, "What's wrong?" Because, you know, they have the satellites, right?

The satellite photos?

Yeah.

And the tanks were lined up and they weren't moving for days. And then they came, they hit them with satellites. They were, they were locked in quicksand practically. You know, it was mud like quicksand. They couldn't move. Had the general just, Tells you, that's why war is always risky. Had this general just gone right up the concrete highway, they would have been in Kiev within four hours and there wasn't a damn thing that Ukraine was going to do about it. That war would have been over in one day.

That was four and a half years ago. So that was a terrible mistake. And here's a general, decides rather than going up the middle of a highway right into the town, They couldn't have done anything. They were totally unprepared. And not only that, when they wiped out all these tanks, it gave them confidence.

You know, confidence is very important. But, uh, have you ever heard that story, by the way?

I haven't heard that story. I know that you had armed Ukraine with Javelins --

I gave them Javelins.

-- that the prior administration wasn't so keen on.

You know the expression, "Trump gave them javelins. Obama gave them sheets," right? That's true.

Let's shift a little because time is --

Yeah.

-- of the essence. Shift to Iran. Uh, there's now light at the end of the tunnel --

Yeah.

-- for the conflict. What have you learned about not just the exercise of power, but the limits on your power as a result of the conflict?

There are no limits.

No limits?

No, not, I haven't learned that lesson yet. I know there are, but, you know, there are no limits. We defeated them totally militarily. Uh, I was asked by Pakistan, because they're close, to please not do anymore. I said, I like them a lot. You know, uh, I stopped Pa- -- Pakistan from fighting India, two nuclear nations.

And the Prime Minister of Pakistan said President Trump saved 50 million lives. They were gonna use nuclear weapons. 11 planes were shot down. They were at it. And I was hearing about it. Then I saw some really terrible pictures. They were going at it, Pakistan and India. They have gone at it in the past, but this was, And they're both nuclear armed, heavily.

And they were gonna use those nuclear weapons. And the Prime Minister of Pakistan said, "Donald Trump saved 50 million lives." But it's not 50. I think it was much more than that. 50 is nothing when you look at 1.5 billion people just in India alone. So, uh, I think that, uh, there are no limits. We have the most powerful military in the world, by far.

Who else could have done a blockade like that? I did a naval blockade where not one ship was able to get through. Some tried. They didn't, you know, it didn't last very long.

And it certainly brought Iran to the table more than before. However, beginning of conflict, you had talked about you only wanted unconditional surrender and --

Well --

-- the MOU doesn't look like unconditional surrender.

Well, it really probably is unconditional surrender.

It is?

I think so. Look, they have no military. They're all at the bottom of the sea, 159 ships, that's what they had.

Sure, but they could still menace, They only had these small, what, Gashti boats or go-fast boats.

Well, you, look, you call it what you want. You know, I hear the, the, uh, JCPOA, the, the Obama nuclear catastrophe --

MM-hmm.

-- which was so bad. When Obama left, he didn't hit their military.

Sure.

He didn't damage their navy or, or destroy their air force. I destroyed the air force. I destroyed their anti-aircraft weapons. That's why we were flying over there totally unimpeded. We turned off all the stealth. They couldn't do a thing. He didn't do any of that stuff. He didn't kill their leadership.

I did, twice, two and a half times to be exact. He didn't do anything to Soleimani. I killed Soleimani.

And you killed the Ayatollah.

And I killed the Ayatollah.

And a number of IRGC officials and most --

And I sadly hurt the other Ayatollah who's, who I will tell you, I did not meet him, I did not speak to him, but people were speaking to him. But he's got a certain braveness 'cause he was, he was badly, he's badly injured.

Oh, the, the second of the, Khamenei

Yes, the son. Yeah.

The [Inaudible], the, the j- -- Junior. Uh, nevertheless, all of those things being true, the, the --

Well, you can't just say, "Oh, forget about-"

No, I'm s --

Excuse me. I wiped out their military.

I don't dispute that.

I, I destroyed their general. Okay, ready? Soleimani was the father of the roadside bomb.

Mm-hmm.

When you see, which is a description of something that people understand, when you see soldiers walking around without legs or without arms, with an obliterated face, 96.2% that came from Iran, came from Soleimani. It was his favorite weapon. And I killed him and he killed thousands of soldiers and k- -- thousands of other people, tens of thousands of other people.

And I told the story the other day for the first time, you're not supposed to do that with Israel. And Israel at the last moment backed out. When I killed him, that was supposed to be done with Israel. It was a joint thing. We worked on it for 30 days. He only travels in commercial airlines with lots of people because he knows we're not gonna shoot him down.

You know, a military plane is different and he got into the pla- -- everything was on schedule. But a day before, Israel told us they're not gonna do the attack. And I understood that 'cause, you know, I was not so good for that. But I went to certain generals, not the stupid ones like Milley and some of these guys that were very stupid people that decided to leave equipment behind.

I don't leave equipment behind. But I went to some good guys. I said, "What do you guys think?" They said, "Well, we can do it without him. We don't need him, sir." I said, "Would it be as good?" He said, "Just as good or better." And it was a flawless attack. Now, that was one of the biggest moments in the history of the Middle East because he was the most feared man in a hundred years.

Uh, even Iran, even the Ayatollahs, even, uh, they all feared Soleimani. Now, ready? Did Obama do that? No. That was a big thing. If I didn't take him out and I also, in doing it, also took out the head of Iraq's ISIS. But if I didn't do that, we may not be talking today about, you know, this such a conclusive victory because he was a general.

He was a very evil guy. He was a bad guy, but he was smart. He was a very tough general. You know what he was gonna do? He was gonna fi- -- blow up five of our military bases. I got him one week ahead of that attack.

But that was in what, 2019?

I don't care. It was part of the whole thing. I, I made that statement yesterday. I said, you know, for those people that say, "Oh, maybe I wasn't tough enough." I've wiped out. I took out their biggest bridge because they showed up later in the meeting. They said, "That wasn't very nice." You know that bridge?

I said, "George Washington Bridge. I wiped it out in three minutes." I took out Kharg Island, everything except one thing. I li- -- I said, "Leave the pipes along because, you know, I'm not looking to damage the world economy."

Mm.

So I think we were very tough. Uh, the people --

Well, you have --

Listen, the people that say, "Oh, he could've been tougher." The entire military is gone, ready? Air Force is gone. Do you agree? It's gone.

Wiped out.

There's no airplane.

Yes.

There's no airplanes. They had a lot of them, they had 200 of them. They're all gone. Navy, 159 ships, right? All at the bottom of the sea. Leadership. Their first stringers all gone, including Khamenei, the first one. They then put a new group in there, very good but very nasty. I dealt with them. They're gone, they're all gone.

And we're dealing with the third group, who I actually think is the smartest group. And I actually think it's regime change if you to know another truth. It using different people.

Well, how is a regime change if you have --

Because they're different people.

But you have Khamenei Jr., You still have a lot of IRGC officials there.

Uh, they're different people.

All right.

Khamenei Jr's different from the father.

You have a number of --

And we have people that are much less radicalized than the previous two groups, of which I knew them both. But think of it. "Oh, why aren't you tougher?" Let me, the only way I can get tougher is if I go in there for another two or three weeks and continue the bomb the hell out of I'm right. But what does that get us? The Strait of Hormuz will not be open.

Let's say I did that. Let's say I decided to do that. I, I was a decision ahead of me. So right now, our stock market is through the roof. The oil prices are tumbling. The oil prices are practically the same as there were before I started. The big difference is that Iran will never have a nuclear weapon.

They're never gonna have a nuclear weapon, okay? It's very clear and very simple. But if I were hitting them right now, when you stopped, it's f- -- if we're not gonna put boots on the ground, okay? I mean, you don't want boots on the ground, right? If we're not gonna put boots on the ground, probably the same people, you know, they go deep into the caves, they're called granite caves, they're very powerful.

They go deep in, and then when we stop, they'll come up and they'll probably be the same leader. So nothing, okay, ready? Uh, when I knocked them out, we knocked them out so powerfully we would right now have the Hormuz Strait would be totally closed. You would have mines all over it and it would have missiles flying over a billion-dollar ships and those ships will never sail.

We wouldn't have oil for months. As long as you're dropping bombs, that thing is automatically closed because those ships cost $500 to a billion dollars a piece. They're not gonna be sailing with rockets. So just to finish, I just looked. Oil is tumbling. Their ships are roaring out of there. They wanna go home.

They wanna drop. They're all full with oil. This is Gusher. I mean, this, We have seven or 800 ships are leaving. But if I attack them, none of those ships are leaving. The stock market is way up, way, way up. You know, the stock market is up over the last four or five days when it looks like we're gonna make a deal.

Stock market's up thousands of points. Everybody's richer. Now, would you rather have that or be like some stupid people? I, I, I'd be honest with you. I lost respect for some people because --

Who'd you lose respect --

I don't, I don't wanna mention the names.

Oh, you can't.

But, but, you know, hardliners, "Oh, you gotta take them out here --

Well, what are you gonna do to the one --

And plus, I'm not looking to kill people.

Well, what are you gonna do to the --

Go ahead.

In order for your plan to be fully executed --

Yeah.

-- as the MOU indicate --

It is.

-- eventually, it's gonna have to go through Congress. There are Republicans in Congress who don't like this.

Well, so far not too many, but I think it'll get approved. And if it's not approved, it's a --

What are you gonna do if --

By the way, Obama never got his plan approved. You know that, right? Now, Obama did something very different. He thought he could buy --

I think he got approved at the Senate, but it wasn't a treaty. I think it was no --

Was never got the treaty.

Yeah.

Which you're talking about. So --

No, even, uh, the sanctions, for instance. Some of the sanctions --

No, but he didn't, He, look, I negotiated from total strength. Their neighbor was gone. Their Air Force was gone. Their leaders were everything. In fact, the hardest part is so many leaders were gone.

So what are you going to do --

It took us a while to figure out who was their leader.

Uh-huh. But the --

You do understand that?

I do. Well, the Republicans who oppose this, when votes come up in Congress to --

Who are they? Who are they?

Uh, there are a number of them, I would say --

I mean, Lindsay Graham just came out with a very positive statement.

Is there gonna be a price to pay for any of them if they oppose you on this?

No. Oh, if they do, no.

Yeah.

No. Not from main names.

Now, one of the things you had talked about --

And, and frankly, if they approve it or not, look, it is what it is. We've got the greatest economy on earth. I've got the strongest military and I built it. I've got the strong, Obama, when I took over the military from Obama, he gave all our money away to people. He gave hundreds of billions of dollars away to Iran.

And by the way, that's the other thing. I'm not giving money to Iran. I don't give money to Iran. What's gonna happen is this. Obama took over. He didn't kill Soleimani, I did. He should have, by the way, because Soleimani was, he had some good plans and, you know, I'm watching the way, I've known you, Marc.

You're trying to act like, oh, you hate to hear, But you can't, you have no argument for me because you can't win the argument --

I'm not, I'm not gonna --

So here, here's what I was gonna say. Some guys that I used to respect, I don't respect anymore, they're hardliners, but I have the argument with them.

Mm-hmm.

They're unable to win the argument with me. They can't win it. And so they go, here's the end they'll say, "All right, I don't care." I still don't like it. Okay? That's what, "You still show talk." If I went further, the stock market would be much lower. Now think of this. I have on primary wish as president in terms of people, I never wanna be the late great Herbert Hoover.

So this is the kind of thing that could cause a worldwide depression. Do you know that for the last two months, I've been taking many ships out there and nobody knew it? You know why they didn't know it? Because we knocked out their radar. We knocked out all of their defensive stuff and they were unable to say, "Uh, last week we had one night, 25 ships, one night 22, one night 19, one night 21." So every night --

All these ships out.

Oh, we shipped a lot. That's how the, Uh, people were saying, "Where is this oil coming from?" Nobody knew. We'd leave at one o'clock in the morning all lights off and we'd have our Navy destroyers going alongside and they had no equipment because we destroyed all of the equipment that would normally be, you know, used to detect this.

And I went for a month and a half taking many ships out there every night at one o'clock in the morning and we were never detected until about a week ago and then I announced that we're doing it --

Well, I think the New York Times had reported that you guys were engaged in that operation of 20 ships or whatever. I wanted to shift to --

They shouldn't have. If they did, they shouldn't have.

Well, they, they had good sources.

I mean, they, um, you know, that's very, not very patriotic if they did.

Well, the, uh, I did want to talk about Cuban AI.

We'll do it, and we have to do it fast because they're waiting for me at a very important meeting.

Well, so you'd said if Cuba is, or better said, if Iran is finished, uh, then it's time for Cuba.

Right.

Is there a clock, a shot down, a countdown clock on Cuba --

It's a flexible line, but I, you know, Marco is involved very much. Marco's doing a great job, by the way. All my people are doing a very good job, but Marco's parents, it's such a great story. His parents were from Cuba. So you do agree, I defeated Venezuela incredible.

100%.

I got him out of there.

How do you, how do you make the operation of Cuba look more like the Venezuela operation --

Well, the difference is Venezuela has oil. Cuba doesn't. Cuba has nice property and that nice shoreline.

Right. How do you make it look more like the Venezuela operation than the Iran operation? Iran operation took longer. Venezuela --

No, no, I, I think the Iran, Iran operation in a certain way is much bigger --

Yeah.

Uh, much more powerful from the standpoint of weaponry than, uh, Venezuela, but Venezuela's a very military state. You know, they have a lot of soldiers. You know, we went into that fort and they had thousands of soldiers in and we went in with 201 people. And that was a part of, The pilot was very brave.

He had his leg shot from underneath where the machine gunner who, who got a, you know, escaped a bad, a bad life, a bad debt. So no, I think that Venezuela, Here's the thing. In Venezuela, it was so incredible, right?

Yeah.

And we waited and waited. And at the right time, I said, "Let's go do it now." We waited for the weather. We had to wait six days. We had some really bad weather. You know, the pilot said, "Sir, we wanna do it." We went in and less than ideal. They didn't care. And it actually lasted 48 minutes. And this is an arm, you know, they have a lot of soldiers, they have a lot of good soldiers.

Uh, with, uh, if you look at Iran, they've been doing this stuff for 47 years. They've been taunting you and everybody else, all of the media, everything. They're very good with the press. They have a great fake media and I put out a truth a little while ago. I said, "If I had the white flag of surrender raised and if they said, 'Praise be to Allah, Trump is the greatest president.

We hear by surrender.' The New York Times would write that they won the war." They've lost so much credibility, so it's a very different kind of a place than Venezuela. But Venezuela, you know, we're running Venezuela with the people that we to --

Do you see the Cuba operation running similarly to the way Israel --

Possibly. It's possible. Um, the, uh, well, there's another thing. These places are close by. Whereas if you look at Iran, that's a very long trip. You know, I flew to that area a few times and unrelated to this, but you're flying for 18 hours. You know, you're flying for a long time. Venezuela is relatively close and Cuba's, uh, a hopscotch.

Well, I wanted to talk about --

We're gonna have Marco get involved with Cuba. Cuba wants to talk very badly. We have a lot of people that voted for me, like 95%, and, uh, we're gonna --

Some of your strongest support is in the Cuban American community mind.

That's right. Oh, I love 'em.

So wanted to present this to you, just the map of the Western hemisphere. When --

Ha --

-- when you look at, I mean, not as a gift, right? Um, [Laughs] but when you look at this, do you see this as a fundamentally American hemisphere? Is this fundamentally --

More and more so, yeah.

More and more so.

We're much res- -- more respected. So we had a man that couldn't walk up a flight of stairs. And I don't want to talk about because if I have a trip a little bit, they'll say, "Oh, this is terrible." Okay, can happen, but you can't trip every time you go on a stage. We had a man that wasn't respected. He wasn't smart 40 years ago.

He was the worst thing that ever happened to old people 'cause I have old people, friends of mine, that are 93, 95 years old. They're 100%. Gary Player, great golfer. I play golf. He shot 71. He's 90 years old and he's mentally exactly the same as he was for the last 30 years. There are a lot of people. Biden was the worst thing that ever happened to old people because you guys were not honest with the public.

The public saw it. He was a disaster. And you know the worst thing he did? Inflation was really bad, but that wasn't the worst thing. The worst that, 'cause I inherited all this stuff. Look at what's happening with prices. Now they're coming down. And with the oil, they're really coming down. I had to make an excursion to stop a very volatile group of people that are smart.

Very smart, you know? The Iranians, very smart people. Uh, they're sort of primitive genius, but they're smart.

I mean --

Okay? I had to stop them because if they had a nuclear weapon, they would use it. And you wanna see Bedlam? Let them blow up a couple of cities someplace like they would've blown up Israel. If it weren't for me, Israel would not exist today because I terminated the Barack Hussein Obama deal, the JCPOA, which was a road to a nuclear weapon.

They would've had it five years ago. They would've used it within the first week, in my opinion. And Israel would no longer be with us. Israel would've been gone years ago had I not done that. Now, what surprised me most is they waited so long, they waited 'til I came back. They didn't do it intentionally.

They didn't think I'd be coming back. A lot of people didn't think so because of weaponization. They weaponized government, but I came back with Aurora, but better than before, I think. Better than before. And think of it. Israel would've been gone if we didn't hit them with the B-2 bombers. They were all that enriched material.

They were one month away. I was right there. They could've walked down. They can't do that anyway. You know, the B-2 bombers did their job with those great pilots. They, that sitting, the bo- -- the mountain collapsed on top of it. It collapsed on top of it. Had we not hit them, they would've had a nuclear weapon.

They would've used it on Israel. They would've used it also on Saudi Arabia and you saw that on Qatar, on UAE, on Kuwait, Bahrain. Because when that war started, I guess my biggest surprise, almost immediately missiles were flying at these five other countries.

Hm.

I said, "Why is he doing it?" And you know what that did? That brought those five countries right into my lap. They were great.

And last one, artificial intelligence.

Just, excuse me just one second.

Yeah.

If it weren't for Donald Trump and Bibi Netanyahu worked well with me, but he will tell you we're the ones with the guns, we're the ones with the whole deal, we're the ones with the B-2 bombers, et cetera. If it weren't for Donald Trump, Israel would have been eviscerated.

Your relationship with Netanyahu's --

It's good, but we have to keep him a little bit, uh, sane.

Are you gonna be able to control Israel from attacking Lebanon?

Yeah. I will be.

How?

I mean, I wonder. Uh, they have a lot of respect for me and they do as I say. Remember this, if I don't terminate the JCPOA road to, Remember, that was a road to a nuclear weapon, legally. It says right there. And Obama thought he could pay them off. He gave them billions and billions of dollars, 1.7 billion in cash.

You know, it was a well-known story, but it didn't work. You can't bribe your way out of it, you can't pay off your way. But if I didn't do that and if I didn't attack their nuclear supply 10 months ago with the B-2 bombers, uh, Israel would not exist today.

So artificial intelligence.

Yeah.

Not a very artful transition by me. Do you see artificial intelligence as a weapon?

Well, imp- -- improperly used, it could be. Uh, if properly is, I will tell you one thing. It's so big.

Yeah.

It is big like nobody's, I mean, bigger than the internet, it's bigger than any, I've seen the different things come along. It's an age where people like you, if we're nice, smart people like we are, we watch and we see what's happening. This AI is incredible. Now, it's unbelievable for good. You're gonna have medical cures coming up 25 years early because of it. You're gonna have other things happening, but you have to watch.

You know, we have a situation with Anthropic and we didn't like what they were doing. And so far, I think they behaved very responsibly to our request.

Do you view Anthropic and to a degree its CEO, Dario Amodei, as a threat to national security?

Well, not now, but a week ago, maybe. I was with him yesterday. He made a speech. I made a little speech. We were in the room on the G7 and seems like a nice guy, smart guy. But he responded to us very quickly because, you know, it's tremendous liability. People get put in prison immediately for that. You know, you can't play games with that.

And he responded very responsibly, I thought, "So far, I think he will."

Do you have the power and the inclination to shut them down or possibly take them --

Well, I don't wanna do that because I'm somebody that, You know, we're beating China by a lot on AI. I was with President Xi, we talked about it. We're beating China by a lot. Everyone thought that we didn't have the electricity. I came up with an idea. I thought of it myself. I let them build their own electric plants when they're building their factories, that way we don't, They don't have to use an old grid.

And they actually sell back into the grid at a cheap price excess electricity. They need massive amounts. It's amazing, Marc. They need double the amount of electricity that this country produces for everything to run at. So I had the idea, I said, "I'm gonna let them..." I mean, we don't have that kind of electricity.

Really, nobody does. And they're building their plants and they're building the most incredible electric producing factories you've ever seen. So we're leading China by a lot. Uh, it's going to be for the good and we're watching for the bad.

Is there --

I think the good, Let me put it a different way. The good far outweighs the bad. We are going to find the bad and we're going to stop it.

You have the power to use the defense production, potentially.

I have the power to use a lot of things, yeah.

Uh, would, would you consider using the Defense Production Act to possibly regulate or control AI or AI --

I would, but I'm, I'm not sure I have to do that. I think so far it's been very responsible. Actually, it was a competitor and a part owner that turned Anthropic in. They didn't like that, what they were doing. They were very concerned. Think of it, it's part owner and, uh, I think it worked out very well, I think.

And France at the G7 had talked about having an international group --

Yeah.

-- comes together. They want the United States to share more on AI. I, since --

Well, the problem we have is that we are leading everybody by a lot.

Right, is power share, power loss.

Right. Yeah, but here's the problem. I mean, Europe, I heard maybe it's wrong, but the, we have many of the top, Almost all, between us and China, we have almost all. Uh, first European company that's in AI is number 187, so that's not too good. Europe has to be very careful. They're losing their way. They're losing the way entrepreneurially and, and I mean, the big thing is energy wise.

Look, the UK is sitting on the greatest oil find, one of them in the world, the North Sea, the great North Sea, they have the great, one of the greatest, they're not using it because of the environment. And if they did use it, their energy prices would be cut by 75%. They don't wanna use it. And yet, they buy their energy from Norway, which uses the North Sea. And Norway's got $3 trillion sitting in the bank.

So, you know, it's crazy. Uh, I have to go. I'm so late. I did this out of respect for you, but I have to go.

Oh, all right.

Do you wanna just close it out?

Uh, yeah, let's close it up. Um, where are you in as, as you wind down your presidency, you've got two more years.

Yeah.

The --

I don't care to wind down. I think we got a lot of time. We have --

Well, every --

Two and a half plus years.

E- -- every presidency has a life cycle.

Yeah.

And as a president comes to his, in a second term, to his last midterm --

Yeah.

-- his party usually loses control of the house. His poll numbers usually start to decline and he starts to weaken. And that's happening to you.

No, it's not.

Uh --

Fake polls. I have great poll numbers.

How do you maintain --

I, I would beat any candidate they have by 25 points.

Well, how do you maintain your --

I have great, I have great poll numbers.

How do, how do you maintain your power going forward? You have the Senate that's rebelling?

I don't think about it. No, I don't think about it. All I do is do my job. You know, I have more than two and a half years. I have a lot of time. But all I do is think about doing my job. And we have other things, very big things that I wanna do in the next two and a half years. Some very impactful things.

Things are happening that aren't good and I'm gonna straighten them out, and some things are happening that should be better and I'm gonna make them better. Uh, this is a great presidency.

Are you gonna miss being in this White House?

Well, it's so early. I don't like to talk about it because, you know, two and a half years is pretty long time in all fairness. I love the building. I'm fixing the building. You know, I do that in my little side hobby. I've, you see the granite, which was, they had stones that's broken, the marble's broken.

The, the tile they have is garbage from a low-class place that sells garbage. This is the White House. You saw the white floor, I assume? You saw the beautiful granite. I fix it. I pay for it myself. I don't want money. And the White House is, will soon be in better shape than it was. And most importantly, when it was built, most importantly, I'm building what will be one of the greatest ballrooms and safety nets anywhere in the world.

It's all bulletproof glass. It's all drone-proof roofs. Uh, it's actually a drone port on the top of the roof with views of everything. It's very high up. Um --

And you're gonna be able to get there through the Senate. I know the Senate has been --

Well, I don't need it through the Senate. I'm paying for it myself. I don't know what, They're talking about giving a billion, I don't need money from the Senate. I'm, I'm putting up my own money and the money of very great patriots. Apple, Microsoft, you know, all, We don't need money. We have a judge that said he'd rather have it be put up by the government.

Why? We're, we're giving a gift of a tremendous military and also a very important ballroom for safety. You see how many, uh, with all the whack jobs, all these crazy people. The bulletproof glass is this thick. Nothing gets through it. The drones won't hit it. They'll bounce off the roof. Uh, we're actually putting a drone port up that's very important.

But we have a judge that probably doesn't like Donald Trump. Fortunately, we have pe- -- appellate judges that, you know, I've done okay with the appellate judges, but I have not done so well with some of these judges that probably have Trump derangement syndrome. But I will say just in finishing, uh, we've taken Washington DC from a death trap to one of the safest cities in America.

We took crime down 94% in a period of a year. This, this place when I got here was a death trap. Now it's one of the safest cities in America. I beautified it. New grass, got rid of all of the graffiti. 48 fountains and monuments have been not, I mean, so bad. Graffiti all over them. 50 years they weren't touched.

And now they're all beautiful.

And then there's gonna be an arch. You're going to --

I think maybe the greatest of all will be what's called a triumphal arch. Yeah. Well, it's going to be beautiful.

Mr. President, I appreciate your time. I know you've been rushed today. I don't think you had any sleep, did you? Did you?

Not much.

So you, you flew across --

I had two hours for you.

Uh-huh.

Two hours.

Well, I --

You need more than two hours for him, right?

[Laughs]

Anyway, thanks.

Well, I appreciate your time. Thank you very much, sir.

Thank you. I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.