Interview: Hugh Hewitt Interviews Donald Trump on His Radio and Podcast Show - July 13, 2026

Joined now by President Donald Trump. Mr. President, welcome back to the Hugh Hewitt Show. Thank you. I want to begin by saying, I'm sorry you've lost your friend Lindsey Graham. I want to congratulate you on the 250th anniversary of the country, on the mall and your speech, and I want to especially thank you for raising with General Secretary Xi Jinping, Jimmy Lai, and Pastor Mingri, the pastors in the United States.

Do you think it would help get Jimmy Lai out if Pope Leo spoke up for Jimmy Lai?

I don't know. I don't think so. I had a long talk with the -- with President Xi, and he expressed great dislike. He said, very nicely, he kept me up at night. You know, they had a lot of problems there and, uh, I guess at some point, I'll speak to the son. But he, uh, he's got a lot of dislike there. I got the other one out, as you know.

Yes, you did.

And that was good but, uh, I'm having a little problem with Jimmy. We've gotten a lot from China. China's been good. We got TikTok approved, as you know, and it was good. I was number one on TikTok this month, which was very good. But I got a lot of things from China, including we're taking in a lot of money from China.

But Jimmy, I didn't do as well with, frankly.

Well, you don't give up. I hope you keep trying.

No, I'm not going to give up. No, no, no, I'm not going to give up. But, you know, look, they did have a little problem with Hong Kong. Let's face it, Hugh.

Yeah.

We had a -- that was a pretty -- it was a pretty nasty situation, so you can also understand the other side a little bit. But nope, I never give up.

All right. Let me talk about Iran. Iran broke the first ceasefire. They broke another one over the weekend. You have obliterated three of their nuclear sites but they got a fourth site maybe at Pickax Mountain.

Yeah.

Before you -- before you enter into another deal, will you insist that IAEA inspectors get down into that deep, deep, deep tunnel and find out if they got a doomsday machine down there?

Yeah. Absolutely. They don't have it because we have eyes, you know, with the -- with Space Force and everything else, we have a lot of eyes on it. But Pickax is possible, you know, a possible target for a nice, big, fat shot right in the front door. And I think that you'll -- maybe you'll see that. I'll tell them right now.

Look, the fact is they have no air force, they have no Navy, they have no nothing. All they do is talk and they have fake press. They do very well with the fake press. But --

Yes, they do.

Because the fake news wants us to lose. It's not even -- I mean, the New York Times, they actually said a week ago, I don't -- can't imagine they say it now, but, think of it, they have no Navy, have no air force, have no anything. They have no military, they have nothing, and the times said -- and their inflation, by the way, just hit 301 percent from five percent.

They said, oh, they're in better shape now than they were four months ago, before I started.

Yeah, but the fake media always brings up Pickax Mountain, and I don't think it's not on your list. I think it's on your list and you're telling me it is.

No, it is on the list. We're watching it closely. We see no activity there. They're not doing well with their nuclear situation. Every time we hear about it, we blow it up, so they don't like talking about it. But we'll probably give pickax a shot relatively soon.

Good. Now, you know the Iranians will never -- this regime, the crazy people, and they are fanatics. They're religious fanatics. They will never stop trying to kill you and your family and blow up your library. Do you think you've got to get that regime out of there in the next 30 months?

Well, I think they're a little cuckoo. I think they all are. We knocked out the first regime. We then knocked out the second regime. We then took out about 25 percent of this regime, and they're wired a little bit differently. We had a deal yesterday. It was like going to be 100 percent. And then all of a sudden, they got a phone call and they all ran out of the room.

These people are -- these people are crazy. We had a deal where we won everything and they basically break the deals. You know, they make deals and, to them, deals are made to be broken. They are extremely unreliable people. And, frankly, if they ever had a nuclear weapon, they'd use it within one day.

Amen. Can you or the American military or the Israeli military get to what's left of their third string and their fourth string and their fifth string? Do you know where they are? Can you kill them?

Yeah, I do, and -- but we don't want to talk about that. But we --

OK.

Uh, we certainly are watching. Yeah. I know a lot about that subject. I know a lot, but I don't think it's appropriate to talk about it right now. But we will -- we will be hitting them, like as an example, we're going to hit them very hard tonight. And, uh, we're going to hit them hard tomorrow and there's not a damn thing they can do about it. They have nothing.

They have nothing going other than they have big mouths. And I --

Keep it up, Mr. President.

It was very good that I did because I got to know him.

The MOU buckled.

[Crosstalk]

[Inaudible] -- Chris Hansen it's a lot better. You know, people say I was at least reasonable, but I got to know them. They're stone-cold, crazy people.

Yes, they are, fanatics. Now, the MOU buckled and I thought of that high rise on 42nd Street where the columns buckled.

Right.

By the way, what did you think when you saw that story, that high rise columns are buckling?

So I know a lot about buildings, more than anybody in the presidency by a factor of about 2,000. And I looked at that structure, that structure was not meant to be -- to have that much weight added to it. Not only that, if you look at it, because I looked at renderings, and the structure was added on the side.

It was the craziest thing. And, you know, that was probably a Uris building and I knew the Uris family well, but they were known for light structures, as light as they could do it, not to fall down, but they weren't designed for putting ten stories of building on top. But the building wasn't even on top.

Do you know what I mean? It was like side saddle.

Right.

It was a side saddle. All that weight and they're lucky it didn't come down. I don't know what they're doing right now, but they should not be allowed -- I don't know the people, but they should not be allowed -- I can't believe they had a structural engineer, because they should not be allowed to -- it's called the side saddle.

They should not be allowed to do that on that building. That building is a weak structure. It's designed -- it's designed -- it's a very light structure. You know --

[Crosstalk]

Was the MOU designed that way? Was the MOU a light structure?

You have some structural engineers, they put you out of business with a heavy structure. The good news is it'll never fall down. The bad news is you go out of business because it costs so much. This guy gave you a -- a minimal structure to hold up the existing, not a structure to hold up another 10 stories of building.

But the fact that the building wasn't even balanced, I can't -- it's amazing that it didn't come down.

Well, was the MOU that your negotiators brought back, was that a side saddle MOU? Was that built to fall apart?

It was built to test. It was a test. We didn't know. It didn't -- look, memorandum of understanding when you're dealing with Sleazebags, don't mean much. And they don't mean much when you're dealing with honorable people too, because it's a memorandum of understanding, it doesn't mean much. And I said, why are we even -- you know, it's a standard tactic in the US that you go to a memorandum of understanding and then you go to the deal.

I said, just go to the deal first. But you know what, it was sort of a test and they weren't there. They didn't honor the test. We had it -- we had this deal settled numerous times. I said, watch, I guarantee, watch, and they never they never followed it. They --

A bunch of the --

Look, they're known for it.

A bunch of, uh, a bunch of -- a bunch of Israeli journalists are saying that you've undercut Bibi, you've thrown him under the bus; have you?

No, not at all. No, I get along with him very well. Sometimes I disagree with him and I let it be known, and I've been right. But no, I think he's good. Look, he's a wartime prime minister. He's done a good job. If I weren't around or if Bibi wasn't around, especially the combination, Israel would not exist today.

We wouldn't have hit him with the B-2 bombers. You know, they were going to have a nuclear weapon within two weeks, had I not hit him with a nuclear, within two to four weeks, they would have had a nuclear weapon and once they had a nuclear weapon, they would have used it and you wouldn't even have Israel around.

No, Bibi is good.

Is there anyone in Israel better than him to do the job? Is there anyone better than Bibi?

Well, I don't know most of them. I know some of them, obviously, but I don't know most of them. But I think that Bibi -- Bibi and I have had a very good -- if we weren't working together, if Bibi wasn't -- if we had -- if I had a weak person, a president or prime minister over in Israel, you know, you have a president there too.

Right.

If we had somebody weak over there, Israel would not exist today.

So Hamas is still standing, so is Hezbollah. Should Bibi order that those be done, away with, just finish the job in Gaza and in Lebanon?

Well, a lot of progress was made with Hamas and they are disarming. That doesn't mean they're going to, but a lot of progress was made. And don't forget, I got all the hostages back and Hamas did a lot of that work. You know, people are amazed. But we had 28 dead people dead, you know, children, because they call them children, the mom -- the moms and dads.

And it always -- it always -- it shouldn't amaze me, but the people that had a dead son and they knew the son was dead, they wanted that boy back just as much or even more as the people that were trying to get their sons out who were living. It was amazing. And we got all 28 back, every single one of them and everyone's amazed.

And we got Hamas to do much of that work.

So let me ask you about the -- the Iranian people. You said help was on the way and you sent it. 40,000 of them got massacred before your help could get there. Is it time for them to go back into the streets?

Well, you can't do that because they have -- they don't have guns and the other side has guns. And the number is 52,000 people killed so far.

Wow.

And these are thugs. It's very hard for people to go back. They can have great bravado, they can hate the regime, they can do everything, but when you start seeing people dropping a little bit left and right, you know, they have snipers and the snipers are up in buildings, four or five of them. And let's say they form 100,000, 200,000 people and they see one go down with a bullet between the eyes and then they see another one go down with a bullet between the eyes and then they see a third.

Like with the women, they had 300,000 women. All of a sudden, one goes down, two goes down, three, four, five. And you know what happens, Hugh, they say, let's get the hell out of here.

Yeah.

It's very scary.

So let me switch to domestic politics.

I would say this, I think people were wrong. I never thought -- unless they could be completely armed, I never thought they'd have that kind of an uprising, because these people are violent. The so-called leadership is very violent.

They're killers.

They killed 52,000. How about the wrestler? You know, the wrestler is one of the best wrestlers in the world. They killed him and his two friends just because he spoke not even that badly about the regime.

They're crazy. Keep killing them because they're going to kill their people until you do. Domestic politics, Mr. President. You run, or at least the RNC listens to you very closely. 2028.

They better. They better listen.

Do you think there ought to be one -- yeah. Do you think there ought to be one? Many or a lot of debates? And would you moderate one or more of those debates?

I said, I sort of like to do that. Nobody -- nobody gave me that one. You always have a unique way. I'd love to do it. I'm sure the Democrats would be thrilled, but I would certainly moderate -- you're talking to the debate between a Republican and a Democrat?

Oh yeah, because the numbers would go through the ceiling. We'd get 100 million people and you'd ask them about Iran.

Yeah, I get good numbers. No, I like the idea about -- I would -- I would absolutely do it. Now, find the Democrat that's going to do it. I always complained when that loser from ABC did the -- you know, did the debate and he was so biased and I was basically -- it was him and an unknown woman, but -- who was a radical left person.

And I said, wait a minute, this is two and a half against one. They said, who's the half? I said, Kamala is half. I got two people plus a half against me. No, I would love to do something like that. I can't imagine they'd do it, but if they would do it, I would do it.

Oh, you'd get the vice president, Marco Rubio, you'd get Senator Cruz, you'd be a great moderator. I really urge you to do that.

OK. I will do it.

Um, now the -- if the Democrats win the House, they're going to impeach you. And I don't care what the argument is, they're just going to find a way to impeach you. You know, JD Vance could represent you, and he can be in the Senate doing the same thing. Have you thought about that? He's a good lawyer.

Well, I don't like to think about it too much because I think we're going to do well. In fact, a man just walked into my office, the speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, who's great.

Great speaker.

He's doing a great job. Don't forget, we have a majority of two, three. If we hit four, we're like, you know, we're like, we don't know what to do, we have so many. And we've gotten all this stuff done. We got the Great, Big, Beautiful Bill done. And, you know, I'll tell you just a fast story. Yesterday, we had a lot of people -- they're building a heliport because for years they should have had it built at the White House.

You know, they're landing in the mud all the time.

Oh my God. Didn't know that.

And we're building a little heliport, not that little, actually, but a heliport. And they were working on Sunday and I went out to see the men. I said, remember this, no tax on overtime. OK? Think of it, they're working on a Sunday, no tax -- and they all cheered. I said, who voted against Trump? They said, nobody.

So, you know.

I got three suggestions for you.

Go ahead.

Number one, uh, there was an essay in the Washington Post, Make American the official language of America, not English. I think you ought to look at that, because it's a good idea.

All right.

Number two, the Ruthless podcast gets more people than any other podcast. You ought to have them to the White House and do the Ruthless podcast. Do you know them? Karoline Leavitt did it.

The Ruthless podcast. I did hear of it. I mean, you know, I'm not afraid to do any of these things.

Oh, they're the best and they're pretty rollicking. Karoline will tell you about them.

Then we'll set it up. It's OK with me.

And then, finally, um, you -- we've got an AM radio law up on the Hill, and you've got Speaker Johnson there. I think Steve Scalise doesn't like the bill. Maybe you can break the speaker's arm a little bit to get --

No, I like the idea. Look, AM is the home of rush. You know, the famous rush.

You bet.

Remember when he used to go Barack Hussein and he had screamed the word Hussein, Barack Hussein Obama? Uh, no, a lot of our people are on AM radio. The answer is I'm very much onto it. We're pushing it hard. Mr. Speaker, could you just say hello? This is Hugh Hewitt.

I love Hugh Hewitt. And Hugh, I used to be a broadcaster on AM radio, so I'm with you.

Woah.

Oh, well, Mr. Speaker, thank you. Get in there and get Mr. Scalise to go with you and get that thing to the floor, because we need it to keep --

Well, I think we can handle Steve. I do. I really do. He's actually a very good guy. Will you please work on that?

He's a great guy. Yes, we'll be working on it.

Oh, I didn't know they were having a problem. I know we're backing it 100 percent. Nothing's going to happen to AM radio that's bad, OK?

All right. I'm looking forward to your speech Thursday night. You want to give us a preview?

Uh, it's just going to be a speech, like a lot of my speeches. I tell you, we got a lot of good reviews between -- you know, we went out underneath the most beautiful structure you've ever seen, carved into the mountain and there's never been such a beautiful -- you know, the radical left wants to take it down, right?

They want to rip that down.

Oh, yeah, but don't listen to them.

So we did three of them and then we did, on July 4th -- it was exciting because we had 425,000 people and there was a little lightning, so some brilliant person said, everybody got to go, you have to go home. So the place goes from packed to empty. And then I heard about that and I said, have them come back.

We had 150,000 people come back. And I said, I thought it was going to make the speech at 3:00 in the morning. Somebody said, some genius you said, no, we'll make it in a couple of weeks, sir. I said, are you kidding?

You're crazy.

But I ended up making the speech at 11:30 and it was well received and people loved it. And we had a tremendous crowd. You saw that. And so we do pretty well in that regard, Hugh.

Great speech, Mr. President. Go get Pickax Mountain and don't keep the speaker waiting. I appreciate your time, sir.

OK. And we will do that. We're going to take out Pickax Mountain. Tell the Iranians to be ready.

I will -- we just did.

Let them know we're coming, OK?

You just did.

There's not a damn thing they can do about it. All right.

Thank you, sir.

Thanks a lot, Hugh. Thank you.

Bye.

Bye-bye.