[Tony Dokoupil conducted a 12 minute, 45 second interview with Donald Trump at the Ford Rouge Complex in Dearborn, Michigan on January 13, 2026. The interview was conducted at approximate 1:20 PM and was released in full in the evening on the same day. CBS has requested we do not publish the video, though it is available online on their website. The following is a transcript of the interview.]
Mr. President, thank you very much for doing this.
Thank you. Thank you, Tony.
I really appreciate it. Uh, we're standing here on an active Ford assembly line.
Yeah.
A little bit of loud. Incredible symbol of American manufacturing power. And I got a lot of questions about it. But I actually want to start overseas with Iran. Americans woke up this morning and they saw that you said help is on the way.
Yeah.
What do you mean by that?
Well, there's a lot of help on the way and in different forms, including economic help from our standpoint and we're not gonna help Iran very much. And, you know, we put Iran out of business with their nuclear capacity and now, depending on what's actually happening, nobody's been able to give us accurate numbers about how many people they've killed.
Well, on that point, Mr. President --
But it looks like it could be a pretty substantial number, and that's gonna be a lot of problems for them.
A lot of problems. On that point, you, you did say the US would get involved if Iran started killing protestors. They have.
Yeah.
By the many thousands, according to reports --
Well, we'll see what that is. I've heard two numbers, but we'll see what that is.
Well, now we're hearing that they're gonna start hanging protestors tomorrow. So it comes back to the question, have they crossed your red line or has the line moved?
I haven't heard about the hanging. If they hang them, you're gonna see some things that, uh, I don't know what your, uh, where you come from and what your thought process is, but you'll perhaps be very happy.
What do you mean by that?
Uh, we will take very strong action. If they do such a thing, we will take very strong action.
And this strong action you're talking about, what's the end game?
The end game is to win. I like winning, and we'll win --
How do you define that in Iran?
Well, uh, let's define it in Venezuela, let's define it with al-Baghdadi, he was wiped out, let's define it with Soleimani, and let's define it in Iran where he wiped out their Iran, nuclear threat in a period of about 15 minutes once the B2s got there. And that was a complete obliteration as it turns out, which is what I said initially.
Then some questioned it and they said, you know, Trump was right. So we've been right about everything. Uh, we don't wanna see what's happening in Iran happen. And, you know, if they wanna have protests, that's one thing. When they start killing thousands of people and now you're telling me about hanging, uh, we'll see how that works out for them.
It's not gonna work out good.
There's so much going on overseas. Understandably, a lot of your focus has been on other countries. But when I talk to Americans, when I talk to your own voters, they want your focus to be on them and they feel like it may be drifting. What do you have to say to them?
Well, Tony, we have the strongest economy, maybe in the history of our country. If you went around this plant like I have, they just announced they're going to 24 hours. This is a Ford plant. But GM's the same. Stellantis is the same. They're going 24 hours all around the clock. Uh, they're enlarging every plant in this country.
We're building more plants in the country that we've ever built. There's no inflation. You saw the inflation numbers of, inflation's very low.
It seemed bad on groceries.
Wait a minute. Our growth numbers are through the roof. Our job numbers are tremendous. We have the highest stock market we've ever had. Today, we hit, every day for the last, I think, 48 times out of, uh, 11 months, 48 days out of 11 months we've had the number one stock market in the history of our country.
So, uh, my big focus is here. But you, you can't be forgetting about bad threats. You can't be forgetting about an Iran with a nuclear weapon. You can't forget that there's tremendous wealth in the Middle East, and a lot of that wealth is coming over here to build plans. Saudi Arabia is giving us $2 trillion.
Uh, Qatar is giving us $2 trillion. UAE is giving us $2 trillion. All of that is for the good of this country. So my focus is very much on this country, and, but you can't lose sight of the fact that we need peace all over the world. I've ended eight wars. If we had those eight wars raging, it would be very bad for this country.
Mr. President, you mentioned the market there. I've got a question, uh, that might affect the markets. It's the Jerome Powell situation, he's the Fed chair. I know you've said you had nothing to do with the investigation, the criminal probe into him, but you have been criticizing him for m --
He's terrible. No, I think he's --
-- for most of the last year. And, and even some prominent conservatives say it, it looks like political retribution.
And some prominent conservatives also love it. So, you know, you gotta mention them too --
Well, what, what do you say to that that accusation?
As you grow older in this position, you have to mention the other side. More people like it than not. He's been a lousy Fed chairman. He was reappointed by Biden, I was a little surprised at that because I didn't think he really earned his stripes. Uh, he's been too high on interest rates, and I call him too late.
He's too late to reduce. He should have reduced him by more. Despite that, we fought through that. In addition, he heads up a, uh, construction situation on a rebuilding of a little building, two little buildings in, called the Fed.
Yeah.
You know where they are? You've seen them a million times.
Yeah, yeah.
I think I could have done that job. I could have fixed him up for 25 million. He's into billions and billions of dollars, and it looks like they won't open for a long time. And he's either corrupt or incompetent.
So on the question of corrupt or incompetent, you're right. Some prominent conservatives are criticizing this. I'll take your word that others are not.
You don't have to take my word. What you should do is go out and interview some people and you'll find out.
But on this direct question about political retribution, what it looks like, sir, what's your response?
I can't help what it looks like. Look, I've created the greatest economy maybe in history, and you're seeing that now. Plants are being built all over the country. We've never had anything like it. They're leaving Canada. They're leaving Mexico. They're leaving Japan and all over Europe, Germany, all over Europe.
They're coming in. Uh, Bill Ford, Ford Motor Company, he just told me that he's never seen anything like what's happened. I also freed up some of the environmental nonsense which made it impo- -- virtually impossible to build a car and certainly to build a car for the right cause.
Yeah.
And they're doing better than they've ever done. AI, we're leading China by a lot. We're leading China by a tremendous amount. We're leading everybody at everything. And then we had a big victory. I would say that even you would say that. We had a big victory with, uh, Venezuela. We had a big victory with Iran.
We have a lot of victories. We don't have any defeats. I don't want to keep it that way.
I've got an important question about the situation in Minnesota, the, the death of Renee Nicole Goode. I've been speaking to her father, who is a big supporter of yours --
Good.
-- like many Americans are. But he's heartbroken right now. He's heart --
I can understand that. Yeah. Yeah.
He's heartbroken because his daughter is dead. That's obvious.
Sure.
He's also heartbroken because your administration so quickly has come out and said she's a domestic terrorist. What do you wanna say to her father right now?
Well, I want to say to the father that I love all of our people. They can be on the other side. As you say, he might be on my side and --
He is on your side.
-- and I think that's great. And, and I do. I think it's great. And I would bet you that she, under normal circumstances, was a very solid, wonderful person, but, you know, her actions were pretty tough. I mean, I've seen it, uh, many ways and many different shapes and forms. But the bottom line is, look, we have hundreds of thousands of murderers in our countries, killers.
ICE is trying to get them out. They were let in through an open border policy of sleepy Joe Biden. ICE is working very hard to get them out. Their job is being ve- -- made very, very difficult. And, you know, when you look at that tape, it, it could be viewed two va- -- ways, I guess. But when you look at the way that was, that car was pulled away, uh, there are a couple of versions of that tape that are very, very bad.
Uh, I, I wanna talk about the economy while we have you here. Uh, the inflation numbers came out. Overall, not bad, but grocery prices --
No, no, overall very good.
Of --
Good for us. Good for our country. Joe Biden had the highest inflation numbers in history, correct?
The direction --
I have them down to a level that they haven't seen in about nine years.
And Mr. President, help me understand, when I travel the country and I go all over the place and I talk to everyday Americans, they tell me they don't feel it because grocery prices are up.
Well, they might not, but they're going to now. I've only been here for 11 months, okay? And, you know, the first few months were really rough, if you look at them, because I inherited a mess. I inherited a mess of crime. I inherited a mess of inflation. I inherited a mess of places closing up and going to other countries, and now we have the hottest country in the world.
Tony, we have now the hottest country in the world, and a year and a half ago, our country was dead. We had a dead country. You wouldn't have a job right now. If she got in, you probably wouldn't have a job right now. Your boss, who's an amazing guy, might be bust. Okay?
Might be what?
That's how it, might be bused. I doubt it in his case, but you'd never know. Let me just tell you, you wouldn't have this job. You wouldn't have this job, certainly whatever the hell they're paying you. Our country is rocketing right now. We have the hottest country in the world. If they got in, we would be Venezuela on steroids.
Mr. President, uh, I'm just trying to be fair here, just trying to do my job, and I wanna talk about this assembly line here. Uh, uh, still --
To me, it's hybrid. Listen to the sound.
It's incredible, right?
I love the sound [Laughs] of an assembly line. I know it's --
It's incredible. But they've got one not far from here, they just, they just idled the electric vehicle plant.
Well, yeah, but it's going to, it's going to gasoline vehicles.
Yeah, it's going to go to gasoline.
But, but why don't you say that, Tony? You can't say --
I mean, you, you didn't give me a chance.
I mean --
I'm coming there. I'm coming around.
I agree. I said, I want electric and I want gasoline and I want hybrids. I want everything. But you were going to be forced under the mandate to buy an electric car in a very short period of time. I didn't want that, and I, I ended that. Now, people can have electric, they can have gasoline, they can have hybrid.
But are they going to have people to build these cars? The CEO of Ford said not long ago, he's got 5,000 open mechanic jobs, he can't find people willing and able to fill them. Well, come on.
I know, but that's a good thing, Tony. That means it's vibrant. You could also have things where you have so many people and they can't get jobs. It's true, we are doing so well. It's hard. Now what's gonna happen is people are being trained rapidly and you're gonna have a thing called robots. And robots are gonna be a big factor.
I predict --
Yeah. Let's talk about that.
-- that robots are gonna be a big factor in the future and it's gonna help out. But you have --
[Crosstalk]
You have a situation now where our economy is doing so well that it's not that easy to get people. We're training people, they're training people, companies are training people, and they're doing well.
Why do you think --
You know, that's a positive question you asked me. I don't think you asked it in that way. But we are doing so well right now that we're training people to take those jobs. One other thing, we terminated many federal jobs, those federal, because that's a good thing because they wanna go private. The way you make our country great is you can't have too many federal workers, all right?
Those workers are being trained to go into the private sector at a much higher salary.
Yeah. Well, let's talk about robotics for a second because that's a concern of a lot of people working --
Sure.
-- not only here, but all over the country. What is the future for jobs like these? I, one guy told me on the way in, he thinks it's a critical threat to his industry.
Well, you know, in one light you're telling me that, you know, you can't get workers.
Well, that's what the CEO said.
Um, well, you said that, and then you said the opposite for me. You can't have it both ways. Look, uh, we're gonna need help because we're expanding so rapidly that we need, people are gonna make a lot of money. A, a skilled worker, a person with talent, education in what they do, not education in nuclear physics, education in what they do, they're gonna make a lot of money.
Federal workers are leaving the federal government, where you had 10 people for every job, and they're going out and they're going into the private sector at two and three times the salary. And you see that all over. So I only say this. I think that robotics are gonna be great because this country won't have enough people if we don't have it.
Last question --
Our people are gonna be trained and they're gonna make more money than they've ever made before.
Last question, I think you'll be in, I was very interested in a comment you made recently about nothing being able to limit your action overseas except for your own morality and your own mind. I'd like to take that same question and apply it here in the U.S. Is there anything that limits your power, your movement, your action here, other than your own morality?
Well, I talk about morality. I'm a moral person. I don't like seeing death. I don't like seeing our people hurt. I don't like seeing the other side hurt either. You know, when we went into Venezuela, we lost nobody, but a lot of people on the other side were, were killed. I don't like that. Somebody else would say, "Oh, that's wonderful." I don't like that.
So yeah, it li- -- it's limited by my morality and I have a very high grade of morality. So, therefore, it's limited.
Not the Constitution? Not the courts? That's what I thought you were gonna say.
Well, the Constitution and courts, that goes without saying, but you're asking me what really can stop? Uh, we'll never get to the courts, we'll never get to the Constitution because I don't, I wanna see what's good for our country. And you know what? The courts want to see that too.
Yeah. Mr. President, thank you very much.
Thank you.
For the record, I do think I'd have this job even if the other guys won.
Yeah, but at a lesser salary. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
[After the interview was released, The New York Times published 29 seconds of audio from after the interview, where Karoline Leavitt spoke to CBS News staff and insisted the whole interview be released, or else CBS would face a lawsuit.]
-- job, by the way, [Inaudible]
Make sure you guys don't cut the tape. Make sure the interview goes out in full.
Yeah, we're doing it.
He said if it's not out in full, we'll sue your ass off.
Oh, great, okay.
[Crosstalk]
He always -- he always says that.
[Crosstalk]
-- 13 minutes.
We only have 19 minutes and 30 seconds, so 13 minutes.
How long did we talk?
We'll put it out.
The whole thing will be out.
[Crosstalk]
I appreciate you, Karoline.
But just to confirm --