Hello, everybody.
How's your [Inaudible]
Are there any questions?
How was the golf tournament?
Uh, very good because I won. [Laughter]
It's good to win. You heard I won, right? Did you hear I won? Just to, uh, back it up. You were there. I won. And I like --
What's your handicap these days?
Very low, have a very low handicap. Okay, let's go.
Sir, uh, Chinese foreign --
Back up a little bit.
Sure. Chinese Foreign Ministry said, uh, that the market is spoken when asked about the tariffs. What do you make of that?
The market has spoken? When they look at the fact that we have a billion dollar trade deficit, when you look at, at the trade deficit that we have with certain countries, way over a billion per country, but with China it's a trillion dollars, and we have to solve our trade deficit. We try, we have a trillion dollar trade deficit with China.
Hundreds of billions of dollars a year we lose with China. And unless we solve that problem, I'm not gonna make a deal. Now I'm willing to deal with China, but they have to solve their surplus. We have a tremendous, uh, deficit problem with China. They have a surplus of at, of least a trillion dollars a year.
I think it's like a trillion [Note: Trump either said "yuan" or "one"] , and I want that solved. And no other president has taken it on. I had to take it on the last time, and then we had a rigged election. No other president has taken it on. And so China is, you know, they say the market has spoken. The market -- China is right now taking a big hit because everyone knows we're right.
We, they have to pay tariffs because, otherwise, we have a surplus, that they have a surplus with us that is not sustainable.
Mr. President --
And we're talking about a trillion dollars, you know that, right? We're not gonna lose a trillion dollars for the privilege of buying pencils from China.
On the idea of crashing the market on [Inaudible], there's been some speculation, partly because of the video that was posted on Truth Social, that there was some sort of deliberate effort on your part to have the market sell off. Can you just talk about that one?
No, that's not so. But I do wanna solve the deficit problem that we have with China, with the European Union and other nations. And they're gonna have to do that. And if they wanna talk about that, I'm open to talking. But otherwise, why would I wanna to talk? And as you know, because of the tariffs, we have $7 trillion already committed to be invested in the United States, building auto plants, building, uh, chip companies, and all sorts of companies are coming into our country at levels that we've never seen before.
Biden had nothing coming in. It was, this was a dead company with -- this was a dead country with Biden. He didn't know what he was doing, and that's now been proven, at least.
You talked to a lot of leaders this weekend. Can you tell us, sir, were there any deals made?
I spoke to a lot of leaders, European, Asian, from all over the world. They're dying to make a deal. But I said, we're not gonna have deficits with your country. We're not gonna do that. Because to me, a deficit is a loss. We're gonna have surpluses who are at worst gonna be breaking even, but China would be the worst, uh, in the group, because the deficit is so big and when -- it's not sustainable, and you know, I was elected on this, this was one of the biggest reasons I got elected.
It's exactly because of this that we're gonna put tariffs and we've already put 'em on. It's not a question of we will, we're gonna put 'em on. And those tariffs next year will make us $1 trillion. In addition to the $1 trillion, thousands of companies are gonna relocate back into the United States. In North Carolina, already furniture people are starting to move back in. In, uh, Detroit and Michigan, which I won because of what I said, what I'm telling you, uh, car companies are starting to open up in Indiana, a big one is under construction, as an example, Honda, but they're moving in like nobody's ever seen this before.
So, it's unsustainable for us to allow China to have surpluses of $1 trillion. We will be taking in over $1 trillion over the next short period of time with the tariffs that I've already instituted. They're already in place. Now, what's going to happen with the market? I can't tell you, but I can tell you our country has gotten a lot stronger, and eventually it'll be a country like no other.
It'll be the most dominant country economically in the world.
Mr. President --
Which is what it should be.
Is there Trump put though? Is there a mark -- is there pain in the market at some point you're unwilling to tolerate this idea of a Trump put. Is there a threshold?
I think your question is so stupid, but I mean, I don't want anything to go down, but sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something. And we have such a horrible -- we have been treated so badly by other countries, because we had stupid leadership that allowed this to happen. They took our businesses, they took our money, they took our jobs, they moved it to Mexico, they moved it to Canada.
They moved a lot of it to China. And it's not sustainable. We're not going to do it. Now, we have hundreds of billions of dollars is pouring into our country on a monthly basis. It's pouring in. It's already started because I put tariffs on and eventually it's going to straighten out and our country will be solid and strong again.
Elon Musk has said he hopes for zero tariffs between the US and Europe. Is that a place you'd like to also get to?
Well, the problem is that Europe has made a fortune with us. You know, Europe also has had a tremendous, uh, surplus with the United States. Europe has treated us, it's a little smaller, but it -- they've treated us very, very badly. China has, but Europe has also. Europe has been very, very bad to us. Europe has, uh, taken our leaders for a ride.
They don't take our cars. They don't take our food products. They don't take anything. And we take their cars, Mercedes, Volkswagen, BMW. You know, we take their millions of cars. They take no cars. They don't take our farm product. They don't take anything. Europe's treated us very badly. We put a big tariff on Europe.
Uh, they are coming to the table. They want to talk, but there's no talk unless they pay us a lot of money on a yearly basis, uh, number one for present, but also for past, because they've taken a lot of our wealth away and we're not gonna allow it to happen.
Sir, have you talked to any tech leaders over the weekend about the tariffs?
Yeah, I talked to the biggest in the world. I talked to the biggest of them all. Uh, many of them, but I've talked to, uh, I would say four or five that are considered the biggest. They don't -- you know what they said? "We don't blame you.
Who did you talk to?
Uh, I don't want say. I -- I'll put it out. I may give it to you.
[Inaudible] NVIDIA CEO?
I have to find out if they mind. You know, I don't know if that was a confidential goal or not. But we had five or six. Uh, I've spoken to many countries. They all wanna do it. Just so you understand the power of what I'm doing, every country is calling and being very solicitous of us. Very, very nice. They're being very nice and -- and we have to be able to justify.
We -- this is not sustainable. The United States can't lose $1.9 trillion for trade. We can't do that and also spend a lot of money on NATO in order to protect European nations. We cover them with military, then we lose money on trade. Uh, it's the -- the whole thing is crazy. And I got elected on that basis.
We explained it. You know, the American people understand it a lot better than the media, but the media understands it, and much of the media writes correctly about it, I must say.
Sir.
Okay.
Sir. When do you -- when are the next set of talks with Russia and who will participate? And where are we in terms of making progress in terms of peace?
We're talking to Russia. We'd like him to stop. I don't like the bombing. The bombing goes on and on and every week people and thousands of young people are being killed. And, uh, it's a horrible thing that should have never started, would've never started if I were President, 100%.
On the tariffs, is it a negotiation now?
Who are you with?
Bloomberg, sir. Is it a negotiation or rules of the road?
Go ahead. Another question, please.
Sir, about -- about TikTok.
She asks too many questions.
Sir, about TikTok. There was a report that there was bout to be a deal, but China changed its mind because of the tariffs.
I'd say it was largely true. The report is that we had a deal pretty much with TikTok, not a deal, but pretty close, and then China changed the deal because of tariffs. Uh, if I gave a little cut in tariffs, they'd approve that deal at 15 minutes, which shows you the power of tariffs, right?
Mr. President, former New Hampshire governor Chris Sununu is saying that he'll win the open Senate seat in New Hampshire and that he has no doubt you'll support him if he runs. Is that true?
True. I told him. He came to my office, came to the Oval Office, and met with Chris Sununu, and I support him fully. I hope he runs. He's been very, uh, nice to me over the last year or so. But, uh, no, I hope he runs. I think he'll win that seat.
Sir. When -- when we get into -- to late summer, early fall, and people are doing their back-to-school shopping, do you think they'll have inflation to worry about at that point?
I think there's not gonna be -- I don't think inflation is gonna be a big deal because, if you look at me, I took in hundreds of billions of dollars. This is not new to me. I took in, during my four year, hundreds of billions of dollars from China. And we also took in a lot of money from other countries, but in particular China because it was just getting started.
And there was -- we had no inflation. Who had inflation was by Biden. Biden had the worst inflation in the history of our country. I had no inflation. We had a perfect country. We had no wars. I ended them all. I defeated ISIS. Everything was good. And then when this numbskull got in, as they really call themselves now, numbskulls, but, uh, when he got in, bad things happened to our country, including our -- our open border, that now we're doing very well with.
You know, we -- uh, we have the best numbers on the border that we've ever had.
Speaking of the border, have you talked to Attorney General Pam Bondi recently about the cases going on with the deportations?
Yeah, sure. It's really sad when you think that Biden allowed millions of people to come in and if they find one, now, I will tell you the one, somebody said he's a member of MS-13, not Tren de Aragua. He's a member of MS-13, and therefore he should immediately be brought back. Well, MS-13 is just as bad as Tren de Aragua, so they say, "Oh, we've made a mistake." Because he's not with them, he's with MS-13. Bring him back, bring him back.
MS-13's a very bad group.
Sir, how co --
Maybe as bad actually.
How concerned are you about the measles outbreak, there was another fatality today, and what else would you like to see in terms of the response?
Well, I think they, uh, they're doing reports on it. It's so far a fairly small number of people relative to what we're talking about. Something that people have known about for many, many years. I mean, measles has been, you know, this is not something new, and, uh, we'll see what happens, but certainly, uh, if, if something, if it progresses, we'll have to take action.
Very strong, action.
El Salvador's president said on exit, he'd been invited to the White House on April 14 for a working visit to discuss Tren de Aragua and MS-13, and other ways we can support each other, the US and El Salvador. I was curious if you could expand more on what some of these other ideas you have for El Salvador.
Well, I think, yeah, I think, you know, you're in the way of that camera, by the way. Am I, you should at least say that, the camera operator should probably say that he, she's shooting the back of your head. You know, I don't know why she doesn't say it, I have to say it instead. I have great respect for him, I know him.
Uh, I've known him for a long time, he's young leader and he's very tough on crime, very, very tough on crime. And in their system, their prison system, they spend a tiny fraction of the money that this country spends, so, uh, but he is coming in, I don't know when, but he is coming in sometime over the next couple of weeks.
What are you and Prime Minister Netanyahu going to speak about tomorrow?
Uh, we're going to talk about trade and we're gonna talk about the obvious subject. You know, what the obvious subject is.
Do you have any news for us on the obvious subject?
I'm trying, trying to do trade just to keep it down. No, look --
Will there --
There's a, there's a lot of things going on with the Middle East right now that have to be silenced. You know, uh, we had no problem with the Middle East, everything was done, we had, uh, no problem with Iran, we had no problem with anybody. And then you had October 7th, and that was all because Iran, as you know, was not giving money to anybody because they had no money, now they have a lot of money.
So we'll see what happens.
To go back to El Salvador, the president there said he would be willing to take American citizens in the federal prison population, is that one of the ideas you're gonna be discussing?
Well, I love that. If we could take some of our 20-time wise guys that push people into subways, and that hit people over the back of the head, and that purposely run people over in cars. Uh, if he would take them, I'd be honored to give 'em, I don't know what the law says on that, but I can't imagine the law would say anything different.
If they can house these horrible criminals for a lot less money than it costs us, I'm all for it, but I'd only do according to the law. But I have suggested that, you know, why should it stop just at people that cross the border illegally? We have some horrible criminals, American-grown and born, and if we have somebody that bops an old woman over the head, and we have somebody that is in jail 20 times and goes back and shoots people all over the place and then has a bad judge or a bad prosecutor that do nothing about them, all they worry about is politics and don't worry about that, I think if we could get El Salvador or somebody to take them, I'd be very happy with it, but I have to see what the law says.
Okay. What else?
Mr. President, did you say, did you agree to lowering tariffs for any of the countries that you spoke to today?
Oh, no. What you understand, Jennifer, you have to understand this. We have massive surplus countries that we're dealing with, we have massive deficits. We've got to straighten that out because you can't continue to be that way. It's been that way for years now, and it can't go on any longer. And we're the piggy bank, we have all the advantages.
Forget markets for a second, we have all the advantages. We're going to straighten that out, we're gonna become a wealthy nation again, wealthy like never before, and we're not gonna let other nations that have been ripping us off, whether it's China or the European Union, with all of the European nations that have just made, it's been like a feast.
Look, the European Union was formed for one reason. You know what that was? To rip off the United States. So put that in your bonnet. Uh, I hope you had a good flight. Have a good time.
Thank you for your time, Mr. President.
Thank you, sir.
Thank you.
We'll see you tomorrow.