(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump’s national security adviser Michael Waltz is expected to leave his post, sources familiar with the decision told ABC News Thursday.
This move comes as President Trump has been increasingly frustrated by Waltz after he came under intense scrutiny for inadvertently adding a reporter to a Signal chat with top Trump officials discussing a U.S. military strike on Houthi rebels in Yemen.
The White House and Waltz have not commented on the moves. Sources cautioned the move is not final until Trump announces it.
The president is expected to announce the changes soon, according to sources.
Waltz was present at Trump’s Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, where he offered praise for the president’s leadership and strength on the world stage during his first 100 days in office.
Trump publicly defended Waltz in the aftermath of the March Signal mishap, telling NBC News the day after details came to light in an article by The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg that Waltz “has learned a lesson and is a good man.”
Trump was asked further about Waltz’s future by The Atlantic in an April 24 interview. He said Waltz was “fine” despite being “beat up” after accidentally adding Goldberg to the group chat.
Trump also said in that interview that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who also came under fire for the Signal fiasco, was “safe.”
“I think we learned: Maybe don’t use Signal, okay?” Trump said about the controversy. “If you want to know the truth. I would frankly tell these people not to use Signal, although it’s been used by a lot of people. But, whatever it is, whoever has it, whoever owns it, I wouldn’t want to use it.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
A 9/11 responder with life-threatening pancreatic cancer was told this week that he couldn’t start chemotherapy. Two others with new cancer diagnoses were also denied treatment, according to Dr. David Prezant, chief medical officer of the New York City Fire Department and director of its World Trade Center Health Program.
“We postponed chemotherapy for a firefighter this week, hoping this could be fixed,” Prezant said “He’s too young for Medicare, and this delay may cost him his life.”
All three patients were part of the federally funded World Trade Center Health Program — a system created to care for those who risked their lives on Sept. 11, 2001. But the program has come to a standstill, Prezant said.
“We have been directed not to process any new certifications,” an internal email that was shared with ABC News said.
To receive care through the program, a responder or survivor must first enroll and then have their illness formally certified by the federal program as being related to 9/11 exposure.
Certification is a separate and critical step. Clinics must submit medical evidence, such as biopsy results or lung scans — and only after the program approves it can treatment move forward or compensation claims be filed.
Without someone in place to authorize these certifications, patients with newly diagnosed conditions are stuck waiting.
Prezant said the secure federal website used to track approvals had removed the certification tab entirely.
In addition to its freeze on certifying illnesses, the program can no longer enroll new members or approve life-saving treatments like chemotherapy, lung transplants or stem cell therapy.
The crisis, Prezant said, is the result of a breakdown on multiple fronts: severe staffing cuts, and budget shortfalls worsened by inflation.
Sixteen of the program’s doctors, nurses and support staff were laid off in early April — depleting the program by approximately 20%.
This month’s layoffs followed a previous round of cuts in February — but those were reversed after bipartisan backlash. It hasn’t yet been established if any of the newly terminated employees were part of the original group.
Either way, the decision once again left the program critically understaffed, according to clinic leaders and advocacy groups.
To make matters worse, the World Trade Center Health Program’s longtime leader, Dr. John Howard, was also removed in February — and then rehired after bipartisan backlash. But according to Citizens for the Extension of the James Zadroga Act, an advocacy group, it’s still unclear whether he was actually reinstated to his legal role as administrator.
“It appears that Dr. John Howard, Director of the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and the Administrator of the World Trade Center Health Program (WTCHP) was not properly reinstated as Administrator of the World Trade Center Health Program, as the Health and Human Services Department told the NY Republican Members of Congress which they announced on April 5,” the group said in a statement on its website.
Howard’s unresolved status is preventing the program from functioning, the statement added.
Clinics were allowed to begin treating patients under “initial approvals,” Prezant said, while waiting for formal certification from the federal program. But that emergency workaround was shut down this week, Prezant explained.
The process of certification requires submitting medical evidence — like biopsy results or lung scans — and a signature from the program’s administrator, which has not been possible, “a clear sign that Dr. Howard hasn’t been fully reinstated,” according to Prezant.
Without formal certification, treatment for new conditions cannot proceed, Prezant emphasized.
Funding problems are also interrupting the program’s ability to function.
The program now serves more than 150,000 people nationwide, up from about 76,000 in 2015, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A bipartisan bill, HR 1410, was introduced in February to close the funding gap as enrollment surged, but it remains stalled in Congress.
“We don’t decide who qualifies,” said Prezant, noting that eligibility rules and certification decisions are set by the federal program under the Zadroga Act. “That protects the system from fraud — and it works.”
He pointed to FDNY data showing that five years after a cancer diagnosis, 86% of program patients are still alive — compared to just 66% among those diagnosed in New York State who are not enrolled in the program.
Now, according to Prezant and others, patients in all 50 states who rely on care from the program are being turned away without clear answers about when, or if, the system will be restored.
“No one is asking for anything more than what was promised under the law,” Prezant said, referring to the Zagroda Act’s commitment to provide lifelong medical care and monitoring for 9/11 responders and survivors whose illnesses are linked to their exposure. “We just want the federal government to honor that promise before more lives are lost.”
ABC reached out to HHS for a response but did not hear back. In a statement sent earlier this week, an agency spokesperson said, “The Program continues to accept and review new enrollment applications and certification requests.”
Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who has stayed largely out of the political limelight since leaving office, sharply criticized President Donald Trump – her opponent in the 2024 presidential election – over tariffs, government cuts, and the direction his administration is taking the country, during remarks on Wednesday in San Francisco.
Her remarks, delivered at the 20th anniversary celebration for Emerge, an organization that supports Democratic women running for office, came as the Trump administration celebrates its accomplishments in its first 100 days – a date Harris acknowledged.
“Now I know tonight’s event happens to coincide with 100 days after the inauguration, and I’ll leave it to others to give a full accounting of what’s happened so far,” Harris told the audience.
“But I will say this, instead of an administration working to advance America’s highest ideals, we are witnessing the wholesale abandonment of those ideals,” she said.
Harris has had few public appearances since departing the White House and has limited her political activity, but on Wednesday night, she called out Trump by name.
“We all know President Trump, his administration and their allies are counting on the notion that fear can be contagious. They are counting on the notion that, if they can make some people afraid, it will have a chilling effect on others,” Harris said.
“But what they’re overlooking, what they’ve overlooked, is that fear isn’t the only thing that’s contagious. Courage is contagious,” Harris said to raucous cheers.
Harris had brought up similar themes – including the “courage is contagious” line – during remarks at a women of color leaders summit in early April.
That courage, Harris added on Wednesday, extends to Americans protesting against what she called “the greatest man-made economic crisis in modern presidential history.”
“Americans across the political spectrum who are declaring that the president’s reckless tariffs hurt workers and families by raising the cost of everyday essentials; devastate the retirement accounts that people spent a lifetime paying into; and paralyze American businesses, large and small forcing them to lay off people, stop hiring, or pause investment decisions,” she said.
Trump and the White House have argued that tariffs will help Americans be better off economically in the long run and will level the playing field between the U.S. and its trading partners.
Later in her remarks, speaking more broadly about the White House’s actions, Harris said she would describe the current moment in America as a “high-velocity event” to implement an agenda she claimed was “decades in the making” to shrink and privatize government while giving tax breaks to the wealthy.
“It’s an agenda, a narrow self-serving vision of America, where they punish truth tellers, favor loyalists, cash in on their power and leave everyone to fend for themselves, all while abandoning allies and retreating from the world,” Harris said. “And folks, what we are experiencing right now is exactly what they envision for America.”
Americans should be ready, if the “checks and balances” such as Congress “ultimately collapse,” Harris said, to work together and raise their voices.
“I am not here tonight to offer all the answers, but I am here to say this, you are not alone, and we are all in this together — and straight talk, things are probably going to get worse before they get better, but we are ready for it. We are not going to scatter. We are going to stand together, everyone a leader,” Harris said.
At the end of her remarks, Harris struck a populist note: “Always remember this country is ours. It doesn’t belong to whoever is in the White House. It belongs to you. It belongs to us. It belongs to We The People.”
The former Democratic nominee for president has had few public appearances since departing the White House, and has limited her political activity.
Harris’ speech came as she is set to possibly re-enter politics in the coming months. Harris has been mulling a run in California’s gubernatorial race and will make a decision by the end of summer, two sources familiar with her plans told ABC News in March.
Some Democrats have also floated her as a potential 2028 presidential candidate, although some of her longtime supporters have told ABC News they are torn over that prospect.
Whether she runs for either office or not, Harris’ public remarks thus far have sometimes included veiled and explicit swipes at the Trump administration and the president himself.
In remarks at a women of color leaders summit in early April, she weighed in on the second Trump administration, saying “there is a sense of fear that has been taking hold in our country” but that “courage is also contagious.”
And in remarks at the NAACP Image Awards in February, Harris framed the “chapter” America is in as one that “will be written not simply by whoever occupies the oval office nor by the wealthiest among us. The American story will be written by you. Written by us. By we the people.”
Harris and her spouse, Doug Emhoff, have been the target of recent actions by Trump.
Trump issued a memo in March that revoked the security clearances and access to classified information of his previous presidential opponents — Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris — as well as more than a dozen former administration officials. On Tuesday, Emhoff said he had been dismissed from the board of trustees of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum as the White House confirmed it had removed board members.
-ABC News’ Averi Harper, Zohreen Shah, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim and Kelsey Walsh contributed to this report.
LONDON — The U.S. and Ukrainian governments touted the signing of a controversial minerals sharing deal as a launchpad for expansive bilateral economic cooperation — and as a signal of America’s long-term investment in a free Ukraine.
American and Ukrainian representatives signed the accord in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday after months of tense negotiations, President Donald Trump long having framed the proposal as means to recoup more than $100 billion worth of aid given to Kyiv since Russia launched its invasion three years ago.
“This partnership allows the United States to invest alongside Ukraine to unlock Ukraine’s growth assets, mobilize American talent, capital and governance standards that will improve Ukraine’s investment climate and accelerate Ukraine’s economic recovery,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a video announcing the deal.
The full details of the agreement are yet to be released, with Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal expected to present the deal to the Ukrainian parliament — the Rada — on Thursday. Shmyhal this week previewed some parts of the agreement, saying it would not undermine Ukraine’s potential for accession to the European Union.
The deal will also need to be ratified by the Ukrainian parliament, members of which suggested on Thursday it was too early to fully evaluate the agreement.
“I don’t know what we have signed,” Oleksandr Merezhko, a lawmaker representing President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s party and the chair of the parliament’s foreign affairs committee, told ABC News.
“Judging by the statement of the prime minister, it is better than the initial version,” he added. “It seems like we have managed to dodge Trump’s idea to turn the previously-provided U.S. military and material aid into Ukrainian debts.”
The lawmaker suggested it was too early to say whether the deal represented a win for both Kyiv and Washington.
“It seems like Trump put pressure on us in an attempt to get a victory in his first 100 days in office,” Merezhko said. “The devil is in the details. But politically there are upsides. First, we have improved relations with Trump for whom it’s a win.”
Other members of parliament suggested that ratification would not be immediate. “I would really like to see the final document of the agreement,” lawmaker Oleksiy Goncharenko wrote on Telegram.
Lawmaker Yaroslav Zheleznyak, meanwhile, suggested it may take until mid-May for the parliament to vote on the minerals agreement — “and that’s only if everything is submitted to the Rada on time,” he wrote on Telegram.
In Russia, Dmitry Medvedev — the former president and prime minister now serving as the deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council — framed the deal as a defeat for Kyiv.
“Trump has broken the Kyiv regime into paying for American aid with minerals,” Medvedev — who through Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has become known for his hawkish statements — wrote on Telegram. “Now they will have to pay for military supplies with the national wealth of a disappearing country,” he wrote.
Nonetheless, Bessent said the agreement “clearly to Russian leadership that the Trump administration is committed to a peace process centered on a free, sovereign and prosperous Ukraine over the long term, it’s time for this cruel and senseless war to end the killing must stop.”
Bessent also said this deal was because of “President Trump’s tireless efforts to secure a lasting peace.”
ABC News’ Oleksiy Pshemyskiy, Nataliia Popova and Michelle Stoddart contributed to this report.
(SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.) — Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who has stayed largely out of the political limelight since leaving office, is set to deliver remarks on Wednesday in San Francisco as the Trump administration celebrates its accomplishments of its first 100 days.
Harris will be speaking at the 20th anniversary celebration for Emerge, an organization that supports Democratic women running for office.
The former Democratic nominee for president has had few public appearances since departing the White House, and has limited her political activity.
But her remarks come as she is set to possibly re-enter politics in the coming months. Harris has been mulling a run in California’s gubernatorial race and will make a decision by the end of summer, two sources familiar with her plans told ABC News in March.
Some Democrats have also floated her as a potential 2028 presidential candidate, although some of her longtime supporters have told ABC News they are torn over that prospect.
Whether she runs for either office or not, Harris’ public remarks thus far have sometimes included veiled and explicit swipes at the Trump administration and the president himself.
In remarks at a women of color leaders summit in early April, she weighed in on the second Trump administration, saying “there is a sense of fear that has been taking hold in our country” but that “courage is also contagious.”
And in remarks at the NAACP Image Awards in February, Harris framed the “chapter” America is in as one that “will be written not simply by whoever occupies the oval office nor by the wealthiest among us. The American story will be written by you. Written by us. By we the people.”
Harris and her spouse Doug Emhoff have been the target of recent actions by President Donald Trump.
Trump issued a memo in March that revoked the security clearances and access to classified information of his previous presidential opponents — Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris — as well as more than a dozen former administration officials. On Tuesday, Emhoff said he had been dismissed from the board of trustees of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum as the White House confirmed it had removed board members.
-ABC News’ Averi Harper, Zohreen Shah, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim and Kelsey Walsh contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative majority on Wednesday appeared ready to clear the way for creation of the nation’s first religious charter school funded directly with taxpayer dollars.
The justices heard arguments in a landmark dispute from Oklahoma, where the state Supreme Court last year blocked the Catholic Church from receiving a charter school contract on grounds that it violated state and federal constitutional bans on government-sponsored sectarian education.
A decision overruling the state high court would have ripple effects nationwide, especially in the 45 states that are home to 8,000 charter schools serving more than 3.8 million kids.
The state’s Republican attorney general argues that charter schools are public schools – open to all and subject to close supervision – and, as such, operate as extensions of state government subject to principles of separation of church and state.
Lawyers for the prospective school — St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School — insist that it is privately created and controlled and that excluding it from generally available charter school funding is religious discrimination.
For more than two hours, the justices debated application of the First Amendment’s competing religion clauses to the case, weighing both its prohibition of state establishment of religion and its protection of free exercise of religious faith.
The court’s three liberal members were united in the view that charter schools are quintessentially public institutions that cannot advance a specific ideology using taxpayer funds.
“The essence of the Establishment Clause was, we’re not going to pay religious leaders to teach their religion,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
Justice Elena Kagan noted that the Oklahoma law creating a charter school program explicitly says they must be nonreligious.
“These are state-run institutions,” Kagan said. “With respect to a whole variety of things, the state is running these schools and insisting upon certain requirements.”
Conservatives suggested they had a fundamentally different view of charter schools — as contractors for a public service rather than an arm of the government.
“The argument that St. Isidore and the board has made is that it’s a private entity that is participating in a state program,” noted Justice Clarence Thomas. “It was not created by the state program.”
Justice Brett Kavanaugh expressed concern that a ruling against St. Isidore on First Amendment grounds could call into question other government contracts with religiously affiliated organizations.
“I think a concern here is that religiously operated senior homes or food banks or foster care agencies or adoption agencies or homeless shelters, many of which get substantial funding from the government, would potentially … become state actors and, thus, not be able to exercise their religion,” Kavanaugh said.
A series of recent Supreme Court decisions has endorsed the idea that taxpayer-funded public benefit programs, from school vouchers to state-run scholarships, must be equally available, even if a person or organization has a religious affiliation.
Many of the justices said those precedents apply to the Oklahoma case.
Kavanaugh emphasized that religious charter schools would provide families with “options” but not confine students to a religious education.
“A student in Oklahoma is free to choose a public school, correct? No student is required to attend a charter school, correct?” he said.
“That’s right,” replied Gregory Garre, the attorney representing the state.
Justice Neil Gorsuch suggested that individual states opposed to religiously affiliated charter schools could tailor their laws to prevent that — and potentially curtail a charter’s independence.
“I can imagine some states might respond to a decision in your favor by imposing more requirements on charter schools,” Gorsuch said to attorney James Campbell representing the plaintiffs.
Chief Justice John Roberts posed critical questions of both sides. At one point, Roberts opined that a St. Isidore charter school would pose a striking “comprehensive involvement” between church and state. Later, he likened the relationship to Catholic Charities’ contract with the City of Philadelphia to provide adoption services; a 2021 high court decision said the city could not exclude the religious agency from the foster care program.
“How is that different from what we have here?” Roberts asked Oklahoma attorney Gregory Garre. “You have an education program, and you want to not allow them to participate with a religious entity.”
Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused from the case last year but did not explain her decision. Veteran court watchers have noted her close ties to the University of Notre Dame and personal relationships with law professors there who are involved in the case.
Her absence creates the possibility of a gridlocked 4-4 court, in which case the Oklahoma state Supreme Court ruling would stand. Roberts is widely seen as being the decisive vote.
“Today’s oral arguments made clear that states must not treat religious individuals and institutions as second-class citizens,” said Carrie Severino, a former clerk to Justice Clarence Thomas and president of JCN, a conservative legal advocacy group. “I expect the court will follow precedent and allow St. Isidore to offer educational choice for Oklahoma’s students.”
Opponents of religious charter schools said they feared a major ruling is on the horizon and could be transformative.
“If today’s arguments are any indication, the Supreme Court may be on the verge of abandoning one of the bedrock principles of our democracy,” said Rev. Dr. Shannon Fleck, executive director of Faithful America, a left-leaning Christian advocacy group. “Let’s be clear, this was always a test case, and today, the constitutional protections that have guarded true religious freedom for generations are at risk.”
Office of the President of Ukraine via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump reflected on the dramatic meeting he had with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy inside St. Peter’s Basilica just before the pope’s funeral on Saturday, when asked by ABC News anchor and Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran in an exclusive interview Tuesday in the Oval Office.
Noting the striking photograph of the two men “talking peace” that “went around the world,” Moran asked Trump, “Take us into that moment.”
“The moment was a moment of solace in a sense, because — tremendous numbers of people are dying. A lot of his people are dying,” Trump answered. “They’re being killed, and I feel very badly about it,” he said.
It was the first time Trump and Zelenskyy had met face-to-face since their heated argument in the Oval Office in February.
At the time, Zelenskyy contended the Russian president needed stronger pushback from Ukraine’s allies.
“I really count on your strong position to stop Putin,” Zelenskyy said to Trump at the February meeting.
Moran noted that Trump has since appeared to have changed his thinking about Putin’s intentions, bringing up what Trump said in a social media post after his conversation with Zelenskyy in St. Peter’s.
“There was no reason for Putin to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, in cities and towns, over the last few days,” he said in the post. “It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war. He’s just tapping me along.”
Trump repeated those comments in the interview.
“It’s possible. Yeah, that’s possible. Sure,” he said. “He could be tapping me along a little bit. I would say that he would like to stop the war.”
When Moran asked if Trump truly believed Putin wanted to end the war even with the continued attacks, Trump claimed that negotiations would have been much worse under a different president.
“You think Vladimir Putin wants peace?” Moran asked.
“I think he does, yes. I think he does,” he answered.
“Still?” Moran said.
“I think because of me … ” Trump continued.
“Even with the raining missiles on …?” Moran asked.
“I think he really– his– his– his dream was to take over the whole country. I think because of me, he’s not gonna do that,” Trump answered.
Asked if he trusts Putin, Trump said, “I don’t trust a lot of people. But I do think this. I think that he … let’s say he respects me,” he said.
(WASHINGTON) — In his interview with ABC News on his 100th day in office, President Donald Trump was asked about one of his biggest supporters sounding the alarm about his aggressive migrant deportation plan.
Joe Rogan told his audience of millions on his April 17 episode that “rounding up gang members and shipping them to El Salvador with no due process” was “dangerous.”
“We gotta be careful that we don’t become monsters while we’re fighting monsters,” Rogan said.
Responding to that quote in an interview with ABC News anchor and Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran on Tuesday — who asked whether Rogan was right — Trump said he was.
“Oh, I agree with that a hundred percent, yeah,” the president said. “We want to be careful. We are careful.”
When asked about the various court challenges to the deportations and court orders admonishing his administration for not following the law, Trump pushed back, calling those being deported “criminals.” He claimed Venezuelan “criminals are now living happily in the United States of America, and we’re getting ’em out.”
“And I was elected to get ’em out, and we’re getting them out, getting them out fast, and we’re getting them out legally,” he said.
Moran stressed that “in our country even bad guys get due process,” but Trump contended the situation is different for migrants in the country illegally.
“If people come into our country illegally there’s a different standard. These are illegal. They came in illegally,” the president said.
“But they get due process,” Moran said.
“Well, they get a process where we have to get ’em out, yeah,” Trump said.
The president was asked about the unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruling that ordered the administration to “facilitate” the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a migrant from El Salvador who was deported from Maryland to a notorious prison there because of an “administrative error,” according to the Justice Department.
Trump alleged that Abrego Garcia was a violent gang member, even though judges have said such claims have not been proven in court by prosecutors in the weeks since he was arrested.
“You could get him back. There’s a phone on this desk,” Moran said.
“I could,” Trump said.
“You could pick it up, and with all … ” Moran continued.
“I could,” Trump said again, interrupting Moran.
“… the power of the presidency, you could call up the president of El Salvador and say, ‘Send him back,’ right now,” Moran said.
“And if he were the gentleman that you say he is, I would do that,” Trump said. “But he’s not.”
When Moran said “the buck stops in this office,” Trump responded, “I follow the law. You want me to follow the law. If I were the president that just wanted to do anything, I’d probably keep him right where he is.”
When questioned again about the Supreme Court ruling, Moran saying, “the Supreme Court says what the law is,” Trump said he was elected in November to crack down on illegal immigration.
“Listen. I was elected to take care of a problem that was — it was — a, a unforced error that was made by a very incompetent man,” Trump said, referring to former President Joe Biden.
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump exclusively sat down with ABC News on Tuesday for the first broadcast interview marking the 100-day milestone of his second term.
ABC News anchor and Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran conducted the interview from the Oval Office, which aired on ABC at 8 p.m. ET. The interview will also be streamed later Tuesday on ABC News Live, Disney+ and Hulu.
The president’s first 100 days back in the White House have been marked by controversial tariffs, an overhaul of U.S. immigration enforcement and massive cuts to the federal workforce, all policies that Trump notes he campaigned on.
Read the full transcript of ABC News’ milestone interview with Trump below.
TERRY MORAN: Okay. Mr. President, thank you for doing this.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Thank you very much.
TERRY MORAN: Here in the Oval Office, it’s — it’s special. A hundred days into your second term. So what’s the one thing, just one thing, that you think is the most significant thing you’ve done so far in these 100 days?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I think maybe the border is the most significant because our country was really going bad. They were allowing people to come in from prisons, as you know. And you’ve heard me say it, but you’ve heard a lot of people say it. Prisons, mental institutions, gang members — murderers.
We had many murderers, 11,888, they think. Some murdered more than one person. So you had murderers coming in. You had everybody coming in. And not just South America. From all over the world, they were emptying their prisons into our country.
And now it’s totally closed down. And you’ve seen just yesterday, they announced 99.9%. Nobody thought that could happen, and it happened quickly, very quickly. And I think that’s very significant. But we’re doing other things that are very significant.
Results will take a little bit longer because it’s one of those — you know, it’s complicated. It’s — many years of trading abuse. We’ve been abused by other countries for years and years. They laughed at us. They thought we were stupid people, and we’re fixing it. And — I think that’s gonna be very, very important. But I — I would —
TERRY MORAN: We have a lot of ground to cover.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah. I would really say that — that — that the border is so important, you know? You just can’t —
TERRY MORAN: And we’ll get there. Immigration is huge —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — let that happen. Yeah.
TERRY MORAN: And we’re gonna get there. But I wanna start —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Sure.
TERRY MORAN: — with the economy, the number one issue for so many people, for just about everybody. It — it’s one of the main reasons that you’re back in this office. And now we have this trade war with China that — that Moody’s and other analysts say is gonna cost American families thousands of more dollars per year. And there is a lot of concern out there. People are worried, even some people who voted for you, sayin’, “I didn’t sign up for this.” So how do you answer those concerns?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, they did sign up for it, actually. And this is what I campaigned on. I said that– we’ve been abused by other countries at levels that nobody’s ever seen before. We were losing $3 to 5 billion a day on trade. We were losing– a trillion and a half to $2 trillion a year. Not sustainable.
They were takin’ advantage of us like they’ve never — I could’ve left it that way, and at some point there would’ve been an implosion like nobody’s ever seen. But I said, “No, we have to fix it.” I’ve — I’ve wanted to do this for many years.
You know, I had the best economy during my first term. We had a tremendous economy, tremendous success. And we — we did tremendous numbers of tariffs on — we took in a lot of money from tariffs — China in particular, hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs. We had no inflation, as you know. We had an incredible economy. We were given credit for a great economy. But I said, “We have to fix this, otherwise it’s just not self-sustaining.”
TERRY MORAN: Well, one of the things you ran on was you’d said you’d bring prices down on day one. And that —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And I have —
TERRY MORAN: — it would happen fast. And that it would happen fast and —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I have.
TERRY MORAN: Many — most economists will tell you that tariffs will raise prices. So don’t your tariffs cut against that promise you made to bring prices down?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, because I had massive tariffs on China, if you remember in my first term, and we had essentially no inflation. Like, around 1% inflation, which is, like, a perfect number. The — and then when Biden took over it went through the roof.
It went to the — probably the worst inflation we’ve ever had. I mean, we had an inflation nightmare. Now, if you look at what’s happening now, we’re only there for 100 days, as you say, and in 100 days we took over the — we had bad inflation for four years, for two years of — especially two years of his — his administration. I would say record-setting like we’ve never seen. They say 48 years, the worst in 48 years. I’d say it was much worse than that —
TERRY MORAN: You lived through that, I lived through that, yeah.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Right. So — so now if you look at what’s happened — energy is down. Gasoline hit $1.98 in a few states — during the last couple of days. It was $3.50 and $4.00 and $4.50. But gasoline is way down. And when I took over, you remember the big thing with eggs?
They hit me the first week, “Eggs, eggs, eggs,” like it was my fault. I said, “I didn’t cause this problem. This problem was caused by Biden. What’s the problem with eggs?” And they said, “They’ve doubled it.” Well, eggs are down 87% since I got involved.
TERRY MORAN: A lotta that is bird flu, right —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And by the way — and there were plenty of eggs for Easter, which we just went through. There were plenty of eggs for Easter. They were saying, “You won’t have enough eggs for Easter.” We ended — our sec — my secretary did a fantastic job on eggs. Groceries are down. Everything’s down —
TERRY MORAN: Okay.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Interest rates are the same. Interest rates should be down, but we have a Federal Reserve that wants to be stubborn. They wanna be cute —
TERRY MORAN: Alright, we’ll get to that. A couple — you said something a couple weeks ago that — that struck me. You said, concerning the tariffs, which economists say are gonna raise prices, you said, quote, “Hang tough. It won’t be easy.” You said that to the American people. Is that what Americans should expect —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I’ve said that —
TERRY MORAN: — some hard times?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’ve said that during —
TERRY MORAN: Because of these tariffs–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — my campaign. Look, we won a campaign by a lot. We won all seven swing states. We won the popular vote by a lot. You know, we had a tremendous campaign. I said all of these things during my campaign. I said, “You’re gonna have a transition period.” We’ve been ripped off by every country all over the world. They’re laughing at us. They thought we were stupid people, and we were. And I said, “That’s not gonna happen. We’re not gonna let that happen” —
TERRY MORAN: Hard times — hard times are ahead?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t think so. I think great —
TERRY MORAN: “Hang tough” —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — times are ahead. Look, since I came in gasoline is down, groceries are down, egg prices are down — many things are down, just about everything. You know, you don’t have the drop in — in fuel and energy and oil like we did. I took it from maybe $3.20, maybe more than that, down into a low — a much lower number. When you have that kind of a drop you’re not gonna have inflation.
TERRY MORAN: Not now. But it’s the tariffs, right? We still have 145% tariffs —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well —
TERRY MORAN: — on China
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Why is it —
TERRY MORAN: Your Treasury secretary said we basically have an embargo on China.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Look, you’re trying to —
TERRY MORAN: And that —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — say something’s gonna happen, Terry —
TERRY MORAN: No, no, no, no. Okay, well, do you —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Nothing’s gonna happen
TERRY MORAN: You know business. I wanna ask you —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Terry — Terry —
TERRY MORAN: I wanna ask you.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I do know business. And —
TERRY MORAN: Yeah, so 145% tariffs on China. And — and that is —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That’s good.
TERRY MORAN: — basically —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That’s good.
TERRY MORAN: — an embargo
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They deserve it.
TERRY MORAN: It’ll raise prices on everything from–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They deserve it.
TERRY MORAN: — electronics to clothing to building houses.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: You don’t know that. You don’t know whether or not China’s gonna eat it —
TERRY MORAN: That’s mathematics.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: China probably will eat those tariffs. But at 145, they basically can’t do much business with the United States. And they were making from us a trillion dollars a year. They were ripping us off like nobody’s ever ripped us off. And by the way, we have other countries that were just as bad. If you look at the European Union, it was terrible what they’ve done to us. Every country, almost every country in the world was ripping us off.
TERRY MORAN: But I —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They’re not doing that anymore.
TERRY MORAN: I want you to think about the boom that this country has had in small businesses, mom-and-pops — Etsy stores, small businesses that became —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Really? They haven’t had a boom —
TERRY MORAN: — big businesses
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — because of inflation.
TERRY MORAN: Well, your boom, what they’ve done —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The boom was inflationary boom. The people were wiped out with inflation. I mean, you read the news. You do the business stuff, I assume —
TERRY MORAN: Now they face — now they — they — a lot of ’em built those businesses on the trading model before you —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, and they’re gonna make more money now
TERRY MORAN: They source their products overseas. And now they’re looking at an extinction event —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’ve been here.
TERRY MORAN: They’re — they’re — it’s disaster for them.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’ve been here for three months. I’ve taken a trade deficit down to a number that’s very, very — starting to get really good. I only — I just got here. We had a country that — it was not sustainable. What Biden did to this country, between — the open borders where criminals poured into our country, between every country in the world ripping us off on trade, it was not sustainable.
TERRY MORAN: So your message to those small businesses who are saying, “We can’t live a month, two months with these tariffs,” Apple got a big deal. Is there something for them?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, no. Not only Apple. We’ve got $7-8 trillion being invested in our country in two months. Biden didn’t have that over a year. I mean, if you look at Biden, nobody was really investing in this country. Everybody was ripping off our country. Apple’s putting up $500 billion, but that’s only one of many companies. Companies are flooding into our country right now.
TERRY MORAN: So your answer to the concern about the tariffs is, “Everything’s gonna be hunky-dory?”
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Everybody’s gonna be just fine. It wouldn’t have been if I didn’t do this. I had a choice. I could leave it, have a nice, easy time. But I think ultimately you would’ve had an implosion. Our country had inflation that was worse than they’ve ever had it before.
You don’t mention that. Why don’t you mention that? We had the worst inflation probably in the history of our country. People say 48 years, probably in the history of our country we had the worst inflation. And people were dying over the inflation. You know that. Now the grocery prices are coming down. The energy prices are coming down. Gasoline’s coming down. It’s all heading in the right direction.
TERRY MORAN: Okay. Let’s move on to immigration. And as you said, it is an undeniable fact that illegal crossings at the southern border have plummeted, a staggering decline. But there are questions about your methods, and so I want to ask you —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: About my message?
TERRY MORAN: Methods. About your methods, how you’re accomplishing this —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, they seem to work.
TERRY MORAN: Do you acknowledge that under our law every single person who gets deported gets a hearing first to make their case?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, are we talking about people that are citizens of our country or not?
TERRY MORAN: No, you’re not deporting citizens, at this point.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, lemme ask you. Do they get hearings when — when Biden allowed 21 million — ’cause I think the number’s 21, 20 million — people to flow into our country? He had 21 million people that came into our country through a stupid open border.
And they were prisoners and they were — people that you don’t want, in many cases, in our country, right? They came from all over the world. They came from the Congo. They came from south — they came from all over the world. We’re talkin’ about some of the roughest countries in the world — they had — they had here, including terrorists, by the way. Now —
TERRY MORAN: But the law —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Did we give them a hearing when they came in?
TERRY MORAN: Well, the law requires that every single person who is going to be deported gets a hearing first.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well —
TERRY MORAN: Do you acknowledge that?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’ll — I’ll have to ask the lawyers about that. All I can say is this: If you’re gonna have 21 million people, and if we have to get a lot of ’em out because they’re criminals, we’re gonna have to act fast. We can’t — do you think we can give 21 million trials? Let’s say each trial takes two weeks. Is that what you want us to do —
TERRY MORAN: The law is the law, sir —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — give 21 million?
TERRY MORAN: The law is the law and you’re sworn —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, no. The law doesn’t say anything —
TERRY MORAN: — to uphold it —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — about trials
TERRY MORAN: No, not trials. Hearings. I said hearings —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: If these people came in, they’re not citizens, they came in illegally, they came into our country illegally, we have to —
TERRY MORAN: And they —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — get them out.
TERRY MORAN: There’s a legal process for that.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I can’t — sure, and we follow the legal process. I can’t — I can’t have a trial– a major trial– for every person that came in illegally, we have thousands of murderers that came in. They’re gonna murder people. They already have murdered people in our country.
TERRY MORAN: Right, so —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We have to get ’em out–
TERRY MORAN: They’re bad guys —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And we have to get ’em out fast.
TERRY MORAN: Really bad guys. But in our country even bad guys get due process, right?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: If people come into our country illegally there’s a different standard. These are illegal. They came in illegally.
TERRY MORAN: But they get due process.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, they get a process where we have to get ’em out, yeah.
TERRY MORAN: Okay. Let’s talk about the Venezuelans.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They get whatever my lawyers say.
TERRY MORAN: Right. Alright, let’s talk about the Venezuelans. You deported more than 200 Venezuelans to that prison in El Salvador. You — you say they’re — they’re violent. They’re gang members. They’re terrorists. Many of them don’t have — a criminal record —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They are, by the way.
TERRY MORAN: — at all.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well — I’m not so sure about that, if you take a look —
TERRY MORAN: I wanna — I wanna read you something —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: When you — excuse me. When you look at those — those people, they were violent people. They were violent people —
TERRY MORAN: But many of them don’t have a criminal record at this point —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Go ahead.
TERRY MORAN: I wanna read you something —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I mean, that’s what you say.
TERRY MORAN: Well, it’s based on — their lawyer– what their lawyers have said —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Go ahead. Go ahead.
TERRY MORAN: Joe Rogan said this. Joe Rogan, one of the leading podcasters, Trump supporter, about the deportation of Venezuelans. He said, quote, “Rounding up gang members and shipping them to El Salvador with no due process,” he said it was dangerous and added, quote, “We gotta be careful that we don’t become monsters while we’re fighting monsters.” I — is Joe Rogan —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I agree with that.
TERRY MORAN: — right?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Oh, I agree with that a hundred percent, yeah. We want to be careful. We are careful. We’re doing something that has to be done. We have a country that’s very sick. Joe Biden — and it’s not him, because I don’t even think he knew what the hell was happening.
But the people around him are vicious people. And what they’ve done to the country is unbelievable. They’ve allowed 21 million people to pour into our country. Many of these people are criminals. They’ve allowed the — you mention Venezuela — the jails of Venezuela to be emptied into the United States.
Do you know Venezuela crime is way down? Way, way down. You know why? Because their criminals are now living happily in the United States of America, and we’re getting ’em out. And I was elected to get ’em out, and we’re getting ’em out —
TERRY MORAN: Under the law, it sounds like —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — getting them out fast, and we’re getting them out legally. Now in some cases, we have judges. In some cases, they’re radical left judges. What happened the other day, where a judge was protecting a criminal, was horrible.
TERRY MORAN: Mmm.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And I think she’s got big problems, frankly —
TERRY MORAN: Probably. And talk about —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And there are a couple of them like that.
TERRY MORAN: I want to talk about one man —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Wait a minute.
TERRY MORAN: Yep.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We have to be treated fairly by judges. And we’re not being treated fairly by all judges.
TERRY MORAN: Oh, that’s a subject its — so you’re saying that you don’t like some of the rulings, some of the —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I think —
TERRY MORAN: — court orders?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think the rulings will be overturned, yeah.
TERRY MORAN: Alright. Well, let me ask about one man and one court order. Kilmar Abrego Garcia. He’s the Salvadoran man who crossed into this country illegally but who is under a protective order that he not be sent back to El Salvador. Your government sent him back to El Salvador and acknowledged in court that was a mistake. And now the Supreme Court has upheld an order that you must return him to the — facilitate his return to the United States. What are you doing to comply?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, the lawyer that said it was a mistake was here a long time, was not appointed by us — should not have said that, should not have said that. And just so you understand —
TERRY MORAN: Said it in court. Said it in court —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — the person that you’re talkin’ about, you know, you’re makin’ this person sound — this is a MS-13 gang member, a tough cookie, been in lots of skirmishes, beat the hell out of his wife, and the wife was petrified to even talk about him, okay? This is not an innocent, wonderful gentleman from Maryland —
TERRY MORAN: I’m not saying he’s a good guy. It’s about the rule of law. The order from the Supreme Court stands, sir —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: He came into our country illegally.
TERRY MORAN: You could get him back. There’s a phone on this desk.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I could.
TERRY MORAN: You could pick it up, and with all —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I could
TERRY MORAN: — the power of the presidency, you could call up the president of El Salvador and say, “Send him back,” right now.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And if he were the gentleman that you say he is, I would do that.
TERRY MORAN: But the court has ordered you —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But he’s not.
TERRY MORAN: — to facilitate that — his release–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’m not the one making this decision. We have lawyers that don’t want —
TERRY MORAN: You’re the president.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — to do this, Terry —
TERRY MORAN: Yeah, but the — but the buck stops in this office —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I — no, no, no, no. I follow the law. You want me to follow the law. If I were the president that just wanted to do anything, I’d probably keep him right where he is —
TERRY MORAN: The Supreme Court says what the law is.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Listen. I was elected to take care of a problem that was — it was — a, a unforced error that was made by a very incompetent man, a man that turned out to be incompetent that you always said was wonderful, a great genius, right? And now you find out — all of the media, now they’re saying what a mistake they made. A man who was grossly incompetent allowed us to have open borders where millions of people flowed in —
TERRY MORAN: Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I campaigned on that issue. I wouldn’t say it was my number one issue, but it was pretty close.
TERRY MORAN: Right up there.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I campaigned on that issue. I’ve done an amazing job. I have closed borders. He said you couldn’t do it, you wouldn’t be able to do it, it would never happen. Well, it happened. And it happened —
TERRY MORAN: Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — very quickly. Wait a minute. When we have criminals, murderers, criminals in this country, we have to get ’em out. And we’re doing it.
TERRY MORAN: By law —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And you’ll pick out one man, but even the man that you picked out —
TERRY MORAN: He’s got —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — he said he’d — wasn’t a member of a gang. And then they looked, and —
TERRY MORAN: Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: On his knuckles — he had MS-13 —
TERRY MORAN: Alright. There’s dis — there’s a dispute over that —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, wait a minute. Wait a minute. He had MS-13 —
TERRY MORAN: Well —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — on his knuckles tattooed.
TERRY MORAN: — he — he — he — it didn’t say– oh, he had some tattoos that are inper — interpreted that way. But let’s move on
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Wait a minute.
TERRY MORAN: I want —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Hey, Terry. Terry. Terry.
TERRY MORAN: He — he did not have the letter —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Don’t do that — M-S-1-3 — It says M-S-one-three.
TERRY MORAN: I — that was Photoshop. So let me just–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That was Photoshop? Terry, you can’t do that — he had —
— he– hey, they’re givin’ you the big break of a lifetime. You know, you’re doin’ the interview. I picked you because — frankly I never heard of you, but that’s okay —
TERRY MORAN: This — I knew this would come —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But I picked you — Terry — but you’re not being very nice. He had MS-13 tattooed —
TERRY MORAN: Alright. Alright. We’ll agree to disagree. I want to move on —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Terry.
TERRY MORAN: — to something else.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Terry. Do you want me to show the picture?
TERRY MORAN: I saw the picture. We’ll — we’ll — we’ll agree to disagree —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Oh, and you think it was Photoshop. Well —
TERRY MORAN: Here we go. Here we go.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — don’t Photoshop it. Go look —
TERRY MORAN: Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — at his hand. He had MS-13 —
TERRY MORAN: Fair enough, he did have tattoos that can be interpreted that way. I’m not an expert on them.
I want to turn to Ukraine, sir —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, no. Terry —
TERRY MORAN: I– I want to get to Ukraine–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Terry, no, no. No, no. He had MS as clear as you can be. Not “interpreted.” This is why people —
TERRY MORAN: Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — no longer believe —
TERRY MORAN: Well.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — the news, because it’s fake news —
TERRY MORAN: When he was photographed in El Sal — in– in El Salvador, they aren’t there. But let’s just go on —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: He is —
TERRY MORAN: They aren’t there when he’s in El Salvador.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: –there — oh, oh, they weren’t there —
TERRY MORAN: Take a look at the photograph —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But they’re there now, right?
TERRY MORAN: No. What —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But they’re there now?
TERRY MORAN: They’re in your picture.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Terry.
TERRY MORAN: Ukraine, sir.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: He’s got MS-13 on his knuckles.
TERRY MORAN: Alright. I —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Okay?
TERRY MORAN: — we’ll — we’ll take a look at it —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It’s — it’s — you do such a disservice —
TERRY MORAN: We’ll take a look. We’ll take a look at that, sir —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Why don’t you just say, “Yes, he does,” and, you know, go on to something else —
TERRY MORAN: It’s contested. Ukraine. I want to turn — I was just in Rome, and to that moving photograph of you and President Zelenskyy sitting in St. Peter’s Basilica —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah.
TERRY MORAN: — talking peace. It went around the world.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Sure.
TERRY MORAN: Take us into that moment.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, look, the Ukraine is a very serious, very tough situation. And this is Biden’s war. This is not my war. But I want to see if I can solve it, because probably close to 5,000 young soldiers a week are being killed, Russian and Ukrainian. We also spend a tremendous amount of money in Ukraine, and Europe should be spending much more than us. They’re not. They’re spending much less. It’s been badly handled by the Biden administration. It’s been badly handled all the way around, all the way around —
TERRY MORAN: But that — that moment.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The moment was a moment of solace in a sense, because — tremendous numbers of people are dying. A lot of his people are dying. They’re being killed. And I feel very badly about it. I feel very badly about — that’s a war that would have never happened if I were president, and it didn’t happen for four years. It was never even a thought of it happening.
TERRY MORAN: It — it does feel like something’s happening. After that meeting with Zelenskyy in St. Peter’s, you posted this on social media. “There was no reason for Putin to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, in cities and towns, over the last few days. It makes me think that maybe” —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, well, that was part of my post. But you’re right. That was — that was part of a post, yes —
TERRY MORAN: And it says, “It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war. He’s just tapping me along–“
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It’s possible. Yeah, that’s possible. Sure.
TERRY MORAN: “He might be –“
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: He could be tapping me along a little bit. I would say that he would like to stop the war. I think that —
TERRY MORAN: You believe that?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — if — if it weren’t for me, I think he’d want to take over the whole country, personally. I always felt — so when I left, there wasn’t even a chance that this would happen. When Biden got involved, I won’t say whether or not he handled it properly, but obviously it wasn’t good, because the war started.
Putin went in. The war started. I believe that Putin wanted to get all of Ukraine once he went in. And I think part of the reason he went in is he saw what happened in Afghanistan, how incompetent — how incompetently Milley and all these guys handled that. It was one of the greatest embarrassments of — of our lifetimes but maybe in the history of our country. Okay. So Putin went in. I think Putin wanted all of Ukraine.
TERRY MORAN: Right.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think if I didn’t win the election, he would have gotten all of Ukraine. I think he would have taken all of Ukraine.
TERRY MORAN: From —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think his first choice — never with me. He would have never gone in. With this group of losers, he went in. He saw what happened in Afghanistan. He said, “Wow, this is my chance,” because it was always the apple of his eye. I talked to him. Ukraine was the apple of his eye. I think he wanted the whole country.
TERRY MORAN: You’ve said for months that —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And because of me, I do believe that —
TERRY MORAN: Yeah. Yeah.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — he’s willing to stop the fighting. Don’t forget —
TERRY MORAN: You think he wants peace?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — this is —
TERRY MORAN: You think Vladimir Putin wants peace?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think he does, yes. I think he does–
TERRY MORAN: Still?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think because of me —
TERRY MORAN: Even with the raining missiles on —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think he really — his — his — his dream was to take over the whole country. I think because of me, he’s not gonna do that.
TERRY MORAN: Do you trust him?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think —
TERRY MORAN: Do you trust him?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t trust you. I don’t trust — I don’t trust a lot of people. I don’t trust you. Look at you. You come in all shootin’ for bear. You’re so happy to do the interview.
TERRY MORAN: I am happy —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And then you start hitting me with fake questions. You start tellin’ me that a guy — whose hand is covered with a tattoo —
TERRY MORAN: Alright. We’re back to that.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — doesn’t have the tattoo, you know.
TERRY MORAN: Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I mean, you’re being dishonest.
TERRY MORAN: No, I’m not —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Let — let– let me just tell you —
TERRY MORAN: No, I am not, sir.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Do I trust — I don’t trust a lot of people. But I do think this. I think that he — let’s say he respects me. And I believe because of me he’s not gonna take over the whole — but his decision, his choice would be to take over all of Ukraine.
TERRY MORAN: Okay.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It’s a war that never should have happened. It did happen because of incompetent people —
TERRY MORAN: Last question on this.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But it never should have happened.
TERRY MORAN: If there’s no peace deal, will the U.S. cut off military aid to Ukraine?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t want to tell you that. I’m not gonna tell you whether or not I would or not —
TERRY MORAN: That sounds —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I want to leave that as a big, fat secret, because I don’t want to ruin a negotiation. But —
TERRY MORAN: I’d be worried if I were Ukraine.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — I will tell you I was not happy when I saw Putin shooting missiles into a few towns and cities. And — that was not something that I liked seeing, and I thought it was inappropriate. But I think the whole war is inappropriate.
TERRY MORAN: Okay.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Again, it’s a war that shouldn’t have happened. This war is a war that if the election weren’t rigged — and it was totally rigged, the 2020 election — if it weren’t rigged, you wouldn’t have that. You wouldn’t have had the embarrassment —
TERRY MORAN: Okay.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — of Afghanistan.
TERRY MORAN: Got it.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: You wouldn’t have October 7th with Is —
TERRY MORAN: Got it.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: –Israel. You wouldn’t have had any of the problems that you have right now —
TERRY MORAN: Thank you. I want to ask one question —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And you wouldn’t have had inflation either.
TERRY MORAN: Alright. I want to ask one question about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. There’s a lot of turmoil — at the — at the Pentagon right now. There’s the Signal chat with his wife on it where he’s discussing that attack in Yemen. There’s another Signal chat — discussing the attack on Yemen.
There’s a reporter accidentally involved. You said the other day that you had a talk with the secretary. Did you take him to the woodshed?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I had a talk with him, and whatever I said I probably wouldn’t be inclined to tell you. Bu t– we had a good talk. He’s a talented guy. He’s young. He’s smart, highly educated. And I think he’s gonna be a very good defense — hopefully a great defense secretary, but he’ll be a very good defense secretary —
TERRY MORAN: You have a hundred percent confidence in Pete Hegseth?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t have — a hundred percent confidence in anything, okay? Anything. Do I have a hundred percent? It’s a stupid question. Look —
TERRY MORAN: It’s a pretty important position.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — I have — no, no, no. You don’t have a hundred percent. Only a liar would say, “I have a hundred percent confidence.” I don’t have a hundred percent confidence that we’re gonna finish this interview.
TERRY MORAN: We will.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Let’s go.
TERRY MORAN: Elon Musk and DOGE. Everyone knows that there’s wasteful government spending. It’s really important. But the cuts have had some serious consequences. There have been cuts to foreign aid programs that save lives and keep people alive overseas. There’s been research at the National Institutes of Health on cancer, on Alzheimer’s that has had to be stopped. And- – the question I think people have is: Did DOGE go too far, too fast, too recklessly?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, I think DOGE has been, look, saved $150 billion. Billion. We saved — that’s a lot of money. There’s also a lot of things right now under investigation, which is gonna increase that amount by a lot. And that’s a tremendous amount of money. There were some things where when I heard about ’em I — I put ’em back, as you know. There are things that I’m considering right now putting back. But overall, we’ve saved hundreds of billions of dollars of —
TERRY MORAN: Well, the original promise was $2 trillion, went to $1 trillion. Now, it’s $150 billion —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I don’t know —
TERRY MORAN: — and heading south.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: You don’t know what it’s gonna be because we have things that are very — at a very high level that are being looked at right now. We also found tremendous waste, fraud, and abuse, as you know.
We found a lot of fraud. There was a lot of fraud. Fraudulent things were taking place, and we ended that, and those people are gonna be suffering —
TERRY MORAN: Just —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — because of it.
TERRY MORAN: — a legal note. Fraud is a crime. There have been no referrals to the Justice Department on any of this —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, you don’t know that, do you? How do you know that?
TERRY MORAN: Have there been referrals —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: How do you know that —
TERRY MORAN: — to the — are there criminal referrals —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Why — how would you know that, that there were no referrals? I think there–
TERRY MORAN: There’s — there’s —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — were referrals.
TERRY MORAN: They generally — alright. There’s been no investigation from the Justice Department —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: How do you know that?
TERRY MORAN: I’m asking you, sir.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, you’re not askin’ me. You made a statement. You’re not asking me —
TERRY MORAN: Now, I’m asking you.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That was a statement that you made. There have been —
TERRY MORAN: Now, I’m asking.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Have there been? Yes, there have.
TERRY MORAN: So there have been referrals for fraud from the work of DOGE?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Of course there have been. Take a look at some of these things —
TERRY MORAN: Alright. Alright.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — that took place. Millions of dollars were given to people for no reason whatsoever. Of course there have been.
TERRY MORAN: I want to bring up — what is truly one of — to a lot of people, one of the biggest achievements of your first term. That is Operation Warp Speed. You got that COVID vaccine up and going —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That’s right.
TERRY MORAN: — and distributed. And a lotta people took it, and a lotta people that feel their lives have been saved by it. Now, we have this measles outbreak, biggest in a decade — in Texas, and it’s because people aren’t getting their children vaccinated. Do you recommend to parents that they get their children vaccinated for measles?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I recommend the governors to make the decisions. You have a very talented governor of Texas, and he’s making decisions, and those decisions are gonna be made rapidly. This is a very much different thing than COVID in terms of rap — rapidity and speed and other things.
Measles have been with us a long time. And I’m not saying good, bad, or indifferent. I’m just saying that — the governors are making the decision. It’s a federalist decision —
TERRY MORAN: So you’re — the president is — is our leader in so many ways, and your voice counts so much. And you can’t tell moms and dads, you know, it’s a good thing —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Oh, sure. I rec —
TERRY MORAN: — to get a measles vaccine?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Do I recommend it?
TERRY MORAN: Yes.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yes, I do. I recommend it. Yeah.
TERRY MORAN: Got it. That was my question —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Do I mandate it? No.
TERRY MORAN: No. No, I didn’t ask —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But I do recommend it, yes —
TERRY MORAN: Good. Do you think your —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And I have recommended it.
TERRY MORAN: Do you think the secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has a history of at the very least vaccine skepticism — do you think Kennedy recommends the measles vaccines?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: He did. He did. He recommended it. Yeah, he did. He recommended it —
TERRY MORAN: Are you satisfied with his —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, I mean, he —
TERRY MORAN: — response on this?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — recommended that they go out and get the vaccine. Yeah.
TERRY MORAN: Okay. I want to talk a little bit about presidential power, the powers that you have in the presidency- – temporarily that the American people ha — have given you, right? You’ve revoked a lot of people’s security clearances. You’ve revoked people’s security details who are — still threatened, you know, with death threats. You’ve gone after law firms because they’ve employed people you don’t like or they have represented people that you don’t like —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, they obviously agreed because they paid me a lotta money.
TERRY MORAN: Well, the reason they agreed is because you were threatening to destroy their business with your executive order that said, “You can’t represent clients before the federal government.” That’s–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well — These are big —
TERRY MORAN: That’s their bread and butter —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: These are big boys. These are big — these are the biggest, most powerful lawyers. These are not people that —
TERRY MORAN: You got a lotta leverage as president —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: — are easily intimidated.
TERRY MORAN: As president, you’ve got all the cards.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And they paid hundreds of millions of dollars because they felt — I guess they probably felt they did something wrong, you know —
TERRY MORAN: It was for survival, sir. You —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, it isn’t. These —
TERRY MORAN: You were crushing their business —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: These — these firms are very powerful firms, and there’s 15 of them. And these are firms that — probably– look, you have to ask them. In fact, this is a separate story. You have to ask them, “Why did you all pay Trump hundreds of millions of dollars in services, et cetera? Why did you do that?” I don’t know.
TERRY MORAN: You don’t think that factored —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We — we — we have a clause in the thing that, “While we admit no wrongdoing.” But, you know, it’s like one of those things. And now I’m friendly with those firms. But it’s — you know, these are the most powerful firms in the world.
And they just signed whatever I put in front of ’em. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m– I’m actually surprised myself in a certain way. But they obviously felt they probably did something wrong. I guess that’s why they signed.
TERRY MORAN: I guess the question out of that is the concern that people have: Are — are you using your powers as president to get personal revenge?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No. I’ll tell you what — I tell you what you sh — not — you’re really not asking and you should be asking. There has never been a president in this country in the history that was persecuted like I was persecuted by really crooked people. Dishonest, horrible people. And it’s been proven.
So when you say I’m treating people rough, I’m not treating people rough. I was treated worse than any president in the history of our country. And, you know, people figured, “Well, maybe that’s it. Finally we got– you know, he’s leaving town. There goes the helicopter.”
And then I came back. And — I came back because I have tremendous support. You know, when you win an election like I won it — and you will admit: I won all seven swing states. I won the popular vote. I won — 700 of — let’s say 2,750 districts compared to 500 districts. That’s why the map is all red. And those people feel that I was treated unfairly.
TERRY MORAN: But does that give you the right to go after your political opponents with the powers of this office —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t go after — I don’t go — I’m going after — all I’m doing — hey, Biden did something to me —
TERRY MORAN: So —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: –a nd I did something to Biden. And you know why I did it? ‘Cause he’s grossly incompetent. That’s not a man that should be allowed to, you know, be lookin’ at things that are very confidential.
TERRY MORAN: But what about –71 people you’ve revoked their —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Here’s a man that used an autopen to sign very important documents. Now, who really is — do — do you think he knew what — that they were using an autopen? I mean, he used an autopen to sign very, very important documents. And so those are really the questions you should be asking: “What do you think of the autopen? Who wielded the autopen?” Because — whoever that person was, think of it. Whoever the person that wielded the autopen, he was really the president of the United States.
TERRY MORAN: You are the president, right.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t think that Biden knew anything about it —
TERRY MORAN: Okay, fair enough. But you are the president now. And I’m asking the justification for going after people you don’t like.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Uh. No, no.
TERRY MORAN: That is the —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: People that I think are dishonest. It’s not that I don’t — I don’t even know most of ’em. They’re people that I think are dis —
TERRY MORAN: These are people that made you angry.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No– it’s not anger. These are people that I think are very dishonest. I don’t think they’re worthy of being able to go into top-secret information. I think that’s fine. And Biden did that with many of our people. But when you look at it — these are people that I don’t think are worthy. That’s my decision. It’s not a question of anger.
TERRY MORAN: Okay. I understand you just had a phone call with the new Canadian premier. And they just had this election. You were a big issue in it. And Canadians, many of them, are really angry, furious, about your talk about, “We’re gonna take over Canada. It’s gonna become the 51st state–“
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That’s their prerogative.
TERRY MORAN: And it kind of is of a piece — a lotta — travel is down into the United States from around the world.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We’re doing great —
TERRY MORAN: Feels like there’s been reputational damage —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The country’s doing great.
TERRY MORAN: Well —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Prices are down.
TERRY MORAN: Not the tourism industry —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Gasoline’s down. Energy’s down. Tourism is gonna be way up. Wait till you see the numbers. The tourism is way up.
TERRY MORAN: Not now.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Now, Canada — oh, sure — tourism’s doing very well. We’re doing very well. We’re doing very well. Wait till you see the real numbers come out in about — in six months from now wait till you see the numbers.
TERRY MORAN: But do you think —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They’re gonna be very good —
TERRY MORAN: I’m gonna ask — if I may, do you think the reputation of the United States has gone down under your presidency?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I — no, I think it’s gone way up, and I think we’re a respected country again. We were laughed at all over the world. We had — a president that couldn’t walk up a flight of stairs, couldn’t walk down a flight of stairs, couldn’t walk across a stage without falling. We had a president that was grossly incompetent. You knew it, I knew it, and everybody knew it. But you guys didn’t want to write it because you’re fake news.
TERRY MORAN: Alright. Thank you —
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And, by the way, ABC is one of the worst. I have to be honest with you —
TERRY MORAN: Okay. Thank you for the opinion. But more importantly, thank you for having us here. I have one more question.
It’s a big one. It’s a question that you know a lot of people have out there. What do you say to people who are concerned you are taking, seizing too much power and becoming an authoritarian president like we haven’t had before?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, I — I would hate them to think that. I’m doing one thing: I’m makin’ America great again. We have a country that was failing. We have a country that was laughed at all over the world. We had a leader that was grossly incompetent. He should have never been there.
The election was rigged. He shoulda never been there. Our country suffered greatly, and now our country’s coming back like nobody can believe. I have editorials just today where they’re saying they’ve never seen anything like it. They love it. Our country’s coming back, and we’re respected again.
TERRY MORAN: Mr. President, thank you.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Thank you, Terry, very much.
(NEWWARK, NJ) — Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil’s bid to remain in the United States survives after a New Jersey federal judge decided Tuesday he could retain jurisdiction over the case.
Khalil claimed he was detained and targeted for deportation because of his speech at pro-Palestinian protests on the Columbia campus and challenged his detention based on the constitutionality of the State Department’s finding that his continued presence in the country could have “serious adverse foreign policy consequences” for the United States.
Judge Michael Fabiarz did not address the substance of Khalil’s challenge but decided the case belonged in his courtroom so he could assess the Trump administration’s basis for Khalil’s removal. Fabiarz said an immigration court in Louisiana, which has already allowed for Khalil’s removal, did not have the ability to “look under the hood” of Khalil’s claims.
“If there needs to be fact-finding here, it may potentially be sprawling, and it may potentially involve sensitive evidence, or (renewed) requests to depose senior officials,” Fabiarz said. “This is not the kind of fact-finding work the immigration courts have been built for.”
Fabiarz previously found that the Newark court can retain jurisdiction over the case in a decision issued earlier this month. The judge wrote that there were still “other jurisdictional hurdles” to consider before reaffirming in his latest opinion that the case can stay in his courtroom.
The federal government had argued that Khalil’s habeas challenge should be denied in part because the Newark court cannot hear the case.
“Today we moved one step closer to vindicating Mr. Khalil’s rights by challenging his unlawful detention and the administration’s unconstitutional and retaliatory actions against him,” Amy Greer, one of Khalil’s attorneys, said in a statement on Tuesday.
The case could have consequences beyond Khalil’s status, since the State Department is using similar justification to attempt to deport other students and recent graduates who were outspoken supporters of the Palestinian cause.
Khalil, a lawful permanent resident, was detained on March 8 at his student apartment building in New York. He was taken to 26 Federal Plaza in lower Manhattan, then to an immigration detention facility in Elizabeth, New Jersey, before ending up in a Louisiana detention center, his attorneys said.
After his lawyers filed a petition for Khalil’s immediate release, a federal judge in New York last month moved the case to New Jersey.
Fabiarz rejected the federal government’s request to move the case to Louisiana earlier this month.
The following week, an immigration judge in Louisiana ruled that Khalil is removable after Secretary of State Marco Rubio invoked a section of the law that deemed him deportable because, the government claimed, his continued presence in the US would have an adverse consequence on foreign policy.
Khalil’s legal team said it has pending motions seeking his release so he can be with his wife, who recently gave birth to their first child.
“As I am now caring for our barely week-old son, it is even more urgent that we continue to speak out for Mahmoud’s freedom, and for the freedom of all people being unjustly targeted for advocating against Israel’s genocide in Gaza,” his wife, Noor Abdalla, said in a statement Tuesday. “I am relieved at the court’s finding that my husband can move forward with his case in federal court. This is an important step towards securing Mahmoud’s freedom. But there is still more work to be done.”
