Full Transcript Of Trumps Oval Office Interview With The Daily Caller

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump sat for an exclusive Oval Office interview Wednesday with The Daily Callers Saagar Enjeti and Benny Johnson for approximately 31 minutes.

The transcript is as follows:

THE DAILY CALLER: Lets get the news of the day out at the top. Theres all of these things that are being discussed about the chief of staff [John Kelly], about Kirstjen Nielsen. Why are you disappointed in the DHS secretary and is John Kelly going to be staying in his job right now?

POTUS: So, you know, always in an administration after the midterms you make changes, so, Im looking at things and Ive got a lot of options. A lot of people want to come in. A lot of politicians that have had very successful careers that are very good want to come in. So Im looking at things — havent made a decision yet. I will be making a decision on Homeland shortly.

But I have not made decisions yet. But I will be making changes on various things. Overall, I have a very good cabinet. I think our cabinets great.

You know, youre talking about a few names, youre not talking about many.

Uh, weve been doing incredibly on trade deals and trade with my whole staff of traders, because thats what they are. What weve done on trade deals is incredible — with Mexico, with Canada, with South Korea — taking deals that were horrible and making great deals. And now were in the midst of China and others.

But we have a great cabinet, we have — well see, uh there will be some changes made before the end of the year.

THE DAILY CALLER: Sure. Could you tell us where your thinking is currently on the attorney general position? I know youre happy with Matthew Whitaker, do you have any names? Chris Christie —

POTUS: Matthew Whitaker is a very respected man. Hes — and hes, very importantly, hes respected within DOJ. I heard he got a very good decision, I havent seen it. Kellyanne, did I hear that?

WHITE HOUSE ADVISER KELLYANNE CONWAY: 20 pages.

POTUS: A 20 page?

THE DAILY CALLER: It just came out right before this, sir.

POTUS: Well, I heard it was a very strong opinion. Uh, which is good. But [Whitaker] is just somebody whos very respected.

I knew him only as he pertained, you know, as he was with Jeff Sessions. And, um, you know, look, as far as Im concerned this is an investigation that should have never been brought. It should have never been had.

Its something that should have never been brought. Its an illegal investigation. And you know, its very interesting because when you talk about not Senate confirmed, well, Muellers not Senate confirmed.

THE DAILY CALLER: Right.

POTUS: Hes heading this whole big thing, hes not Senate confirmed.

So anyway, I have a lot of respect for Matt Whitaker, based primarily on reputation. And I think hes really — I think a lot of people are starting to come out very much in favor of him during this period of time.

THE DAILY CALLER: What about who will eventually replace him, sir?

POTUS: Well, Im looking at a lot of people. I have been called by so many people wanting that job. We have some great people. In the meantime, I think Matts going to do a fantastic job.

THE DAILY CALLER: Banning Jim Acosta. Taking his White House credentials. His hard pass. Is this going to be something that happens with repeated nature inside of the White House? Who you feel are disrespecting the White House, sir.

POTUS: Your world has changed quite a bit and you have grandstanders much more than you did before. Its just a grandstanding. Its just an average guy whos a grandstander. And hes got the guts to stand up and, you know, and shout.

Its primarily led by CNN because they pay him to do that. You know, CNN is low on the ratings now, relative to Fox and others, and theyre doing very poorly actually. But because of me — the age of Trump — because of me, theyre doing better than theyve done but theyre doing very poorly in compared to others. Very very poorly. And, um, and getting worse.

Theyve lost a tremendous amount of credibility and, you know, Jim Acostas just somebody that gets up and grandstands. He doesnt even know what hes asking half of the time. So, well see how the court case goes. Its today.

THE DAILY CALLER: Are you confident that youre going to win the court case?

POTUS: I dont know, I think that we should. Certainly, you shouldnt be able to go up into a White House and, on principle, its very disrespectful to the rest of the press. You were actually getting up to do a question.

THE DAILY CALLER: Thats right, sir.

POTUS:— And this guys screaming. And I kept saying to you, come on, you didnt give me much help. I kept saying, give me the question already. But, you know, he just screamed and, you know, you knew it because youre standing, you didnt know what to do and I understand that.

He was very rude to the young lady. I wont, I wont even — who knows. Who knows. Certainly, he didnt act very respectful to the press. Hes actually more disrespectful, I think, to the rest of the media. Because he gets up and grandstands and says he wants to ask three or four questions and everyone else is, you know, youre trying to get one question in and the room was packed with a couple of hundred people that want to ask questions.

So, I think hes very disrespectful to the media, I think hes very disrespectful to the office, and I think hes bad for the public. You know, when I say that the fake news is the enemy of the people, it really is. A lot of the animosity that we have in our country is because of fake news. Theyre so angry at the news. They get it. You guys are at my rallies all the time, you see the anger when I mention the words fake news and they turn around. And they use CNN because they— it just sort of works for them I guess.

But its ABC, its — NBC is maybe worse than anybody. I mean, NBCs a total fraud as far as Im concerned. Their news is disgusting. But I think NBC is as bad as anybody. You look at — and CBS — you look at whats going on with the fake news and the people get it.

Now they get it, and you know they had a very high approval rating before I became president and I think its actually a great achievement of mine. Their approval rating now is down as low as just about anybody. And much lower than your president. I actually have good approval ratings, which nobody ever writes. I was at 51, I guess, with Rasmussen the other day.

So I will say that I really think when you have guys like Acosta, I think theyre really bad for the country. Because they show how fake it all is. And its a grandstander and well see how the court rules, and then they talk, Oh, freedom of the press. But can you really have — is it freedom of the press? Its actually the opposite. Is it freedom of the press when somebody comes in and starts screaming questions and wont sit down after having answered a couple of them? And then wont sit down and then I cant ask you guys because hes standing — I dont think thats freedom of the press, I actually think thats the opposite.

THE DAILY CALLER: Which is an important follow-up question, why this administration? This doesnt seem to be the norm, it certainly wasnt the norm in previous administrations, that reporters behave in this capacity.

POTUS: Well, I think they behaved badly. I remember Sam Donaldson was terrible at two presidents, and, you know, we tend to forget. I think that now its become, with cable television, playing such a role, although, you know, cable television was supposed to be a dying medium. And because of me its now hotter than its ever been. But someday I wont be here and it will die like youve never seen. And so will The New York Times — will die — and every one of them will just be dead.

I mean, look, I remember picking up before I announced for president, I picked up The New York Times and I said to somebody, Boy, this paper is dead, look at it. The paper was dead. It was like a leaflet that you hand out at the supermarket and now its a vibrant paper.

But you look at the stories, many of the stories on the front page are about me. You know, all my life I told this story, had stories on the front page. A few, not a big deal. Which wasnt bad, you know, maybe seven, but, you know, a few. And, you know, now if I have a few each day Its surprisingly low.

But it has made a big difference.

THE DAILY CALLER: Sir, I do want to turn to policy.

POTUS: Thats why I always joke when I say theyll all be endorsing me. Cause I dont know what happens to their business after Im gone.

THE DAILY CALLER: Sir, right now, in 2010 we saw several pieces of major legislation passed in a lame duck Congress. What can we expect your and the Republican agenda to be in this Congress? Is it going to be an immigration fix? What about criminal justice reform? What are the two to three things youre looking at?

POTUS: Were working on many things. Criminal justice reform were working on very hard. We have a meeting today, did you know about that? We have a meeting today.

THE DAILY CALLER: We heard about that.

POTUS: Get these two in, alright? I think we have a chance at that. We should be able to fix health care. We should be able —

THE DAILY CALLER: Just one second, sir, on that criminal justice bill. Is that the Jared Kushner-backed bill that you want to focus on?

POTUS: The answer is Im looking at it very closely, okay? I am. Its a good thing. You know, Texas is backing it, if you look at Mississippi, and Georgia and a lot of other places they believe in it, those governors, and theyre conservative people. Rick Perrys a big fan.

You know, a lot of people are backing it. Look at the people that are backing it. Even, you know, like Mike Lee, he votes against a lot of things and we respect Mike and Mike is backing it. We have a lot of people that are backing this.

THE DAILY CALLER: What about immigration, sir? Are you willing to shut down the government if you dont get a certain set of policies?

POTUS: I may be. I may be. Ill have to see how it plays out. But I may very well be willing to shut down the government.

I think its horrible whats happening and, you know, building the wall, its in smaller stages, we can build it very quickly. Im building the wall in smaller stages and we moved the military there, we put up barbed wire, we did all sorts of things. You have to have a barrier. You have to have a barrier.

Look, we have a chance of, they can do presidential harassment, put very simply, and Ill be very good at handling that and I think Ill be better than anybody in the history of this office. And in a certain way I look forward to it because I actually think its good for me politically, because everyone knows its pure harassment. Just like the witch hunt, the Mueller witch hunt. Its pure harassment. Its horrible. Its horrible that theyre allowed to get away with it.

Again, not Senate confirmed but, you know. You have 17 people, half of them worked for Hillary Clinton, some on the Foundation. The Hillary Clinton Foundation. I mean, you think of it.

So, I think well do very well if they want to play the presidential harassment game. If they play the presidential harassment game I dont think anythings going to be done cause why would I do that, okay? If they want to get things done I think it will be fantastic, I think we can get a lot done.

I think we can almost get more done because theyre gonna want to prove something too. So if they wanna do health care, we can do health care. There a very good fixes to health care that could solve a lot of problems. Weve really, you know, terminated a lot of the Obamacare, as it was referred to. But we could do a new health care bill that would be fantastic that could take everybodys — that could incorporate good pieces of everybodys good ideas.

So theres a chance at that, theres a great chance at comprehensive immigration reform. If they wanna do it, they wanna do it, they wanna do it right. And theres a good chance at doing things that maybe you couldnt do.

Dont forget, I didnt really have a majority. I had one Senator. And I had a few Republicans in the House. You know, a very small number. Um, and now the pressures on them because theyve gotta come to me with things.

Hey, the beauty is, and Ive said this, you heard me at the news conference, I dont know if you agree with me — lets say I won with two Republicans or three. Id have to make deals with Republicans. Id have guys coming to me, you know, out of that group therell be people. Lets not say theyre good or bad but theyll be, well I dont want to do this. Well, Im gonna have three or more. I mean, literally, unless I had like a 25 majority, you know, something substantial, they would come to me and they would say, well, I dont like it. You wouldnt even be able to get something through there. It would be too close.

Where I am now, when they have a small majority, I can sit back and say, hey. And the beauty is when it gets passed, when we pass things, well get it passed in the Senate, which now we cant because we need ten Democrat votes. Because well have Democrats and Ill be able to get enough Republicans to pass.

But the beauty is, the beauty is, we actually have something that can work much better than it worked before because before it was politically very difficult for a lot of people.

THE DAILY CALLER: While were on the subject of Congress, I do want to get — does Kevin McCarthy have your full endorsement in the speakers race?

POTUS: Well, I didnt endorse because I stay out of it, but I like Kevin a lot and I like Jim [Jordan] a lot. I like both of em.

THE DAILY CALLER: How would you like them to work it out?

POTUS: Who else is running, nobody, right?

THE DAILY CALLER: Thats all there is right now.

POTUS: Well, I like both of em a lot. I think Jim is a fantastic guy and I think Kevins a fantastic guy. Theyre very different but Kevin is a very political person, which is good, hes a very honorable guy, and I think hes gonna do great, and it looks like, you know, hell probably get it.

THE DAILY CALLER: Would you like to see Jim on the ranking member on Judiciary?

POTUS: I would like to see Jim in a high position cause he deserves it. Hes fantastic but I havent gotten into the endorsement or not. I just like both of em. Too much. Too much to get very much involved. Its something I shouldnt be involved in. But Jim is a fantastic guy and Kevin is a fantastic guy and theyre very different and they complement each other.

THE DAILY CALLER: Broward County election commissioner Brenda Snipes is in violation of Florida law. Shes in violation of Florida reporting laws, shes in violation of a judges order. Shes also reportedly mixed in illegal ballots with legal ballots and asked for them to be counted. Is she behaving criminally and should she be removed?

POTUS: Look, you know, the bottom line — its, shes a disaster. You look at her past, shes a disaster. Even with me. I won Florida and, you remember? That area, Broward, didnt come in. It didnt come in. I think Palm Beach was like — they wouldnt call Florida, I won. Then it got to a point where I won by enough that all the votes of the people that lived there would, you know, in other words — you can only put in so many votes, although she may change that system.

You can only put in a number of people that are registered voters or live there. Now theyre, I guess they were trying to take illegal voters but these are — Ive been saying, this is a problem all over the country by the way. This is what Ive been saying.

This is a problem in California thats so bad of illegals voting. This is a California problem and if you notice, almost every race — I was watching today — out of like 11 races that are in question theyre gonna win all of them.

The Republicans dont win and thats because of potentially illegal votes, which is what Ive been saying for a long time. I have no doubt about it. And Ive seen it, Ive had friends talk about it when people get in line that have absolutely no right to vote and they go around in circles. Sometimes they go to their car, put on a different hat, put on a different shirt, come in and vote again. Nobody takes anything. Its really a disgrace whats going on.

The disgrace is that, voter ID. If you buy, you know, a box of cereal, if you do anything, you have a voter ID.

Well, over here, the only thing you dont is if youre a voter of the United States. A voter in the United States of America. I think its a disgrace whats going on. Really a disgrace. And they try to shame everybody by calling them racist or calling them something, anything they can think of, when you say you want voter ID. But voter ID is a very important thing.

If you look at what happened in New Hampshire, where thousands of people came up and voted from a very liberal part of Massachusetts and they came up in buses and they voted. I said, whats going on over here, my people said, you won New Hampshire easily except they have tremendous numbers of buses coming up. Theyre pouring up by the hundreds, buses of people getting out, voting. Then theyre supposed to go back within 90 days. And of the people that are supposed to go back, almost none of them do. In other words, they go back after the vote is over. They go back — and I think its like three percent — I mean, almost nobody goes back to show that, you know, that they were allowed to vote. And so what do you do? Recall the election. Recall the election. I mean, there, you should be able to recall the election.

THE DAILY CALLER: You think they should call Florida right now, sir?

POTUS: Uh, I think they shouldve called Florida election evening. Well, many votes were added to that, and, you know whats going on. And now they have mixed them up. You said it better than I did. They mixed the votes up and now you cant find the ones that were put in, they just put em into a batch.

When they call this woman incompetent, theyre wrong. Shes very competent but in a bad way.

THE DAILY CALLER: Should she be removed from office?

POTUS: Oh, she should have been removed — I think she should have been removed in the middle of this mix-up.

THE DAILY CALLER: How do you prevent this in 2020? From happening when you run for reelection?

POTUS: First thing you do is fire her and her cronies. You get em out of — you get em out. And it should have been done, I mean, if theres anything really that I would be — because, again, in the 2016 election, you guys remember, remember how long it took to get Florida?

THE DAILY CALLER: It took a long time.

POTUS: Had I not been winning Florida by more than they could — I mean, you cant produce — if you have a million people, you cant give 1,200,000 votes, okay? So actually, what happened is they went with fairly accurate numbers because whether I won by ten votes or by half a million votes it didnt matter.

But I had, fortunately, enough votes, and they were sitting there waiting. They said, Broward County is not reporting. This went on for hours.

WHITE HOUSE ADVISER KELLYANNE CONWAY: The panhandle came in an hour later.

POTUS: Well, the panhandle was so devastating to Crooked Hillary, that, frankly, it didnt make any difference, okay? Because the panhandle was so — it was like 98 percent. That thing came in, then all of a sudden Broward came in. And I won by, you know, I won by a lot of votes. I call it four Yankee stadiums.

THE DAILY CALLER: Sir, as a resident of both D.C. and New York City, what do you think about Amazons relocation and the decision of both Virginia and New York to give billions of subsidies to Amazon. Do you support that?

POTUS: I think theyre paying a very big price. I think that it was a competition. I know all about those competitions, Ive been in those competitions, you know, and its a lot of people, a lot of cities who are competing for it. They took the best deals.

THE DAILY CALLER: So you support the cities giving them tax breaks?

POTUS: Well, I think theyre giving up a lot. Theyre very expensive deals, only time will tell, maybe Amazon will have massive competition and they wont be the same company in five years, in which case it will be a big mistake.

You know, Amazon could have — I see Walmart is doing very well and others are building sites. I think thats going to be a very competitive business someday, Amazon. And Im not sure that size necessarily helps when you get —

THE DAILY CALLER: Do you still think theyre cheating the U.S. postal system?

POTUS: Oh, I think theyre getting the bargain of the century. I think that Amazons getting — and thats why Ive asked for a review of that. And others too, you know, not just Amazon. There are classes of companies that are getting the bargain and I think that — I may be wrong about this, youll check — but I think the contract they signed with Amazon was a closed contract. You cant even see it. It was a sealed contract.

No, I think Amazon has the bargain of the century with the U.S. Post Office, which is losing a fortune.

THE DAILY CALLER: Tucker Carlson had his house attacked, he had a mob outside of his house while his wife was home. They cracked the door — what is this violence? Where does it come from? Do you have a message for Tucker and his family?

POTUS: I do, I spoke to Tucker and I think Tuckers a great guy and I think its terrible, they were actually trying to break down the door.

THE DAILY CALLER: How do you think the police should handle Antifa, generally?

POTUS: These people, like the Antifa youre talking about, the Antifa — they better hope that the opposition to Antifa decides not to mobilize. Because if they do, theyre much tougher. Much stronger. Potentially much more violent. And Antifas going to be in big trouble. But so far they havent done that, and thats a good thing.

But they better hope that the other side doesnt mobilize, you understand what Im saying. Because if you look, the other side is the military, its the police, its a lot of very strong, a lot of very tough people. Tougher than them. And smarter than them. And theyre sitting back and watching and theyre getting angrier and angrier.

THE DAILY CALLER: Whats your takeaway from the 2018 election and what do you think that means for the 2020 election for you?

POTUS: I think I did very well. Because if you look at — Obama was 60-something odd House seats and lost seven Senate seats. So we picked up three or four Senate seats depending on how it all goes — its a big pickup. In fact, they say in 80 years I think the presidential partys only picked up two Senate seats, I picked up three. I mean, assuming they dont do any further shenanigans in Florida.

Almost picked up Tester. Almost picked up, you know, if you look — and that was somebody that wasnt even in play. And that was another one at the very last moment, all of a sudden, that was over. Almost picked up Arizona and that was another one I question, I have to question that more strongly than our candidate, a wonderful person. But she didnt question strongly so Im not going to but I think that was very odd the way that all happened in Arizona. But we picked up — I mean, it looked like we picked up five. But probably three. Its a lot.

I think this — if I didnt go around, and you were there, you saw the crowd — in the history of politics, and I say this proudly, I wasnt even running. In the history of politics nobodys ever gotten crowds like that or close because you were in those stadiums and those arenas, but outside you had many more times — you know, in Houston we had 109,000 people sign up for 22,000 seats. We actually took ads saying, please dont come and that helped Ted Cruz a lot.

So if you look at Ted Cruz, and you look at some of the people that won, they wouldnt have won without my helping them. And then you look at the new Senators, you look at Indiana, Donnelly was not going to happen. Nobody said Donnelly was going to lose. Nobody said — even look at a case of a congressman. I couldnt help that many congressmen because I dont have that much time. The only congressman I went for was Andy Barr and that was in Kentucky, Mitch was there but he wasnt running, and Rand Paul was there. Good guy, Rand Paul, by the way. And he was there, and the only congressman — I specifically went, there was no senator running in Kentucky, it was Andy Barr, and he won nicely. And he was down ten and he won his race.

Every place I went, look at Georgia, Im assuming he wins. Thats another one now theyre trying to play around with the votes. Honestly, its a disgrace whats going on. Oprah went, Obama went, and Michelle Obama went. They went and they spent a lot of time and I went and did a rally and the real number was probably 55,000 people, cause, you know, were you there in Georgia?

THE DAILY CALLER: Not Georgia, sir.

POTUS: Because we had a hangar, another hangar with like 18,000 at the top of the hangar. These are massive, like 747 hangars. It went way back and he won. And everybody said he wasnt going to win. But they had Obama, Mrs. Obama, and Oprah. Oprah spent three days there and every place we won or came real close with areas, like, as an example, Tester.

Tester, nobody wanted even to contest it. Well, look at what happened in North Dakota with Heidi. Heidi, they said dont contest. One year ago when we were looking they all said dont contest Heidi, she cant be beat. She lost by a lot. I went there three or four times.

I mean, the truth is, every place I went, we either won or did well or did really well. If I didnt go, if I didnt do those stops — I did 31 stops in 30 days or something like that. If I didnt do those stops, I think we wouldve lost ten Senate seats, seven to ten Senate seats, and we wouldve lost 60 to 70 House seats or more.

By doing the stops, then again a lot of times Id have the congressmen in the room, so they wouldnt be the prime focus but Id get up and Id be able to talk about them for a couple of minutes apiece, right? If I didnt do the stops — and Ive been thanked by a lot of Republicans — if I didnt do those stops we would definitely not have control of the Senate, it would be a question, so what are we up, three? Two or three. We would be down five or six or seven. And they know that. Nobody has ever had a greater impact.

Well, Ill give you another, in Georgia. He was ten points down when I endorsed him, he ended up winning by 40 points in the primary. Hes now in, but he was ten points down. It was 70 to 30, something like that, 70-30 or 70-40, maybe 70-40. But it was an easy win.

Take DeSantis. Ron DeSantis was a three, had no money. He was running against in the Republican primary, who was at 31 and he had $21 million cash in the bank. The Department of Agriculture, right? Nice guy, too. But I didnt know him so I dont feel guilty. I endorsed DeSantis. I endorsed DeSantis and he won by 20 points. Okay, it wasnt even a race. And his opponent, who I spoke to afterward because he is a nice guy, he said, Ive never seen anything like it. He said, you endorsed him, the race was over.

Theres never been an impact — I dont say it braggingly. I mean, its hard for me to say it because Id rather have them say it but they dont say it very well. No, theres never been a story, nobody ever writes it.

But you take a look at the races that I was involved in, I had a massive impact. Then they said, well, DeSantis is not gonna make it in Florida, hes never gonna get elected. So I went down and made a speech, he got elected, he won. Now theyre trying to take votes away from him, its a disgrace whats going on, but it looks like hes gonna be good and hopefully, Rick [Scott] is gonna be good. Maybe the machines are bad, now the machines are all smokey, theyre all — its crazy. Honestly, its a disgrace.

Georgia, what theyre doing is a disgrace, and Florida, what theyre doing to the two people — no, to the three. Look at what theyre doing, how about the agriculture guy. He was leading all night long and then he ends up losing by 5,000 votes because nobody was watching that one. Thats a very important position in Florida, right? Pretty impressive if I do say so myself.

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The daily caller

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