Photo of Donald Trump

Interview with Forbes Magazine Editor Randall Lane and Chief Product Officer Lewis D'Vorkin

October 06, 2017

Lane: You've always talked about having fun as a key to business. Are you having fun?

The President: I am having fun. I'm enjoying it. We're accomplishing a lot. Your stock market is at an all-time high. Your jobs, your unemployment is at the lowest point in almost 17 years. We have fantastic numbers coming out. And I think we'll have, over the course of the next, fairly short period of time, and more importantly over a long period of time, we're going to have great numbers coming out of our country.

D'Vorkin: What's your personal thought?

The President: I enjoy success. And we're having tremendous success, as a country. We have some difficulties with respect to North Korea, the Middle East. I inherited-- and I've said it often--I inherited a mess. The country was having many different problems. Among them, the Middle East, ISIS, which we've done more with respect to ISIS in nine months than we've done in nine years. But we have really done, we have done, I would say eight months in eight years, to be specific. But we have done a really, really good job with the military. We're building up our military. We just had an over $700 billion budget, which will be approved. We're, you know, there's been few times where the military was more important than what it is right now. And, in addition to that, which is by far the overriding element, it's lots of jobs in the United States. So, what the country is doing, we're doing very well. And on an economic front, we're doing very well.

Lane: Now that we're almost a year from the big upset and the big win, do you think your business background prepared you for this job? And were you ready, now that you have a year in?

The President: Well, I think it helped. It's certainly a different kind of job than, really there is anywhere. Because you have so many skills necessary. But certainly the campaign was successful. What people don't realize is that I spent much less money than Hillary Clinton. So right there, perhaps that's business. You know, if you look at the numbers it's astronomically different.

Lane: Yeah.

The President: I don't think anybody's ever written that. You know, in the old days, if you spent less money and won, that was supposed to be a good thing. Today nobody talks about it. But I spent much less money and won. I think that's--so we start off there--I think that was good. I also think that, yes, being in--just last night I had dinner with all of our generals and admirals, at the highest level. You probably saw that.

Lane: Yeah, I saw the picture right here. Yeah.

The President: It was lovely. It was fantastic. But I talked about business. I said, "Your equipment is coming in too slowly and at too great a cost." And I actually got involved in negotiating, as an example, the F-35 fighter with Lockheed. You may call Marillyn [Hewson], the head of Lockheed, who you know, I think.

Lane: Mhmm.

The President: And she's a terrific person. But I developed a bidding system between Boeing and Lockheed. And I was able to reduce the price of the Lockheed by billions of dollars. By billions of dollars. And this took me, actually, a very small amount of time. And I read a story, and this when I was president-elect, had not come here yet. And I called the military. I said, "What's the problem?" We met with the generals. I then met with Lockheed. I then--the generals were unable to get anything off the price. And in fact, they wanted to raise the price and claim extras. And I met with Marillyn [Hewson], from Lockheed. I then went and had a very frank discussion with her. I then met with Boeing, and I said, "Well, we're going to come out with a competing plane." And then went back to her. And I went back and forth. And the end result is billions and billions of dollars have been taken off the cost of the plane.

Lane: Well, again, you're negotiating with them. You have obviously a lot of negotiation skills that you bring.

The President: And that's one thing. There are many, many things that I was too late into the game for the President Gerald Ford aircraft carrier. But it took too long to build, and it was way over budget. And you know, those things, we're being much more conscious as a country about things such as that.

D'Vorkin: So you've had pain points in business, obviously.

The President: Well, I don't know.

D'Vorkin: If you--

The President: Pain points?

D'Vorkin: In other words, obstacles that you have to overcome.

The President: Oh, sure. You always have obstacles.

D'Vorkin: So, if you take away the politics of being president, and what you're trying to do with the economy, what are the obstacles that you are finding that you necessarily didn't find in your business life?

The President: Well, you have Congress. That's a big obstacle in many cases. You have, in some cases, well-meaning people in Congress that truly feel strongly about something. And I understand that and actually don't mind that. And then of course you have grandstanders and others that want to try and make a point or want to do something that really isn't necessarily in the best interests of the country. And those people I fight. And what people don't know is that I've had just about the most legislation passed of any president, in a nine-month period, that's ever served. We had over 50 bills passed. I'm not talking about executive orders only, which are very important. I'm talking about bills. We've had a tremendous amount of legislation passed. Like VA accountability, which nobody could get passed. Meaning people are accountable now, because before you couldn't do anything if you caught people who worked there doing very bad things. But many, many bills have been passed. And now we're going for taxes. I will get health care. I'm one vote short of health care. I'll get health care. And I think block-granting it back to the states is going to be a great thing to do. I think it'll be great for the people. Smaller government, great for the people. They'll be able to handle it better. But we're one--

Lane: Are you talking about the Graham-Cassidy bill?

The President: Yeah, I like it very much. I do. I like it. It's block-granting. It's granting the money back to the states.

Lane: Right, right.

The President: And you have a smaller form of government that's going to be able to do--if they do a proper job--that will be able to do. There are certain states where they are very well run. And I could name them. I could name certain states where they really--they will do miracles with that money, in terms of health care. It'll be far better than it is. Because Obamacare has failed, badly. So I'm working on that now. But we actually, I would say, I either have the votes or I'm one vote short. And I believe we'll get health care done sometime prior to the election.

Lane: With Obamacare, until you come up with something different, don't you feel there's a lot of things going on with Obamacare right now, where, don't you feel you need, as CEO of America, an obligation to make it run as good as it can while it's still the law of the land?

The President: Well, that's an interesting, that's a very interesting question. It's a failed concept. It's thousands and thousands of pages. It's been amended by additional thousands of pages. It's a total mess. The premiums are going up, you know.

Lane: But while it's still the law, don't you think, you know, we're cutting back on advertising, we're shrinking the window of signing up, so--

The President: Well, we're actually, what we're doing is trying to keep it afloat, because it's failing. I mean the insurance companies are fleeing and have fled. They fled before I got here. But with that being said, no, Obamacare is Obama's fault. It's nobody else's fault. In fact, if you go back to--

Lane: Yes, but now it's your administration's responsibility.

The President: Yes. But I've always said Obamacare is Obama's fault. It's never going to be our fault. With that being said, I think the Democrats want to make a deal. At the same time, I think I have a deal with the Republicans. So I have the best of both worlds. That's business to a certain extent--

Lane: Right.

The President: --when you asked the business question. And as you have noticed, I'm very able to make deals with Democrats if I have to.

Lane: Who have you found so far are better deal-making partners, the Ryan-McConnell set or the Pelosi-Schumer set?

The President: Well, the Republicans have something called the filibuster rule. Which is a disaster. And if they don't get rid of that, it's always going to be very tough for them. You know what that is.

Lane: Yes, well, of course.

The President: The filibuster rule is--

Lane: It's a disaster when you're in the majority. It's a friend when you're in the minority.

The President: Well, you need eight Democrat votes every time. I mean, they literally need eight Democratic votes. And, they keep it for the sake of history. But history is that, in 1789, when it all began, what it actually, when they started voting, it was 1789, the first votes, that was a simple majority. And we should go back to a simple majority. If we had the filibuster rule, if we had the 60 votes for Justice Gorsuch, he would not be sitting on the bench right now because for the judges that has been taken off. And part of my plan is that the Democrats would take it off in two minutes. And the Republicans--

Lane: Well, they didn't when they had a majority.

The President: Well, they were going to. Well, they did it for the judge. Don't forget, 95 percent of that work was done before we got there. So I think the filibuster rule is very bad. At the same time, I think if we pass taxes, I think we'll have health care and taxes before. I believe we'll have a great infrastructure bill before, which is easiest of all of them. In fact, I think I'll have more Democrat votes for infrastructure than I will Republican votes. And I also have another bill that I think will be very--an economic development bill, which I think will be fantastic. Which nobody knows about. Which you are hearing about for the first time. But I'm going to do that. But before--

Lane: What is that? What does that mean?

The President: Economic development incentives for companies. Incentives for companies to be here. Incentives for companies to do things.

D'Vorkin: What kind of incentives?

The President: And it'll be a great bill. It's something I've had. I just don't want to do it before I do health care--

Lane: So business, like Carrier? Business incentives to create jobs, keep jobs?

The President: So that when companies leave our country, they get penalized severely. So that when companies stay in our country, they're incentivized. But there won't be any more companies, and it's really stuck. I hope you have seen--again, this is an interview where I am doing the talking, I guess--but I hope you've seen that companies are moving back into our country. You saw Toyota, five plants. Other companies, car companies are moving back into our country. They are expanding their plants.

Lane: So is it a carrot--

The President: We have a lot of--

Lane: So is it a carrot to get companies to stay and/or grow? Or is it a stick that you penalize?

The President: It's both. It's both. It's both a carrot and a stick. It is an incentive to stay. But it is perhaps even more so--if you leave, it's going to be very tough for you to think that you're going to be able to sell your product back into our country.

Lane: How comfortable are you, as a businessperson, having the government involved in a business decision about where a company wants to locate? And where a company wants to put jobs.

The President: Very comfortable, because there's no tax if you stay. There's no tax. We have to protect our companies. And if you looked at what's happened, they've been ravaged by the stupidity of politics and, frankly, the stupidity of politicians. They've been ravaged. And we have to protect our companies. We have to protect our workers. And the only way you're going to do that is you have to create rules. I mean, when you talk about, Randall, when you talk about fairness, do you think it's fair that some countries charge us 100% tariff, or tax, to sell a product in their country? And yet the same product coming out of that country coming into our country comes into our country for no tax. See, that makes it unfair for our companies. And what I want to do is reciprocal. See, I think the concept of reciprocal is a very nice concept. If somebody is charging us 50 percent, we should charge them 50 percent. Right now they charge us 50 percent, and we charge them nothing. That doesn't work with me.

Lane: You are also taking steps with the corporate tax rate. Which I think there's a lot of consensus on that.

The President: Yes.

Lane: In terms of the individual tax code, you campaigned on tax reform that does not increase the deficit. Are you sticking with that?

The President: Yes. This will not increase, this will lower the deficit, because I think we're going to take off like we have never taken off before. This is going to bring jobs back. This is going to bring $3 trillion dollars back.

Lane: The corporate tax cuts.

The President: Yeah, well, the offshore money.

Lane: Offshore money, right.

The President: That's part of it.

Lane: But in terms of individual tax-rate reform, without spending cuts, even with dynamic scoring, it's going to increase the deficit. So are you committing to then having offsetting--

The President: Yes.

Lane: --spending cuts?

The President: First of all, we're going to have some spending cuts, okay. We are going to really have some spending cuts. But I will tell you that most of what we are going to do is we're going to gain. Look at GDP. So GDP last quarter was 3.1%. Most of the folks that are in your business, and elsewhere, were saying that would not be hit for a long time. You know, Obama never hit the number.

Lane: He hit 3%. He hit three a couple quarters.

The President: He never hit it on a yearly basis. Never hit it on a yearly basis. That's eight years. I think we'll go substantially higher than that. And I think this quarter would have been phenomenal, except for the hurricanes. The hurricanes were very very--actually there was some really good things on the jobs report that just came out. You saw.

Lane: Yep, yep.

The President: The hurricanes had a huge impact on and, you know, as soon as I saw the first hurricane I said, "That's bad." Then I saw the second, the third, the fourth. But the hurricanes will have an impact of, could even be a point. I was saying a half a point, could even be a point. But that's somewhat artificial. Now, we're going to have some great success. What I'm saying, though, is that the tax cuts will spur business. Companies will stay in our country--they won't be leaving. Companies will be hiring people. They'll be expanding. They'll be building new plants, and that's what it's all about. It'll be a great spur, so through growth, our deficits will come down.

Lane: Last week you said twice, both on the South Lawn and in Indiana, that you won't personally benefit from this new tax reform. Do you still hold to that?

The President: Well, what I say is that the, this whole concept, everybody benefits if the country does well. We all do. You guys benefit. Everybody benefits if the country does well. We're the highest-taxed nation in the world--now some people like to say "developed nation," but I haven't found too many that are higher. We're the highest-taxed developed nation in the world, probably the highest-taxed nation in the world. It makes it very uncompetitive when you're paying 42 and 44%, if you start including state taxes and other things that many businesses have to, depending on what state they're in, and in China you're at 15% and in other countries you're at numbers far lower than that. So, we're bringing it to 20, I was thinking in terms of 15.

Lane: The corporate tax, the corporate tax rate.

The President: Actually. The corporate tax rate. I was actually saying 15 for the purpose of getting to 20.

Lane: Right.

The President: But it was a spread that I didn't like. You know I didn't want to be talking about, so we started at 20 with the understanding I'm not negotiating. I actually wanted the 15, so that, because as you know, this will be a negotiation--

Lane: Sure.

The President: --for the next 30 days.

Lane: But in terms--

The President: But I wanted the 15 in order to get to 20.

Lane: But in terms of the tax reform and what's on the table so far, there's a lot of people saying, "Oh, Trump's not as rich." You're worth many billions, we've looked at you for decades, and we all know that. The estate tax, the death tax ...

The President: Did you say Trump's not as rich? What?

Lane: No, other people are saying that. We say Trump's worth billions. You say you're worth more than we estimate, but the point is, if the estate tax in the current plan is going away, that's more than a billion dollars, even on our number, that benefits you. How do you square that and being able to sell that to the American people?

The President: Well, we're going to have to see what happens. We're going to have to see what happens. The estate tax is for many, many family companies where people are forced to sell their businesses. That includes farms. But it includes a lot of businesses, any business--not even small businesses only. Large businesses also, where the estate tax is so onerous that families are forced to sell and some cases have fire sales and not get proper pricing. And in many cases, those businesses don't do very well after the family leaves. So that's the primary reasoning behind the estate tax. But we'll be talking about estate tax. We'll be talking about all of it. You know, it will be a very serious set of negotiations going on over the next period of time. But the estate tax is really for those businesses, of which there are many, that are forced to go out of business or forced to sell for that reason.

Lane: Yes, but you could raise that threshold higher. I think the point that for someone like yourself, as president--the first businessman president--how do you push forward a bill that would, right now, as written, give you and your family more than a billion dollars' worth advantage just on that clause alone?

The President: Well, the big advantage that I would get is if the economy does well. That's a great thing for me--politically and otherwise. But the economy is a very--you know it's very interesting, Randall. I built a great business, but it doesn't mean anything to me. My children are running it. It doesn't mean anything to me anymore. I don't even think about it because this is so big, what I'm doing now, so big and so, so important because this country was going in the wrong direction. We were heading toward a really bad situation. And if you remember, when I got elected, the stock market dropped and then they heard my speech, and it dropped. And then it went up more than it dropped. It went down like 800 points, and then it went up a lot--whatever it was, much more than that. And then since then, it's gone--

Lane: Yeah, you're up 15, 20%.

The President: How much?

Lane: Up 20%, right?

The President: No, 25 since the election. You have to go since the election."

Lane: Depends which index, but yes.

The President: Since election day it's 25%. It has gone up since the Election Day $5.2 trillion--$5.2 trillion. If Hillary Clinton would have won, the markets would have gone down substantially. Instead of $5.2 trillion. It was interesting, I just saw the number today, $5.2 trillion. It was just announced that since election day, November 8, the markets have gone up $5.2 trillion dollars. They've gone up 25%. Because the Nasdaq was 26, et cetera, et cetera.

D'Vorkin: One of your sons, I believe it was Eric, told Forbes that he would give you quarterly reports on the your business, on your former business. Is that happening?

The President: I have not seen a report. You know, I have, I built, I think the thing that I--look obviously people know I've been very successful but I built a truly great company with truly great assets and very little debt, and I don't think that's been recognized to the extent it should. And I don't care about it so much anymore because this is--you know, I'm here.

Lane: But do you talk? Do you check in on how they're doing?

The President: You know what? He may be doing quarterly reports. I haven't seen any yet. I know he's, you know, he's doing a very good job because I know the kind of person he is. He's running it with Don. And they're doing a very good job, I would imagine. But it's very good stuff that they're running.

Lane: Again, between your business success and then this big tax bill, do you think the American public has a right to know how you will personally fare with this new--

The President: Yeah. Yeah, I think so.

Lane: And then to that--

The President: You see, you have to understand, if what I do is good for the middle class, that's also good for me, and then if I do what's good for the upper class, that's good for me. Don't forget--the companies that we're talking about--many people own some of these companies. And sometimes wealthy people own them, and sometimes poor people own them. But when we make life and business better for companies, that's a great thing for everybody, including me... . But people are dying to know if I have any benefit.

Lane: Right.

The President: And I ask them, and I tell them, most important, this is a jobs bill. This is a jobs tax cut and reform. It's a tax cut. It's a massive tax cut.

Lane: Right.

The President: Will be the biggest tax cut in the history of our country. It's a massive tax cut, and it's a reform. It's both.

Lane: So it's a massive tax cut, but then that runs against your pledge to not increase the deficit because you can't, you know.

The President: No, because, no, because a tax cut will spur growth.

Lane: Yes, that is true, and there is dynamic scoring

The President: The growth, the growth will be so much that it'll be--

Lane: Yes, but history has shown that you can't just cut. It does spur growth, but it won't pay for itself. History has shown that.

The President: Well, history has also shown the opposite. I mean, you've had it both ways. It has shown both ways.

Lane: Which time have you been able to cut and out of growth cut--

The President: Well, during Reagan, during Reagan, during his cuts, he--tremendous growth.

Lane: It spurred growth, but it also ballooned the deficit.

The President: My feeling is that we are losing so much business, and so many companies are leaving our country, and so many companies are doing so badly. Look at our steel industry. Look what's happening with our steel industry. Now I'm going to give them additional help, as you'll see later from economic development plans, because we're not going to let these industries be taken advantage of by the other countries. What has happened and what will be happening is not only will we have massive tax cuts and reform. Not only will we have the largest regulation cuts in the history of a presidency--there has never been a president who has cut regulations anywhere even close, and I'm not nearly finished. You know the ones I've done. And I'm actually doing one next week, which will be massive. But we've cut. Now, I believe in regulation, by the way, but it's got to be reasonable regulation. It can't take 21 years to build a highway--

Lane: Right.

The President: --to get approved.

Lane: Right."

The President: It can't take, to put up a structure someplace, 15 years before you find out that you're not allowed to build it. You know, that's what's been happening. You saw what I did with Keystone Pipeline, the Dakota Access Pipeline, approved within 24 hours--approved. In fact, the one is now built, and the other one's under construction. Forty-eight thousand jobs. Now we're going to have massive growth. We're going to have massive job production. We are going to, I think very, very importantly, help the companies because I'm going to be following this up with a bill that makes it more fair for our companies. One of the unfair, probably the--I won't even say the worst aspect, but one of the bad aspects--was taxes, but we have worse because some countries treat our companies so unfairly that it is almost impossible for them to compete. And we will be straightening that out in a different bill which will be coming, which I've never really discussed publicly very much, but which will be coming fairly soon after the tax cuts... . We have cut, we have cut regulations, or deregulation, but we have cut regulations more than any president ever in history, and it's not even close, and this is only nine months. And there's more coming. I don't know if you saw when I held up that highway chart a few months ago.

Lane: Yes.

The President: Where it took anywhere from 17 to 21 years. We have highways that have been under negotiation for decades. Roads, bridges--you know you can't build. Those days are over. We're trying to get it down to a maximum of 2 years, so that instead of 20 it'll be a maximum of 2. And, by the way, they may not get approved. But if they don't get approved, you're going to know fast. You're not going to be going 20 years and then find out you can't build.

D'Vorkin: So besides your own vision for the Trump Organization and the success that you provide, you've always said talent matters. Talent you bring in matters. How do you feel that you've done so far with managing the talent that you've brought in to your White House, to your administration?

The President: Well, I think you have different kinds of talent. I have some that is terrific, that is unknown to the public for the most part, that has been incredible.

Lane: Who have been your biggest successes?

The President: I've had a lot. I hate to point them out because then when I don't point somebody out they're disappointed. And then I have had some that I've been disappointed in. I've had some that I thought would be very good that I'm not as happy as I thought. But I've had some--

Lane: Examples?

The President: --I've had some disappointments. Excuse me?

Lane: Example?

The President: Well, I don't want to use examples now, but I've had some that I'm not, that I haven't been happy with and that frankly right now I'm not that thrilled with. I was disappointed. I thought they'd be better. And I've had some that turned out better than I thought.

Lane: What did surprise you about the ones that didn't turn out better? Was it--

The President: You never know when to fire. You can meet somebody, and you can see somebody sitting in front of you, and you can even look at their record to a certain extent. Don't forget one of your early questions is: How does this compare with the business? Well, it is a different set of skills. You need more skill for this. And you need more heart. You also need more heart. Because a lot of your decisions here are based on what's good for people, not just what's good for the budget or what's good for the pocketbook. But, so it is, there are tremendous skill sets from the world of business that are great. But you need additional skill. You also need political skill--

Lane: Where--

The President: And you need political instinct. People in business, many people in business have no political instinct, or you don't know if they do. But I've had people that I'm extremely pleased with, that I actually think have been better than I would have thought. And I've had some--I mean for the most part I got it right--but I've had some that I'm disappointed. I've had some that I'm still disappointed.

D'Vorkin: You're very public about that. Do you think that's a positive?

The President: Yeah, I think it's positive. I think people understand it. That's the way life is, sure.

Lane: Where are you today with Secretary Tillerson?

The President: He came out of a great company. A company that has been around a long time. I don't mind opposing views, but he and I have some opposing views. I think we have to be a much, much stronger in stance. And, ultimately, my view matters. That's the way life goes. But I have a very good relationship with him. And generally speaking, we get along very well.

Lane: There are reports out today over the last couple days about him calling you a moron privately. Has he talked, reached out to you about that? Do you believe that he said that?

The President: Well, we may have to, if he did that--which he says he didn't, by the way, he said he didn't. And they announced with the State Department that he didn't. I think it's fake news, but if he did that, I guess we'll have to compare IQ tests. And I can tell you who is going to win.

Lane: You have had a lot of turnover, you've had--

The President: But so does everyone else.

Lane: Yeah, you know we--

The President: Well, one of the biggest advantages that I have, that somebody like me has, is that I was not in politics, so I haven't gotten to know Washington for 30 years. I don't know everybody here. I've had to make new relationships. So that's--

Lane: So was that hiring mistakes or was it management mistakes in terms of--

The President: No, in some cases it wasn't a mistake. It might just be a different style. But overall I think I've got it right, and I think that there's always a lot of turnover, especially in the early years of a White House. But overall, I think I have a great group of people.

Hicks: I just, I know you have a speaking engagement soon so just one or two more [questions].

The President: What time is it, 12:30? That's all right. Feel free.

Hicks: Okay

Lane: Okay, thanks. A lot of your appointments--you say this, and it's true--it has taken you longer to get them through the Senate, but you've also made fewer --

The President: No, no, no, it's not taking me longer.

Lane: It's taking the Senate longer to confirm

The President: It's taking the obstructionist people.

Lane: Absolutely right. But you've also made many fewer appointments than other presidents at this stage. Is that an intentional--

The President: That's because I don't need as many people. And that has to do with business also. And I've said that loud and clear, but nobody wants to write it.

Lane: So is it that you're not going to make those appointments, ever?

The President: I'm generally not going to make a lot of the appointments that would normally be--because you don't need them. I mean, you look at some of these agencies, how massive they are, and it's totally unnecessary. They have hundreds of thousands of people. And you look at--so the appointments, I've made some great appointments. You take a look at the appointments we've made. But two things that nobody mentions that I think are very important: judges. I have many, many judges in the pipeline. Already we've had approved a number. Federal judges. I'm not just talking about Justice Gorsuch, Supreme Court, I'm talking about many federal judges. And I will have approximately 145 federal judges. I'm getting praised--right, I mean, are you disputing that? It's approximately 145. That doesn't include the court-of-appeals judges, which will be about 17. So we've had a tremendous amount of judges. Many are in the pipeline, and we're being praised for the quality of the people we're putting on the court system. That's a very big factor. In addition, so if you look already in nine months, numerous judges have already been approved. Many are in the pipeline. Others are now, as we speak, being chosen. And our system is working very, very well. We will have made a stamp on the court system the likes of which I don't think anybody has ever been able to do before, because we have so many.

D'Vorkin: Who do you call, who do you pick up the phone and call and say, "I need to talk. I have a question."

The President: Well, I have friendships, I have relationships. Largely the relationship is where I am--in other words, now it's very much of a Washington relationship. I deal with people here. It's a very fair question. I do like to call friends. I don't have much time, believe it or not. I am definitely a working president. I come in early. I start very early. Today I've already spoken to the head of France and the head of other countries. And you know, I mean, this is very much of a, in fact I have my actual working desk inside. This looks very nice, don't let that fool you. But more family, I think, than anything else. Plus I have some very good friendships in business. And I do like to get opinions. I am somebody that very much accepts opinions from people that I know understand what's going on in the world.

D'Vorkin: Is it at times lonely?

The President: It's a lonely position, because the decisions are so grave, so big. If it's a big--like, if you buy airplanes, it's tens of billions of dollars. It's not like you're buying a plane. It's hundreds of billions of dollars. But that's not--the decision I made on Syria, for example, going in and firing 59 rockets, missiles, into Syria. When I had to give the go-ahead for that, that's a very hard decision to make. You don't know. Every one of them hit their target with incredible technology--Tomahawks in that case, but incredible technology. And I was actually sitting with the president of China at the time, having dessert in Florida, at Mar-a-Lago. But you know those decisions are tough decisions. It's lonely. And you have to make them yourself. And the military is--we have the greatest military. And by the way, our military is getting so much stronger, so much better. And rapidly. But I will tell you, you make those decisions all by yourself.

D'Vorkin: Did business prepare you for that decision?

The President: No, nothing prepares you for that. Nothing prepares you for-- when you send missiles, that means people are going to die. And nothing really prepares you for that.

Lane: So where are you and North Korea right now, and what's the endgame? You spent your whole life negotiating, but you haven't left any room for negotiation. So where do we go?

The President: There's not that much room left. There's not that much room left. Look, this should have been taken care of by four or five previous administrations. It certainly should have been taken care of over the last eight years. And every year makes it a more difficult situation. And right now, I mean President Obama told me--sitting right there, the two of us. He said that the previous--in the meeting we had prior to my coming into the White House--he said that was his toughest decision. But I said, but you didn't make a decision, because you didn't do anything. You let it go on. I just, I feel strongly you cannot allow him to have nuclear weapons.

Lane: And you've kind of shut off, again with Secretary Tillerson. You've told him, stop wasting his time with diplomatic--

The President: He was wasting his time.

Lane: Let's hypothesize that there could be a good-cop, bad-cop scenario. How can somebody who is under you be taken seriously as any kind of cop if his boss has undermined his authority?

The President: Well, I'm not undermining. I think I'm actually strengthening authority. But in the case of North Korea, they have been talking for 25 years. Obviously, that doesn't work.

Lane: Similarly, you inherited a lot of deals. Iran, TPP, Paris ...

The President: TPP, I'm very proud of the fact that--

Lane: But don't you think, just the question--

The President: Yes.

Lane: Don't you have an obligation as CEO of America, even if you don't agree with these deals, to continue some of these deals--

The President: No.

Lane: Otherwise every administration is just undoing each other's deals.

The President: Well, TPP was not a signed deal. It would have been a disaster. It would have been a large-scale version of NAFTA, which is a disaster. I inherited the NAFTA. It's a disaster for this country.

Lane: A lot of business loves, thinks NAFTA has been great, so--

The President: No. You take a look at your car manufacturing plants, go down to Mexico.

Hicks: Just two more minutes, we're wrapping up.

The President: Five more minutes. If you take a look at your car manufacturing plants, Randall, NAFTA has been a disaster for manufacturing in this country. We have lost so much of our car business to Mexico. NAFTA is a disaster as a deal. Now we're renegotiating it. I happen to think that NAFTA will have to be terminated if we're going to make it good. Otherwise, I believe you can't negotiate a good deal. It's a terrible deal for our country. It's been a terrible deal. It was a mistake. TPP would have been a large-scale version of NAFTA. It would have been a disaster. It's a great honor to have--I consider that a great accomplishment, stopping that. And there are many people that agree with me. I like bilateral deals.

Lane: But we're in a multilateral--

The President: We would have gone into a hornet's nest. No, no, but you can have it this way and do much more business. And if it doesn't work out with a country, you give them a 30-day notice, and you either renegotiate or not. But TPP would have been a disaster for the country. Well, let's look at it differently. I also took things and made them happen that weren't going to happen, like the big pipeline deals. Those were deals that were not going to happen--48,000 jobs. Those were deals that were not going to happen that I made happen, and I made them happen immediately.

Lane: Is there a focus on deals versus policy? We're in a multilateral world--at least take something like the Marshall Plan or foreign aid. Are you still talking about cutting foreign aid even though a lot of people acknowledge that the Marshall Plan was actually great for America overall? As a single deal, it might not look great, but as a policy, it was incredibly effective.

The President: For me, it's America first. We've been doing that so long that we owe $20 trillion, okay? It's America first. We have to build up our country. I got elected. It's called Make America Great Again. We have debt. We have deals going. I mean, the deal we made, as an example, the trade deal we made with South Korea, is a terrible deal. We're renegotiating it. It's a terrible deal, and we're renegotiating that deal right now. At the same time, we're helping them militarily. But they have to treat us fairly, and other countries have to treat us fairly. As an example, we defend Saudi Arabia. I'm very good friends with many of the people in Saudi Arabia, including the king. I have great respect. Saudi Arabia is a very wealthy country. Why are we defending them, and not being properly taken care of economically? It doesn't make sense. Nobody ever thought of it. There are many countries that are extremely wealthy that we defend. Why are we defending them, and spending money to defend them, and they're not reimbursing us properly and fully? And I'm doing that. At the same time, we will have better relationships than we have right now. You know, I have very good relationships with the leaders of countries.

Lane: In terms of Russia, the Department of Homeland Security reached out to 21 states and confirmed that Russia was meddling with their elections. Do you think Russia meddled in the U.S. election in 2016?

The President: Well, they just announced that there was no vote change, number one.

Lane: I don't think the question has ever been messing with the total tally. Really it's been influence.

The President: They just said there was no change in vote. They just said that. They also just said that there has been absolutely no collusion. They just said that. Yesterday. Two days ago. Senate. There has been no collusion. I didn't speak to Russians. Everyone knows that that was just a statement put out by the Democrats so that they could have an excuse for losing an election that in theory they should have won because it's very easy for the Democrats to win the electoral college. And not only didn't they win, it was 306 to--what was it?--223, if you could get the right number. It was 306 to 223. That was an excuse for the Democrats not winning the election. [Ed. Note: Clinton received 232 electoral votes.]

Lane: But now that you're in this seat, does it bother you that the Russians tried to meddle with the election?

The President: It would bother me greatly if that's the case. It would bother me greatly. And I look forward to seeing what the final reports are. And hopefully they'll come out soon, so if there are suggestions, we can do those suggestions prior to the '18 election. But it has been taking so long, all of the various studies and reports, but I would like to see what everybody comes up with, so that we can, if there's something to do with respect to the '18 elections, which are right around the corner, we'll have time to do it. Don't forget, we have those elections now in about a year. There's not that much time. So I would like to see that, because I don't want Russia messing with our elections, nor do I want anybody or any other country messing with our elections, that's for sure.

Hicks: I'm so sorry, we do have to wrap up. If you have one closing question to just kind of tie everything together.

D'Vorkin: So Las Vegas, hurricanes--nothing like that happened in your business of that magnitude. What were you able to bring from your former business career that helped you deal with that kind of thing?

The President: Well, I've gotten very high marks for the hurricanes. And I think I really feel that the reason is because of what I've done, to a certain extent, in business. We mobilized. I put some excellent people in charge of FEMA. We have some excellent people that I worked with. We had fast mobilization. We had mobilization before the hurricanes even hit, which other people didn't do. You probably noticed that in terms of signing emergency orders, they were signed immediately as opposed to waiting for long, long periods of time, and then, by that time, it was too late. And you had catastrophes that had lasting damage. I think, yeah, I think that there is a natural business instinct for that. And we worked closely with the governors, and we've had some really great governors to work with. Governor of Texas. The governor of Florida. We have really had some, I think, great relationships, but the mobilization went very, very well. And you look at what's going on in Texas. They're rebuilding. They're going to be back very soon. Florida is going to be back, way ahead of schedule. I've done a very good job in Puerto Rico--haven't been given the same kind of credit, but if you speak to the governor of Puerto Rico and other representatives, you'll see that they were thrilled. Virgin Islands, U.S. Virgin Islands--people don't even talk about it, but the governor of the Virgin Islands, Governor Mapp, gave us an A+. He said the job we've done has been incredible. He said that yesterday, very officially. Governor Mapp. Kenneth Mapp, terrific guy. But yeah, we've gotten very high marks for that. Then we had the tragedy in Las Vegas, which is a whole different thing. That was a very, very sad occurrence. I was there. I was in the hospitals. I met some incredible people, though horribly wounded. They were horribly wounded. But it, in one sense, taught me how great our country is, the fact that they can get back on their feet so quickly

D'Vorkin: Thank you.

The President: Yeah. We have some great--the people of this country are just great. I mean, more than anything else, all of the hurricanes, the Las Vegas tragedy, it teaches me how great the people of our country are.

Lane: Do you support these initiatives about the bump stock?

The President: Oh, we're going to look at that very closely. This has just come up. And we're going to take a look at that very closely.

Lane: Last question, related to what Lewis just said, you've pretty much never had a boss. In some ways, now you do have a boss--the American people. How has this changed?

The President: I have about 330 million bosses.

Lane: Right. So how has this changed how you operate as an executive?

The President: It doesn't change, because all I want to do is the right thing. You'll see that I'll make decisions that aren't politically popular, but they're the right thing to do. So I do have all 330 million bosses, but it doesn't matter, because I'm going to do the right thing. I think that's another thing that maybe you'll do more as a businessperson than you would as a politician. A politician is going to do the politically correct thing. I'm going to do the right thing for the country.

Hicks: Thanks guys.

D'Vorkin: Thank you.

The President: Thank you very much.

Lane: Thanks. Thank you, Mr. President. Appreciate it.

Donald J. Trump, Interview with Forbes Magazine Editor Randall Lane and Chief Product Officer Lewis D'Vorkin Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/332169

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