Photo of Donald Trump

Interview with Sean Hannity of Fox News

October 08, 2020

HANNITY: … [inaudible] radio host. Thank you, Mark. Joining us now live from the White House, President Donald Trump. Mr. President, thank you for being with us. First, an obvious question, how are you feeling? How's the First Lady feeling? And I want to get into your comments that you would make Regeneron and therapeutics free for the American people. But first, how are you doing?

THE PRESIDENT: Really good, and First Lady is doing really good. I thought Mark was fantastic, and I love your show.

HANNITY: Okay, I'll take it. Have you been tested since? Your campaign and your doctor, Sean Conley put out that you'll be medically safe and cleared for safe return to public engagements by Saturday, five full days. Have you been tested recently?

THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, I just saw the doctors today. They think I'm in great shape. I'm in great shape. I know I'm in good shape [crosstalk].

HANNITY: Did you test negative?

THE PRESIDENT: And I'll tell you, I took this Regeneron. It's phenomenal. Eli Lilly has something very comparable. It's phenomenal. It's a whole new day. It's all… If you go back a few months, nobody ever even thought about this stuff. We came up with it, and I'm going to have it delivered to every hospital we have sick people with the COVID, or the China Virus as we call it, and we're going to make people better. It actually made me better. I went in, I could have left a day later.

I'm telling you Sean, it was incredible. So, that's Regeneron. But again, Eli Lilly has something similar. The kind of things we're coming up with now are incredible. Remdesivir, but that's a little bit different, works much differently actually. But these things are absolutely incredible. I think I'm going to try doing a rally on Saturday night if we have enough time to put it together. But we want to do a rally probably in Florida on Saturday night. I might come back and do one in Pennsylvania the following night. It's incredible what's going on, because I feel so good.

HANNITY: Have you had a test since your diagnosis a week ago?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, what we're doing is probably the test will be tomorrow, the actual test, because there's no reason to test all the time. But they found very little the infection or virus, if any. I don't know that they found any. I didn't go into it greatly with the doctors. We have these great doctors at Walter Reed, and you do rely on them. They're really fantastic talents, and they came in from Johns Hopkins also and other places. Yeah. When you're president, there are so many doctors looking over me. I think I'm the most analyzed human being in the world right now. But we have… They had people at not only Walter Reed which is incredible with the job they do, but also Johns Hopkins and other hospitals. I think they're amazed at how quickly this went frankly.

HANNITY: Let me ask you, the Debate Commission said earlier tonight that their decision is not going to be reversed even if you get a full, healthy go ahead from all of your doctors and follow the CDC guidelines. How do they get to unilaterally decide that without consulting with you or former Vice President Biden's campaign even?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I didn't even want to use them. Last time, I had a big problem. They isolated my mikes when I had one debate… We had three debates with Hillary. Or I think the first debate, they… Excuse me. On the first debate, they asked isolated the mike and they isolated it very, very seriously, and they actually apologized to me. And I said… "What's this all about?" They were Clinton people. And I said, "We ought to just do the debates ourselves, John. We ought to just do it ourselves." I pick… I'm the president, so we won't to have debates. I'd rather just do it ourselves. Pick some good anchor. So I ended up with Chris Wallace who's essentially… Look, his father did me once or twice. Twice, I guess. Those 60 minutes, he was great, Mike. Chris is not Mike that I can tell you. He's not even close, but Chris was terrible. He was protecting Biden the whole night. I asked Biden about, "Why did he get all of that money from the Mayor of Russia, from the wife of the Mayor of Russia?" Then Chris wouldn't let that be answered.

When I said, "What did you do with a billion dollars? You're not getting a billion dollars to Ukraine unless you get rid of the prosecutor." Chris wouldn't let that. He protected him. The guy was choking like a dog. He couldn't answer the questions and he was choking like a dog. And Chris kept staying, and so now we have another one. I didn't know this, but the other one is from C-SPAN and he's never-Trumper, and I think somebody said he worked for Biden at one point. These are the people we get.

That's okay, because I've had some bad ones over the years, and I've got an unblemished record I think in the debating world according to the polls. If you look at [inaudible] 15 debates last time, and they say I won them all against very talented people in some cases. But I will say this, that it's a very sad thing. Now you have this Debate Commission. It's a joke. The commission's a joke. Take a look at the letter they wrote me four years ago when they apologized. They were oscillating my mike. They were turning it up and down when I was speaking to Hillary, crooked Hillary who turns out to be very crooked.

Look at all the stuff we found out on Obama and Biden and her. So we'll see what happens. But no, I'm not interested in doing a virtual. I'm not Joe Biden. I'm not going to do a virtual debate, sit behind a computer screen. That gives them the answers, because there'll be handing him the answers just like he gets what he asks. He does news conferences, he does them and they give him the answer and they give him the question and they give him what kind of a news conference. He does them all the time. He was choking like a dog the other night, but Chris Wallace bailed him in. He just bailed him in or bailed him out.

HANNITY: Let me ask you this, because I think this is… You have an opportunity to challenge Joe Biden directly. His campaign could make the decision to go forward with a debate, get any health check that they want and follow through and have two debates, and you could agree upon the rules. You don't need a debate commission to do that. So I guess you have the ability to challenge Joe Biden to such a debate. Are you doing that tonight?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I might. I'll do it right through your show. Let's go, Joe. Let's have a fair… Let's get a fair anchor, somebody like a great Sean Hannity. We'll get Rush.

HANNITY: Oh, yeah.

THE PRESIDENT: We'll get Mark. We'll get Laura.

HANNITY: That'll happen.

THE PRESIDENT: We'll get Judge Jeanine.

HANNITY: That's going to happen.

THE PRESIDENT: We got a lot of them out there. We got a lot. We'll get Jesse or Pete. We got a lot of them. Tucker [inaudible] feeling good. [crosstalk] is a disgrace.

HANNITY: You're going to get me killed on all the Fox talk. Let me ask you.

THE PRESIDENT: [inaudible] but this is a disgrace what's going on. So now I find out the guy that's doing it from C-SPAN is a never-Trumper, but I don't mind that. Look at the people I've had in the past, and I've always won the debates. I had Martha Raddatz. Her hatred was so incredible I couldn't believe it, but I beat Hillary in that debate easily. So I don't mind that. It's not even that. But I'm not going to sit behind a computer and have somebody feed him answers, because he has no idea, because he won't be president for three months before the wonderful Kamala takes over with her. She's the most liberal person in the senate. She's not a socialist. She's a step beyond socialism as you know.

HANNITY: What did you think of the… What did you think of last night's debate, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: I thought Mike was great, legitimately. I don't mean because he's with me and he's my friend and he's done a great job as vice president, I thought he was great. He's a calm person. We're really a good combination. A lot of people have said that for a long time. He's a calm person. He's a good person, and he was just… He couldn't believe some of the things she was saying, and he really didn't. He couldn't believe it what she was saying. They lie. They lie so much, like fracking.

Him and her for a year, whatever the Democrat debate said, we are against fracking. We will… Biden says, "We will never ever see fracking and…" etc. As soon as he gets the nomination, he has to center over a little bit. No, we want to go fracking. We'll be fracking. Her too, even her. I mean, she's a super… Then they get beat up by AOC plus 3, because they said, you never said that before. Now the press gives them a pass. The reason they give them a pass is because they are fake. The news is fake, the enemy of the people and the press gives them a pass. If I ever did that, I would be excoriated.

HANNITY: Let me ask you about the issue that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris refuse to answer, that is about packing the United States Supreme Court which would a change that hasn't happened in 150 years. And-

THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, terrible thing.

HANNITY: … Joe Biden literally said today, and I honestly thought last night Kamala Harris would have a different answer. I thought when Mike Pence challenged her that she was going to say no, that they would not support it. Their non-answer's revealing. Joe Biden went further today and said, "You'll know my position on court packing the day after the election." What's your reaction to that?

THE PRESIDENT: I think it was a terrible thing to say. I think it's so disrespectful to the people, and he should have said something, and say, "Look, to the best of my knowledge, this is probably what I'd do." I think what he said was so disrespectful to the process and to the people. What he said then was just disgraceful. But what that means really is that they're going to do it, because obviously, that means 100% that's what they're going to do. No, they're going to end the filibuster and they're going to do things that you wouldn't have thought. I'd been fighting the filibuster with Mitch for a long time, because I said, "Mitch, they're going to do whatever. If they ever got in, Schumer would do that on day one." I agree that what they did was right.

You take a look at what Mitch and some very good Republican senators, because it's good for the country. But I said, "Here's the problem. If they ever got in, day one, this would be the first move they make, end the filibuster," the nuclear option as they call it. And they'll do that… Not a week will go by, probably not a day will go by. But again, Harry Reid did it, that's why we have so many judges. I want to thank you very much, Harry Reid. Because Harry Reid, he ended the filibuster and I'm going to have 300 judges by the time I finish. 300, it's a record by the end of the first term. Think of that. It's a record [inaudible] the term. By the end of the first term, I have 300 judges just about give or take a few couple. And-

HANNITY: Mr. President don't-

THE PRESIDENT: … it's all because of… Think of it, Sean. It's all because of Harry Reid and a lot of good work-

HANNITY: 2013.

THE PRESIDENT: … by a lot of good Republicans including Mitch.

HANNITY: Don't you think or do you think that the people of this country need to know whether or not Joe Biden, if he were elected president would pack the courts, whether or not he would support statehood for places like DC, whether or not he would support ending the filibuster, whether or not even maybe pursue a constitutional amendment to abolish the electoral college? To me, these are fundamental questions that he is refusing to answer. What is your answer to his non-answer? In the media, I think he's answered less than 100 questions since this whole campaign has started which I think makes these two debates that are forthcoming even more important than any average presidential year.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, he's got a lot of non-answers. Look at Second Amendment, you never talk about Second Amendment. He wants to take away your guns 100%. He put Beto as a… He turned out to be… He was exposed by Ted Cruz and me, I think I helped a lot too. But he was exposed as a clown, as much worse than that, but I want to be nice, because it's a nice evening show. But he was exposed as a clown. He wants to take away your guns. He's going to take away your Second Amendment. Nobody ever… Nobody asks him about the Second Amendment anymore. Do you notice that? The Second Amendment is very important. It's a big thing that we campaign on it. I protected this.

If I weren't president, you wouldn't have a Second Amendment right now. And Biden does it. Nobody's talks about life anymore, pro-life. Is he pro-life? No, he's not pro-life. What is he? Why don't you ask him that question? He doesn't want to talk about it. But he endorsed a Governor of Virginia who not only executed a baby late term abortion, but executed a baby because he said the baby can be born and then you can kill the baby. He's totally in favor of that. I can tell you, your pro-life groups are… They're in mess. This is their one shot because what's going on is so bad.

It's so evil. The governor of Virginia said, we will execute the baby after the baby is born, that's… When you talk about late term abortion, this is early term execution, and it's a very, very bad thing. But you don't ever hear everybody talking about pro-life, pro-choice with Biden. Did you ever hear it? I haven't heard it. Very rarely do you hear it? I don't think he'd know how to discuss it. But very importantly, a Second Amendment. They just don't discuss the Second Amendment. He's going to take your guns away. So everybody with a gun, you can't vote for him because you're not going to have your gun. At the same time, they want to defund the police.

So if you're not going to have police protection and by the way, you can't have a gun. So if one of these maniacs breaks into your house at night because there are no cops around and you don't have a gun to protect yourself, that's a great combination. The suburbs are going to fall. A lot of people talk about the women of the suburbs. Women of the suburbs, they do or don't like Trump. I don't know. But what I've done is incredible for the suburbs. The suburbs are over as you know. The suburbs have become more unsafe than the cities run by the Democrats. And so I think I should do very well with suburban women, because I'm the one that's protecting them both in terms of law and order and in terms of zoning.

They want to build low-income housing right next to your house as the American dream is destroyed, but they don't talk to Biden about this. They don't talk to him about law and order. I said to him the other night, "Mention the words law and order." He wouldn't do it. He wouldn't do it. I said, "Don't mention the word law and order. Go ahead." He wouldn't do it. And then of course Chris Wallace came in to protect him.

HANNITY: Let me ask you this Mr. President if I may, I played at the beginning of the show. We don't have a lot of time left, I won't play it again. Joe Biden twice in the debate that he had with you said he will eliminate the Trump tax cuts. Now he's saying only on people $400,000 or more, but that's… I'll let you explain it. He says he's not against fracking, but I have him saying he will eliminate fracking twice, and we played that tape.

He has repeatedly said, and Kamala Harris last night falsely claimed that you do have yet to once condemn white supremacy, yet I showed multiple instances when you have done just that, the neo-Nazis, David Duke, white supremacy, white nationalism, disavowing David Duke. And yet they continue to spread that falsehood. Your reaction, because they don't seem to get called out by the media on the fact that what they are saying is false.

THE PRESIDENT: And I condemn the people on the left like Antifa that are burning down your cities all summer long and without any control whatsoever. They're all Biden people, meaning not Biden. Biden's not smart enough to know what the hell it even is, but they're of that philosophy. I condemn them very strongly, very, very strongly. It's not just the right. It's the right, it's the left. But the left has been the problem up for a long time. Antifa is a big, big problem. I see Whitmer today, she's complaining, but it was our justice department that arrested the people that she was complaining about.

It was my justice department that arrested them. But instead, she goes and does her little political act and she keeps her state closed although we just won the big case as you know to open up Michigan, because what she's doing is a horrible thing to the people. The churches are closed, the schools are closed and all state is closed. People are being hurt very badly by it in the form of drinking and suicides and depression. It's a very sad thing. But now, Joe Biden wants to raise taxes. And very sadly, if you take a look, he wants to raise taxes, but he says he's going to end our tax cut. Well, people are getting actually much more.

Mike [inaudible], he said 2000 was actually much more than $2,000 in child tax credits, which is a $1000 a child. but he wants to take all that away. So therefore, if you do nothing else, you're raising taxes by the largest percentage in the history of our country. If he terminated my tax cuts, which is one of the reasons that our economy has done so great, even now in this pandemic which hopefully we're rounding the turn and we have incredible cures and a lot of therapeutics and the vaccines are going to be coming very soon. But I'll tell you what I took is incredible. To me, I viewed it as a cure. It's incredible, and we're going to get it to everybody free of charge.

It's going to hospitals. Starting very soon, the military is going to be delivering it. But he's looking to do big, big tax cuts, big, big tax increases at a level that's never been seen. Nobody's ever gotten the cuts that I got. I got the biggest tax cuts ever given as you know Sean, better than probably most. But he's going to end those tax cuts and reverse them. And now, people are going to pay $2000 plus child tax credits, all that. It's going to be a disaster for our country. It's going to put our country into a depression. Your 401ks are going to go down the tubes, and your jobs are going to go away, and you're going to have a depression the likes of which our country has never seen before. And that possibly includes 1929.

HANNITY: Mr. President, there has been articles out, and I would assume that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris not giving their position on court packing would be a national ad. I assume them both on record saying they would ban fracking would be an ad that would run on a lot of cycles in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Their website that endorses the Green New Deal, and Joe Biden saying he would spend trillions of dollars on it and pledging that. What would the new Green Deal look like in your view if implemented as promised by both Joe Biden and as a cosponsor with Kamala Harris in the US Senate?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, it's a deal that was conceived up by not smart people, AOC plus 3 and others, but I don't even think they had any experience in the environment. But this was a deal conceived up. The real price is $100 trillion. That's more money that this country could make in 100 years if things went well. They literally want to take buildings down and rebuild them with tiny little windows. Little windows, so you can't see out, you can see the light. The whole thing is so crazy. It's such a crazy thing. Take a look, Biden agreed to this with crazy Bernie, because they have the manifesto.

They've agreed to most of these things, and it's going to cost more money. Our country will be a Ninth World country, not a Third World country, a Ninth World country. We won't have energies. Look at what's happening with the rolling blackouts in California? Looking at where California is going to have to ration water? You know why? Because they set millions of gallons of water out to sea, out to the Pacific because they want to take care of certain little tiny fish that aren't doing very well without water to be honest with you. But it's a very sad thing that's happening. It's still common sense. Even the fires in California. I talk about, you need…

I was with governor Newsom. I get along with him very well. We disagree on a lot of things, but I get along with him. Number one, you should let water come down from the North and accept it instead of throwing it out to the Pacific. But you also have to have forest management. We send them so much money. I don't have to, but I want to help California. But they have the biggest forest fires because they don't manage their land. They don't have separators. They have trees that have been laying on the ground that are stone cold dead, dry like a matchstick. You throw a cigarette butts on between the leaves and the trees, everything catches on fire. You lose 200,000 acres in a short period of time. They get to manage their forest. And if they manage their forest, you're not going to see the forest fires.

HANNITY: Mr. President, the Heritage Foundation identified nearly 1000 convictions on voting fraud. There have been… You have expressed many times your concerned about some of the changing laws and rules and have spoken negatively about these changes. But with that said, a lot of states have now begun early voting. Some will be starting in a week or two. Will you encourage your supporters to get out and vote early?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I want them to vote, but I will say this, absentee is okay, because absentee ballots… Excuse me. Absentee ballots are fine, because absentee ballots, you request, you ask for a ballot and you request and that's it. Absentee ballots are absolutely fine. You request them, you fill them in, you send them back in. But these unsolicited ballots, universal unsolicited ballots Sean, it's going to be a disaster the likes of which we've never seen. We will never have seen an election like what's going to take place. Thousands of ballots all over the country are being reported. Some thrown in garbage cans with my name on them. Some thrown in trays in a river. What's going on is absolutely crazy. We have people watching. We have US attorneys watching. We have sheriffs watching. We have US Marshals watching. But with all of that-

HANNITY: With that said-

THE PRESIDENT: … you're talking about millions of ballots are being sent out-

HANNITY: With that said, if there's in-person early voting-

THE PRESIDENT: … [crosstalk] big and tremendous fraud.

HANNITY: … would you prefer that your supporters, if that's the system and that's what the law is, would you prefer that they get out early also so that there's not a big deficit heading into election day?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, my supporters are going to be mostly people that vote. They go to the vote the old fashioned where it's like go to the voting booth and vote, which first of all, we should have voter ID all over the country. We don't. When you buy something, you have voter ID. To get into the Democrat National Convention, you had to have voter ID.

HANNITY: That's true. I had to have it four years ago.

THE PRESIDENT: Right. But to get into vote, you don't need voter ID in many places. In many places, you do. Indiana has a great system. You have many places where you do have it. But we should have voter ID, universal voter ID. When you go to vote, they should see who you are, make sure that it's not fraudulent. But this will be one of the greatest fraudulent, most fraudulent elections ever because of this whole thing with… They're sending out millions and millions and millions of ballots. Where are they sending them? Who's sending them? Where are they going? Where are they coming back from? How many are fraudulent? Are they being thrown away? Are they being sold?

Are they being harvested? It's a terrible thing, Sean. Despite that, I think we're going to have a tremendous victory. I saw some polls just now, some real polls not the fake news polls where they put out fake numbers like at CNN and ABC, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, NBC. It's the same stuff as I had. It's not nearly as bad as it used to be. It used to be much worse believe it or not. It's hard to believe when you think of it. But I'm looking at polls that are doing great. We're doing great in Ohio. We're doing great in Iowa. We're doing great in many, many places, many places. Then you come home, you turn on television. You say, gee, I'm four down. I can't believe it. But they're the fake polls.

HANNITY: Last question, and I only have about a minute for you to answer. And that is the, we now discovered that the CIA had briefed then President Obama on a plan that Hillary Clinton concocted to distract from her email server scandal and concoct this Russia hoax. We also learned that she paid… We already knew she paid for the dirty Russian misinformation dossier, and that the source was Steele's dossier was a known Russian operative for over 10 years. They still went forward with it. In the 40 seconds, we have left your reaction to this new news?

THE PRESIDENT: We caught them spying on our campaign. This is treason. We caught them trying to take down a duly elected administration/ president. We have all the evidence down. Now, we have to see what the law enforcement's going to do with it, but we caught them spying. As sure as you're sitting there, I assume you're sitting, but as-

HANNITY: I'm sitting.

THE PRESIDENT: … sure as you're sitting there, we caught them spying on our campaign. You know that almost better than anybody. And it's something when you see the New York times, Washington Post get [inaudible] surprises they got everything wrong. They get everything wrong. We caught them spying in our campaign. We caught them trying to take down a duly elected… And then they talk about, we want a peaceful transition of power. Peaceful-

HANNITY: We know what Hillary Clinton said.

THE PRESIDENT: … [crosstalk] answer was that answer last night. Peaceful transition. Look what they did. They spent three and a half years trying to terminate a presidency.

HANNITY: Mr. President, we wish you and the First Lady and every American that contracted COVID a very speedy recovery. Very, very positive news on Regeneron and Eli Whitney and the therapeutics, and Operation Warp Speed seems to be moving along nicely. We pray that it gets finished-

THE PRESIDENT: It's doing really well.

HANNITY: … quickly. All right, sir-

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much.

HANNITY: … thank you. 26 days.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Sean.

HANNITY: Let not your heart be trouble…

Donald J. Trump, Interview with Sean Hannity of Fox News Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/370710

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