Remarks and an Exchange With Reporters Prior to Departure From Morristown, New Jersey

The President. Well, thank you very much. I think we've done a lot of good work over the last couple of days.

Being at West Point yesterday was incredible. What incredible people they are. And I think it was a very big success, and it was an honor to be there.

Very importantly, we had some very good talks with Iran yesterday and today, and let's see what happens. But I think we could have some good news on the Iran front.

Likewise, with Hamas, on the—on Gaza. We want to see if we can stop that. And Israel—we've been talking to them, and we want to see if we can stop that whole situation as quickly as possible.

But having to do with nuclear, we've had some very, very good talks with Iran. And I don't know if I'll be telling you anything good or bad over the next 2 days, but I have a feeling I might be telling you something good. We've had some real progress, serious progress.

On any other front, I don't know. Do you have any questions?

The President's Legislative Agenda

Q. Do you have a message for the Senate? A lot of Republicans have said there are going to be significant changes to the budget bill.

The President. Well, I want the Senate and the Senators to change—you know, to make the changes they want, and we'll go back to the House, and we'll see if we can get them. In some cases, those changes maybe are something I'd agree with, to be honest. You know, it happens.

But we've had a very good response from the Senate. And I don't know how Democrats can't vote for it. If they don't vote for it, they're talking about a 68-percent tax increase. Remember that. If the Democrats don't vote, it's a 68-percent tax increase, which is ridiculous.

And one of the things that's being covered indirectly is the fact that we'll be lowering the cost of drugs from 50 to 85 percent under Trump, and it's going to have, indirectly, something to do—not directly, but indirectly—something to do with the bill—the "One Big Beautiful Bill," and it is a big, beautiful bill.

And so I think the Senate is going to get there. I hope they're going to get there. I think they're going to have changes. Some will be minor, and some will be, you know, fairly significant.

But we've been working with the House all the way up. They've been working together. And the Speaker has been working with the leader of the Senate, and you know, they've done a great job. John Thune and Mike Johnson have done a fantastic job. They've been working together all the way up. So, hopefully, that will be fine.

Q. President Trump——

The President. Yes.

New York City Mayoral Campaign

Q. President Trump, Andrew Cuomo—he's under Federal investigation. Do you have a comment on that and how that should impact the mayoral election coming up?

The President. No, I was surprised. I didn't know exactly. I just read about it, just like you did, having to do with Andrew. I've known Andrew, and we've had an on-off relationship. [Laughter] He was saying the greatest things about me, I'm the greatest President, et cetera. And then the next day it hit us.

But I did a lot for them. I brought in the ship during the COVID crisis. I brought in the—Mercy ship, and I built about 3,000 units in the Javits Convention Center, and he didn't use them. I don't understand it. He wanted them, but he didn't use them.

But I hope it's going to be okay. I hope it's not going to be serious for him. Let's see what happens.

European Union

Q. Mr. President, you spoke to European Commission President von der Leyen. Did you discuss the 50 percent tariffs, and did you agree to——

The President. Yes, she——

Q. ——reduce those?

The President. She just called me, as you know, and she asked for an extension on the June 1st date. And she said she wants to get down to serious negotiation, because I—I told you specifically; I mean, I told anybody that would listen: They have to do that.

And we had a very nice call, and I agreed to move it. I believe June 9 would be—July 9 would be the date. That was the date she requested. Could we move it from June 1 to July 9? And I agreed to do that, and that she said we will rapidly get together and see if we can work something out.

U.S. Steel Corporation

Q. Another question. You announced on Friday about U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel.

The President. Yes.

Q. What will the ownership structure look like? What made you satisfied about that?

The President. It will be controlled by the United States. Otherwise, I wouldn't make the deal. I went to the unions, to the—all of the local unions. They all wanted it. And I'm doing it because all of the Congressmen came in—about five of them—and the others, I understand, are in concurrence—and they asked that I do it. Everybody seems to want it.

And we'll see. I mean, you know, we'll see what the final is. But they're going to invest billions of dollars in steel, and it's a good company. Nisson [Nippon; White House correction]—it's a very good company. We'll see.

But it would—it's an investment, and it's a partial ownership, but it will be controlled by the U.S.A.

Saudi Arabia

Q. President Trump, on Saudi Arabia, you came back with a lot of investments. There's an American who's stuck there and facing a trial for tweets. His family want you to intervene and ask the Crown Prince to let him go.

The President. Oh.

Q. What do you think about that?

The President. I haven't heard about it at all. If you give me the information on the plane—are you on the plane?

Q. Yes.

The President. Give me the information. I'll see what I can do.

Do you think he's okay?

Q. I'm a reporter. I can't take an opinion.

The President. I know, but are you giving a recommendation?

Q. No, I'm not.

The President. Okay. Well, then maybe I won't do it. I don't know. You tell me—the way you—the way you posed the question, I thought you assumed it was—he was okay.

What did he do, supposedly?

Q. He sent some political tweets about Saudi Arabian politics.

The President. Were they bad?

Q. He said he approved of naming a street—renaming a street in DC. It was fairly innocent stuff, by American standards.

The President. Let me take a look.

Russia/Ukraine

Q. Mr. President, could you provide us an update on Russia and Ukraine as well?

The President. Yes, I'll give you an update. I'm not happy with what Putin is doing. He's killing a lot of people.

And I don't know what the hell happened to Putin. I've known him a long time, always gotten along with him, but he's sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don't like it at all. Okay?

We're in the middle of talking, and he's shooting rockets into Kyiv and other cities. I don't like it at all.

President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia

Q. Mr. President, what do you want to do about that?

The President. And I'm surprised. I'm very surprised. We'll see what we're going to do.

Q. Do you have——

The President. What, am I going to tell you?

Q. Well——

The President. You're the fake news, aren't you?

Q. But you've—you——

The President. You're totally fake.

Q. You've talked to the——

The President. All right. Any other questions?

Q. President Trump——

The President. I don't like what Putin is doing, not even a little bit. He's killing people. And something happened to this guy, and I don't like it.

Go ahead.

President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia

Q. Can I follow up on that? A Russian commander reportedly said that Putin was almost caught in the middle of a drone attack from Ukraine. So do you have any response——

The President. I haven't heard that, but maybe that would be a reason. I don't know, but I have not heard that.

Secretary of Defense Peter B. Hegseth

Q. President Trump, Secretary Hegseth's Acting Chief of Staff is a Biden administration holdover who has said some very critical things about you and Vice President Vance. Do you have thoughts on that?

The President. Who is the Chief of Staff?

Q. Ricky Buria.

The President. I have no idea who he is, but if he did say that, I would recommend that we don't take him. I mean, if he did say something like that, I would recommend we don't take him. But let's see. I'll take a look.

Buria? I'll check it out.

Yes.

Harvard University

Q. On Harvard, do you think you'll come for their endowment in any way or go after financial aid, Federal student aid for them?

The President. Well, look, part of the problem with Harvard is that they're about 31 percent—almost 31 percent of foreigners coming to Harvard. We give them billions of dollars, which is ridiculous. We do grants, which we're probably not going to be doing much grants anymore to Harvard. But they're 31 percent, but they refuse to tell us who the people are. We want to know who the people—now, a lot of the foreign students, we wouldn't have a problem with. I'm not going to have a problem with foreign students, but it shouldn't be 31 percent. It's too much. Because we have Americans that want to go there and to other places, and they can't go there because you have 31 percent foreign.

Now, no foreign Government contributes money to Harvard. We do. So why are they doing so many? Number one. Number two, we want a list of those foreign students, and we'll find out whether or not they're okay. Many will be okay, I assume. And I assume, with Harvard, many will be bad.

And then the other thing is they're very anti-Semitic. Everybody knows they're anti-Semitic. And that's got to stop immediately.

Q. President Trump, Secretary——

The President. Who are you with?

Q. New York Post.

The President. Oh, I like the New York Post.

Q. Thank you.

The President. I like Keith Poole.

Q. Thank you. I do too.

The President. Okay.

Q. So Secretary——

The President. [Laughter] Now I'm going to be nicer to him. I didn't know he was with the—go ahead.

Domestic Manufacturing

Q. Secretary Bessent has said that we don't need to return textile manufacturing to the United States.

The President. Yes.

Q. How do you see—like, a lot of your reciprocal tariffs are pretty big on those low-income countries. How do you see that working out?

The President. Yes, no, I tend to agree. We're not looking to make sneakers and T-shirts and—we want to make military equipment. We want to make big things. We want to make—do the AI thing with the computers and the—many, many, many, elements. But the textile, you know, I'm not looking to make T-shirts, to be honest. I'm not looking to make socks. We can do that very well in other locations.

We are looking to do chips and computers and lots of other things and tanks and chips—meaning chips, you know.

Iran

Q. You mentioned you were happy with the talks with Iran. Will there be another round of talks soon?

The President. Very soon. Iran—the Iran talks—I can't tell you what's going to happen tomorrow. I can tell you the Iran talks have been going very well.

Q. And you said you're unhappy——

The President. And I'd love that to happen, because I'd love to see no bombs dropped and a lot of people dead. I really would like to see that happen. And I think there's a good chance that it could happen.

President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia

Q. You mentioned you're unhappy with President Putin. You've talked before about putting more sanctions on Russia. Is that something you're considering more seriously?

The President. Absolutely. He's killing a lot of people. I don't know what's wrong with him. What the hell happened to him, right? He's killing a lot of people. I'm not happy about that.

Go ahead. What else? Anything else?

Threats Against the President's Life

Q. There was just a person arrested for attempting to—a plot in Israel to throw Molotov cocktails at a U.S. Embassy office in Tel Aviv.

The President. Yes.

Q. The person also reportedly—who is a dual German-U.S. citizen—issued threats against your life. If you could——

The President. Against my life?

Q. Against your life. Yes, sir.

The President. We've got a lot of them around. We've got a lot of sick people around.

Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you.

Q. Thank you, Mr. President.