Remarks in an Exchange With Reporters Aboard Air Force One En Route to Rome, Italy

The President. Hello, everybody.

Q. Mr. President.

The President. We have a long flight today, but we're going for a good reason. You have any questions?

U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East Steven C. Witkoff

Q. What do you hope Steve Witkoff will get out of his meeting with Putin today?

The President. He'll be calling me. They just left the meeting. I haven't been briefed yet, but he had a, I hear, pretty good meeting.

Signal Messaging Application

Q. Mr. President, any update on Secretary Hegseth, your confidence in him?

The President. About what?

Q. With Signal, having Signal on his home——

The President. I don't view Signal as——

Q. ——on his work computer? What do you think?

The President. I don't view Signal as important.

Q. Sir——

The President. I think it's fake news, really. I don't view it as important.

The President's Travel to Rome, Italy

Q. You said you were going to be meeting with some leaders while you were in Rome attending the Pope's funeral. Who are you attending——

The President. I'm going to be meeting with some people in Rome, yes.

Q. Who are you meeting with?

The President. And a little bit quickly. And frankly, it's a little disrespectful to have meetings when you're at the funeral of a Pope——

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy/President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine

Q. Are you going to be meeting with——

The President. ——they said. I mean——

Q. ——with——

The President. So—but I'll be talking to people. I'll be seeing a lot of people——

Q. ——with Zelenskyy, sir?

The President. ——including the—yes, including the Prime Minister of Italy.

Q. Do you have any plans to see former President Biden?

The President. A very, very good Prime Minister. What?

Former President Joseph R. Biden, Jr.

Q. Former President Biden—any plans to talk with him? He's going to be there.

The President. Oh, he is? I didn't know that. I mean, it's not high on my list. It's really not.

Wisconsin Circuit Court Judge for Milwaukee County Hanah Dugan

Q. Sir, can I ask you about this judge in Wisconsin who was arrested because of immigration issues? What's going on with the case there? Can you tell us about it?

The President. That's a terrible thing. The judge was arrested because he was housing a Tren de Aragua. Right? Is that the one you're talking about?

Q. Yes.

The President. It's pretty surprising. It's terrible.

China-U.S. Trade

Q. Mr. President, you said that you've spoken to President Xi multiple times. Is that since taking office, sir?

The President. I don't want to discuss that. But I'm speaking to a lot of people from China. But I'm speaking to people from all over the world on the tariffs, and we're making very good deals. Very good deals. It's going to make our country rich. We're not going to be ripped off like we have been for the last, literally, 50 years.

[At this point, several reporters began asking questions at once.]

Explosion in Moscow, Russia

Q. Mr. President, there was a car bomb in Moscow today—this morning that killed a Russian general. Do you have any reaction to that and the impact——

The President. Who killed—who killed what?

Q. Russian general killed by a car bomb.

The President. Wow. No, I just heard—you're just telling me that for the first time. Where— where did this take place?

Q. It took place in Moscow.

The President. Wow. That's——

Q. It was a Russian general who was——

The President. That's hitting close to home, right? That's a big one. Yes, I'll look at it. If I hear anything, I'll let you know.

The President's Travel to Rome, Italy

Q. So, when you see these leaders in Rome, it's more like mix and mingle at the funeral, right? Or are you having individual one-on-ones?

The President. It's a little tough because we don't have much time, and we're arriving at about 11:30. And we have some people meeting us already. And then I'm taking pictures with the military tonight when we get to the house at 12 o'clock—the Embassy. And so we don't have, really, much time. And then, as you know, tomorrow morning we're sort of leaving early.

I think that we're going to try and see a couple of people that are important to what we're doing.

Funeral for Pope Francis in the Holy See (Vatican City)/2024 Presidential Election

Q. Why did you feel it was important to go to the Pope's funeral?

The President. I just thought it was out of respect. You know, I won the Catholic vote, and I think it's the first time that ever happened, where a Republican won the vote. But—and I won it by a lot. And you know, I have a great relationship to the Catholics. Very simple, when you think of it. [Laughter] But I won the Catholic vote. We got 56 percent of the vote. I don't know why we didn't get more. Actually, I don't know how they got any.

But we did well with the Catholic vote and my relationship is very good, so, therefore, you know, I think it's appropriate.

China-U.S. Trade/Tariffs

Q. Secretary Bessent said that—Secretary Bessent said that, you know, you wouldn't drop tariffs on China unilaterally, that you would need to see some kind of movement. What do you want to see from China?

The President. Yes. No, he's right about that. Well, I'm not going to drop them unless they give us something that's, you know, substantial. Otherwise, I'm not going to drop them. But it'll all work out. Those things always work out.

You know, we're working on a lot of projects right now. The wall is solved. The border is the most secure it's ever been. We're having a very hard time with judges because they don't want people to be moved out of the country.

Shockingly, nobody has ever had this before—no other President. There's never been a time when this has ever become an issue, where they talk about due process—when you have millions of people that you're moving out that are really bad people, very dangerous people, and you have a judge that wants every single one of them to have a trial. So they want us to have millions of trials, therefore. And how long does a trial take? Weeks? A trial could take weeks.

It's—that's not what it's about. That's not what our country is about, and that's not what I got elected on.

And these are judges that just want to, you know, show how big and important they are. They have—they're local Federal judges, and they shouldn't be allowed to do it.

You know, we're—we have hundreds of thousands of people that we want to get out of the country, and the courts are holding us back. Some judge that nobody ever heard of is holding us back. It's very dangerous for our country. I mean, you want to see a country that will have crime? Let that happen, because it's really dangerous for our country, and I can't believe the Supreme Court would let that stand.

China-U.S. Trade/Trade Negotiations

Q. What kind of movement do you consider "substantial" from China?

The President. Well, free up China. You know, let us go in and work China, because, frankly, that's what we wanted last time. We almost got it, and then they backed out of that deal, but we had it. To go into China and to sell our product, sell our wares—in other words, it's called "to open China." That would be great. That would be a big win.

But I'm not even sure I'm going to ask for it because I don't—they don't want it open.

Q. Mr. President, on——

The President. They don't want it open.

Q. On the immigration front——

The President. The big thing are the tariffs. But because of tariffs, I could possibly get that.

What do you think? Opening up China would be a big win, right?

The problem is, no matter how big the win is, the press will not give me credit for it. If I got the greatest win in history, if I got—they'll pay us trillions and trillions of dollars, they'll give us anything we want, the press will say: "Trump, he just had a terrible defeat. He suffered a terrible defeat." But the people know.

No, I think we're going to have a lot of big wins. I don't know if it's going to be covered that way by the fake news, but the wins are going to be very substantial.

You know, we're losing—we were losing, with Biden, $5 billion a day. Think of that: $5 billion a day. I've got that number way down, and soon it's going to be very, very positive. We're going to make—we'll be making $5 billion a day, but we have a little ways to go yet. A little ways to go.

Texas Senate Race

Q. Mr. President, can I ask you about the Texas Senate primary—the Texas Senate primary with John Cornyn and Ken Paxton? Are you going to get involved? Have you talked to the candidates—[inaudible.]?

The President. Well, they're both friends of mine. I like them both. In a way, I wish they weren't running against each other. But I like Paxton. I like Cornyn. They're both good people, so I'll make a decision somewhere along the line. But you have two very good men.

Sanctuary Cities/The President's Immigration Policy

Q. I have a question on your immigration agenda. Yesterday a judge in San Francisco put a nationwide injunction on you guys taking money away from sanctuary cities. Your reaction to that? Then I have a question about the markets.

The President. Well, it's unbelievable when you hear a judge in San Francisco or a judge in San Diego does nationwide injunctions having to do with the whole country, sitting behind a bench—a local bench, even though, in some cases—in many cases, they're a Federal judge, but a judge can close down—we should close down sanctuary cities. We shouldn't have sanctuary cities. And we'll see how that turns out.

But sanctuary cities are sanctuary for criminals. That's what they are. They're sanctuary for criminals. They protect criminals, and we should close them down. If we want a safe country, you have to get rid of sanctuary cities.

India/Pakistan

Q. Mr. President, on India and Pakistan. There are tensions after the attack in Kashmir.

The President. Yes.

Q. Have you got any message for them? Are you going to be talking to their leaders?

The President. Well, I'm very close to India, and I'm very close to Pakistan, as you know. And they've had that fight for a thousand years in Kashmir. Kashmir has been going on for a thousand years. Probably longer than that.

And it's—it was a bad one yesterday, though. That was a bad one—over 30 people.

Q. Are you concerned that there's—there's now tensions on the border between them? Are you concerned about—how are you—concerned are you about that?

The President. Well, there have been tensions on that border for 1,500 years, so, you know, it's the same as it's been. But they'll get it figured out one way or the other. I'm sure that it's—I know both leaders. There's great tension between Pakistan and India, but there always has been.

Tariffs

Q. Sir, you've—you've done the—the one 90-day pause on the—some of the tariffs. Is it possible you'll have to do another 90-day—or another extension, another pause?

The President. Probably unlikely. I think I know pretty much—and, again, you know, we'll have deals made, but we'll also make deals. In other words, we'll just set the tariff, and we'll be reasonable—very reasonable, and that will be the end. That's the deal. Because, you know, we set the price. They want to come in.

Now, they set the price for their country, but everybody wants to come into ours. They don't want to come into theirs. Most people don't want to come into theirs.

Stock Market Volatility

Q. On the—do you think the markets are adjusting to your tariff policy?

The President. I think so. When you look at what's happening, I think so. You know, I said there'd be a transition. People haven't understood it. Now they're starting to understand it.

You know, look, think of it this way: We've lost millions of dollars a day for years on trade—millions. Not going to happen. We're going to make billions of dollars a day. Because that's not sustainable.

Trade Negotiations/Insider Trading

Q. Mr. President, can you commit that nobody on your financial team was giving any type of tips to Wall Street executives about deals with India? There was some reporting yesterday that people had heads-up on Wall Street, possibly to make money. Can you commit that that did not happen?

The President. No, I can commit to myself. That's all I can commit. You know, I have thousands of people that work for me. But I can't imagine anybody doing that. I have——

Q. If they did?

The President. I have very honorable people. That I can say. So I can't even imagine it. But no, I haven't even heard that, actually.

Gaza, Palestinian Territories

Q. Sir, there have been some concerns about access to food, medicine coming into Gaza. When you spoke to Prime Minister Netanyahu the other day, did that come up at all about access and humanitarian aid going into the Strip?

The President. No, but Gaza came up, and I said, you know, we got to—we got to be good to Gaza. Those people are—those people are suffering. We got to be good to Gaza. We'll—we're going to take care of that. There's a very big need for medicine—food and medicine, and we're taking care of it.

Q. In terms of, like, opening up——

The President. We're pushing——

Q. ——more access points or——

The President. We're pushing people very hard——

Q. Pushing the Israelis?

The President. ——on that. We are.

Q. To open up more access points?

The President. Very hard to get food and medicine into Gaza.

Q. How did the Prime Minister respond to that?

The President. Well. Felt well about it. Okay?

Iran

Q. You've got these Iran technical talks tomorrow in Oman. What do you—do you think—see any kind of——

The President. The Iran situation is coming out very well. We've had a lot of talks with them, and I think we're going to have a deal. I'd much rather have a deal than the other alternative. And it'd be good for humanity.

Q. Will it start with an interim deal of some sort, or how is it going to work?

The President. I think it's going to be pretty much—I'm—we're not looking to do lots of long-term. It's a very simple deal. One thing: They just can't have a nuclear weapon. I'm saving them a lot of money just on that. Having a nuclear weapon is really expensive, but it's also very dangerous, and they can't have a nuclear weapon. And just that, I'm saving them billions and billions of dollars, because that would—that's what it would cost.

Now, with that being said, the Iran deal is coming along very well. We're dealing at the highest levels of Iran, and I think they want to make a deal, and we want to make a deal.

There are some people that want to make a different kind of a deal, a must nastier deal, and I don't want that to happen to Iran, if we can avoid it.

Thank you very much, everybody.

Q. Thank you, Mr. President.

The President. Thank you.

The First Lady's Birthday/Tariffs/National Economy

Q. What's on tap for Melania's birthday?

The President. Oh, she's going to have a great birthday. [Laughter] She's got a working birthday. She's up front. I should send her back.

Q. Send her back.

The President. You want to have somebody answer a question——

Q. Yes.

The President. ——I'll send—I'll send her back into the lion's pit. [Laughter]

Susie, let's send Melania back to the lion's pit. [Laughter]

Q. Are you—are you taking——

The President. That's funny.

Q. Are you taking her to dinner, Mr. President?

The President. They—by the way, they would love that, wouldn't they? Put her in.

Q. Are you going to dinner?

The President. She would be so—[inaudible.].

Q. Can we see your office up there sometime this weekend?

The President. Yes, you can come up. We'll let them come up a little bit later. Okay? We'll do it.

Q. Mr. President, are you—are you taking Melania to dinner?

The President. Maybe going back.

The First Lady's Birthday/Tariffs

Q. Are you taking Mrs. Trump to dinner, or have you had time to get her a present? You've been very busy.

The President. I'll take her for dinner on the Boeing. [Laughter] Right? I'll take her for dinner on Air Force One.

Q. There you go.

The President. I haven't had much time to buy presents, no. We've had a lot of—we've been pretty busy.

But it's working out. Things are working out very well, and people are starting to understand how good tariffs are for us.

And you know, tariffs have been used against us for 50 years. Now—I never understood it, as a private person, why we allowed that to happen. You know, it goes back a long time, but I never understood it. Why did we allow that to happen, where we couldn't go into China, but they could come here? We couldn't go into Europe, but they could come here. So many—every place. We couldn't go into India. They could come here. I never understood why they allowed that.

And I don't blame the countries. I blame the Presidents for allowing it to happen. But you have a different kind of a President now.

So thank you very much. I'll see you later.

Q. Thank you.