Remarks at a National Republican Congressional Committee Dinner

The President. Well, thank you very much. This is a great room. And, you know, we've done very well in this room before. But right now we broke every record. I just heard from Mike Johnson. He said, "We broke every record, sir." There is over $35 million. That's not bad for the evening. For the evening, that's not bad.

I wonder if you ever turn the room this way. You know, it's interesting, because I love real estate. I love ballrooms. I have nice ballrooms, a lot of them. I wonder if they ever turned it this way instead. So might be interesting. This way, I'm not talking to a wall. [Laughter] They think they get a better view, but actually, I'm not sure. But next time—maybe we'll have to worry about that next year, where we'll do 45 or 50 million dollars. Right?

There are a lot of people. You broke your record attendance, and you broke your money record, and that's a great tribute to the Republicans in the party and everything it stands for. And it's wonderful. And I want to thank especially Speaker Mike Johnson because he's been incredible.

And we have some unbelievable supporters of our House Republican majority with us, as you know. And with the help of everyone in this room, the next year's Republican Party is going to defy history. We're going to really defy it. And we already are. We're getting things done. It's going to be very interesting to see. It's going to be a very interesting year. We have an interesting time.

We're making a fortune with tariffs. Two billion dollars a day. Do you believe it? I was told $2 billion a day.

You know, I got hit by the press about tariffs. We're making $2 billion—billion. This isn't $35 million. That's peanuts. Two billion dollars a day. And then they say, "Gee." They don't know—you know, this is—only the enemy can be talking this way.

In addition, we have a lot of countries coming to see us. They want to make a deal. And we're doing—we're doing things that nobody has ever even thought about doing. And we're going to defeat the radical-left Democrats who are out there complaining about everything. All they do is complain, and then they want to put men in women's sports and things like that. [Laughter] They want men in women's sports. They're still fighting for that.

I saw this poor guy. You all know him. I won't mention his name. He's sort of a nice guy. He's a loser. He's a Democrat, but he's a loser—[laughter]. And he was fighting on a big show this morning. "We've got to have that. It's not fair that—essentially that men aren't allowed to compete against women." Can you believe this guy?

But let them do it. I say we shouldn't be fighting a lot of these things. Just let them go. And then, just before the next election, we'll unleash on them. Because this—it would be very sad if they actually changed their policies. We don't want that to happen.

But we're going to win the midterm elections, and we're going to have a tremendous, thundering landslide. I really believe that.

And it's so important that we pass the big, beautiful bill, because that's going to be—and I really think—and I really think we're helped a lot by the tariff situation that's going on, which is a good situation, not a bad—it's great. It's going to be legendary. You watch. Legendary in a positive way, I have to say. It's going to be legendary.

But I really think it actually puts pressure on those few Republicans that just can't get there. [Laughter]

You know what the alternative is? A Democrat bill or a chapter for the country—you know, we have the debt continuation. And they have to do—they have to do this. They have to get there and—I think we are there. We had a great meeting today. I think we are there.

But just in case there are a couple of Republicans out there, you've just got to get there. Close your eyes and get there. It's a phenomenal bill. Stop grandstanding. Just stop grandstanding. Boy, oh, boy, oh, boy.

You know, their policy—the Democrats—is horrible. It's horrible. Think of it. Open borders. Just—all of the horrible, stupid things they have. You don't have energy. You don't have anything. They've lost their confidence. Everything is bad.

But the one thing: They always vote in unison. You don't see somebody that's holding up. "I'm going to hold up." And the alternative is hell. You know? The alternative is hell.

So the Republicans just have—one little thing the Republican Party has to do is get together and damn vote. If you're a single guy or a second guy—and you fight like hell for what you get. And then, in the end, you have to vote because the policy is phenomenal. You know, they don't get every little ounce. It doesn't work that way.

And this bill that we're working on now is the best I think we've ever passed. Mike, wherever you may be, it's the best. I think it's the best thing we've—we'll get it passed, but I think it's going to be the most important thing we've ever passed. It's the best thing we've ever passed.

And I do think that the war with the world—which is not a war at all, because they're all coming here. Japan is coming here as we speak. They're in a plane flying—lots of them. All tough negotiators.

But things that people wouldn't have given us 2 years ago—wouldn't have even thought of it 2 years ago, 3 years ago, 5 years ago, 7, every—they're giving us everything.

They don't want tariffs on themselves. And it's very simple. We're making deals, and people are paying tariffs. Countries are paying tariffs. Right now China is paying a 104-percent tariff. Think of it. One hundred and four percent.

Now, it sounds ridiculous, but they charged us, for many items, 100 percent, 125 percent. Many countries have. They've ripped us off left and right. But now it's our turn to do the ripping, if that's okay. We're going to make our country even stronger—stronger than it ever was.

In 2026, Republicans will fight for every State, every seat, and every single vote. We're going to fight like hell. I intend to personally campaign for candidates all across the country. And we just won't—you're right about that. We won't just keep our majorities; we want to expand our majorities by a lot.

You know, there's this thing about midterm elections that you have a President, and the—they never seem to win. I don't understand. They never seem to win the midterm elections, and I have no idea why. You know? We're not going to let that be a self-fulfilling prophecy. I have no idea why.

We're setting records right now. We're getting more things approved than any president has ever done in the first hundred days. It's not even close. I had somebody say, "The most successful month—first month in the history." Now they said, "The most successful hundred days in the history of our country." And I believe that's right.

And we're going to continue that way, if not more so. And we're going to do tremendously in midterms. There's no reason—we should do great in the midterms. There's this thing that, for some reason, the President—whoever the President is, the midterms are tough or w-—

But why would they be tough? If we're doing great, they should be easy. And I'm telling you, we're going to—we've got to win a lot more.

But as Mike said before—I happen to listen to him—he was on C-SPAN 1. That's a big upgrade, right? [Laughter] I was listening as I was putting on the tie. How does it look? He was on C-SPAN 1, and we—they were talking about that. And I thought to myself—because people love him and they love your leaders. They love—it's—really, the party is just doing well. A couple we could do without, to be honest with you, but—[laughter]—but the party is doing well. And there's no reason we shouldn't just get together and win these midterms and win them by a lot, because seven that I heard Mike talking about before—seven is not really enough.

But we lived for one for a period of time. You know, the only thing good about seven: When you have one, and now, all of a sudden, you have seven, it sounds like—it's like a landslide. [Laughter] It's so good. It's like the most amazing thing. Seven sounds so good when I hear that. It sounds like we can't be beaten. And we should be 50, 60 up. Honestly, we should be 100 up because, based on policy, these people have the worst policy that anybody has ever seen. There's something wrong with them. Honestly, there's something wrong with them. All this crap.

Thirteen House Democrats currently represent districts that voted for Trump—and voted for Trump big. And in 2026, we are going to tell them—all 13—that "You're fired. Get out. Out. Get out." No reason for that. Thirteen. But 13 is a small number compared to some of these stats.

We are going to work very hard. I'm going to do telerallies. You know telerallies? I'll do rallies for a lot of you, but I'll do telerallies at a minimum.

And we just had two great elections, by the way. And I heard everybody is introducing our two new Congress—where are they, please? Stand up. I want to look you in the eye. I want to look you in the eye, Randy. Look at them. Two of them.

Where's—what a job you did, man. Huh? You were never in doubt. Where the hell—where is our second person here? I know he's—oh, there he is. Boy, they gave him a lousy seat. He's being —[laughter]. Good—great job. We're proud of you, man, and great job. Great job. Thank you.

And, you know, those—both elections, they were saying, "It's going to be close. It's going to be close." And I was listening. And they won by like—you won by—what?—17 points, 18 points. I don't think that's close. I don't think it's close. It's—so we won by 15 and—and 18 points. And they're saying, "It was a terrible evening for Trump." Can you believe it? "Terrible evening. They only won by 18 points and 15 points."

Anyway, good job, both of you. Good job.

But in addition to our fantastic House Speaker, we're pleased to be joined by Majority Leader Steve Scalise. And I watched you too, Steve. I watched you on C-SPAN 1.

And Steve has suffered greatly. I mean, I was there the night that it looked like he wasn't going to make it. He's very brave. He suffered greatly. And I tell the story about the baseball game where—I mean, he was really—the doctor told me: "Sir, I've never had anybody lose so much blood. It's not looking good."

And his wife loved him. She was such a disaster that night. She was crying. She was crying. Because I've been with people that were in serious trouble, and their wives couldn't care—they couldn't care less. [Laughter] In fact, after they recovered, I said: "Do yourself a favor. Get rid of the wife. She couldn't"—[laughter]. No, I'm only kidding, of course. I'm only kidding.

I like to say I'm only kidding. That way, that cleans it up a little bit for the press. [Laughter] I say, "I was only kidding."

No, I've seen some wives that were truly not bothered too much. I had one where the dog died and the husband died on the same day. And I said, "It's too bad about Harry." "No, no, but Lucy died. Lucy. Oh, my god." Harry didn't mean—he left her a fortune too. Can you believe it? [Laughter] Harry didn't matter. The dog mattered a lot.

But I was with Stephen, and he was really—you know, that was a tough thing. And then, amazingly, he was—like, a year later, he was in the baseball game against the Democrats, and he's playing second base. And he was having a hard time. You know, it's a hard time getting around.

And with his luck, a shot was hit to him on the ground. A ground ball. And he got down, and that ball was—no way that ball was—it was right at him. But really, it was whacked. I don't know who the hell hit it. It looked like a Major League ground ball. And Steve went down and blocked that sucker and got on his knees and threw it to first base.

It was the most unbelievable thing, that it could happen. This was God watch—this was God watching the game, I'm telling you. Does everybody remember that? He blocked it. It knocked the hell out of his foot. Not his glove. It was his foot.

And he got down and grabbed the ball, threw it out, and got the runner by quite a bit. And they then took him out of the game. And I said, "What a great move." That was a good manager. They took him out of the game, because you can't improve on that, let me tell you. [Laughter]

But he had great courage. And amazing how he's done. And he's been very special, and all of us know it. He's really done great.

Another man I've really gotten to know a lot—and I think he's fantastic—is Tom Emmer, majority whip. I think he's fantastic. Where's Tom? Where is Tom? Where is our Tom? Because I want to see his wife. You know, his wife is better than him. She—he admits it.

Oh, that's good. Hi, Tom. So where is she, Tom? Oh, no, she's not—she's home. She's watching C-SPAN. Yes, I know. [Laughter] Thank you, Tom. Great job you do.

And, Lisa, you were up talking about Donald Trump tonight. And Lisa McClain, conference chair, she was talking about Trump, and I appreciate it, Lisa. Lisa—where are you, Lisa? This is like a roast. Thank you, darling.

That—I saw your whole speech. I watched you and Steve and Mike. I watched the whole thing. And then they said: "Sir, we have to leave. You're going to be late." I said, "I want to watch your speeches."

And we have Richard Hudson, the NRCC chairman who set the record tonight. Richard, great going. That's a great job.

And Brian Jack, who was with me from day one of my political career. He was so fantastic. He was so fantastic. And he came to me; he said, "Do you think it would be okay?" He wanted to run for Congress. He always wanted to run for Congress. It was the most important thing. But he was with me. Knows so much about politics and boxing. He knows a lot about boxing too, but he loves politics.

But he really just wanted to run. I think his ambition was to be a Congressman, and the seat came due. A good Member of Congress, actually, retired, and Brian—in Georgia—and Brian said, "What do you think, sir?" I said, "Well, you've got my endorsement." And he won by a lot, and he's never looked back.

He's a fantastic guy and a great political leader, a great politician, Brian Jack. Where are you, Brian? Where are you, Brian? Hi, Brian. Great job. Proud of you, Brian.

And more than 160 Members of Congress. And I'd like to really—you've done incredibly well. They're really looking back. And, you know, I said before, the Democrats have taken a lot of beatings. They have lost their confidence. They've gone crazy. They've gone crazy. How about this new one they have? Their new star: Crockett. How about her? Is she—is that real? Are they serious about that? That's their new star? If that's their new star, they're in serious trouble. [Laughter] I mean, this is—Crockett. Oh, man. Oh, man.

But we have—we've done a job, but they've totally lost their confidence, and it's a hard thing when you lose your confidence. But they have. They've taken a lot of beatings, and now they're going to rely on Crockett to bring them back. Crockett is going to bring them back. You ever watch this?

Last November, all the leaders here tonight were given a mandate from the American people. And at the Presidential level, we won—think of this—all seven swing States. We won the Electoral College 312 to 226. That's not bad. Remember? The fake news was saying, "It's going to be tough because people like Trump, but he should be able to get 270."

I actually went to Nebraska and campaigned for one vote. I went to New Hampshire. I campaigned, because they said that it could be we're 270, 269. So I'm going to all the places, and I'm trying to get one. We won Nebraska big, but there was one area. And I went there, I went all over the place campaigning, and then we get 312.

But we won in a landslide too, because we won the popular vote for the first time of a Republican in decades. And now I think that's going to be done routinely. We won 85 percent of all counties in America—525 for them, and 2,725 for us. That's that map that you see. It's all red, except for the two corners that have a little blue, a little line of blue.

For the first time in history, all 50 States shifted toward the Republican Party. First time in history. It's never happened. It's a shift. It shifted Republican. And today there are more registered Republicans than any time in the history of our country. How good—how about that?

Meanwhile, approval ratings for the Democrat Party have plunged to the lowest level ever recorded. They're at 26 percent. So you tell me about the midterms, right? Twenty-six. The lowest level ever for either party.

The Republican Party is a much bigger party now than it was ever before. And I must say that it's the biggest now since you heard the name "Donald J. Trump" running as a politician. You heard the name before, but not as a politician.

I said to my wife: "You know, I think I'm going to do this thing. Do I have your approval?" "Yes, darling. I think you'll win." See, she's a supportive First Lady. I don't know if she believed it or not, but she said it. [Laughter] She said: "Yes, darling. I think you'll win."

"How do you think I'll do?" "Oh, darling, you'll win very easily," even though I've never done it before. I said, "I have one problem. I've never done it before." She said: "That doesn't matter. You're so talented." I said, "Thank you very much." This is why we get along. It's easy to get along like that. [Laughter]

But we have far more people and far more enthusiasm than the party has ever had—I think I could almost say than any party has ever had. I don't think any party has ever had more enthusiasm than us—and spirit. A lot of that's our leadership.

The Democrats are a broken party with bad policy. They've lost so much and—both as politicians and as people, they've lost.

The stage is set for a monumental victory for the Republicans in the midterms. And many of you—I guess most of you and so many great Congress men and women here—you've got some Senators here also—but many of you are—all of you are up. We've got to win. Got to work really hard, and we got to win, because there's no way they should be winning based on policy. And it's ultimately about policy.

We simply have to keep our promises to the people, and we have to, very simply, put America first. Put America first.

And I said I ran on common sense. You know, I ran in—you—it sounds like a phrase that would have been used—I don't know. Nobody tells me it was used in politics before. Now everybody has used it. I see the Democrats—some Democrat guy who's a real sleazeball got up. He said: "Yes, I ran on common sense. That's what I did. Common sense. Yes." And I said, "Gee."

But the problem in politics: You come up with a little slogan, and they copy it. But, you know, they copied "No Tax on Tips." Remember? I said, "No tax on tips."

Nevada hadn't been won for many years by a Republican and—the State of Nevada. And don't ever call it Ne-vah-da. [Laughter] You'll lose 25 percent. Call it Nevada. It's true.

It seems almost nicer the other way. You know, "Nevada" sounds like Brooklyn. Does that make sense? [Laughter] "I come from Nevada." But don't ever call it Ne-vah-da. Call it Nevada.

But, as you know, the corrupt globalist establishment that ruled our country for decades is now complaining that I'm doing exactly what I pledged to do in the campaign. All of these things—tariffs, the men in women's sports—everything—the borders, strong borders.

We have the strongest border we've ever had. Today it was just announced. Strongest border. They don't want to write that. You know, they forget. They forget.

Eggs. I came in—eggs. Not a very glamorous thing to talk—but eggs. I was in for 1 week, and they said, "Egg prices are soaring." I said: "I've just been here. I didn't know this. Please."

I didn't know it. The fake news. They're going, "Egg prices are soaring." I said: "Man, I just got here. You know, let me know about it. What's going on with eggs? Tell me."

So they gave me a little bit of a thing. And it's true. Under Biden, they soared like double, triple, quadruple. You couldn't even get them. They were not available. They said: "Don't use eggs for Easter. Use the plastic alternative." [Laughter] Plastic. We got—at Mar-a-Lago, we've got plastic eggs all over the place. They said: "Don't use it for Easter. For—if you're doing an Easter egg hunt, do not use eggs."

Well, we have a wonderful Secretary of Agriculture, as you know, Brooke Rollins. She's here someplace, I think. And she got—she went after it. When she goes after something, we don't play games. Right, Brooke?

And eggs—egg prices are down now 87 percent, and you have all the eggs you want. Eighty-seven percent. And they didn't write about it. They don't talk about it.

I go up. I make speeches about eggs all the time. I never get a reporter writing about it, because we were successful.

If you're a Republican, when you're successful in something, you have to toot your own horn, talk about it, because you're the only one that's going to. It's a pretty rough—it's a rough business, I will tell you.

But the shrill voices that you're hearing this week about tariffs are the same scoundrels and frauds who never thought twice about when the United States lost 90,000 factories and plants. Think of that: 90,000. How do you do 90—if you had a map, a big map the size of that wall, and you had a pin for each factory, you would have enough room.

You think of it: 90,000 factories since NAFTA—the worst trade deal in history, by the way, and we had it terminated. Everybody said, "You'd never be able to." It had to be terminated by Congress, and it was not easy. It was so bad.

You know, the people have a lot of—it's very interesting, they have a lot of power. They have a lot of political power. It's hard to get even a bad deal terminated, but we did do it. And we got USMCA, and that's been really great.

But when they cheat, it's not so good. And they cheat. They do cheat. You know, I respect Mexico, I respect Canada, but they cheat like hell.

You know, Canada charges, for our dairy products, 270 percent. Nobody knows that. They charge you 2 percent for the first two cartons of milk, and after that, you go up to 270. Then the press says, "They've only charged 2 percent." No, that's for the first two cartons.

So it's—you know, we can't have that. And we have to be wise to it and get along with everybody, but we have to call people out.

Six million manufacturing jobs were lost since NAFTA, when 21 million illegal aliens were brought across our borders—think of that—many of whom were violent criminals, murderers, drug lords, and the mentally insane. Insane asylums were closed.

They used to go crazy when I talk about Hannibal Lecter—the late, great Hannibal Lecter, right? "Silence of the Lambs." [Laughter] The fake news would say: "Why does he talk about that? He's a fictional character." He's actually not. We have many of them that came across the border. [Laughter] He's actually not.

But when the people went to the voting booth, then we understood why he talked about that, because they voted for us. They said, "We don't want Hannibal Lecter in our country."

The great Hannibal Lecter. He was a very important force, but the press would go absolutely crazy if I mentioned Hannibal Lecter's name because they said, "He's a fictional character." No, but it was making a point.

And the point is: They're emptying mental institutions and insane asylum—not anymore they're not—insane asylums into our country. We had numbers the likes of which nobody's ever seen anything like it.

Other countries—I deal with other countries all the time. I am right now on tariffs, where they want to make a deal with us. We don't necessarily want to make a deal with them. We're happy the way we are, taking our $2 billion a day. But they want to make a deal with us, and they talk about it. And they say, "We cannot believe that they had open borders."

These are countries, they have—you know, they have borders, and they don't let people into their country. They can't understand how. They did it because they're sick or they're crazy. There's something really wrong with these people.

But the same people now telling me about how to deal with China are the ones who sold out America for decades to China. For decades, they gave up to China. I'm the only one that China—you know how much—China has paid almost $700 billion in tariffs under me.

And then they say, "Donald Trump hasn't been tough on China." They say, "Trump hasn't been tough on Russia."

Okay, here's the story. Nord Stream 2—did anybody ever hear of it? It's the biggest pipeline in the world. I closed it. Russia had it. I closed it. Putin told me, "That's the worst thing. You're supposed to be friendly with me. I'd hate to see you as my enemy." I closed Nord Stream 2.

When Biden got in, he opened it up immediately. It serviced all of Europe, going to Germany. It serviced all of Europe. We closed it. And they say, "Oh, he wasn't tough on Russia." I was very tough with the sanctions and everything else.

And by the way, just for your information, we're trying like hell to get the fighting stopped between Russia and Ukraine—a thing that never would have happened if the election wasn't rigged. We had a rigged election, and we can say it and say it loud and say it proud, because the election was rigged and we can't let that stuff happen anymore.

Go to paper ballots; go to same-day voting; go to voter ID; go to citizenship; you have to prove your citizenship—a little piece of paper—and you won't have it.

It's sort of disappointing, because a lot of Republican Governors—they could do that. Same-day voting, paper ballots—very sophisticated paper, actually, it's all watermarked. You can't cheat—very hard to cheat.

France went that way. They were like us, and they were, you know, having very bad elections, very crooked elections. They had 37 million people. They voted. They had a winner. They had a loser. They went home. That was it. Ten o'clock in the evening, it was over.

With us—you ever see: We have these machines that cost a fortune. And they say, "We think we're going to have the final vote tally in 2½ weeks." [Laughter] And, wait a minute, this is election day. You ever see where, in California, they were counting votes four weeks later? And then they say—and that—

And by the way, all paper costs 8 percent of the machines. Why is it that Republican Governors aren't going to it, okay? What's going on with our Republican Governors? If nothing else, you say, "Even if it was just the same"—and it's not. It's—you know, it's—nothing's foolproof when it comes to voting, but it's pretty close. But it costs 8 percent.

In other words, you can have your election 8 percent the cost of the machines, and you get an accurate count. So it's pretty amazing.

They gave us NAFTA, mass illegal immigration—the Democrats did—the fake Paris climate accord and the—China's entry into the World Trade Organization. That was a wonderful day for us. [Laughter] China entered the World Trade. They've done pretty good.

And you know, they didn't do things exactly by the books, and they were a developing nation. They still are. They say: "We are a developing nation. We should be entitled to more." And our people say: "Oh, that's right. They're developing."

They're not developing. We're developing. Look at some of our inner cities. We've got to develop them.

But we can't let the Democrats get away with this stuff. But we're developing more than they are.

The globalists have been wrong about everything. And so I wear their attack on me—because nobody has ever been attacked like a man named Donald J. Trump. In the history of our country, nobody has ever. But I wear it as a badge of honor.

Nobody has ever been attacked. I was under more investigations than the late, great Al Capone. [Laughter] He was the most violent criminal. He was the most violent mob boss in history, and I was under investigation far more than him. It wasn't even close.

Our opponents are not afraid that our "America first" policies will fail. They're terrified that our strategy will succeed and we're going to get bigger and stronger and better as a party, and that's what's happening. And that is what's happening. It's going to be something.

And I'm actually looking forward to the midterms. I really are. We're going to prove that all of their treasonous years of betrayal will not be forgotten, because it's treason. What they did is treason.

When they allowed millions of people to pour in through open borders—from all over the world they came—to me, that's treason. What they've done to our country is unthinkable. The money we have to spend to take people out.

And then we have judges that say, "No, let Tren de Aragua come back into our country." They want them to come back in. Killers. They cut off a man's fingers because he—"Did you cut off—did you, sir, make a phone call to the police in Colorado?" "Yes, I did. I did." "You've attacked us, and you've taken over our building." They took over real estate all over Colorado. "You did, right? Give me your hand. Put the hand down." Boom. Cuts off his fingers. And they want him back.

And how about the mix-up with the MS-13? Where it wasn't a Tren de Aragua; it was an MS-13 killer. And they said: "Oh, they got them mixed up. Let's get them back into our country."

No, we've got to—we need people that are going to love our country.

I'm proud to be the President for the workers, not the outsourcers; the President who stands up for Main Street, not Wall Street, who protects the middle class, not the political class, and who defends America, not trade cheaters all over the globe.

They're trade cheaters. They cheated on us. They cheated with tariffs on us. They stole our money. They stole our jobs.

And now people are going around, saying, "Oh, we're not treating them right." No, we're treating them very good, actually. They're lucky we're treating them so good.

And you know, when I have tariffs, and I say: "Well, we're going to charge what they did. We're going to charge what they did," and then I say, "I'm going to charge much less than they did"—believe me, we're actually being nice about it. But we're doing very well, better than we've ever done before.

My job is not to maximize the profits of outsourcers and foreign—I mean, these foreign corporations are horrible. It's horrible what they're doing, but we're catching them. We're catching them by the dozens.

My job is: Defend the—I have to defend the American dream, and I have to defend the American citizens. That's my job. I have to defend that. The American dream is never mentioned.

It was mentioned for 4 years, and now it's being mentioned again, but it was never mentioned when we had Sleepy Joe in office. [Laughter]

I used to have a big—the hardest thing I had to do with Joe Biden is the nickname. Do I call him "Sleepy Joe" or "Crooked Joe"? Could we take a vote, please?

Who wants to call him Crooked Joe? [Applause]

Who wants to call him Sleepy Joe? [Applause]

That's my problem. It's, like, the same. They both work. [Laughter] They both work beautifully.

Joe had one ability that I didn't have. You know, he said he was a good golfer. He's terrible. [Laughter] Somebody said the only time I got angry during our debate: when he said he was a six handicap. He's not a six. He's not a 36, okay? [Laughter]

But he had one ability that I don't have: He was able to go to a beach, bathing suit in tow—[laughter]—because it looked like it was actually falling off. [Laughter] But he'd go—had a hard time walking through the sand because, you know, sand is heavy on your feet—[laughter]—carrying one of those 6-ounce chairs that are made out of aluminum, that if you weigh a little bit too much, it just cracks in the middle when you sit down. And he could sit down in a beach, with photographers on the beach. You know, he's the President, so he had a minimum of photographers, but he still had photographers. And he could fall asleep.

Who the hell could do that? Who could fall asleep? [Laughter]

And he'd turn around, and drool would be coming out. [Laughter] He didn't care. His wife didn't care. It's an ability that—I could never fall asleep under those circumstances. I'd be very conscious of my body and what we look like. [Laughter]

I'd be sitting up like this. Then I'd say: "Darling, it's time to go. Let's get out of here." [Laughter] Well, wouldn't most people? I mean, when you think—this guy could go to the beach and he was out in seconds. [Laughter] Guys are shooting him. He'd be in the papers the next day, eyes closed, mouth open.

The United States has been getting ripped off for 50 years, and we're simply not going to take it anymore. And that's what's happening right now.

In 1950, the United States dominated global auto production, producing more than 75 percent of all of the cars on Earth—think of that, 75 percent—and even higher before that. Today, we produce 11 percent, while China produces three times more than we do.

Let me tell you something, with the tariffs that we're doing—as you know, we have tariffs on automobiles, aluminum, steel—separate from the other tariffs—"the baseline," we call it—companies are pouring back into our country with plants. There's a run on sites. There's a run on old plants. Most of them are being ripped down for new plants. They've stopped building in Mexico four or five plants, and they come—they're all coming into the United States.

I know what the hell I'm doing. I know what I'm doing, and you know what I'm doing too. That's why you vote for me.

And the chipmakers are coming in. They're all coming in. We've never had anything like this. We have investment, they think, of about seven—think of this: $7 trillion. And that's been in a month and a half. Think of that. For the first, like—you've got to give me a little time to get warmed up with that, so let's take the first couple of weeks off. For about a month and a half, we got seven—almost $7 trillion spoken for. Trillion.

We've never had that. I don't know if we've ever had it anytime. But if you go back and look at Biden and these other campaigns, any of them, they had—they didn't have those numbers for the year.

These are the biggest chipmakers in the world, the biggest auto manufacturers in the world. Seven trillion dollars of investment, and that means jobs. I look at differently. Not investment, I mean—I look at it as jobs. And they're coming in at levels that we've never seen before.

And it is true that Mexico—they've stopped building plants, and those plants are now going to be built in the United States of America. So it's pretty exciting.

All because of two things. They say—they want to be nice to me. They say: "Sir, because of November 5, the election, and because of tariffs." I said, "In that order?" And the smart ones say: "Yes, sir. First was that you got elected, and second was tariffs," and I'll accept that, you know? But I will tell you: because of tariffs.

But I'm the only one that would have done the tariffs, because everybody was afraid. They were afraid of being criticized, because the globalists will go after you.

For seven decades, American ships have patrolled the seas, American troops have kept the pace and peace, and American wealth has enriched the globe. But despite all we have given to them, you will not find an American car in Berlin, in Tokyo, in Seoul, in Shanghai. Not a car.

I used to say to Angela Merkel, "Angela, how many Chevrolets do we have in Berlin?" "Why, none, Donald. None." "That's right, Angela. You got it. How many Chevrolets do you think we have in Munich, Angela?" "None, Donald." I said, "You sent us 7 million cars last year."

So we're going to start buying American-made cars or cars that are manufactured in America.

And if you can do it—not part of what I was going to say, but one of the best things that I think I've come up with is interest deductions. If you buy a car that's made in America, you get an interest deduction on the money you borrow—and I love it. I hope you can do it, Mike. I hope you can do it, because I haven't bugged you about that. I've been talking about "No tax on tips," "No tax on Social Security," "No tax on overtime."

And I haven't really been as strong on this one, but it's only because it gets a little bit long, you know? But if you think of it: You buy a car, you borrow money, and you get a deduction on that money if the car is made in America. I think—that will not cost you 10 cents. You'll make money with that one. I think you'll make money, actually, in a certain way, with the other three also. I think they're very important, and they were part of our campaign.

I was going to say, before that—in Nevada, that when I came up with the "No tax on tips," I think that's why we won by a massive amount.

And interestingly, they came up about a month and a half later. She was making one of her few speeches. She didn't speak too much—for a reason, a good reason. She was making a speech, and, in the middle of it, she said, "Oh, and, by the way, we will have"—everyone's falling asleep—"we will have no tax on tips." That place booed the hell out of her. [Laughter] They said, "You're a little late on that one."

Because I was worried they would copy me. You know, it was so good.

You know how it actually happened? Maybe I should tell the story quickly.

I was in my building in Las Vegas—we have a great restaurant there—and this young, beautiful waitress—and you're not allowed to say "beautiful," because that's the end of your political career. [Laughter] If you called a—if you call a young woman beautiful, that's the end of your career. But what the hell? She was beautiful. [Laughter]

So she came up to me, and she said: "Hello, sir. It's so nice to have you at the hotel." I said, "Thank you." I had a group of people—some political people, actually. It was very interesting. And I said, "How's everything going?" She said: "Oh, it's so tough. They're after my tips." "Who's after?" "The government. They're after my tips. Constantly, after my tips. They're after all of us for the tips."

She said, "Sir, we should have no tax on tips." I said: "Say it again. What?" "We should have no tax"—she said it. This was my consultant: a waitress from my hotel. Most people go out spend millions of dollars to come up with an idea. [Laughter] I said, "She just said 'no tax on tips.' That's the coolest thing I've ever heard."

So I went outside. There were a lot of—we finished our wonderful meal—steak—went outside, and there were a lot of cameras, as there always are, unfortunately. I say: "Ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to have a new policy all over the country, but specifically in Nevada. There will be no tax on tips." Right? And the cameras went wild. Click, click, click, click, click. And we won the state by a lot. So I don't know.

So I hope—I have to find that waitress and thank her. She was my consultant—[Laughter]—except I didn't pay her $2 million like the other consultants that we all get screwed by.

Even worse than the tariffs other countries impose are the nonmonetary barriers. That's a nonmonetary—these are not financial. These are other things, what they do so that you can't get your product in that country.

And China, as you know, is one of the bigger offenders. It's not all China.

Look, I get along with President Xi. I have over the years, but, you know, you just—when COVID came, that was the end. That was it. That was called the "bridge too far." But I've always had a good relationship with a very smart guy. He loves his country. I love our country. So, you know, we love our country; he loves his.

I tell that to other leaders: "You've got to fight for your country. It's—you're not going to fight for us, but we can't fight for you." We're fighting for other countries. We're trying to make them great without making us great. But those days are over.

They steal our intellectual property. They rob our trade secrets. They manipulate their currency to levels that have never been seen before.

Today it was announced that China is reducing its currency. Did you see that? Big. Big. In other words, they're going to make up for it. They got every trick in the book. I'll tell you, they are great. You've got to hand it to them. You've got to hand it to them. They've—they're manipulating their currency today as an offset against the tariffs.

You're not supposed to do that. The game isn't supposed to be played that way. It makes it very hard for us.

But, in the end, it's not good because they have to buy oil. See, we don't need oil. We don't need oil and gas. We have more than any other country. They have to buy it. That's where it hurts them when they do that. It costs them twice as much.

And they ship their products through every one of our trading partners, running up our deficits with these countries. They sell a lot.

You know, when you put a tariff on them, they sell it, like with steel. They were dumping tremendous amounts of steel into our country during my term. I saved every steel mill. Every—we only have steel mills because of what I did. I put a high tariff on them, 25 and then 50 percent, and it stopped. It stopped. They were dumping so much steel, we would have lost every single steel mill.

The people that like me best are the people in the steel business, but I think the auto business is going to be right there. I think chips are going to be there.

I think pharmaceuticals are going to be there, because, you know, we don't make our own pharmaceuticals—drugs and other things to get better. They're made in other countries. And you pay a number—I mean, the same package in our country compared to, like, London and other places, is sometimes 10 times more. Ten times more. Something that sells for $88 in London sells for $1,300 here, made in the same factory by the same company. And that's over. I told them all, "That's over."

They put all of their research and develop money; they put everything. But what they don't tell you is that these other countries are smart. They say, "You can't charge more than $88. Otherwise, you can't sell your product," and the drug companies listen to them.

But we're going to do something that we have to do. We're going to put—we're going to tariff our pharmaceuticals, and once we do that, they're going to come rushing back into our country because we're the big market. The advantage we have over everybody is that we're the big market.

So we're going to be announcing very shortly a major tariff on pharmaceuticals. And when you—and when they hear that, they will leave China, they will leave other places, because they have to sell—most of their product is sold here. And they're going to be opening up their plants all over the place in our country.

We're going to be announcing that. So that's breaking news. Ladies and gentlemen, we have breaking news. That's what's going to happen.

What other Presidents allow China to get away with is absolutely criminal, but I'm not like the other Presidents, and it's not going to happen under President Trump. It's just not going to happen.

After all of the abuses they've perpetrated, China is attempting to impose additional unjustified tariffs.

Just so you understand, they all got rich because of tariffs. You know, now, when we do it, "Oh, it's so terrible what Trump is doing. It's so terrible." They got rich. And not only China, many countries. I mean, you look at Vietnam, you look at so many—I could name 50 right now. Biden couldn't do that. He couldn't name any. [Laughter] "Name one country. Name any country. What's the name of our country?" He doesn't know. [Laughter]

That's why additional tariffs on Chinese goods are in place, effective midnight tonight, at 104 percent. Until they make a deal with us, that's what it's going to be. I think they'll make a deal at some point. China will. They want to make a deal. I—they really do. They want to make a deal. They just don't know how to get it started, because they're proud people.

China will now pay a big number to our Treasury. This is all taxes. And don't let them keep telling you that this is a tax on our people. I hate that. You know, they say, "It's a tax." No. Often, much of it is paid.

And, hey, look what happened during my first term. We had no inflation, and yet I took in hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs and taxes from China. No other President got 10 cents in tariffs or taxes from China. I got hundreds of billions of dollars—hundreds of billions of dollars.

And I still got along with them, because they understood what they were doing was wrong. They understood it. It's—when you explain it, they sit—they say—I've had numerous leaders tell me: "You're right, sir. I was waiting for you to bring this up." Because some of the trade deals that were made by predecessors, as President, were so bad, you almost wonder who did these deals. They were either crooked or stupid. They could be nothing else. They were either stupid or crooked.

It's terrible, but it's all being changed. I changed a lot of it in the first 4 years, but it's all being changed.

You know, in the first 4 years, we had the most successful country in history in terms of economics. We had 88-percent increase in the stock markets. We had an 88-percent increase. There's never been any president that had an 88-percent increase. We had 88 percent. And there were a lot of happy people. And I think we're going to do much better than that this time, because this time I'm doing what I want to do with respect to the tariffs. I think we're going to do much better.

And just remember the numbers. When you get up to $2 billion a day—$2 billion a day. They're saying, "Sir, can't be that, can it?" I said, "Yes, it can." It's the biggest transaction ever made. This is bigger than any deal.

You guys—some of you work for companies. Your companies are peanuts—I don't care how big they are—compared—this is the largest transaction in the history of our country.

And don't let some of these politicians go around saying, "You know"—because I'm telling you, these countries are calling us up, kissing my ass. They are. [Laughter] They are dying to make a deal. "Please. Please, sir, make a deal. I'll do anything. I'll do anything, sir."

And then I'll see some rebel Republican—you know, some guy that wants to grandstand, say, "I think that Congress should take over negotiations." Let me tell you, you don't negotiate like I negotiate. Congress takes over negotiating, sell America fast because you're going to go busted. [Laughter]

You don't—I just saw it today. A couple of your Congressmen said, "I think we should get involved in the negotiation of the tariffs." Oh, that's what I need. I need some guy telling me how to negotiate. [Laughter] Ai yai yai.

I'll tell you, the happiest people in the world would be China. They wouldn't be paying 104 percent, I tell you. They'd be paying no percent. We'd be paying them 104 percent. [Laughter] That's the beauty is these guys. We got to be careful.

And even the concept of it hurts your negotiation. When they see a little story like that, the other side, you know, it hurts your negotiation. And then the fake news wants to build it up, and it has no chance anyway. But we have to remain united.

As I defend workers from unfair trade, House Republicans have a chance this week to bring trillions and trillions of dollars pouring back into America by pushing forward with the largest tax cuts in American history, which is what you're working on right now. The largest in American history.

And you know, the reason we had—because we had a great first term and—amazing first term. But I saw that the other day, that we had the most successful—I mean, I knew it anyway, but I saw that we had 88-percent increase. That's a tremendous increase. Think of that.

And that's with all of the difficulties and all of the fake investigations and the Adam "Shifty" Schiffs. Can you believe this guy? He's got the smallest neck I've ever seen—[laughter]—and the biggest head. We call him "watermelon head." How—I'd say, "How could that big, fat face stand on a neck that looked like this finger? How can it?" It was the weirdest thing. It's a mystery. Nobody can understand it. [Laughter]

But he's one of the most dishonest human beings I've ever seen. And, you know, how we can allow people like that to run in office is a shame, but we did. He was in charge of the witch hunt. You know, he was in charge of the fake witch hunt with "Russia, Russia, Russia." It was a made-up story. Made-up. Think of it. They make up a story. They know it's made up.

It's gone on for a year and a half, two years, "Russia, Russia, Russia." I knew nothing about it. The only thing I knew was that I taxed the pipeline that I told you about, that I put all sorts of sanctions on everything else. I never had—no—they never had a problem like they had with me.

But it was "Russia, Russia, Russia" constant as a method of—that was a—what they did is that was the complaint about why she lost that election, because Crooked Hillary was expected to win the election. But that was—they didn't—they didn't see what we saw. We saw the biggest crowds in history gathering, only superseded by the crowds we just had.

But here's a guy that goes out, and he goes to an intelligence hearing or whatever you might call it, and it's supposed to be secret. He'd walk out. He'd either make a call, off the record. "Off the record. This is Crooked Adam Schiff." "Shifty" Schiff. He's a "Shifty" Adam. Or he'd just go out blatantly and have a news conference, and because it had to do with me and my family, he'd go out and have a news conference, and he said—

Now, you've got to remember, he knows it's a hoax, because he made it up with Crooked Hillary. So he knows it's a hoax, because we're dealing with human beings on the other side. He'd say, "Donald Trump, Jr., the son of the President of the United States, will spend many years in prison because of what he's done with Russia."

Now, think of that statement on a human basis. I have a son—a young son, who is being told that he's going for prison on something he has—he doesn't even know what they're talking about. He said: "Dad, I don't know what's going on. They keep talking about I'm involved with Russia. I don't know anything about Russia. I swear to you, Dad."

And yet Adam Schiff goes out and makes a statement about a hoax that he made up that he knows is false. How bad a human being do you have to be? They put my son and my family through that kind of trauma. These are bad people. These are sick degenerates. And I used to be much nicer to them. I gave them the benefit of the doubt, but I've just seen too much.

They make up a story about Russia. It's a hoax, and eventually—now they've all admitted it was a hoax. Onto the next one. That's "Russia, Russia, Russia." But they know it's a hoax, and they say about a young man that he's going to spend the rest of his life in prison because of what he's done with Russia. He knows it's a hoax. How bad do you have to be to have that happen to your son?

And you know, there's a bad effect on a family, a bad effect. You know, "Are you okay, Don? "I am, Dad, but I don't understand. They keep tying me to Russia. I don't know anything about Russia." He didn't know a damn thing about Russia. It's a disgraceful situation. That's why we've got to kick their asses in the midterms, and we've got to kick their asses again in 4 years.

If we slash taxes on American workers and producers, our economy will soar, jobs will surge, manufacturing will boom, and our country will prosper like never, ever before. We've got to get this big, beautiful deal done. We got to get it done and get it done now. Don't wait 2 weeks. Don't wait 2 weeks. See, bad things happen. Crazy things happen in politics, just get the damn thing done and stop showboating.

Couple of people want to—"Sir, we've got to get a little bit more." A little bit more—you know what you're going to get? End up getting nothing. You end up getting a Democrat bill or worse.

In the past 11 weeks, we've already created 350,000 jobs—it's unprecedented—including 10,000 manufacturing jobs, and we haven't even started yet.

Gas prices—you know, when I came in, they said, "He campaigned on prices coming down, and prices are going up." They're not going up; they're going down. Gas prices are way down. In fact, they had something—$2.50 a gallon, I saw on television a little while ago in between my—watching my great friends on C-SPAN, I saw that the prices are down to $2.50, $2.60, $2.75. It was—when I came in office, it was $3.50, $3.75, but prices are coming down.

Prices on groceries are coming down. Prices of eggs are down, like, 87 percent—87. You know, they got me with that, I told you. Before I even got in office, they would tell me about—they're down close to 87 percent.

And core inflation has dropped to the lowest levels in 4 years. And as I said, we had no inflation in 4 years, despite the fact that I took in hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs, and we hadn't even started yet. Nearly $6 trillion of new investment, and that number is now revised up to about 7.

Apple, great company, is spending $500 billion because of tariffs—$500 billion, not $500 million. That's a lot. Five hundred million. You know, when I first heard the number, I said, "You mean $500 million. You could build a lot of plants for five"—"No sir, $500 billion." Five hundred billion.

TSMC, the biggest, most powerful chipmaker in the world—this is without that stupid CHIP Act, where they say, "Here's billions of dollars," to a company that doesn't need it. These chip companies are loaded. They give these companies billions of dollars to build a plant in the United States. They don't build them in the United States. They keep the money. It looks good. They gave them billions.

No. TSMC, I gave them no money. Great company, most powerful in the world, biggest chip company in the world. They're spending $200 billion in Arizona, building one of the biggest plants in the world, and that's without money. All I did is say, "If you build—if you don't build your plant here, you're going to pay a big tax—25, maybe 50, maybe 75, maybe 100 percent."

Nvidia is investing hundreds of billions of dollars. Johnson and Johnson is investing $55 billion. Eli Lilly is investing $27 billion. DAMAC is investing $20 billion. We have billions and billions being invested by Merck, Clarios, Stellantis, General Motors, Honda, Nissan, Hyundai. All are putting in billions and billions and billions of dollars. They're buying sites all over. They're building, because they don't want to have to pay 25- and 50-percent tariffs. They're all doing it.

And I think they also have confidence in the country. They have a President that they have confidence in. I know many of them.

With the help of people in this room, we are one big, beautiful bill signing away from the greatest economy in the history of the world.

And it's an overhang. You know, this bill is an overhang, because if it doesn't get signed, we will have imposed the biggest tax on the people of this country in our country's history by 40 percent—the biggest tax. Because we gave you the biggest tax cut in history; now we're giving you another, which is one of the reasons that—there are many reasons why we were so successful, but that's one of the big ones.

The other one is that 1-year deduction—all-in, 1-year deduction. So big. And I know they're working on that, the big deduction. It makes people invest. But now we're working on something that's going to, I think, blow it away. This bill is unbelievable. It's going to bring a lot of money back into our country.

But if we don't do it, it's going to be a disaster, and you'd just better hope that people believe that it was the Democrats' fault, because, you know, they're very good at saying it was our fault. It will be the biggest tax increase in history.

And all my life, as I watched politicians—I wasn't a politician, but I watched them, and I contributed to them a lot—contributed a lot of money over the years—but I watched it. But all my life, I'd hear politicians saying: "We are going to give you a tax cut. I will cut your taxes. We will cut your"—I never heard—they're the only party that says: "We are going to increase your taxes. Vote for me." Who the hell ever heard this? [Laughter] Only these people.

We're in a strange time. These lunatics go out and they tell everybody how you're going to have a big tax increase. So maybe they want the bill to fail so they can have a tax increase—maybe they'll take credit for it. But I've never heard that said. All—I've watched politics all my life. I've never seen politicians campaign on, "We're going to increase your taxes," except these crazy Democrats.

As part of this legislation, I am committed to spending cuts, and I will fight hard to include the elimination of hundreds of billions of dollars in waste, fraud, and abuse in the bill. We've already found hundreds of billions of dollars through DOGE. And Elon has been terrific. He's been really terrific. But we've found hundreds of billions of dollars of waste, fraud, and abuse.

But now we need to get the budget resolution, and we have to get it passed in the Senate. We have to bring it through the House. It's going to pass in both.

One thing I'll say is that Thune has been great. John Thune has been great. And he's worked with your great leader hand in hand. Those two bills are coming up together, and they're very similar, and I didn't know if that would happen, because you have a lot of different rules, procedures, complicated stuff.

But Mike has been amazing and John Thune. And they've worked, like, amazingly well, because they've just been going on at the same time. And we're ready to get this thing done and beyond and get rid of the debt hangover ceiling that's a disaster for our country and for everybody and to give people the biggest tax cuts they've ever had, because we're going to add them both up together. It will be the biggest tax cuts. It will blow away the tax cuts that we got them four years ago.

If we follow through on this agenda, we will be rewarded with a phenomenal economy and a massive victory at the ballot box in 2026 because we will have a record of triumph like no President has ever had, like no Congress has ever had. They will not be able to even touch your seat. Your seat is secure, and we'll pick up 40, 50, or even 60 seats, and we'll have something that's going to be smooth sailing for years to come.

If we don't get it done because of stupidity or a couple of people that want to show how great they are, you just have to laugh at them or smile at them or cry right in their face.

In less than 3 months, our new administration has already accomplished more than most administrations achieve in four years or eight years, and everybody says it. And we have to have this stuff documented and approved.

In a matter of weeks, we've achieved the lowest level of illegal border crossings in American history—in history. They have a plaza in front in Tijuana—Tijuana, Mexico. I wouldn't advise going there on a trip, but nevertheless—[laughter]—they have a plaza, a big plaza. It held hundreds of thousands of people. Yesterday morning there were none. There was a man sweeping this massive plate of concrete—massive. And he was sweeping the concrete, and there was nobody there.

During the same period last year, Joe Biden released more than 184,000 illegal aliens into our country. Think of it. Many of these people were from jails and mental institutions, as I said.

Since my Inauguration, we've released a grand total of nine. Nine. Nine. And they were all, in all cases, medical emergencies. We did that for medical emergency reasons.

Last month, we officially designated Tren de Aragua, MS-13, and the Mexican drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. And thanks to the Supreme Court yesterday—and today we had a big ruling too; we had a very big ruling today—but we will continue to deport these monsters under the Alien Enemies Act. Think of that: Alien Enemies Act. Can you believe it?

All things we wouldn't have had to do if the election weren't rigged. Now, in reconciliation, we need Republicans in Congress to give us the full funding to permanently secure the border and to carry out—that's part of what we're asking for. Who could fight that? We want to permanently secure.

Without a border or without fair elections and without a good press, you don't have a country. Well, we have a lousy press, we now have a good border, and we're going to get good elections pretty soon. There's a lot of clamor for it. I think it's something that you—you should work on. You should go out and put a bill in demanding—you demand. You know, because the states are just an agent of the Federal Government, of you. You ought to demand paper ballots. You ought to demand 1-day elections.

You know what they do when it's longer than 1 day? All of a sudden: "Well, we're fixing the room up. Move those boxes. We're putting in air conditioning." "Oh, really?" "We'll move the boxes back in a few days. Oh, we're painting the room. Please move the boxes." And you notice, the boxes go out, and then they get—they move back in about half the number. Oh, it's so sick.

One-day election. You don't need any more than that. One-day election, paper ballots. It's—I think you should put a bill in. I mean, I don't know. Who's in favor of a bill? Who could not want it? Who could not want it?

But I think you should do a bill on that. I think it would be so popular. And more importantly than popular, it's so necessary. You have to have great elections. You have to have fair and free elections, and you've got to have borders; otherwise, you don't have a country.

To quickly bring down the cost of energy and lower the price of everything, on day one, I declared a national energy emergency to drill, baby, drill. We're drilling. Oh, we're drilling.

I withdrew from the unbelievably expensive, for us, Paris—the Paris climate accord. So, we were paying—it would have cost us a trillion dollars. A trillion. China doesn't come into it till, like, 2035. Russia is based on a 1992 standard when it was—the air was dirty. Everybody was—India was based on a very low standard. Except the United States, we had to pay immediately.

We would have spent trillions of dollars on that scam. And it sounds so nice: the Paris climate accord. What a beautiful name. Isn't it beautiful? It was a rip-off for the United States.

Well, don't forget, you know, I mean, I'm negotiating with these people. But if you really look, the European Union, why was that set up? It was set up to screw the United States of America. It was—they formed a group of countries, got together, and "Let's make life miserable for the United States of America on trade and other things." And they have done that. They've done that. They've treated us very badly.

We don't sell cars into the European Union. We don't sell—they won't take our agriculture. They want their own. But we take their agriculture. We take their cars by the millions.

I terminated the "green new scam," one of the great scams, one of the great hoaxes in the history of our country, only superseded by "Russia, Russia, Russia" hoax.

I canceled Joe Biden's insane electric vehicle mandate, where everybody had to have an electric vehicle in a very short period of time. Everybody was forced to have an electric vehicle.

You know, they built some power stations in the Midwest. They look like gas pumps with electricity, right? They spent $8 billion, and four of the nine of them don't work. Four of nine. They built nine or eight, but half of them don't work. They spent $8 billion bringing the cables, bringing the wires. What a great investment that was. Billions of dollars they spent.

No, now people can go out and buy a gasoline-powered car, a hybrid. They can buy whatever they want. We don't want hydrogen because they have some big problems. They blow up, and you'd never see who was driving the car. You'd not recognize them. [Laughter] That's a big problem.

They were telling me about, "Sir, I'm really liking hydrogen cars." I said, "But isn't there a problem?" "Yes, they tend to blow up on occasion." [Laughter]

I said, "How bad is it?" "Well, we found body parts 250 yards away from the car." [Laughter] "We think it was Mr. Jones, but we're going to go to see his dentist and see if we can find"—[laughter]. So, if you have one of those incidents, let's forget it, right? It's a bomb. It's a bomb. [Laughter]

I don't want him to work on—I actually said, "Don't work on it." Between that and windmills—you can have windmills too. Most expensive form of energy ever.

Anybody have a windmill by your house? Congratulations, you'll never sell your house. [Laughter]

And today I signed historic Executive orders to unleash coal production to the highest levels ever. Because, you know, coal is the most powerful thing. We have more of it than any—we have more liquid gold under our feet, oil and gas; and we have more coal than any other country. Any other—no other country has as much as we have. All different forms of coal.

And take a look at China. They're building two coal plants a week. Think of that. Two a week.

We aren't screwing around with wind. Oh, wind. [Laughter] It's—these people are crazy. They say, "Oh, it's great for the environment." Yes, it kills all your birds. [Laughter] You want to see a bird cemetery? Walk under a windmill sometime. [Laughter] Got birds all over the place. They're screaming for help. They got whacked. [Laughter]

The environmentalists—it's an environmental dream. You know why? Because you're never going to have energy. [Laughter]

They're the most expensive form of energy there is—10 times more expensive than clean, natural gas. Ten times. Much more expensive than coal, and not—very unreliable. Like, if they wanted to watch us tonight on television—"Alice, Alice, I want to watch the president tonight." "I'm sorry, darling, but the windmills aren't blowing." [Laughter]

We're going to give them confidence to do what they have to do long into the future, because coal is going to be a big factor in our country now. You know, it—it does give us our electricity, because there's nothing like coal in terms of power, but it's going to be clean, beautiful coal, like our bill. [Laughter] It's going to be clean and beautiful.

Coal miners—and by the way, they've made tremendous progress with also coal in terms of clean coal. But the coal miners standing alongside of me this afternoon in the White House, they were incredible. They were a beautiful sight to behold. These are really great American patriots, beautiful guys.

I didn't want to have any arm wrestling contests with any of them, I can tell you that. They're good, strong guys.

That's what they want to do. They love to dig coal. That's what they want to do. They don't want to do gidgets and widgets and wadgets. [Laughter] They don't want to build cell phones with their hands—their big, strong hands doing a little thing.

Remember when Hillary Clinton went to West Virginia, and she had decimated them 3 weeks before in, like, some State where they make little, tiny circuit boards? And she said, "We're going to teach the miners in West Virginia how to make a circuit board with little, tiny things." She—"We're going to teach them." And then she went to West Virginia. She was going to—she was in the campaign, and she had to go there. Do you remember that stop? It was memorable. It was one of the worst.

Did they go after her. And one of the miners said: "I don't want to do anything else but dig coal. I want to dig coal." They're so—they said it today. That's what they love. They love doing it. It's like that in a lot of industries. People love doing what they're doing.

They want to dig coal. That's what they want. They don't mind going deep in earth. They feel comfortable there. Me, I could do without it. [Laughter] But they feel comfortable.

They're incredible people, actually—hard-working, incredible people. And we're giving them their lives back.

We've also begun the largest deregulation campaign in history. For every one new regulation, I have directed that 10 old regulations must be eliminated before the first one can go into effect.

And we're working tirelessly to restore peace through strength and bring back the hostages held captive abroad. We've brought a lot of them back already, but what a sad situation that is. What a sad situation that is.

That would have never happened if I were President. October 7 would have never happened, and I said Russia-Ukraine would have never happened. All this stuff. Inflation would have never happened. Afghanistan disaster would have never happened. Most embarrassing moment in the history of our country. Not leaving—I was going to leave. I'm the one that got them to a point where they could leave, but I was going to keep Bagram, the air base, the biggest—one of the biggest in the world. I was going to keep it, not for Afghanistan—because it's 1 hour away from where China makes its nuclear weapons.

Wouldn't it be nice to have it? You know who occupies it now? China occupies it now. Can you believe how stupid this guy was?

On top of that, they get blown up at the airport, leaving the wrong airport. They didn't leave from Bagram. They left from a local, little airport, which was crowded and, like, crazy with the people from the towns and cities. And the bomb went off and decimated hundreds of people. Killed hundreds. We lost 13 soldiers, but we also had 42 or 48 horribly injured—arms, legs, face horribly injured—all because we had a stupid leader. Should have never happened. Should have never been involved in that.

We're also joined tonight by a number of brave souls who recently released from—they were recently released from Hamas captivity. Hamas is just a disaster, the level of hatred. Where are the people? Hamas—they understand what that's all about. Where are you?

That's great. How does it feel to be out? How does that feel to be out, huh? You want to come up here for a second? Do you want—come on up here. Come on up here. Come on up. Yes, let—let them up, please. That's great. That's great.

I'll tell you, these people, what they had to go through. I've—I had 10 hostages in my office 2 weeks ago. What they had to go through is just horrible.

Come on up. That's great.

That is so nice to see you. That is so nice. Fantastic.

Released U.S. citizen Keith Siegel. Thank you. Thank you very much, President Trump.

I am here, and I'm alive. President Trump, you saved my life.

You saved the life of 33 hostages that—because of your efforts and your setting the hostage crisis at the high priority of what you are doing, among all of the enormous issues and things that you're dealing with. Since you came into your position as President of the United States, you set the hostage crisis at the highest priority. You got 33 of us home alive.

We all owe our lives to you. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

And please, please continue your tremendous efforts and your tremendous actions and your tremendous accomplishments. Continue, and we will get, with your help, all of the remaining 59 hostages still in Gaza back home.

Thank you.

Aviva Siegel. Thank you, President Trump, for bringing my Keith home. Thank you.

The President. Thank you, dear. Thank you, dear.

Mrs. Siegel. Keith's grandchildren are the happiest. Keith's children are the happiest. Keith's family is the happiest. But I am the most happiest. Thank you so much.

The President. Thank you so much.

Ms. Siegel. We need you—we need you to bring all the hostages home. There's 24 that are alive, and 59 to come home to their families. Just like I received Keith, they need it too.

We have Iair standing here with us. And Eitan, his brother, is underneath the ground now, begging to get out. So I'm begging you all to help us. We need your help.

Thank you.

The President. Thank you.

Please. [Inaudible]

Released Israeli citizen Iair Horn. So my name is Iair. I've been in hell for 498 days. I've been held in hell with Hamas terrorists. When we didn't see the light, but we feel—when we heard President Trump get elected, we knew—we knew there is now someone who makes the things happen.

We need—we knew that—I'm sorry about my English. I am a half Argentinian, half Israelian. I'm sorry. [Laughter]

We knew we need someone who do the things. That's President Trump. We are here because of President Trump. Thank you. Thank you for your efforts.

It's really surreal to be here, you know? We—I just—I'm a simple man. I'm running the bar in the kibbutz, in the Nir—in Nir Oz, where I was live. And now I'm here with President Trump, who's running the world. [Laughter]

We are thankful. We are really thankful. But humbly, we ask—we ask for more: the last push, the last 59 people, the last 59 hostages—among them, my brother Eitan. Where is the Liran brothers, Ziv and Gali; and Evyatar; all the brothers, all the families?

In a few days, we mark the Passover—right?—Pesach. It's a family—family time. So, I expect that in the next seder, I—when my mother make the kneydlekh, the matzah balls, that my brother Eitan, my little brother—who I call "little," but he's 38, but it's my little brother—I hope he can sit with us in the seder in—of Passover. And—wow, it's overwhelming. I just want to tell you again: Thank you. Thank you very much.

The President. So beautiful. So beautiful.

[At this point, the President spoke briefly with Mr. Siegel, Mrs. Siegel, and Mr. Horn.]

I just want to say—I said: "Of the 59 people that you want to bring home, how are they, and how are they doing? Do you have any idea?" Because they left that whole scene not long ago. And they said: "Well, of the 59, 24 are living. The rest are dead." I just heard that.

And I was told that before by somebody else. But 24 are living; the rest are dead. These are young people—largely, young people. Young people don't die. Young people are killed. They don't die. But the conditions were so horrible.

But think of that. So, of the 59—and I've had Israeli parents tell me that, "My son is dead, but please bring him home." As though he were alive, she wanted him brought home more than—it just seemed almost more than if her child was living. Amazing. She just—they wanted—the mother and father, in three other cases, they wanted to have them brought home.

I said, "How is he doing?" "He's dead. It's only his body, but we want him home." So there's an amazing thing.

But the 59 that you mentioned, you said that 24 were alive, and the rest are dead. This is a terrible thing that's going on with Hamas. Terrible.

The hatred is so incredible. It's unbelievable. And the way they were made to live was not even understandable, I think, by anybody in this audience. And you have great people in this audience that love you, and they're going to fight for you.

And I just want to thank you very much. Thank you.

Mr. Siegel. Thank you.

Mrs. Siegel. Thank you. Thank you so much.

The President. Thank you. You take care of yourself. Okay?

Mrs. Siegel. Thank you so much. Thank you.

The President. [Inaudible]

Mr. Siegel. Thank you, Mr. President.

The President. You did a good job.

Mr. Horn. Thank you.

The President. [Inaudible]

Mrs. Siegel. Please stop Hamas.

The President. I will.

Mrs. Siegel. Please.

The President. Thank you very much. Thank you. We'll get him back. Be careful.

It's incredible what they've been forced to live with for 450, 500 days. Incredible. Nobody in this room could really understand it. I found it hard to understand.

But we'll not rest until your loved ones have been returned home, and hopefully, we can do it the right way. The—we want to get those 24 out really fast, and we're working on it very hard.

There was no chance before. This is something that should have done—been done right at the beginning during the past administration.

On day one, we ended the so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion policies across the entire federal government, private sector, and it's just not even allowed. I also signed an order making it the official policy of the United States Government that there are only two genders: male and female. We want to keep it simple.

As you know, in a very important Executive order, I banned men from competing in women's sports. That was done, and I hope all of these Executive orders can be codified, can be voted on by Congress. I can't imagine any Republican that's not going to vote for them. We have many, many of them—over a hundred—and I think every single one of them is just common sense. Good—it's good politics, but the word "politics" doesn't matter to me so much. It's good for our country.

If Democrats retake the House next year, they will try to reverse all of the progress that we've made, which is record-setting progress. Instead of House committees run by Mike Johnson, Steve Scalise, Jim Jordan, James Comer, Ronny Jackson, and so many other of our friends in this audience, the House will be run by the same band of radicals and lunatics you saw at my address to Congress, including Hakeem Jeffries, A.O.C., Ilhan Omar, Nancy "Crazy" Pelosi, and weird Al Green. He's a weird dude. [Laughter]

No, he should have been treated very badly for the way he behaved that night.

Think of it. They didn't stand up. They didn't pay respect to anybody, including—think of it. You take a look at Laken Riley. You take a look at any of the people there, the parents of these incredible people. The young boy with cancer, serious cancer, wanted to be in a police department, would give anything to be a policeman someday. They refused to even applaud or acknowledge them. They're sick. There's something wrong with them.

They sat as the stories were explained. Two young ladies killed by—killed—savagely killed by illegal aliens. They came into our country, and they killed these two young ladies, and the Democrats sat there. They didn't smile. They didn't clap. They didn't do anything.

I think you, frankly, win the midterms just—all you have to do is show a picture of these grieving parents, uncontrollably grieving, and they didn't get one clap out of the whole group of them. They just sat there like stoic and disgraceful. And you show that in your commercials that you're going to be putting on, and you'll win every race that we have in this room.

That was a bad night for them, and now they know it. They're trying to make up for it. But they're just—I don't know. Something wrong with them.

That's why, every day from now until November 2026, we're going to fight, fight, fight to elect and expand the Republican majority of the House and save our country from these radical-left lunatics. We will not be deterred. We will not stop. We will not yield. And we will never, ever back down. We're not going to back down.

They would lose respect if you back down. They're the ones that back down. They're the ones that have lost their confidence. They're no good anymore. I saw politicians that were good politicians 4 years ago. They're not good politicians anymore. They've lost their confidence. They've totally lost their confidence. But they can get their confidence back, so you can't rely on that too much, I guess.

Together, we're liberating our country, reclaiming our wealth, unleashing our energy, protecting our children, rebuilding our military, repelling the invaders, deporting the criminals, destroying the gangs, and unlocking what history will know as the golden age of America. This is going to be the golden age of America.

With your support, your commitment, and your help to elect more Republicans, we will finish the job that we have really brilliantly started. It's been a brilliant period of years. And we go back to 2016, it was brilliant. Then they stole it from us by illegally rigging the election. And we did great in that election, but we had to write it off. And we all went through hell.

I went through hell, in particular: Indictments. We—what we had to go through is hard to believe. Impeachments—two impeachments over nothing, over a phone call that was perfect. They knew it was perfect, and they found out after. They realized that the calls were essentially taped by the Government because you were talking to a foreign leader. And when that was played back, they didn't know what the hell to do, but they went forward with it anyway, because they're sick people.

The American dream will come roaring back in our country. Together, we're going to make America greater than it's ever been before.

And I just want to thank you, and congratulations on your record evening. And I'm with you all the way, and I'm going to be campaigning with you, and we're going to win, win, win like we've never won before.

And thank you to your leadership. And, Mike, great job. You're doing a fantastic job.

Thank you all very much.