Remarks at a Tesla Viewing and an Exchange With Reporters

The President. Looks good. Wow. That's beautiful. That is——

X Musk. [Inaudible] Hello, everyone. Hello, hello.

White House Senior Adviser Elon R. Musk. [Laughter] Say, "Hello, everyone."

The President. That is beautiful.

X Musk. Hello, everyone.

The President. Anybody know who he is?

Senior Adviser Musk. Hello.

The President. Hello, Peter [Peter Doocy, Fox News].

White House Senior Adviser Elon R. Musk/Tesla Models on Display

Q. Hello, President Trump. Are you looking to buy or lease today?

The President. Well, I'm going to buy. And I'm going to buy because, number one, it's a great product, as good as it gets. And number two, because this man has devoted his energy and his life to doing this, and I think he's been treated very unfairly by a very small group of people.

And I just want people to know that you can't be penalized for being a patriot, and he's a great patriot. And he's also done an incredible job with Tesla. And, I mean, nobody else—has a car company started up in the last 30 years that's been successful? I don't think so. And not only successful, but super successful.

And because he's able to find billions and billions and billions of dollars of fraud and waste and all of the things, I mean, our country is going to be very strong very soon because of a lot of the things that he's done and a lot of the things that I'm doing.

And there's no better team, but there's no better—for what we're doing, there's nobody like this, and he shouldn't be penalized. And when I watched the other day, I said, "I can't believe it." It should be the opposite. People should be going wild. And they love the product, but because he's finding all sorts of terrible things that have taken place against our country, they want to penalize him in a economic sense. And I just think that's very unfair.

So I just want to make a statement. I'm going to buy one. Now, here's the bad news: I'm not allowed to drive because—[laughter]—I haven't driven a car in a long time, and I love to drive cars. But I'm going to have it at the White House, and I'm going to let my staff use it. I'm going to let people at the place use it. And they're all—they all are all excited about that.

I'm not allowed to use it. Can you believe it? [Laughter]

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

And one of my great—one of my great things in life is that I can—you know, I like to drive cars, but I'm not allowed to.

And I will say, this one, the Cybertruck, I bought for a very special young woman. Do you know? I'm sure you've never heard of her: Kai. And she's a great golfer, and she puts the clubs in the back. And I guess it's a very safe deal. She loves it. And I actually bought one about a year ago. And she loves it. And it's very safe. It's very strong, heavy. It's all steel—stainless steel.

But the cars themselves—so what is this one, Elon?

Senior Adviser Musk. This is a Model Y.

The President. That's a Model Y. So I have a lot of information, including the price.

Senior Adviser Musk. [Laughter] Yes.

The President. I want to make a good deal here. [Laughter]

You know, I do notice this. They have one which is $35,000, which is pretty low. What is that all about?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, it's—I guess we wanted to make the point that Teslas aren't all expensive. You can get a Tesla for as little as $35,000.

The President. Yes.

Senior Adviser Musk. And I just wanted to thank the President for his support. This means a lot. And also thank everyone out there who is supporting Tesla.

It's really terrible that there's so much violence being created against people at Tesla, Tesla supporters, Tesla owners, Tesla stores. These are innocent people who have done nothing wrong. So, you know—[inaudible].

The President. But nobody's been—I mean, it hasn't been—there's been some physical damage, a little damage. And we want to keep it that way, because—I don't want to say this, it's just not the appropriate—but law enforcement is out there watching everybody. We don't want this to happen, and not to somebody that's been so good to our country.

He didn't have to do this. He didn't have to go through this, and we can't let it happen.

And aside from that, I happen to love the product.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

It's always—it's a lot nicer if you also happen to love the product, and he's done a really good job.

Q. Is Elon Musk——

The President. Go ahead, Peter.

The President's Interest in Purchasing a Tesla

Q. Is there—I guess this is for Elon Musk. Is there a discount? President Trump wrote "The Art of the Deal." Is there any kind of room—[laughter]—for negotiating here?

The President. Let me answer that. I know he'd give me a discount, but, honestly, I don't want to ask for one. You know, I'm President, so I want to pay full price.

National Economy/Tariffs/U.S. DOGE Service

Q. And what is your message, President Trump, buying a new car while there are some folks who will see this clip at home and they are struggling with their retirement accounts, down at the moment; uncertainty about work ahead?

The President. Well, I think they're going to do great. I think we're—our country had to do this. We had to go and do this. They've taken away—other countries have taken away our business. They've taken away our jobs. I did it initially, very strongly, against, as you know, China and some others in the first term.

And it was a very successful term. We had no inflation. We had the greatest economy in the history of our country. And then we had COVID, which we had to straighten out, so I didn't want to be doing anything with respect to other countries at that time. And we did a great job with it.

We handed the stock market over. It was higher than it ever was and—think of that: higher than it ever was to that point before. And nobody thought that was even possible. We did a great job.

But we had the greatest economy in history. This economy, in my opinion, is going to blow it away. But what I have to do is I have to get the workers back. I have to get the factories open. We have—90,000 factories and plants are closed from what you had just prior to NAFTA, which is not very long ago—90,000.

Think of it: 90,000 factories and plants are closed from what it was, and it's just not right. So—and we gave it away. Presidents before me gave it away. And I could name every one of them. But they gave it away, and we're taking it back. We're taking our jobs back.

And one of the things I'll say, by the way, speaking of Tesla, he manufactures more cars—I mean, he opened this incredible plant, one of the largest plants in the world, in Texas.

Could you talk about that, Elon?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, it's worth noting that the Tesla cars have the most U.S. content of any cars on the market. So they're the most American-made. We have the biggest factory and most advanced automotive factory in Texas that we've opened and continue to expand.

And so this is a—very much a—it's a—these are great products. Our Model S has won best—car ever, you know. And so they've all these cars have won incredible awards. So they're great cars, and they're American-made.

And I think, you know, try it. You'll like it. [Laughter]

The President. And I'm just saying, beyond the cars, they're great, but we have to celebrate somebody that has the courage to do this. He could have said: "I'm not doing anything. I'm not going to get involved. Let the country go to hell." He didn't want to do that.

And remember, he's going to find—and we're up to almost $500 billion worth of waste and fraud and abuse—$500 billion. We give—we're giving $2 billion here, $2 billion—not millions. It was a bad—if it was a million dollars or $2 million, that's a lot of money, but we're talking about billions of dollars being given to defunct, you know, scams; given to people with no—with nothing. They have nothing going. They open up a Subchapter S corporation, and they put $2 billion into it from nowhere. And we've caught a lot of them.

I wish we could catch all of them, but we've caught a lot of them. And he's been largely responsible, so we have to celebrate him. And it's not that he's conservative. I don't even know if he's conservative. [Laughter]

The President. I will tell you this——

Senior Adviser Musk. These days, I am. [Laughter]

White House Senior Adviser Elon R. Musk

The President. ——I've been doing this for—I've known him for a pretty long time. He endorsed me. I didn't know him that well when he endorsed me. But in the time I've known him, he has never asked me for a favor. He didn't ask me for this.

I said, "You know, Elon, I don't like what's happening to you. And Tesla is a great company. I don't like what's happening." It's—from our standpoint—American cars, American-made. He employs thousands of people. He's got—at the same time, he has the most modern plants in the world.

I said, "I don't like what's happened to you. I'm going to do it." I didn't even know he was going to come. He's never asked me for anything. He endorsed me, and he never asked me. I didn't even know he was going to endorse me. The guy has never asked me—

He's not saying—in fact, I could go a step further. I ended the electric mandate. [Laughter]

Okay? I ended the electric mandate.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes. [Laughter]

The President. And I figured, "When's this guy calling to raise hell with me?"

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. And he never called. I mean, it's—he never called me.

Senior Adviser Musk. True.

The President. If I were him, I would have called——

Q. So, on that——

The President. ——because he's probably even better than I am.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Q. Mr. President, is he rubbing——

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Is Elon Musk rubbing off on you? Is electric, then, the way to go? [Laughter]

The President. It's not that—I'm not—this isn't for electric or gas, because people have their choices.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. I'm just saying that I know people that have these cars. I know one man, we see him all the time——

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. ——he's constantly—he has five of them.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. He thinks it's a great—and he was a big guy for Ferraris and other things. And he says, "Man, this"—it blows him away.

I know other people; they have three, four. They love them. They love them.

And some people like the gasoline—and they should have their options.

Senior Adviser Musk. Right.

The President. I'm all about options.

But I'm telling you, I ended the electric mandate, and I was waiting for a call. [Laughter]

I said, "Did Elon call yet?" They said, "No, sir." The next day: "What about Elon? Did he call?" He never even mentioned it to me. Never complained. Until this moment—I'm just bringing it up. [Laughter]

Who would do that?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. He has never asked me for a thing.

And he's built this great company, and he shouldn't be penalized, because he's a patriot. He's an incredible patriot. And I don't even know if he's a Republican. [Laughter] I really don't.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, I am.

The President. Huh?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, definitely.

Stock Market/National Economy

Q. What's your reaction to the stock market drop today?

The President. Well, I'm not sure if he was.

Q. Tesla stock is also——

The President. Well, you're going to have—you're going to have drops, and markets are going to go up and they're going to go down.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. But you know what? We have to rebuild our country. Our country has been stripped of its jobs, of its factories. And I'm tired of seeing where they build apartments—cheap apartments—in an old, broken-down factory. But you have factories all over the place that are empty from many decades ago, and we're going to change it around.

And it's all taxing policy. You know, it's really a policy—because we have great workers, great people—it's really a policy of taxing and incentives, and I'm bringing the incentives back.

And I'll tell you what, numerous plants—and I don't want to mention specifically, but I'll mention this one—numerous plants in Mexico and other places that were under construction or soon to be under construction are now coming here, and they've dropped that, because it was unfair what was happening.

Mexico—they were building cars. They were selling them into the United States with no tax, no nothing. And in the United States, we were allowing them to take our jobs and take our factories, and we don't do that anymore.

Now, from a President, it would be a lot easier if I just coasted for another 4 years. I would have been an 8-year President. I had the best economy in history in my first 4 years. I would have done very well with this one. And I had a decision to make: Do I want to do this, or do I not? Do I want to do it right?

The right thing to do is what we're doing. We're going to get our jobs back, and we're not going to be laughed at.

Now, I will say this—that, already, Canada—and I respect very much. As you know, there's a very strong man in Canada who said he was going to charge a surcharge or a tariff on electricity coming into our country. He's—he has called, and he said he's not going to do that. Okay? He's not going to do that. And it would have been a very bad thing if he did. And he's not going to do that. So I respect that. But we were just informed that he's not going to do that.

Q. Will you change the tariffs?

The President. Look, we've be treated very unfairly by Canada.

Mexico-U.S. Trade/Illegal Immigration/Ukraine

Q. So you think the markets will turn around?

The President. We've been treated very unfairly by Mexico. But we've been treated very unfairly by every country all over the world. The European Union is horrible. Horrible. And we're going to get it back.

And I have a choice. I could just coast, and eventually, there'd be a blowup down the road, maybe a long way. But we owe $36 trillion, and we're going to get it back.

We're the biggest. We're the best. And I'm very optimistic. I have to tell you, I'm very optimistic about the country, much more optimistic this way than if I did it the easy way. I could have done it the easy way. I could have coasted.

Biden left us a mess. He left us tremendous inflation, tremendously high cost of products. He left us a mess.

But he also left us a mess with millions of people that poured into our country that are criminals. Millions of those people happen to be criminals, and we're looking for them. All over the place, we're looking for them. And Homan and Kristi are doing a—an incredible job. But he left us a horrible situation, and we're changing it.

But one of the things we're changing is, we're going to make our country really wealthy again. We're going to bring our jobs back. Right now we're like a chicken that's being plucked at from all over the world. We're not going to let that happen anymore.

Q. Mr. President——

Q. The CEO tonight, Mr. President.

The President. But, very importantly, and I said it: Ukraine, a cease-fire. Ukraine. Cease-fire. Just agreed to a little while ago.

Now we have to go to Russia and hope President—hopefully, President Putin will agree to that also, and we can get this show on the road. We can get—we can get this horrible war, where 2-, 3,000 soldiers a week—every week, 2-, 3-, 4,000 sometimes—I get the reports. And they're not American soldiers; they're Ukrainian and they're Russian. But people are being killed outside of that. People are being killed in the cities as things explode throughout the cities, and we want to get that war over with.

So I think—I think it's a very big——

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine

Q. Are you inviting President Zelenskyy back?

Q. Will you talk to President Putin about that?

The President. I think it's a big difference between the last visit you saw at the Oval Office and this. So that's a total cease-fire. Ukraine has agreed to it, and hopefully, Russia will agree to it. We're going to meet with them later on today and tomorrow, and hopefully, we'll be able to wipe out a deal. But I think the cease-fire is very important.

Q. Is Zelenskyy coming back?

The President. If we can get Russia do it, that'll be great. If we can't, we just keep going on and people are going to get killed—lots of people.

Q. Is Zelenskyy invited back to the White House?

The President. Sure. Absolutely.

National Economy/Afghanistan/Inflation

Q. Mr. President, you mentioned the ups and downs in the stock market. You said it will go up; it will go down. But do you and your tariff policies right now bear any responsibility for the turmoil we're seeing this week?

The President. No, I think Biden gave us a horrible economy. He gave us horrible inflation, and I think the market was going to go very, very bad.

If anything, I have a lot of very smart people, friends of mine, and great businessmen. They're now investing because of what I'm doing. Because, long term, what I'm doing is making our country strong again—financially strong, militarily strong, and strong if—and we want to get away—remember this: We have wars. When I left, we had no wars. We didn't have Ukraine and Russia. We didn't have October 7. We didn't have that disaster that took place with the withdrawal from Afghanistan.

And you look at what's happened there: We caught the major terrorist, which Biden wouldn't have caught. Why didn't he catch him? I caught him. Five weeks into the Presidency, I caught the man responsible for Abbey Gate, and he's going to pay hell right now. He's a bad dude. He's a bad guy.

But we didn't have these problems. I had no inflation. I had a great economy. He gave you high prices. You couldn't buy bacon. You couldn't buy anything. And also, I inherited a situation with eggs. The price of eggs was through the roof. [Laughter]

Well, now the price of eggs has come down a lot.

Interest rates have come down. Gasoline prices have come down. It's all coming down. It's all a beautiful thing.

I can do it the right way or the wrong way. We're doing it the right way.

And I have tremendous confidence in this country and the people of this country—tremendous—much more so than if I sat back for 4 years and had a good time in the Oval Office.

Senior Adviser Musk. I just——

Q. Mr. President, what are you going to tell——

The President. I want to look at cars.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Q. Mr. President—what are you going to tell your CEOS tonight, Mr. President?

Senior Adviser Musk. Mr. President, this is—I have an announcement to make——

The President. Go ahead.

Senior Adviser Musk. ——that I think would be helpful.

Q. You mentioned the Ontario——

Senior Adviser Musk. I want to say, as a function of the great policies of President Trump and his administration, and as an act of faith in America, Tesla is going to double vehicle output in the United States within the next 2 years.

The President. That's a big deal.

Senior Adviser Musk. Double.

The President. That's great. Thank you.

Q. Are you concerned about your stock price, then?

The President. By the way, he makes one car—this one, I don't understand. This one, I don't want, but that's okay—[laughter]—without a steering wheel. It comes out next year, right?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. Tell me—explain that, please.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, so—well, the Cybercab starts production in Texas next year, and it's self-driving. We have so much confidence in the self-driving nature of it that it will actually not have a steering wheel. It will not have pedals. It will either self-drive or not drive at all. But it'll self-drive.

Q. President Trump, before this——

The President. And I'm going to pass on that particular—[laughter].

The President's Experience Buying Cars

Q. Before this event today, when's the last time you bought a new car?

The President. Wow. Well, I buy a lot for—through my children, because they run the company now. I used to buy a lot. I haven't bought a new car in a long time.

Q. What was your first car?

The President. The only thing I know—the only thing I know is the Beast. [Laughter] I got a big car with very thick windows and thick side panels.

Q. Is that going electric?

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

The President. But anyways——

Q. Is the Beast going electric?

Senior Adviser Musk. [Laughter] Maybe—maybe one day.

The President. No, but we buy a lot of—we buy a lot of cars.

Actually, I bought this one for Kai.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. I bought that.

Q. Do you remember your first car?

Canada-U.S. Trade

Q. You mentioned Prime—the Ontario Premier calling you and giving you his decision about the electricity surcharge, and you said you were pleased about that. Will you make a different decision now about the tariffs on Canada? Will you reduce it?

The President. Well, now I'm looking at that, but probably so, yes. He was——

Q. You're looking at it?

The President. He was a gentleman.

Q. Will you reduce it back?

The President. He was a gentleman.

Look, I said it before: We give Canada $200 billion a year. We subsidize Canada. Between all of the things we give them and trade, we give them—we don't have to have cars made in Canada. We don't have to have lumber from Canada. We have tremendous lumber. We have tremendous trees. All I have to do is unfreeze them from some of the restrictions that were put on. I can do that with an Executive order. We don't need energy. We have more energy than anybody else in the world.

So we spend $200 billion a year subsidizing Canada. We don't have to do that. And frankly, the way that gets solved is Canada should honestly become our 51st State. We wouldn't have a northern border problem. We wouldn't have a tariff problem.

They don't have much—they spend very little, as you know—the least of almost anybody—on military, and we spend the most of anybody on military. We have a great military. I rebuilt the military during my first term. We're going to rebuild it a little bit again—not that much, but we're going to have to rebuild it a little bit again.

But Canada would be great as our cherished 51st State. You wouldn't have to worry about borders. You wouldn't have to worry about anything.

And by the way, Canada is very highly taxed, and we're very low tax. We're considered a low-tax nation because of me, because I cut the taxes so low. So the people of Canada would pay much less tax.

Q. But just to be clear, would that——

The President. It makes a lot of sense.

And by the way, when you take away that artificial line that looks like——

Senior Adviser Musk. It looks——

The President. ——it was done with a ruler——

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. ——and that's what it was. Some guy sat there——

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. ——years ago, and they said, "Rah." Well, when you take away that and you look at that beautiful formation of Canada and the United States, there is no place anywhere on—in the world that looks like that. It's——

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Senior Adviser Musk. Plus Greenland. Plus Greenland.

The President. And then, if you add Greenland, that's even—that's pretty good.

Senior Adviser Musk. I mean, it's going to look beautiful.

Q. Mr. President—what are you going to tell the CEOs tonight, Mr. President?

The President. Okay?

Q. What are you going to tell the CEOs tonight?

The President. I'm going to look at this. I'm going to make a decision. Do you want to hear what my decision——

Q. Let's see it.

The President. Okay. What's your best of these cars? What do you think?

Senior Adviser Musk. Well, the car that I drive is the Model S Plaid vehicle.

The President. Which is that one?

Senior Adviser Musk. It's that red one in the middle.

The President. I like that. Yes.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. I like that.

Senior Adviser Musk. It's—0 to 60 miles an hour in 2 seconds, so faster than a Ferrari.

The President. That's pretty fast. I don't know if my people can handle this.

They're going to—Jeff [Jeff Mason, Reuters], they're going to be using it more—I'm not allowed to use it.

Q. It looks fast. It looks fast, sir.

The President. That's a fast one. That's beautiful.

Canada-U.S. Trade

Q. Just to be clear, sir, the 50 percent, is that going to go into effect on Canada or not?

The President. Which one?

Q. The 50-percent tariffs. Will you——

The President. I'll let you know about it, yes. I'll let you——

Q. Okay.

The President. But I appreciated his call. I thought it was nice.

This is beautiful.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. Whoa. Should I get in?

Q. Get in.

Q. Get in.

The President. Okay. Let me get in there—let me get in this sucker.

Q. Have you ever sat behind the steering wheel of one of these—of a Tesla?

The President. Do you want my notes?

Q. Yes.

The President. They gave me notes. I said: "I'm not Biden. I don't need notes."

Senior Adviser Musk. [Laughter] Yes.

Q. I'll take a look.

Senior Adviser Musk. I can take those.

The President. Thank you.

Senior Adviser Musk. [Inaudible]

The President. Now let me get into this sucker. I'll start—I'll watch Secret Service go crazy. [Laughter]

Thank you.

Senior Adviser Musk. I mean, if you actually drove it around—[inaudible]. [Laughter]

The President. Oh, it's beautiful.

[The President sat inside a Tesla Model S Plaid.]

Wow.

Senior Adviser Musk. I can get in on this other side.

The President. That's beautiful. This is a different panel than I've—everything's computer. That's beautiful. Wow.

[Senior Adviser Musk sat inside the Tesla Model S Plaid.]

Senior Adviser Musk. [Inaudible]

The President. How about starting the engine? Is this just the brake?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, this is the brake and an accelerator. [Laughter]

The President. I don't want to—I don't want to give——

Senior Adviser Musk. You'll give Secret—you'll give your Secret Service a heart attack.

The President. That's beautiful.

Q. Can you start it?

The President. Should I? I'll—[inaudible].

Q. Let's hear the engine.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, it's—oh, it—there's——

Q. You going to get it wrapped in gold?

Senior Adviser Musk. It's over here. So do you—do you want to actually drive it or do you [inaudible].

The President. You don't want me to drive it, do you? [Laughter]

Q. I saw Biden do a test loop here, once, in the Jeep.

The President. I'll tell you, it could be——

Yes, oh.

Senior Adviser Musk. It's very easy to drive.

The President. Oh, that's—you're the only one that saw it.

Senior Adviser Musk. It's a—it's like driving a golf cart, basically.

The President. Yes, no, it's beautiful. Very simple.

Senior Adviser Musk. Very simple. So, it's literally like a golf cart that goes really fast.

The President. Yes, this is beautiful.

Senior Adviser Musk. There's no gears.

The President. This is really amazing. It's really amazing.

Let's take a look at a couple [inaudible].

Q. Mr. President, you going to get it wrapped in gold?

[The President and Senior Adviser Musk exited the Tesla Model S Plaid.]

The President. You think Biden could get into that car? I don't think so. [Laughter]

No, that's beautiful.

Incidents of Vandalism at Tesla Dealerships

Q. Mr. President, you talked about some of the violence that's been going on around the country——

The President. Yes.

Q. ——at dealerships. Some say they should be labeled domestic terrorists because—

The President. I will do that. I'll do it. I'm going to stop them. We catch anybody doing it—because they're harming a great American company. You know, I've stuck up for the NFL. I've stuck up for a lot of American companies—and other companies—but American companies. I did a very big favor for the NFL. I do favors for all the—when you heard an American company, especially a company like this, supplies so many jobs that others are unable to do—when you do that, those people are going to go through a big problem when we catch them. And we have a lot of—you got a lot of cameras up. We already know who some of them are, and we're going to catch them.

And they're bad guys. They're the same guys that screw around with our schools and universities, the same garbage. And no, we're going to catch them.

And let me tell you, you do it to Tesla, and you do it to any company, we're going to catch you, and you're going to go through hell. Okay?

Q. Mr. President, your comments——

Business Roundtable

Q. Mr. President, what are you going to tell CEOs tonight at the Business Roundtable, especially with regard to these tariffs?

The President. Well, I have a roundtable to make in a little while. I just consider this much more important, because I want to buy one of these.

My whole staff is so excited, because I told them they're going to safely use them, and they can't believe it.

So, Margo, wherever you are—Margo?

Communications Adviser Margo Martin. I'm here.

The President. She's going to use it. They're all going to be using it, and they're going to have a good time using it.

And if I can—if I—oh, there you are, Margo—look at—Margo is right there. What are you, a member of the press now? [Laughter] I think she's become a member of the press. Takes great pictures.

What do you think of it, Margo? Do you like the idea?

Communications Adviser Martin. I love it.

The President. Okay, good.

Communications Adviser Martin. We're going to have fun.

The President. They're very happy.

National Economy

Q. Mr. President, your comments the other day not ruling out a potential recession seemed to rattle the stock markets. The Commerce Secretary——

The President. I think this country is going to——

Q. ——said there wouldn't be one.

The President. ——boom, just so you know.

Q. Well, just specifically on the recession.

The President. Yes.

Q. Do you think——

The President. I think this country——

Q. ——there will be a recession?

The President. I don't see it at all. I think this country is going to boom. But as I said, I can do it the easy way or the hard way. The hard way to do it is exactly what I'm doing, but the results are going to be 20 times greater.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

And remember, Trump is always right. Right? The hat.

Q. And what do you say to Americans——

The President. If you look at what I've said over the last 10 years, Trump has been right all the time.

Senior Adviser Musk. True.

The President. This is the—way to do it. We're going to make America great again. You know, to make it great, you have to have jobs, you have to have factories, you have to have—

I look at—some of the things that—like this last administration—he was the worst President in the history of our country. Nothing was happening. Nothing. He had no idea what was going on. Our country went to hell. And then to allow millions of people to come in that are prisoners and mental institution patients and all of the things—they're gang members, drug lords. We—we're searching them all down now, trying to get them out of our country. And we're going to do that.

But on the financial end and the economic end, what we're doing is—to me, it's the most exciting. Our country will be greater than ever before, and it won't take too long.

Q. And what's your message to Americans right now, sir, who are——

The President. Let me see these two over here.

Q. ——worried about the stock market? What's your message to them as they watch it?

Senior Adviser Musk. [Inaudible]—the Cybertruck is worth—have you—you've been in it?

The President. Let's go see the Cybertruck. I did buy one of these though.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes. So this is bulletproof.

The President. I mean, look, in terms of imagination, I think I have a great imagination. Who else, but this guy would design this? And everybody on the road is looking at it. It's amazing, actually.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. As soon as I saw it, I said, "That is the coolest design." It's—do you agree with that, Brian [Brian Glenn, America's Real Voice]? I mean——

Q. I do.

The President. It's amazing.

Q. It's very cool, yes.

The President. You've got to give him credit.

Senior Adviser Musk. It's—we want the future to look like the future, and it's kind of—what kind of truck would Blade Runner drive? That was the design idea.

The President. It's really amazing.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

Tesla Leadership

Q. Elon, are you planning to remain CEO of Tesla while working with President Trump? Is there any thinking on your future at the company? As we're talking about Tesla, I'm wondering what you're thinking as—with leading the company going forward.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes. Yes. I'm CEO of Tesla. And you know——

The President. He should.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

Q. I want to get your thoughts on the market.

Q. Any more plans of additional vehicles besides the ones you have now, new models?

Senior Adviser Musk. Well, the Cybercab coming out next year which is——

The President. The one with no steering wheel. You're going to—you're going to buy one of those?

Q. No, sir, I will not.

The President. We'll pass. We're too old fashion. [Laughter]

Q. All due respect, yes, sir.

Stock Market Volatility/Federal Workforce Reduction Efforts

Q. Mr. President, when you look at the market selling off, that didn't concern you? And where do you see it going?

The President. Nope. Doesn't concern me.

I think some people are going to make great deals by buying stocks and bonds and all the things they're buying. I think we're going to have an economy that's a real economy, not a fake economy. It was a fake economy. They were putting in all Government jobs.

You see what happened last week—last month? We had more real jobs, and Government jobs are way down, and that's going to continue. Those are real jobs.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. Those are jobs that keep the country going. You can't have all Government jobs. You have no income to pay the workers.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. And a lot of those workers didn't show up to work. That was the other problem.

Columbia University Graduate Student Mahmoud Khalil/White House Senior Adviser Elon R. Musk

Q. And, President Trump, there's this protest leader from Columbia University that the administration is moving to deport, and you said that his arrest is going to be the first of many. How many?

The President. I think we ought to get them all of the country. They're troublemakers. They're agitators. They don't love our country. We ought to get them the hell out.

I think that guy, we ought to get him—I heard his statements too. They were plenty bad. And I think we ought to get him the hell out of the country. I watched him. I watched tapes. Specifically, I watched tapes. And you can have him, okay? You can have him. And you can have the rest of them.

Let them go to school. Let them learn. Columbia used to be a good school. Now it's been overrun because of bad leadership. That's what happens. It happens to countries, and it happens to universities, and it happens to companies.

And I don't want it to happen to a guy that did nothing—he did everything right, because he did a great company. But what he did by coming into Government to help Government from years of abuse, from decades of abuse—and you see that when you look at Social Security, where you have 200-year-old people on the rolls of —that's just—he uses the word "care." People don't care. Everyone knows this.

But it's also—I believe it's also large fraud. I think it's that.

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

The President. But I think it's also large fraud. So——

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

I'm just—I'm just telling people: This man is a great patriot, and you should cherish him. You should cherish him. You know, I have a little statement. We have to take care of our high-IQ people, because we don't have too many of them.

Q. Mr. President, on that——

The President. And we've got to take care of them.

Q. Mr. President, will you talk to President Putin about——

Social Security Program/Medicare and Medicaid/Manufacturing Investments

Q. And as you guys look at the Social Security Administration and you guys are looking for fraud and waste and abuse, can you guarantee people who are concerned about an interruption to benefits that there will not be?

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes. We're going to be very careful with any interruption to benefits. In fact, only by tackling the waste and fraud in entitlements like Social Security, Medicare can we actually preserve those programs for the future. Because with unchecked fraud and waste, we won't be able to afford them.

The President is very dedicated to solving the budget deficit, which, if we don't solve the budget deficit, we're going to go bankrupt as a country. If we go bankrupt as a country, there's no Social Security, there's no Medicare, there's no nothing.

And to—sort of echo what the President was saying, what really matters is moving people from jobs that are relatively low productivity in Government to high productivity in the private sector, increasing the true output of products and services.

That's the real economy. That's what actually enables Americans to have a higher standard of living. And that's what's happening. And that's, I think, the—you'll see the—you'll see the truth of that in the—in the months to come.

The President. And we're going to make it, really, much stronger by taking people that don't exist or taking people that shouldn't be there out, by taking——

Senior Adviser Musk. [Laughter] Yes.

The President. ——illegal aliens that are on Social Security, on Medicaid—and Medicare. By taking them out, we're making it much stronger.

The country will be much stronger, but it's going to really be stronger economically. And when you look at what we're doing—

I've been called by so many companies—yesterday, as you know, I had a meeting with some of the biggest tech companies in the world. And all they're talking about—they—IBM was there. We had a lot of them. Dell—Michael Dell was there. We had a lot of great companies—Hewlett Packard. And all they're talking about is investing in this country.

They want to be sure—don't forget, they're looking down the road 10 years and 15 years. They want to make sure we have a strong country.

They're all coming in, as you know—Apple. Tim Cook, he said that he's going to invest $500 billion in the United States. He never did that before. He invested in China. He's got his plants in China. And now he's got them—going to be building them in the United States.

And if I didn't have victory in that election, he wouldn't be doing it. And if I didn't say what I'm saying, and I'm being very honest, and it's much more difficult than just sitting around and having a great time—it's a very glamorous position, if you want to do that—we could have kept it, but eventually bad things would have happened. This way, good things.

I'm very optimistic about the country. I think we're going to have the greatest markets we've ever had, and it's going to be really fueled by what we're doing.

All—you ought to see these companies yesterday. They're investing billions and trillions. They're investing trillions of dollars here. They wouldn't have invested 10 cents.

President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia/Ukraine

Q. Mr. President, will you talk to Vladimir Putin about this cease-fire deal? Do you think you need to have a conversation with him to——

The President. Yes. I'll talk to——

Q. ——get the Russians to agree?

The President. ——Vladimir Putin. Yes.

Q. When will you talk to him?

The President. I want to get—look, that's the other. It takes two to tango——

Q. Yes.

The President. ——as they say. Right?

So, hopefully, he'll also agree. And I really think that would be 75 percent of the way. The rest is getting it documented and, you know, negotiating land positions, et cetera.

Q. So you'll talk to him this week about the deal?

The President. I think so, yes. [Inaudible]

Q. So you have—you have a cease-fire in——

Q. And—and when do you anticipate meeting him in person?

Q. ——in place on the Ukrainian side. How close do you think, then, you are to a total ceasefire —with the——

The President. Well, I hope it'll be over the next few days. I'd like to see. I know we have a big meeting with Russia tomorrow, and some great conversations, hopefully, will ensue. The people have done a great job. Marco Rubio has been great. Steve Witkoff has been great. Michael Waltz. They've all—every one of them, they've really stepped up. They are into it.

They want to see two things. By far, number one is death—people that aren't citizens of our country, but they're people just like you. They're people. And we want to stop. And we also don't want to give billions and hundreds of billions of dollars away.

We're in there for $350 billion, and there was no reason. This war would have never happened if I was President. So it's a very sad thing.

Thank you all very much. I love Tesla.

Senior Adviser Musk. [Laughter] Thank you, sir.

Q. Which one did you buy?

Q. Mr. President——

Q. Which one did you buy?

Q. Mr. President, which car are you going to buy?

The President. The one I like is that one.

Q. And how does this work? So——

The President. And I want that same color.

Q. Are you—are you going put down a credit card?

Elon, would you take a personal check from the President?

The President. No, I'm going to give him a check. I do it the old—I give checks.

Senior Adviser Musk. Sure.

The President. I like checks. You know?

Senior Adviser Musk. I think his credit is good.

Q. Do you still have access to—[laughter]——

The President. You know, I like a check——

Q. ——your checkbook?

The President. ——better than this modern system of, all of a sudden, there's money in your account. Nobody knows. I like signing a check. You sort of—but we're going to—we're going to pay.

And I don't want a discount. He would give me a discount, but if I do a discount, they're going to say, "Oh, he got benefits." [Laughter] I don't want——

Q. What about——

The President. I don't want any discounts.

Q. What about a vanity plate?

The President. Yes, let's see: Truth. Truth.

Senior Adviser Musk. All right.

Q. There is it.

The President. T-R-U-T-H. Truth.

Q. Elon, could he download his playlist onto that vehicle?

The President. You——

Senior Adviser Musk. Sure.

The President. That one got you by surprise. All right.

Q. Playlist gets downloaded as well. You can thump your music driving around.

The President. You can do a—I just looked——

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes, the sound system is amazing.

The President. I looked at that dashboard. You could do anything.

Have a good time.

Tesla/White House Senior Adviser Elon R. Musk/Federal Workforce Reduction Efforts

Q. Mr. President, do you think you buying a Tesla will boost Tesla sales and boost their stock?

The President. Well, I hope it does. Look. Look.

Q. Was that your goal——

The President. I care about one thing.

Q. ——by doing this?

The President. When somebody is a great patriot, they shouldn't be hurt. He's a great patriot. He didn't know me from Adam until we—we met a little bit when I was in my first term. But he came out, he endorsed me very strongly, and I admired that and respected that, and I respected him for years. I respected him.

And when there was a chance to help our Government—you know, you're not going to use an average person. Some people would say, "Well, let's use somebody that failed in business for his whole life," you know? [Laughter] This guy has been amazing.

And the kind of thinking is—it's from a different age. It's really from a different age. When we said, "Let's cut 2 percent," he said, "Let's cut 60 percent." And he turned out to be right. And a lot of people were—are just not here. They don't work for us. I mean, they're getting checks and they don't work.

And, you know, Peter, we've been—we've—look, we have so many different stats and so many different figures, and it's so embarrassing to us as a country. No, we're going to have a streamlined country with good people.

And one of the reasons—and I called for the—it wasn't a Cabinet meeting. It was just a meeting of some Cabinet members and Elon. The one thing—and I think he agrees with me a hundred percent—it's one thing to cut, but we want to cut the wrong people, meaning we want to cut people that aren't doing the job. We want to keep the right people.

Senior Adviser Musk. Absolutely.

The President. And I said, "I don't want to just say we're going to cut 50 percent. I want to cut the people that aren't doing the job, the people that aren't there, the people that are scamming the system." And he agrees with that a hundred percent.

The President's Purchase of a Tesla

Q. And are you sure you don't want to take a test drive before you buy?

The President. I'd love to do it. Maybe I'll do it some other time.

White House Senior Adviser Elon R. Musk

Q. Do you want Elon to keep working with you throughout your first term? I mean, is there going to be an end date for the two of you working together over the next few years?

The President. I don't know. You know, I was thinking about that the other day. I think he'll know when it's time. Well, he doesn't want to stay around here just—

Q. He has up to 130 days, I think.

The President. Well, no, I think he does like it. There's no place like the White House. Okay? So, maybe.

Q. Elon, do you want to—would you want to stay?

The President. I don't—think that—I think he wants to get the job done and get back——

Senior Adviser Musk. Yes.

Q. ——to his businesses. That's what I think.

Senior Adviser Musk. I just—yes, I just want to—I'll stay as long as it's useful and I'm productive. And if I can help the country, I'll stay and—do so.

The President. Okay? Thank you, everybody. Thank you.

[The President gestured to Senior Adviser's son X.]

Good-looking guy here, right?

Thank you, everybody. Thank you, everybody.