The President's News Conference in The Hague, Netherlands

The President. Hello, everybody. Well, thank you very much. This has been an honor.

It was a fairly long trip but worth it. Tremendous things have been accomplished, as you probably noticed. I listened to a lot of wonderful speeches from the heads of a lot of wonderful countries.

But I want to thank you for joining us at the conclusion of a highly productive NATO summit in the Netherlands. Want to thank them for the royal treatment they've given us. Couldn't have been nicer. And it's a beautiful country. Really, a beautiful country. Coming in, I saw the most beautiful trees. In fact, I want to bring some back with me. [Laughter]

I want to also thank—I had breakfast this morning with the King and Queen, and they're incredible people. I called—I said, "You're central casting." Beautiful people. Great people. Big, beautiful heart. And I enjoyed that.

And also NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, who's been terrific. He's been a friend of mine. Used to be right here, running this wonderful country. Now he's the NATO Secretary General. He's doing a fantastic job.

And the Prime Minister, we appreciate everything you've done.

And, as you know, last weekend, the United States successfully carried out a massive precision strike on Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities. And it was very, very successful. It was called "obliteration." No other military on Earth could have done it, and now this incredible exercise of American strength has paved the way for peace, with a historic cease-fire agreement late Monday.

And we call it the "12-day war." Spoke to a few people; I guess that just sounded like the right name. It was a 12-day war, and we think it's over. I don't think they're going to be going back at each other. I don't think so.

Not only have we dealt decisively with the critical threat of Iran's nuclear program, which was what I wanted—I said, "Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon"—I've said that for 15 years, long before I decided to do the political thing—but we've also reasserted the credibility of American deterrence, which is like no other. The people at NATO said there's never been anything—you know, I rebuilt the entire military during my first term. And we have a great military. We have great generals. I got to know the good ones and the bad ones. We kept the good ones.

Over the past 2 days, I was honored to participate in the NATO leaders' meeting and also had extremely good individual discussions with the King and the Queen, Secretary General Rutte, and the Prime Minister. Great discussions. Very knowledgeable people.

Major focus of our conversations at the summit was the need for other NATO members to take up the burden of the defense of Europe, and that included the financial burden.

As you know, it was at 2 percent, and we got it up to 5 percent. And they said—a couple of them came up to me—one, in particular, said: "Sir, we've been trying to get it up to 3 percent for 20 years, and we haven't been able. And you got it up to 5 percent." So they're going to be—most of them—I guess almost all of them are going to be contributing now 5 percent, a number that people are surprised at, but you need it today.

The United States accounts for two-thirds of all NATO defense spending. And since I began pushing for additional commitments in 2017—believe it or not—our allies have increased spending by $700 billion. I said to people, "You don't have any money," and a lot of them weren't paying. And so I started the process, and I picked it up as soon as I got back, which is 6 months ago.

And following my election last November, almost all have accelerated plans to reach the 2 percent, 3 percent, 4 percent, and then, ultimately, very quickly, 5 percent. And all of this is going to be done very quickly, almost immediately.

You probably know this as well as I do. I'm sure they've been talking about it. It's really been a big focus.

In a very historic milestone this week, the NATO allies committed to dramatically increase their defense spending to that 5 percent of GDP—something that no one really thought possible. And they said: "You did it, sir. You did it." Well, I don't know if I did it, but I think I did. [Laughter]

This will be known as the Hague Defense Commitment, which is pretty good. It's pretty appropriate.

When the allies reach this number, it will add more than $1 trillion a year—think of that: $1 trillion per year—to our common defense. And this is a monument, really, to victory, but it's a monumental win for the United States, because we were carrying much more than our fair share. Was quite unfair, actually. But this is a big win for Europe and for, actually, Western civilization.

For years, past administrations failed to get most allies to contribute even the 2 percent. I remember, when I came here, we had four countries that were up to 2 percent. And I remember Poland was there. A couple of them were there and—but most of them weren't. We had 28 at the time. As you know, it's increased a little bit. And they've agreed now to more than double their budgets, in all cases.

And Europe stepping up to take more responsibility for its security will help prevent future disasters like the horrible situation with Russia and Ukraine. And hopefully, we're going to get that solved.

Last week, they lost 7,000 soldiers—mostly soldiers, but they're also getting hit in Kyiv. They're getting hit in some of the towns also, and that means life—life is disappearing also in the cities and towns. Should have never happened. Would have never happened if I was President. I said it a thousand times. And it never did happen. It was never even thought about.

But it's vital that this additional money be spent on very serious military hardware, not bureaucracy. And hopefully, that hardware is going to be made in America, because we have the best hardware in the world.

You saw that, where 14 missiles were shot at us the other day. And they were very nice. They gave us warning. They said: "We're going to shoot them. Is 1 o'clock, okay?" [Laughter] I said, "It's fine." [Laughter]

And everybody was emptied off the base, so they couldn't get hurt, except for the gunners. They call them the gunners. And out of 14 high-end missiles that were shot at the base in Qatar, all 14, as you know, were shot down by our equipment. Amazing stuff. Amazing that they can do—it's like shooting a bullet with a bullet. It's the same thing, if you think about it. Fourteen out of fourteen, and they were—they weren't even that surprised. I said, "Do you do that well often?" They said, "We pretty much do, sir."

The Ukraine crisis has also highlighted the urgency of rebuilding our defense industrial base, both in the United States and among the allied nations. We cannot afford to be dependent on foreign adversaries for critical minerals. And, as you know, we made a deal with Ukraine to take a vast amount of the land they have for minerals. We need it.

And once again, I want to thank all of the people in the Netherlands—incredible people; it's a great place—and all of the NATO allies for the tremendous summit that we just had.

A letter just came in and a—a statement came in from the Atomic Energy Commission of Israel, and I just wanted—this is an official letter, and they're very serious people, as you know. "The devastating U.S. strike on Fordow destroyed the site's critical infrastructure and rendered the enrichment facility totally inoperable." It was devastated. "We assess that the American strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities has set back Iran's ability to develop nuclear weapons for many years to come. This achievement can continue indefinitely if Iran does not get access to nuclear material," which it won't.

It's so sad that that whole thing had to go. But I just—want to thank our pilots. You know, they were maligned and treated very bad, demeaned by fake-news CNN, which is back there, believe it or not, wasting time. Wasting—nobody's watching them. [Laughter] So they're just wasting a lot of time. Wasting my time.

And the New York Times, they put out a story that, "Well, maybe they were hit, but it wasn't bad." Well, it was so bad that they ended the war. It ended the war.

Somebody said, in a certain way, you know, the—that it was so devastating, actually, if you look at Hiroshima, if you look at Nagasaki, you know, that ended a war too. This ended a war in a different way, but it was so devastating.

Also, they have—out of Dubai, it just came that Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman—this is Iran's Foreign Ministry—says it's near—its nuclear installations were very "badly damaged" by the American strike.

So what bothered me about these reports—the fake reports put out by the New York Times—failing—I call it the "Failing New York Times," because it's doing terribly. Without me, it would be doing no business at all. [Laughter]

But—and by fake-news CNN and MSDNC, all of these terrible people. You know, they have no credibility. You know, when I started, they were at 94 percent credibility, the media. Now it's at 16 percent. And I'm very proud of it, because I've exposed it for what it is.

But when I—saw them starting to question the—caliber of the attack: "Was it bad?" Well, it was really bad. It was devastating—they obliterated. Like you can't get into the tunnels. They just put that over. That just came out. They can't—there's nothing—there's no way you can even get down. The whole thing has collapsed in a disaster. And I think all of the nuclear stuff is down there, because it's very hard to remove.

And we did it very quickly. When they heard we were coming, it was—you know, you can't move it. It's very hard, very dangerous, actually, to move too. And they also knew we were coming. So I don't think too many people want to be down there knowing we're coming, with the "bunker busters," as we call them. We're the only ones that have them. We have the best equipment, best nuclear equipment, and we have the best equipment in the world.

And by the way, we can't forget our submarine, which was out there—submarines, actually—but submarine was out there. We shot 30 rockets into an area. Every single one of them—I think it was almost 400 miles away—I think, Pete, right?—400——

Secretary of Defense Peter B. Hegseth. Yes.

The President. ——and long. It was in the ocean, a long ways away.

And we shot—we shot a total of 30. Every single one of them hit within 9 inches from where it was supposed to be. It took out a lot, because we didn't do just Fordow. We did two others in addition, which hadn't been completely destroyed. So we hit them with a submarine from hundreds of miles away. Amazing, just amazing equipment. Greatest submarines in the world. Nobody's even close. They're 20 years behind us when it comes to submarine technology.

So that's one, and the other was from the Atomic Energy Commission, and they have about three or four of them now coming in from Atomic Energy Commissions from various places. But the one that we have that just came out—we released it a little while ago—was from the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission. But numerous of them are getting to see the site, and the site has been demolished.

And, again, we had these brave patriots—these incredible fliers, these people that can fly a plane better than anybody can fly a plane—going into very hostile territory, flying into the territory that has got more missiles and things pointed at it. But it was very stealth. They didn't get to see it. It was dark.

That's the amazing thing about the shots. They hit the shots perfectly, and yet it was dead dark. There was no Moon; there was no light. It was virtually moonless. It was very dark. And they hit—the shots were hit perfectly. But when they get demeaned—and they were very upset about it, because they knew how strong it would be.

Back in Missouri, the pilots flew about 36 hours, two ways, far distance, and in those incredible B–2s. And we then had the F–22s, and we had the F–35s, and we had other planes. And we had, I think, a total of 52 tankers. That means the big tankers, because the refueling was a lot for all of the different planes that we sent. Incredible operation.

And I have to say, General "Razin" Caine was incredible. That's why he beat ISIS. And we beat ISIS in a matter of weeks. I was told it would take 4 to 5 years. We did it in a few weeks. And he was great. That's why he's the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff right now, because I had a very good experience with him. He knocked out ISIS in a period of literally a few weeks. Amazing. And it was supposed to take a few years—5 years, to be exact.

So we had a great victory there, and we then came here, and I think we had a great victory here. But this is an ongoing project. This is the safety of Europe, the safety of the world. And they've raised it from 2 percent to 5 percent, something which nobody—and you're talking about over a trillion dollars a year. So we're talking about a lot of money from—coming in from countries that were not paying nearly enough to be effective.

So I have, as you know, Marco Rubio with me, and Pete Hegseth—Secretary of State and secretary of War. Should we say Secretary—you know, it used to be called Secretary of War. Maybe for a couple of weeks we'll call it that, because we feel like warriors. Used to be called Secretary of War. In fact, if you look at the old building next to the White House, you can see where it used to be Secretary of War. Then we became politically correct and they called it Secretary of Defense. I don't know, maybe we'll have to start thinking about changing it. But we feel that way.

Do we have any questions, please?

Wow. [Laughter] That's a lot of questions.

Who's a nice person—oh, you're not a nice person. But I'll let you ask one. Go ahead.

What's he going to ask? He is not nice at all. [Laughter] I know him well.

Q. Thank you, Mr. President.

The President. Yes.

Israel/Iran/U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities/News Media

Q. Thank you for taking the time before flying home.

You just said you believe the conflict between Israel and Iran is over. What makes you so confident it is? And what do you do if it isn't?

The President. Because I dealt with both and they're both tired, exhausted. They fought very, very hard and very viciously, very violently, and they were both satisfied to go home and get out.

And can it start again? I guess someday, it can. It could maybe start soon. I think a big telltale sign was when, as you know, Iran—somewhat, by not much—violated the cease-fire. And Israel had the planes going out that morning. And there were a lot of them, 52 of them. And I said, "You've got to get them back." And they brought them back. They didn't do anything. They brought them back. It was very good. I thought it was amazing, actually.

They have fought a hell of a war. They fought very hard. I think the war ended, actually, when we hit the various nuclear sites with the planes. And I just hope you people can give these pilots—these are the best pilots in the world. They're the best shots in the world. They call them "shots," that's what they are. And——

Q. Can I follow up on that one point?

The President. ——and—wait a minute.

Q. Okay. Yes.

The President. And I just hope you can give them the respect they deserve, because they came home to fake news and, like, "Oh, gee, there was hardly any damage." The things are decimated.

So—but I think—no, I think they're very much finished. I think Israel is going to get back to doing what they do. And I think that Iran is going to get back. You know, Iran has a huge advantage. They have great oil, and they can do things. I don't see them getting back involved in the nuclear business anymore. I think they've had it. They've been at it for 20 years, and I don't see that happening either.

Now, if it does, we're always there. It won't be me, it will be somebody else, but we're there. We'll have to do something about it.

Yes, please.

Q. Thank you, Mr. President.

The President. Go ahead. Go ahead.

Oh, fake news, CNN. [Laughter] Ai yai yai, here we go. Wait till you hear this question. [Laughter]

Q. Thank you, sir——

The President. You should really say how great our soldiers and our warriors are.

Q. I think everyone appreciates our soldiers and our warriors.

U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities

I do have two questions for you, Mr. President. You just cited Israeli intelligence on these attacks. Earlier, you said U.S. intelligence was inconclusive. Are you relying on Israeli intelligence for your assessment——

The President. No. No.

Q. ——of the impact of the strikes?

The President. No, this is—also, Iran made the statement. And it's also, if you read the document that was given—that Pete can talk about, if you'd like—the document said it could be very severe damage. But they didn't take that. They said it could be limited or it could be very severe. They really didn't know other than to say it could be limited or it could be very, very severe. And you didn't choose to put that because it was very early after.

Since then, we've collected additional intelligence. We've also spoken to people who have seen the site, and the site is obliterated. And we think everything nuclear is down there, they didn't take it out. Okay.

Q. Which intelligence said it was obliterated, Mr. President?

The President. Question? Please, go ahead.

Q. Which intelligence says it was obliterated?

The President. Go ahead. Yes. Blue dress.

China/Iranian Oil Supply and Refining

Q. Thank you so much, Mr. President. Yesterday you said China can now continue to purchase oil from Iran.

The President. Yes.

Q. Are you giving up on your maximum-pressure campaign? Because——

The President. With who?

Q. ——there's sanctions right now.

The President. With who?

Q. On Iran?

The President. No. Look, they just had a war. The war was fought. They fought it bravely. I'm not giving up. They're in the oil business. I mean, I could stop it if I wanted. I could sell China the oil myself. I don't want to do that. They're going to need money to put that country back into shape. We want to see that happen.

Q. So you're open to sanction waivers?

The President. We didn't—no. If—they're going to sell oil, they're going to sell oil. We're not taking over the oil. We could have, you know. I used to say with Iraq, "Keep the oil." I could say it here too. We could have kept the oil.

No, China is going to want to buy oil. They can buy it from us, they can buy it from other people, but you're going to have to put that country back into shape. It needs—desperately needs money.

Yes. Yes, please.

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

Here we go. I'm picking the beauties today. [Laughter] Go ahead.

President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia /The President's Foreign Policy

Q. Mr. President, Secretary General Rutte has described President Putin as an adversary, a threat, an enemy. Do you view him the same way? And in addition to that, you mentioned General Caine, your Chief of Staff, or—the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff——

The President. General Caine.

Q. Yes. He has said that Mr. Putin has territorial ambitions beyond Ukraine. Do you view that in the same way, Mr. President?

The President. It's possible. I mean, it's possible. I know one thing: He'd like to settle. He'd like to get out of this thing. It's a mess for him. He called the other day. He said, "Can I help you with Iran?" I said, "No, you can help me with Russia." Because, you know, in the last few weeks, we took care of India and Pakistan; Kosovo, Serbia; I think on Friday, we have coming in—the Congo is coming in, and Rwanda is coming in. That was a vicious war that went on, a machete war, heads chopped off all over Africa. They're coming in.

We did two others in addition to that. Nobody has ever done anything like this.

No, I consider him a person that's, I think, been misguided. I'm very surprised, actually, at him. I thought we would have had that settled easy. I've settled four of them in the meantime. But he did call up and he said, you know, he's close to Iran; he'd like to help us get a settlement. I said: "No, no. You help me get a settlement with you with Russia." And I think we're going to be doing that too.

Q. Mr. President.

The President. Yes, please. Go ahead, please.

U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities

Q. Thank you, Mr. President. You've made clear your position on what impact the strikes had. I wanted to ask you what is next with Iran? For instance, is there any indication from U.S. intelligence that Iran was able to move any material, including enriched uranium?

The President. No, we—just the opposite. We think we hit them so hard and so fast they didn't get to move. And if you knew about that material, it's very hard and very dangerous to move.

Q. So are you interested——

The President. It's called—in—many people, they call it "dust," but it's very, very heavy. It's very, very hard to move.

And they were way down. You know, they're 30 stories down. They're literally 30, 35 stories down underground.

Q. So you think you got it all?

The President. Oh, yes, we think we got—we think it's—covered with granite, concrete, and steel.

Q. And can I ask you, are you interested in restarting negotiations with Iran? And if so, have they reciprocated——

The President. So our people——

Q. ——or is this sort of a settled matter?

The President. Marco could answer this, but our people are not—I'm not. The way I look at it, they fought, the war is done. And you know, I could get a statement that they're not going to go nuclear—we're probably going to ask for that—but—and they're not going to be doing it—but they're not going to be doing it anyway. They've had it. They've had it.

Now, maybe someday in the future we'll want that. But I've asked Marco, "Do you want to draw it"—I just asked him the question as we were walking on the stage: "Do you want to draw up a little agreement for them to sign? Because I think we can get them to sign it." I don't think it's necessary.

Marco, do you want to talk about that, please?

Secretary of State Marco A. Rubio. Well, Mr. President, I think you—President Trump has shown a willingness to meet and talk to anybody in the world who's interested in peace. I don't know of any President that's been as willing as he has to meet with anyone and talk about peace. We'd love to have peaceful relations with any country in the world.

And so, obviously, that will depend on Iran's willingness not just to engage in peace but to negotiate directly with the United States, not through some third-country or fourth-country process.

But I know of no President, probably in our modern history, that's sought peace more than President Trump has.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Iran/U.S. Diplomatic Engagement

Q. So it sounds like the door is open, but you're in in no rush. Is that right? It sounds like the door is open, but you're in no rush.

The President. I'll tell you what—look, we're going to talk to them next week—with Iran. We may sign an agreement. I don't know. To me, I don't think it's that necessary. I mean, they had a war, they fought, now they're going back to their world. I don't care if I have an agreement or not.

We—the only thing we'd be asking for is what we were asking for before, about we want no nuclear. But we—destroyed the nuclear. In other words, that's destroyed. I said, "Iran will not have nuclear." Well, we blew it up. It's blown up to kingdom come.

And so I don't feel very strongly about it. If we got a document, it wouldn't be bad. We're going to meet with them, actually. We're going to meet with them.

Q. Thank you.

The President. Yes.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Yes, go ahead, please.

The President's Visit to the Netherlands/President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine

Q. Yes. Mr. President——

The President. Yes.

Q. ——Netherlands TV. Thank you for visiting our country.

The President. Good. Thank you.

Q. As I understood—I, of course, would like to know how you slept last night at the house of the King.

The President. Oh, I slept beautifully. [Laughter]

Q. But probably a more serious question: I think you just had a meeting with President Zelenskyy. Did you discuss any cease-fire in this Russo-Ukrainian war?

The President. No, no, I just—I wanted to know how he's doing. It was very nice, actually. You know, we had a little rough times sometime. [Laughter] He was—couldn't have been nicer.

I think he'd like to see an end to this. I do. I think—what I took from the meeting—couldn't have been nicer, actually—but I took from the meeting that he'd like to see it end. I think it's a great time to end it.

I'm going to speak to Vladimir Putin, see if we can get it ended. But——

Q. What was un-nice about it?

The President. But look, these are brave people. They're fighting these wars all over the place. You know, last week they had, I guess, close—I told you, seven—close to 7,000 young soldiers—Russian and Ukrainian soldiers were killed. Seven thousand in 1 week. It's crazy. It's crazy. So I'll be speaking to Putin.

No, I had a good meeting with Zelenskyy. And I had a lot of good meetings. We had a lot of good meetings with a lot of people, a lot of great leaders. But he's fighting a brave battle. It's a tough battle.

Yes.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Go ahead, white dress.

Q. Thank you. Iida Hallikainen from Finland, Ilta-Sanomat.

The President. Good.

President Alexander Stubb of Finland/Finland-U.S. Trade

Q. You have played golf with President Alexander Stubb. How do you see Finland as a NATO Ally and partner? And how would you describe your relationship with our President?

The President. Well, he's a very good golfer. [Laughter] Okay? In fact, he was on his college golf team. He went to a good college in the South, as you know—a very good college—and he was a good golfer. We had a good time.

I think my relationship is great. I want to buy icebreakers. You know, you're very good at icebreakers. And I actually made him an offer. I didn't go to Congress. They'll try and impeach me for this. But there's an old—it's not old; it's fairly new, but it's used—icebreaker. And I offered him about one-third of what he asked for. [Laughter] But we're negotiating. We need icebreakers in the U.S. And if we can get some inexpensively, I'd like to do that. Actually, they'll fix it up, make it good.

Also, we may buy some icebreakers. You know that you make—you're the king of icebreakers, that particular country. They make them good. They make them really good, and they know what they're doing. And so we're negotiating with them for about 15 different icebreakers.

But one of them is available now. It's old, and it's—you know, "old"—it's, like, five, six years old. And we're trying to buy it. I'm trying to make a good deal. It's all I do.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

My whole life, that's all I do is make deals.

Yes, please. Go ahead. Sir, go ahead.

U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities/North Atlantic Treaty Organization/National Economy

Q. Yes. Question for News Hour, Dutch TV. First of all, on article 5. On your way here, you spoke about the commitment of the U.S. to article 5, saying, "I'll give you my definition once we're here."

The President. Yes.

Q. What is your definition? And may the U.S. commitment to article 5 change in case some of the NATO members do not reach the threshold that was discussed today?

My second question is following up on a colleague on Iran. What intel reports do say that everything over there was obliterated?

The President. Yes. Well, there are numerous of those reports, and they're coming out fast and furious. But the most respected ones we've already seen. And I will say that, on a very confidential basis, they're looking at the reports—like, numerous reports, and including people going to the site and checking the site—and they're going to be having—I guess you're going to be having over the next couple of days a full—you're going to encapsulate it.

Secretary Hegseth. Yes, sir.

The President. But no, the site was obliterated, just like I said it was, and just like the pilots should be given credit for.

As far as article 5—look, when I came here—I came here because it was something I'm supposed to be doing, but I left here a little bit different—differently. I said—I—watched the heads of these countries get up, and the love and the passion that they showed for their country was unbelievable. I've never seen quite anything like it. The—they want to protect their country, and they need the United States. And without the United States, it's not going to be the same.

And you can ask Mark, or you could ask any of the people that were there. It was really moving to see it. They love their country. They were so respectful of me, because I'm the head of the United States.

And I made—you know, the King of Saudi Arabia, when I was in the Middle East. So yes, I was in Qatar for a different reason, not a reason to get shot at. We were in there for economic development reasons—Qatar, U.A.E., and Saudi Arabia. All three leaders of those countries—and we took back $5.1 trillion into the United States.

All three leaders said: "You know, you're presiding over the hottest country in the world. The United States right now is the hottest country—everybody wants to be there. Everybody—everybody wants a piece of it." He said: "A year ago, your country was dead. You had a deadhead running it. You had a country that was dead." And it was dead. You had people pouring through the borders, you had inflation, you had everything. He said, "You've made it"—in 5 months, at that time—"you've made it the hottest country. This is the hottest country in the world." United States right now is the hottest country in the world.

And when I was around that table, it was a nice group of people, many of whom I knew from previous—when I saw the passion they had for the country, and almost every one—and you probably have the tapes. It was very public. But almost every one of them said: "Thank God for the United States. Without the United States, we couldn't"—they couldn't really have NATO. It wouldn't work. It wouldn't work. It will in the future, because now they're paying much more money. But it wouldn't work. It was great.

And I left here differently. I left here saying that these people really love their countries, it's not a rip-off, and we're here to help them protect their country.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Okay, we'll do one or two more.

Q. Thank you, Mr. President.

The President. Yes.

Spain/European Spending Levels

Q. A question on Spain. Are you satisfied with today President Sánchez——

The President. Oh, I think Spain's—terrible what they've done. [Laughter] No, I do. They—they're the only country that won't pay the—full up. They want to stay at 2 percent. I think it's terrible.

And you know, they're doing very well. The economy is very well. And that economy could be blown right out of the water with something bad happening.

You know, Spain is the only country that—are you from Spain?

Q. Yes.

The President. Good. Congratulations. [Laughter] You're the only country that is not paying. I don't know what the problem is. It's—I think it's too bad.

So we'll make it up. You know what we're going to do? We're negotiating with Spain on a trade deal. We're going to make them pay twice as much. And I'm actually serious about that. We're going to make Spain—I like Spain. I have so many people from Spain that—it's a great place, and they're great people. But Spain is the only country, out of all of the countries, that refuses to pay.

And you know—so they want a little bit of a free ride, but they'll have to pay it back to us on trade, because I'm not going to let that happen. It's unfair. It's unfair to NATO.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

All right, sir, please. Go ahead. Right in the back. Yes, you. Tall one. The tall man.

Q. Mr. President, Johannes Perterer from Austrian National Television.

The President. How are you?

Ukraine/Russia/The President's Foreign Policy Achievements

Q. You once said that you would end the Ukraine war in 24 hours. You later said you said that sarcastically.

The President. Of course it was sarcastic.

Q. But you've now been in office for 5 months and 5 days. Why have you not been able to end the Ukraine war?

The President. Because it's more difficult than people would have any idea. Vladimir Putin has been more difficult. Frankly, I had some problems with Zelenskyy. You may have read about them. And it's been more difficult than other wars.

I mean, look, we just ended a war in 12 days that was simmering for 30 years, frankly.

We ended Rwanda and the Congo. It's—they're coming to sign the documents. We've already signed basic documents, but they're coming, I think, to the White House on Friday.

We ended—Serbia was going to go at it.

But maybe the most important of all, India and Pakistan. And that wasn't whether or not they may someday have nukes, like we're talking about in the Middle East, like we're talking about with Israel and Iran. This is—they have nuclear weapons. I ended that with a—series of phone calls on trade. I said, "Look, if you're going to go fighting each other, it's going to"—it was getting very bad. You know how bad that last attack was. It was really bad. "If you're going to go fighting each other, we're not doing any trade deal." "No, no, no. You have to do a trade deal." I said, "We're not doing any trade deal."

And in fact, I had the General, who's—really was very impressive. The General from Pakistan was in my office last week. You know, Prime Minister Modi is a great friend of mine. He's a great gentleman. He's a great man. And I got them to reason.

I said: "We're not doing a trade deal if you're going to fight. And if you're going to fight each other, we're not doing a trade deal." And you know what? They said, "No, I want to do the trade deal." We stopped a nuclear war.

Go ahead.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Go ahead, Jeff [Jeff Mason, Reuters]. Here's another beauty, Jeff. He's a beauty alright. Go ahead.

Dutch Party for Freedom Leader Geert Wilders/Ukraine/U.S. Security Assistance/President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin of Russia

Q. Mr. President, a follow-up on Ukraine. Will the United States contribute any more money to Ukraine's defense this year, to the $5 billion that allies are giving? And one question: You had another meeting with the Dutch opposition leader, Mr. Wilders.

The President. Yes.

Q. Can you tell us about that meeting, and are you upset about his anti-Muslim stance?

The President. I'm not upset about it. It's just his view. He's unhappy with the way things are going in this country and various countries. He was an opposition leader, and I was asked to meet with the opposition leader by the people that are running. I think they have some deal where if you have a meeting, you're supposed to meet with an opposition leader. I said: "That's strange. That's—we don't do that."

But I met with the—I don't—I didn't know him. He seemed like a very nice guy, but he's in opposition to the current people, and that was set up by the current people. So I assume when I met with the Prime Minister, you're supposed to meet with the opposition.

We'll have to try that sometime in our country. Let's not do it.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

But he was—I thought he was very good.

As far as money going, we'll see what happens. There's a lot of spirit.

Look, Vladimir Putin really has to end that war. People are dying at levels that people haven't seen before for a long time.

Go ahead.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Go ahead.

Q. On sanctions. Which——

Q. I—

The President. White shirt. Oh, she's all excited. [Laughter]

Q. BBC News Ukrainian. I would like to ask you——

The President. Where are you from?

Q. I'm from Ukraine.

The President. Oh.

Ukraine/U.S. Security Assistance

Q. So my question to you is whether or not the U.S. is ready to sell anti-air missile systems, Patriot, to Ukraine. We know that——

The President. Right.

Q. ——Russia has been pounding Ukraine really heavily right now——

The President. Are you living, yourself, now in Ukraine?

Q. My husband is there.

The President. Wow.

Q. And——

The President. I can see you're very—you know, it's amazing.

Q. ——and me with the kids, I'm in Warsaw, actually, because he wanted me to be——

The President. Is your husband a soldier? No?

Q. He is.

The President. He's there now?

Q. Yes.

The President. Wow. That's rough stuff, right? That's tough. And you're living here?

Q. In Warsaw.

The President. And you're a reporter.

Q. I am.

The President. Good. So let me just tell you, they do want to have the antimissile missiles—okay?—as they call them, the Patriots. And we're going to see if we can make some available. You know, they're very hard to get. We need them too. We were supplying them to Israel, and they're very effective, a hundred-percent effective. Hard to believe how effective. And they do want that more than any other thing, as you probably know.

That's a very good question, and I wish you a lot of luck. I mean, I can see it's very upsetting to you.

So say hello to your husband. Okay? Thank you.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Go ahead.

Thank you.

Q. Thank you, Mr. President. You were criticizing——

The President. Where are you from?

Q. Bloomberg News.

The President. Oh, Bloomberg.

Q. You were——

The President. That's wonderful. [Laughter]

Chairman of the Federal Reserve System Board of Governors Jerome H. Powell/Inflation

Q. You were criticizing the Federal Reserve Chair before coming to this summit.

The President. Yes, I think he's terrible.

Q. I was wondering if you've begun interviewing different candidates for the Fed pick and if——

The President. Yes, I—know within three or four people who I'll—going to pick. I mean, he goes out pretty soon, fortunately, because I think he's terrible.

We have no inflation. We have a tremendous economy. Hundreds of billions of dollars of tariff money is pouring in. Factories are being built because they don't want to pay the tariffs, so they're building them all over the country. I think we're close to $15 trillion—I told you, $5.1 trillion from the Middle East alone, but—of investment money coming in. There's never been anything like that in the history of our country.

But we have no inflation, and we have borrowing—because Biden, stupidly, they did short-term debt. So we have borrowing coming up. And you know, we'll go 10 years—maybe longer, maybe shorter—but we'll go a long period of time when we do the debt, and because of him, because of this guy, we will have to pay—for years, we'll be paying for him.

And I said to him, "Listen, there's no inflation." He says, "But maybe there'll be some." That's true. I said: "If there is some, what you do is raise the rate. I'm okay with that. You raise the rate in 2 years from now or in a year from now." But because the rate's high, we have to pay more for debt. It's pretty equal.

In other words, if it's 4 percent, it's 4 percent. If you drop it a point, you'll pay 3 percent. So it's fairly equal—not necessarily—but fairly equal.

So we're going to end up paying maybe 2 points or 3 points more. Three points would be about $900 billion a year because of this very average-mentally person. He's an average-mentally person. I'd say low in terms of what he does, low IQ for what he does, okay?

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Wait. So, unsaid—instead of paying $900 billion—we don't want to pay 900—just because he doesn't want to lower the rate. I said, "If there's inflation in 2 years or 3 years or 1 year from now, you raise the rate. You take care of the inflation, among other things. But he's probably a very political guy, I guess. I don't know. I think he's a very stupid person, actually.

All right, one more. Let's go. How about you? Go ahead.

She looks so happy and everything.

Q. Thank you.

The President. That's why I picked her.

Spain/European Defense Spending Levels

Q. I am from Spain too. I'm Anna Buj from La Vanguardia. I wanted to know if you——

The President. You're where from?

Q. Spain too.

The President. Oh.

Q. I wanted to know if you want to negotiate——

The President. That's the Spain corner right there. Shouldn't have said that. That's okay.

I do like Spain, by the way. I think it's unfair that they're not paying, but go ahead.

Q. Are you going to negotiate directly with Spain about——

The President. I'm going to negotiate directly with Spain. I'm going to do it myself. [Laughter] They're going to pay. They'll pay more money this way. They—you should tell them to go back and pay. You're a reporter?

Q. Yes.

The President. Tell them to go back. They ought to join all of those countries that are paying 5 percent.

Q. Okay.

The President. Spain is going to be just about the only one that's not.

Q. Do you want to——

The President. They were the most hostile toward doing it. I just—doesn't make sense to me.

Okay.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

All right, Kelly [Kelly O'Donnell, NBC News]. Go ahead.

Here we go. There's another one.

Q. Hello, sir. Thank you very much.

The President. We've got them all today.

U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities

Q. Okay. So, Mr. President, you talked about expecting some on-the-ground assessments at Fordow and other sites.

The President. Yes. Now, here——

Q. Is that Israeli——

The President. ——here, again.

Q. ——and U.S.——

The President. It's—it's been obliterated, Kelly. It's been—it's been obliterated.

Q. What is your message then, sir, to the intelligence community, when they present reports? You're not disputing the DIA report, you're just—that it exists——

The President. They presented a report that wasn't finished. We're talking about something that took place 3 days ago.

Q. I understand that, sir. It was an initial assessment.

The President. The report was done days ago.

Q. So what is your——

The President. Wait a minute.

Q. Yes, sir.

The President. They didn't see it. All they can do is take a guess. Now, if you take a look at the pictures, if you take a look how it's all blackened—you know, the fire and brimstone is all underground because it's granite and it's all underground. You don't show it. But even there, with all of that being said, the whole area, for 75 yards around the hole where it hit, is black with fire.

The group that's run by this gentleman—in fact, you may want to talk about it for a second, because we're going to issue a report—and I think it's not even a very exciting report at this point. It's been obliterated, totally obliterated. And they did a report, but it was, like, if you look at the dates, it's just a few days after it happened——

Q. Understood, sir.

The President. ——so they didn't see it. They said, "It may be very severe."

Q. Understood.

The President. Go ahead. Yes.

Q. Do you have a message for the intelligence community, though, in terms of unvarnished information getting to you? That it's not—[inaudible]——

The President. I don't really have a message. I would say, issue the report when you know what happened. I wouldn't say that it could be severe or maybe not. They use the word "severe." It could be severe, or maybe it's not.

Q. And briefly——

The President. So, people like you picked up and said, "Oh, it's not severe."

Q. We're just looking for the—[inaudible]——

The President. No, the report was not a complete report. Yes, the message was probably, wait till you know the answer before you—go ahead.

Ukraine/Russia

Q. And, sir, did you not have a public component to your Zelenskyy meeting for a tactical reason with President Putin?

The President. Let's let him answer this question.

Q. Hello, Mr. Secretary.

Secretary Hegseth. Yes. There's a reason the President calls out fake news for what it is. These pilots, these refuelers, these fighters, these air defenders—the skill and the courage it took to go into enemy territory, flying 36 hours on behalf of the American people and the world, to take out a nuclear program is beyond what anyone in this audience can fathom. And then the instinct—the instinct of CNN, the instinct of the New York Times, is to try to find a way to spin it for their own political reasons to try to hurt President Trump or our country. They don't care what the troops think. They don't care what the world thinks. They want to spin it to try to make him look bad, based on a leak.

Of course, we've all seen plenty of leakers. And what leakers do? They have agendas. And what do they do? Do they share the whole information or just the part that they want to introduce? And when they introduce that preliminary—a preliminary report that's deemed to be low-—a low assessment—do you know what a "low assessment" means? Low confidence in the data in that report. And why is there low confidence? Because all of the evidence of what was just bombed by 12 30,000-pound bombs is buried under a mountain, devastated and obliterated.

So, if you want to make an assessment of what happened at Fordow, you better get a big shovel and go really deep, because Iran's nuclear program is obliterated. And somebody somewhere is trying to leak something to say, "Oh, with low confidence, we think maybe it's moderate." Those that dropped the bombs precisely in the right place know exactly what happened when that exploded.

And you know who else knows? Iran. That's why they came to the table right away, because their nuclear capabilities have been set back beyond what they thought were possible because of the courage of a Commander in Chief who led our troops, despite what the fake news wants to say.

U.S. Airstrikes on Iranian Nuclear Facilities/News Media

Q. But you're not disputing the report said what it said, even though it was initial?

The President. The report said what it said, and it was fine. It was severe, they think, but they had no idea. They shouldn't have issued a report until they did.

But we've gotten the information. And I think Pete said it better than you can say it.

And you know, you should be proud. You—especially you—should be proud of those pilots——

Q. Very much so.

The President. And you shouldn't be trying to demean them.

Q. No, there's difference, sir——

The President. Those pilots flew——

Q. ——between asking about an assessment and the skill of the U.S. military.

The President. ——at great risk, a big chance that they'd never come back home and see their husbands or their wives.

Q. No one is questioning the skill of the U.S military.

The President. Let me just tell you, you and NBC Fake News, which is one of the worst, and CNN, New York Times—they're all bad. They're sick. There's something wrong with them. But you know what? You should be praising those people instead of trying to find some—by getting me—by trying to go and get me, you're hurting those people. They were devastated.

You know, I got a call from Missouri—great State that I won three times by a lot—and I got a call that the pilots and the people on the plane were devastated because they were trying to minimize the attack. And they all said it was hit. But: "Oh, but we don't think it was really maybe hit that badly." And they were devastated. They put their lives on the line, and then they have—and I'm not referring to you, but real scum—real scum come out and write reports that are as negative as they could possibly be.

It should be the opposite. You should make them heroes and heroines. You should make them, really, people that—they were so devastated when they heard this news.

And you know what they said? One of them—I spoke to one of them—said: "Sir, we hit the site. It was perfect. It was dead on," because they don't understand fake news, because they have a normal life, except they have to fly very big, very fast planes.

But it's a shame. You should be making them heroes.

All right, in the back.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Go ahead, back, white. Yes.

White jacket. Yes.

Go ahead, give him a mike.

Hello.

Q. Deborah Haynes from Sky News.

The President. Good.

Secretary General Mark Rutte of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

Q. Mark Rutte, the NATO chief, who is——

The President. Mark.

Q. ——is your friend, he called you "daddy" earlier. [Laughter] Do you regard your NATO allies as, kind of, children?

The President. No, he likes me. [Laughter] I think he likes me. If he doesn't, I'll let you know. I'll come back, and I'll hit him hard. Okay? No.

Q. But do you—do you regard——

The President. He did. He did it very affectionately. He—"Daddy." "You're my daddy." [Laughter]

Q. Do you regard your NATO allies, though, as kind of like children? And they're obviously listening to you, and they're spending more. And you're obviously appreciative of that. But do you hope that, actually, they're going to be able to defend themselves, defend Europe on their own without the United States?

The President. I think they need help a little bit at the beginning. And I think——

Q. But—[inaudible]?

The President. ——they'll be able to. And I think they're going to remember this day.

And this is a big day for NATO. You know, this was a very big day. They took it—one of the gentlemen said: "You know what? We've been trying to raise money for—raise the rate for 30 years," he said. "Twenty years, from almost the beginning." And he's been there for a long time. He said: "Until you came along, it never happened. What you did is amazing." It's been sort of an amazing day for a lot of reasons but also for that.

Yes, go ahead.

Q. Do you think they can do it without you though? In the future, can they do it without the United States?

The President. Well, ask Mark. [Laughter] I mean, you'd have to ask Mark. Okay?

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

So we're heading back. We're heading back.

I want to thank these two gentlemen behind me. They're incredible people, both of them. They're really—they've done a fantastic job.

And Susie is in the front, and she's done great.

And Monica, thank you very much. That was quite an exciting time.

And we're going to be heading back. We'll be back soon, and we'll see you in Washington, DC.

Remember this: We have the hottest country anywhere in the world.

Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you.