Trump tours White House ballroom construction

Mr. President, you mentioned that this is being paid for out of pocket. But why is Congress [INAUDIBLE]? Explain sort of the difference [INAUDIBLE]. Well, they're not. Congress is approving-- yeah, Congress is approving money for security. It may go-- some of it may go here for additional security. I don't know. But Congress is approving money. But this building, I mean, I put up the money to build this building, along with a lot of great patriots. People have put up a lot of money to build the building, and we have a building that is going to be-- I think it's going to be potentially the most beautiful building in all of Washington. And with that is great military capacity. We're building it in conjunction with the United States military and the Secret Service.

[INAUDIBLE] Well, they have a budget in Secret Service and the military to do some of the work that you see right here. So the answer is, I think they want to enhance what you see. It's very powerful. You see what's happening. It's very powerful concrete. It's 9,000-pound concrete. If you know anything about concrete, that's very strong. That's very strong concrete. But they probably want to enhance the area. They're going to spend money. This is a very sacred piece of land. This is the White House, and they want to do things. But everything that you see and the money that's being put up to build the ballroom-- and again, the ballroom, it's necessary for the ballroom to be built with what you see over here. It's all knitted, the air conditioning, the heating, the drone capacity, the shield. The ballroom becomes a shield for everything that you see right here. Without that, they couldn't have this. They couldn't build the lower floors without that shield over the top of it. It's a shield that will totally protect what's downstairs. They have a lot of things going on downstairs, and some of it you see. This goes down six stories. You see three stories because it's already been built. This will be-- very shortly, this will be in the form of-- the roof goes along this line. Basically, it goes outside. You see where the wood is. You're going outside of that line, and then it goes straight up. And it's all protection, and everything's together. You can't build one without the other. And what we have is we have the safest building ever built, in my opinion. You can have-- and the other thing is we're right on budget. We're right on plan. The only budget change would be that we doubled the size. At the request of the military, we doubled the size. But we're right on budget, right on plan. And, originally, we were going to build a much smaller room, and it wouldn't have done the job. It just wouldn't have done the job. You have too many events. Like if we have President Xi coming here, we have no place to put him. We had the king and the queen the other day, and we had a thousand people wanted, and we ended up having a hundred people sitting in a very small room. So they've been after this for a long time, but maybe more important is the safety element. This is a shield that protects everything that's inside, everything that's on top. And, obviously, the White House was built in 1792. Yeah, it's awfully hard to-- it's awfully hard to do that kind of a capacity that we did here. So this will give future presidents-- but you have to understand, when this is finished, my term ends shortly after that. This is really for other presidents. This is not for me. This is my gift to the United States of America. I'm going to be able to use it very little because when it's finished, we're talking about six or seven months. But it will be used for, hopefully, hundreds of years for other presidents. And there will never be anything like this built again. There will never be a room built like with the safety. As an example, if we had the White House Correspondents' Dinner here, there would have been no problem. [INTERPOSING VOICES]

Sir, you said that this will be [INAUDIBLE]. When it opens, you'll have six, seven months. [INAUDIBLE] around that time, have you thought about the first event [INAUDIBLE]? Yeah, I have. I have. I better not tell you about that, Daniel. But yeah, we have-- everybody wants to be here for the first event. We're talking about heads of nation. So we have some very special places that it could happen. Literally, if the king and queen were-- if we had this finished, we would have had an event that would have been 10 times [INAUDIBLE]. I mean, we literally-- we're in a little room in the White House. Presidents-- now we're not even talking about safety. Presidents have been asking for this literally from the time the White House has been built. But on record for 150 years, they've said, what about a big room? And you all know-- you probably attended. They have some where they use tents. If it rains, it's a disaster.

[INAUDIBLE] This is going to be a gift to America. Mr. President, [INAUDIBLE] America. We have to have a safe country. We have to have a great country. We have to make sure that Iran doesn't get a nuclear weapon. All of the things that you see me fighting for so hard, and it's always tough. We're negotiating with Iran, and then you have the Democrats-- I call them the "Dumbocrats"-- putting in a bill that Trump should immediately stop. You know how it is to negotiate with a country where you're beating them badly? They come to the table. They're begging to make a deal because they're begging to make a deal. I hope we don't have to do the war, but we may have to give them another big hit. We may have to give them another big hit. I'm not sure yet. You'll know very soon. But how do you feel when you're negotiating? You're winning every point. And they say, but in Washington, they want to stop you from negotiating. They want to stop you, and it's only political. It's the "Dumbocrats." They're dumb. It's a new name. It's a very accurate name. So I'm in the middle of a negotiation. I'm saying, you cannot have a nuclear weapon. And it comes over the wire that the "Dumbocrats" want to stop Trump from further negotiations. They want to stop Trump from, if he has to, giving them another slap. They want to have a nuclear weapon to blow up the Middle East and to blow up, frankly, the world. It's not going to happen. [INTERPOSING VOICES] Nice to see you, by the way.

How close were you to striking Iran [INAUDIBLE]? I was an hour away. We were all set to go. You're talking about yesterday?

Yes. We were going to be striking very-- it would have been happening right now.

What plans do [INAUDIBLE]? Yeah, it was all done. The boats, the ships are all loaded. They're loaded to the brim. And we're all set to start. [INTERPOSING VOICES] --Gulf nations tell you that convinced you [INAUDIBLE]? They said that they feel-- they've had for the first time in almost 47 years. Iran's been the bully of the Middle East for 47 years. I mean literally the bully of the Middle East. And they're nasty, very nasty, very dangerous. They wanted a nuclear weapon. Had I not terminated Barack Hussein Obama's Iran nuclear deal, had I not terminated it-- see, that's the wind. That can't happen with the real structure.

Mr. President, on Cuba, what do you want to see from Cuba's government in order to take the option of military action-- You're talking about Cuba?

--off the table? Well, we're going to see. Look, Cuba is calling us. They need help. Look, Cuba is a failed nation. Cuba needs help, and we'll do that. Just hold them, [INAUDIBLE]. It's like an exercise game for [INAUDIBLE]. Give that to me. I'll hold it. I'll hold it. It's so beautiful. See I look so thin. They'll say, oh, he's gotten so thin because I'm holding this. You don't have to look at my waist. You can look at this. You saw enough of my waist, along with President Xi, in China.

Are you confident that you can reach a diplomatic [INAUDIBLE]? With Cuba? I think so. Yeah, I think so. I am very prone toward the Cuban Americans. They've been incredible people. Many of them have lost family members. They've been very badly hurt themselves. They've been in prison. They've come to this country, and they've been very successful. The Cuban American people in Miami, I mean, they are amazing people. Most of them are in Miami, in Florida, but mostly in Miami. I'm very, very prone to helping them. I mean, I think I got 97% of that vote. I want to help them. Now, they have family members in Cuba. They've been treated very, very badly. They've been treated extremely badly, and we're going to get that solved. That's not going to be hard for us to solve.

But you can do that without changing the regime [INAUDIBLE]? Well, I don't know about changing the regime. I can do that whether you change your regime or not. It's been a rough regime. They've killed a lot of people. But it's a country that really needs help. It has nothing. They can't turn on the lights. They can't eat. We don't want to see that.

Mr. President, how much notice did the Gulf nations have-- how much notice did the Gulf nations have that you were going to do these strikes before they asked you to pause? They called me over the last two days to say they made a lot of progress because we have them negotiating with us and primarily Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Kuwait a little bit, and Bahrain, and some of the others. And we have them negotiating with them. We're all working together. It's like a team. And Israel, of course, and Israel has been a great partner. And so we are negotiating together. I got a call from numerous of these people. They know the people in Iran. Don't forget, when you talk about regime change, I think it's the ultimate regime change because the first level and the second level are no longer with us. There's some place, but they're no longer with us. So we have real regime change. But I got a call yesterday. Sir, could you wait? We think we're close to a deal, and that's OK. Now, I've heard it before with these people, and they changed their mind. I made deals with them, no nuclear. We immediately get the nuclear dust. And they said, you're the only one can get it because the bombers did such an unbelievable job that the mountain literally collapsed on top of it. They said us and they thought China would be the only two countries that could even get it. But I think it's important to get it, maybe psychologically more than anything else. [INTERPOSING VOICES]

How long did they know that you were planning [INAUDIBLE], the Gulf nations? They knew I was getting ready to attack. I didn't tell them. I never tell anybody when.

You're in constant contact [INAUDIBLE]? I never tell anybody when, but they knew that we were very close. I would say we were-- I was an hour away from making the decision to go today, and we would probably not be talking about a beautiful ballroom today. We'd be talking about that. And no, I had made the decision. So they called up. They had heard I made the decision. They said, sir, could you give us a couple of more days because we think they're being reasonable? [INTERPOSING VOICES]

--for Iran to come to the table? Well, I mean, I'm saying two or three days, maybe Friday, Saturday, Sunday, something, maybe early next week, a limited period of time.

[INAUDIBLE] Because we can't let them have a nuclear weapon. If they had a nuclear weapon, they would start with Israel. They would blow it up, and they would blow it up fast, but they'd blow it up. And I'll tell you what, they'd go after Saudi Arabia. They'd go after Kuwait. They'd go after UAE. They'd go after Qatar. They'd go after-- I think they go after the entire Middle East, and it would be a whole different negotiation. It would not be-- it would be nuclear holocaust. And there's no question, in my mind, that they'd use it. There's no question. And I deal with these people. They're extremely radicalized. These are not people like what I deal with you. You're a very nice guy. These are people that are seriously radicalized. They would use it. The only question, would it be the first minute, the first hour, or the first day?

How many pauses [INAUDIBLE], if there come a point [INAUDIBLE] where they're not longer going to be [INAUDIBLE]? I'm not doing this politically. Look, everyone tells me it's unpopular, but I think it's very popular. When they hear that it's having to do with nuclear weapons, weapons that could take out Los Angeles, could take out major cities very quickly-- when they hear that-- when they're explaining-- I'll tell you what. When we explain it to people-- I don't really have enough time to explain to people. I'm too busy getting it done. When they understand, I think it's, frankly, very popular. But whether it's popular or not popular, I have to do it because I'm not going to let the world be blown up on my watch. It's not going to happen.

[INAUDIBLE] primary with Thomas Massie and your endorsed candidate. Do you think your candidate can beat him, and what are you seeing? Yeah, Thomas Massie is a terrible congressman. He's been a terrible congressman from day one. Dealing with him is just a horrible-- I don't think he's a Republican. I think he's actually-- I think he's actually a "Dumbocrat." He's not a libertarian. Sometimes, they say he's-- he's really a "Dumbocrat." He votes against us all the time. He voted against the border wall. He voted against men playing in women's sports. He voted against transgender for everybody, the mutilation of your children. He voted against, again, open borders. We have the best border we've ever had right now. Nobody's coming in. I mean, a report just came out. In the last 11 months, literally nobody has been allowed into our country illegally. We're taking people legally. They go through a process, but nobody's coming to our country. But we've taken out hundreds of thousands of people. We had 10,000-- it was 10,800-- 11,888 murderers. Many of these murderers allowed into our country from prisons. They were in prisons. Many of these people killed more than one. More than 50% killed more than one person. This was gross malfeasance. This was on behalf of the Biden admin. I don't know Biden because I don't think he knew he was alive. But she, Kamala, was the border czar. She never called-- not one time, she never called the Border Patrol. She never called ICE. She never called law enforcement. She never went to the border. Think of it. I used to call every single day, and that's recently. Now, I call less. We have nobody coming through. We had caravans coming through with tens of thousands of people pouring into our country. We had no idea who they were. We would have been-- I'll tell you what, our country would have been destroyed. If they won this election, our country would have been-- we have now the hottest country anywhere in the world. If they had won the election, our country would have been destroyed. Our country was a dead country two years ago, and now we have really the hottest country in the world. And this is the ballroom, and it's going to be something incredible. You see the quality of it. And there you go, right? Those columns go right into the roof. And on top of the roof, we're going to have the greatest drone empire that you've ever seen, and it's going to protect Washington. Thank you all very much. We have a little breakfast for you.

Really? Yeah. Where is the breakfast? I'd have it. Where is it? [INTERPOSING VOICES] Oh, it's right over here.

Can I ask you one more on the ballroom? We have a little bit of a breakfast for you. I figured I'd be nice to you for a change.

And with that, we pull away from President Trump speaking right next to construction of what he describes as the East Wing renovation project, the White House ballroom. And he also answered a number of questions from reporters. One of the first questions, Shanelle, was on the cost. He'd initially said it would cost $200 million. That jumped to $400 million. And now there's an additional $1-billion security package requested by Senate Republicans, which hit a bit of a parliamentary snag recently. But the president says it will be more secure. It will be more safe, and dignitaries will be able to attend when they visit.

He talked about sniper capacity. He talked about the drones that will be there. And, of course, we know there's also still that big legal challenge by preservationists against this whole project. So we'll see how that plays out. He also talked about Iran and Cuba. With Iran, he said, quote, "We may have to give them another big hit."

That's right. He spoke about the timeline for a decision for military action, sharing that he was an hour away from a decision on Monday, a decision related to today's military action, before he got word that Iran was ready to continue to negotiate. So those talks continue. He mentioned Cuba being a failed nation and having energy and food problems, which is why it's in the focus of the administration right now. And he also mentioned the primaries taking place today across the country, railing against northern Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie, who he does not want to see return to Congress, considering Massie has not supported much of the president's agenda.