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Trump on his red line for Iran amid protests

President Trump says the U.S. "will take very strong action" if Iranian authorities begin hanging anti-government protesters, saying "it's not gonna work out good." Watch more of his exclusive interview with Tony Dokoupil tonight on "CBS Evening News."
Jan 13 (01:56)

TRANSCRIPT FOR: “TRUMP SAYS U.S. "WILL TAKE VERY STRONG ACTION" IF IRAN HANGS PROTESTERS”

DONALD TRUMP:
00:00:03

Yeah. What do you mean by that? Well, there's a lot help on the way and in different forms, including economic help from our standpoint. And we're not going to help Iran very much. And we put Iran out of business with their nuclear capacity. And now, depending on what's actually happening-- nobody's been able to give us accurate numbers about how many people they've killed. Well, on that point, Mr. President-- But it looks like it could be a pretty substantial number. And that's going to be a lot of problems for them. A lot of problems. On that point, you did say the US would get involved if Iran started killing protesters. They have by the many thousands, according to reports. Well, we'll see what that is. I've heard two numbers, but we'll see what that is. Well, now, we're hearing that they're going to start hanging protesters tomorrow. So it comes back to the question, have they crossed your red line? Or has the line moved? I haven't heard about the hanging. If they hang them, you're going to see some things that-- I don't know where you come from and what your thought process is, but you'll perhaps be very happy. What do you mean by that? We will take very strong action. If they do such a thing, we will take very strong action. And this strong action you're talking about, what's the end game? The end game is to win. I like winning. And we'll win. How do you define that in Iran? Well, let's define it in Venezuela. Let's define it with al-Baghdadi. He was wiped out. Let's define it with Soleimani. And let's define it in Iran, where I wiped out their Iran nuclear threat in a period of about 15 minutes once the B-2s got there. And that was a complete obliteration, as it turns out, which is what I said initially. Then some questioned it, and they said, Trump was right. So we've been right about everything. We don't want to see what's happening in Iran happen. And if they want to have protests, that's one thing. When they start killing thousands of people and now you're telling me about hanging, we'll see how that works out for them. It's not going to work out good.

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