March 5, 2025 - The Benny Show - Benny Johnson
55:19
Participants
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| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
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unidentified
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President Donald Trump giving his joint address to Congress with a promise to renew the American dream and fight for a common-sense revolution. | |
| America is back. | ||
|
unidentified
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America is back. | |
| Six weeks ago, I stood beneath the dome of this Capitol. | ||
| And proclaim the dawn of the golden age of America. | ||
| We have accomplished more in 43 days than most administrations accomplished in four years or eight years. | ||
| And we are just getting started. | ||
|
unidentified
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But Democrats did not embrace his message in a chaotic scene unfolded as one congressman had to be physically removed from the chamber for heckling the president. | |
| You are watching Fox and Friends First on this Wednesday morning. | ||
| I'm Carly Shumkin. | ||
| And I'm Todd Pyro. | ||
| Let's get live to Lucas Tomlinson in Washington with more from the president's speech and, of course, that Democrat pushback. | ||
| Hey, Lucas. | ||
| Well, good early morning, Carly and Todd. | ||
| It was the longest address to Congress in modern presidential history. | ||
| President Trump speaking for about an hour and 40 minutes. | ||
| One of the lines that stood out, Trump talking about enforcing the southern border, saying Democrats claimed new legislation was needed. | ||
| Trump said all that was needed was a new president. | ||
| Trump received many standing ovations, including when he walked in, as you can see here. | ||
| The Democrats refused to join in, but did not come empty-handed, as you can see from the signs they waved here. | ||
| Now, one Democrat who did stand up, but not to applaud, but to shout insults, Congressman Al Green, who has called for Trump's impeachment on multiple occasions, including in Trump's second term. | ||
| Green was tossed out by House Speaker Mike Johnson. | ||
|
unidentified
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Mr. Green, take your seat. | |
| Take your seat, sir. | ||
| Take your seat. | ||
| Members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum. | ||
| The chair now directs the sergeant-at-arms to restore order. | ||
| Remove this gentleman from the chamber. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| And here's Green saying he knew what he was doing. | ||
|
unidentified
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I'm willing to suffer whatever punishment is available to me. | |
| I didn't say to anyone, don't punish me. | ||
| I've said I'll accept the punishment. | ||
| So while Democrats sat this one out, even when Trump made a 13-year-old battling cancer an honorary Secret Service agent, Trump said there's nothing he can do to win them over. | ||
| I look at the Democrats in front of me and I realize there is absolutely nothing I can say to make them happy. | ||
| Or to make them stand or smile or applaud. | ||
| Nothing I can do. | ||
| I could find a cure to the most devastating disease. | ||
| A disease that would wipe out entire nations. | ||
| And these people sitting right here will not clap, will not stand. | ||
|
unidentified
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What? | |
| Wrong answer. | ||
| Be nice. | ||
| I'd hate to have to come back here. | ||
| I'd hate to have to come back here. | ||
| Love you, Jon! | ||
| Love you, Jon! | ||
| you you What's going on, beautiful people? | ||
| Welcome to another day in Trump's American Golden Age. | ||
| Benny is, of course, in New York right now on a special assignment with Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem. | ||
| So we will certainly have some very interesting content to come out of that. | ||
| You will be first to see it, of course. | ||
| I'm Danny Darabina. | ||
| I'm filling in for Benny while he's on this very special assignment in New York City. | ||
| Of course, we witnessed what we witnessed last night. | ||
| It was a very historic State of the Union, you can call it, by President Trump to a joint session of Congress where there were so many amazing moments. | ||
| Of course, one of the most famous moments that's been all over my feed, and I'm sure you've seen it by now, is this 13-year-old cancer survivor who President Trump honored in the middle of his address. | ||
| This kid had been through countless brain surgeries, and his one dream was to be a police officer. | ||
| And so President Trump stopped his entire speech last night and made him an honorary Secret Service agent. | ||
| It was a moment that had the entire room in tears, the entire country in tears, at least half of the room in tears. | ||
| Let's be fair, right? | ||
| So every Democrat sat on their hands, didn't applaud for this very moving moment. | ||
| And what we saw later on, actually, was an absolute meltdown from the liberal media. | ||
| Where they call the gesture disgusting. | ||
| They wish some very disturbing things that I won't repeat on air when it comes to DJ Daniels, the 13-year-old cancer survivor. | ||
| It was shocking to see the reaction from liberals in the press. | ||
| And so what we're going to see right now, moments away from Caroline Levitt walking... | ||
| On the podium, I don't know if we have a shot of the podium, if we can maybe put that up on the side so we can just monitor it. | ||
| But Caroline Levitt is, of course, Trump's press secretary. | ||
| We call her KO Caroline because she's known to go hard against some of these Democrat reporters. | ||
| And so this should be a very interesting showing. | ||
| As you can see on the screen right here, this is what the room looks like. | ||
| It looks like most of the reporters are in their seats, which is a really good sign that Caroline should walk out any moment. | ||
| It was scheduled for 1 o 'clock, so it's 1.07 right now Eastern. | ||
| That's a really good sign. | ||
| We should be seeing Caroline soon. | ||
| They've been on time recently. | ||
| So Caroline probably going to have some pretty spicy moments today against some of these members of the press. | ||
| Of course, we know Caitlin Collins is one of our favorites. | ||
| She's in there. | ||
| So who knows? | ||
| Maybe she's going to have something to say about the State of the Union last night. | ||
| There were so many amazing moments. | ||
| Trump brought up the Gulf of America. | ||
| Great to hear it every time. | ||
| And of course, President Trump also brought up the border. | ||
| It was the cornerstone of his campaign. | ||
| And he called out Democrats to their faces. | ||
| I mean, he stared them right down the barrel. | ||
| And call them out because for the longest time they said, oh, we need this policy. | ||
| We need this policy. | ||
| And President Trump said, absolutely not. | ||
| We need it as a president with the big balls to get the job done. | ||
| And President Trump has accomplished that. | ||
| Of course, we've seen record high deportation numbers and record low border encounters. | ||
| So, of course, his policies are working because the president is actually putting action behind his words. | ||
| And we're seeing that happen right now. | ||
| Of course, looking at the room right here, we have Caroline Levitt set to walk out any moment now. | ||
| Chat, I want to hear from you. | ||
| Let me know, who do you think Caroline's most likely to face off with? | ||
| I think it's our favorite Caitlin Collins. | ||
| Who knows? | ||
| There's been some spicy corporate reporters in that room recently. | ||
| So let me know. | ||
| What do you think? | ||
| I'm looking at the chat right now. | ||
| Let's get it rolling. | ||
| Looks like... | ||
| We have some staff there, some photographers, it looks like. | ||
| So, again, that's a very good sign. | ||
| Everyone seems like they're situated. | ||
| So, any moment, we'll see Caroline Levitt walk out. | ||
| And, of course, the minute she does, we'll take you straight there. | ||
| We won't miss a second of it. | ||
| I'm seeing the chat. | ||
| They're going, Collins, I agree. | ||
| Kaitlyn Collins again. | ||
| Kaitlyn Collins, Kaitlyn. | ||
| Yeah, she... | ||
| I think she wins the award for most unhinged member of the press in the White House right now. | ||
| So, who knows? | ||
| We might have a moment there. | ||
| People seem to be very angry about the State of the Union last night. | ||
| Democrats are. | ||
| I think the reason they're angry is because they know Americans watching the State of the Union back home saw a very positive, successful, optimistic vision forward for America. | ||
| And they're panicking because they know Trump is right now at his record high approval ratings. | ||
| Meanwhile, Democrats are plummeting. | ||
| So, I mean, literally, this party is like falling apart right now. | ||
| So I think they're just panicking. | ||
| They don't know how else to react to Americans being so receptive to the America First agenda. | ||
| They're kind of in the tailspin right now. | ||
| So I expect a lot of fireworks today. | ||
| Just seeing what I saw last night, seeing the reaction to this glorious State of the Union, man, Caroline's gonna, I think she's gonna bring the heat. | ||
| She's gonna bring the heat. | ||
| Again, just, I see people asking, where's Benny? | ||
| No, I have not just commenteered the stream. | ||
| Benny is right now on a very special mission with Kristi Noem in New York City. | ||
| We will publish the details of that very shortly, as soon as we can, and you will be the first to see it. | ||
| In the meantime, we're not gonna miss a moment. | ||
| So I said, you know what? | ||
| We're going live. | ||
| We're going to take Caroline Levitt because she's great every time. | ||
| And there's going to be a lot of fireworks today. | ||
| That's my prediction. | ||
| So we're not going to miss a moment of it. | ||
| Yeah. | ||
| Chat is still going off about Caitlin Collins. | ||
| Listen, you're not wrong. | ||
| She's a little interesting. | ||
| And so I predict we're going to have some spicy moments there with Caitlin Collins. | ||
| I don't know if you guys knew this. | ||
| Caitlin Collins used to work at Fox. | ||
| And she would, like, trash Soros live on air. | ||
| And then CNN came along and offered her millions of dollars to trash Republicans and Trump, and she gladly took it. | ||
| This is sort of what happens in D.C. Excuse the cough. | ||
| We've been up for, you know, all hours of the night taking the State of the Union live last night. | ||
| So there's a little bit of a cough there, but we'll get through it. | ||
| There we go. | ||
| Looking at the room right now, I just want to make sure we're not missing any cues, but it looks like reporters are still seated. | ||
| So, of course, whenever Caroline Levitt walks out, we'll go straight there. | ||
| I think you can see Jackie Heinrich there, who's... | ||
| Actually, no, that's Peter Doocy. | ||
| Peter Doocy is in the house today. | ||
| We haven't seen him in a while. | ||
| It's usually Jackie Heinrich lately, but here we go. | ||
| Peter Doocy's back in the chair. | ||
| Front row. | ||
| So he might have some interesting questions as well. | ||
| We know he had some moments there with Cringe Jean-Pierre and Chucky Jen Psaki. | ||
| We kind of missed them, to be honest. | ||
| They were a lot of fun for the content. | ||
| Peter Doocy, he might have something to say maybe regarding all the meltdowns we saw last night. | ||
| We saw Al Green. | ||
| Maybe we can pop that clip up. | ||
| Al Green. | ||
| Absolutely unhinged meltdown last night. | ||
| Armed insurrectionists, right? | ||
| So he interrupted Trump's official proceeding of his State of the Union and just sort of wagging his cane like angry man yells at cloud. | ||
| And, I mean, armed insurrection with that really creepy little pit cane he carries around. | ||
| And he had to get dragged out of the House. | ||
| He had to get dragged off the Capitol. | ||
| He got removed and ejected because he wouldn't shut up. | ||
| He was utterly unhinged. | ||
| If we have that clip, we'll play because it's so great. | ||
| I'm sure someone's going to ask about that today. | ||
| We will bring that to you. | ||
| I'm sure you guys saw that last night. | ||
| It was one of the hottest moments. | ||
| It was utterly bizarre. | ||
| The Democrats were walking in and out. | ||
| They were like, again, I just don't think they know how to handle this. | ||
| They see Americans embracing the America First agenda, embracing the Trump administration, and they're panicking because they know their power is limited. | ||
| They know their time has come to an end. | ||
| Their stranglehold and their grip over the American psyche is vanished. | ||
| And so last night was like a perfect encapsulation of that, where they just couldn't, like, they didn't know what to do with themselves. | ||
| So there's plenty of spicy moments. | ||
| I'm sure we'll play them. | ||
| In the meantime... | ||
| Again, looking right here at Caroline Levitt. | ||
| She is set to walk out any moment. | ||
| We've talked a lot about Al Green. | ||
| I feel like at this point we have to play the clip. | ||
| Team's saying we have it loaded, so let's play Al Green. | ||
| Watch for yourself. | ||
| This is nuts. | ||
|
unidentified
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Take your seat. | |
| Take your seat, sir. | ||
| Take your seat. | ||
| Finding that members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum, the chair now directs the sergeant-at-arms to restore order. | ||
| Remove this gentleman from the chamber. | ||
| Sources say that all he was trying to say is Geico can save you 50% or more on car insurance. | ||
| He's literally the guy from the Geico commercial, if you're not aware. | ||
| He's the caveman of the Neanderthal. | ||
| So, he got dragged out. | ||
| He is not in the chair, but in the chair, of course, we see there Peter Ducey. | ||
| I'm sure he'll have a phenomenal question that he'll ask Caroline Levitt later. | ||
| We have a very powerful moment from last night's State of the Union address that I think is worth playing. | ||
| I've watched it five times, and I've teared up every single time I've watched it because it's just one of those very powerful, heartfelt moments that reminds you of what America is about and supporting your fellow American. | ||
| So one of my favorite moments last night from the speech, if not my favorite, was play that clip. | ||
| We have it ready, I believe. | ||
| Or at least we're loading it up. | ||
| We will play it because it's... | ||
| It's really one of those very heartfelt moments. | ||
| President Trump does this the best out of anyone I've seen deliver State of the Union, where he really commands the room and highlights, by highlighting, just very powerful stories from Americans. | ||
| I live between D.C. and Miami. | ||
| I need to escape D.C. every now and then to see the sun and normal people. | ||
| But when I'm here, I realize just how deranged this city is. | ||
| Where, you know, it's so detached from reality, right? | ||
| You see people out here protesting Doge because they're saving American taxpayer dollars. | ||
| I mean, go out to anywhere else in the country and ask them if they want their taxpayer dollars spent on treadmills for shrimp. | ||
| I mean, it's just deranged. | ||
| Again, D.C. is just so detached from real America. | ||
| And so President Trump does a really powerful job at highlighting. | ||
| The stories of real Americans and also all of his guests in the gallery up there on the House floor and the House chamber are all just, you know, Americans with a really powerful story to tell, powerful stories to tell that highlight the resilience of this country and what makes America so great. | ||
| So it's always my favorite part of these State of the Union speeches that Trump gives. | ||
| There's no one that does it quite like, and Biden tried to copy him, but, I mean, we all know how that went. | ||
| So, yeah, just some really, really great moments. | ||
| Of course, last night we had the 13-year-old cancer survivor whose dream was to be a cop. | ||
| And President Trump last night made that dream come true by making him America's newest Secret Service agent. | ||
| It was such a touching moment. | ||
| And we have that clip for you. | ||
| We have to play it. | ||
| And of course, as soon as Caroline comes on, we'll go straight there. | ||
| But in the meantime, we just have to play it. | ||
| In 2018, DJ was diagnosed with brain cancer. | ||
| The doctors gave him five months at most to live. | ||
| That was more than six years ago. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Since that time, D.J. and his dad have been on a quest to make his dream come true, and D.J. has been sworn in as an honorary law enforcement officer actually a number of times. | ||
| The police love him. | ||
| The police departments love him. | ||
| And tonight, D.J., we're going to do you the biggest honor of them all. | ||
| I am asking our new Secret Service Director. | ||
| Sean Curran to officially make you an agent of the United States Secret Service. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Thank you, DJ. | ||
| Yay! | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Such a powerful moment. | ||
| It's so great. | ||
| I mean, it was like someone was cutting onions in that room last night, just watching that. | ||
| It's like so powerful. | ||
| President Trump really did a great job at highlighting these stories. | ||
| And of course, you saw the joy on that kid when Trump said, I'm going to, you know, bestow you the greatest honor of them all. | ||
| His eyes just like lit up. | ||
| You could see the, you know, the emotion there. | ||
| It was really, really special. | ||
| Of course, he then embraced Secret Service Director Current. | ||
| I mean, it was... | ||
| Really, really a powerful moment. | ||
| We have some clips coming later, but you see that, and I don't know how else you could react other than just heartfelt happiness for this kid and sympathy for your fellow American. | ||
| But what we saw last night was... | ||
| From the corporate media, it was really a show, a disgusting show of apathy for what this family, this kid has been through. | ||
| We'll play those because I think they're worth playing. | ||
| Just because, you know, the media always tries to take the side of like, oh, we're the virtuous ones. | ||
| But they're really like, a lot of them are just terrible people. | ||
| And I think it's worth showing just how disgusting their hatred and derangement for Trump can take them. | ||
| Last night we saw the likes of Nicole Wallace and Rachel Maddow. | ||
| Says some really disgusting things. | ||
| We have Maddow last night. | ||
| She called this disgusting. | ||
| I mean, it was like if she saw something totally... | ||
| As if she watched something different than you and I did. | ||
| It's worth playing. | ||
| Rachel Maddow, let's play her reaction last night. | ||
| For the record, and this is disgusting, the president made a spectacle out of praising a young man who thus far survived pediatric cancer. | ||
| As if the president had something to do with that. | ||
| This was in the midst of him praising Doge. | ||
| Doge cuts, among other things, have cut off funding for ongoing research into pediatric cancer. | ||
| Indeed, you better believe. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| I mean, these people are just totally deranged. | ||
| And it's just sad to see. | ||
| Like, I want to see my media. | ||
| You know, not do that. | ||
| Not do that kind of disgusting spectacle simply because you hate the guy in power. | ||
| Again, this is the power of this audience. | ||
| This is the power of independent creators. | ||
| These deranged individuals no longer have a string hold over Americans and how they get their news. | ||
| We can just vibe. | ||
| We can just talk to each other and play. | ||
| We can take the State of the Union live from the Capitol. | ||
| And expose these deranged reactions and just do it in a way that's a lot more authentic and not just, you know, you know, Caitlin Collins is getting paid millions to trash Trump and she'll gladly do it. | ||
| Ten years ago, she was on Fox News. | ||
| I mean, that's kind of how it works. | ||
| And so this is why I love the chat so much. | ||
| I see you guys are rolling. | ||
| It's good to see you guys. | ||
| And, you know, we're vibing. | ||
| Again, we're waiting here for Caroline Lovett. | ||
| She's set to walk out any moment. | ||
| And when she does, we'll go straight there. | ||
| We won't miss a second. | ||
| Seems like everyone's seated, so, you know, maybe Caroline's getting ready to make some kind of big announcement, and so she's getting the details ready for that before she walks out, because it looks like everyone's been told, be in your seats, because they are. | ||
| Oh, Caroline, here we go. | ||
| Let's go live. | ||
| Do we have audio? | ||
| We're going to fix the audio, and we will go directly there. | ||
| Let me know when we're good. | ||
| Sorry about that, guys. | ||
| We're getting it up right now. | ||
| Caroline Levitt just took the podium. | ||
| She's talking right now. | ||
| Let's listen in. | ||
| Okay, we're efforting the audio here. | ||
| I apologize about that. | ||
| Make sure we're sharing the tab with audio. | ||
| Caroline looks like she's making a point there to talk about the approval rating of President Trump and his State of the Union last night. | ||
| So, again. | ||
| I'm glad we teed it up this way because it looks like Caroline's going to be talking about exactly what we were talking about before, sort of the deranged reaction from the corporate press. | ||
| And so Caroline will now really reinforce that to the press right there. | ||
| They're not going to be happy to hear it. | ||
| I mean, it must be a miserable experience to rehash all the successes of this administration to these, you know, deranged reporters. | ||
| But again... | ||
| Apologize for the audio issues here. | ||
| The team's fixing it right now, and we will go straight there. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| No update. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Here we go. | ||
| Let's go. | ||
| Honor her life. | ||
| And in one of the greatest surprise moments of the night, DJ Daniel, an incredible 13-year-old boy who is beating brain cancer, saw his dreams fulfilled by President Trump when he was made an honorary Secret Service agent. | ||
| And finally, after nearly four years, President Trump delivered justice for the families of the 13 American heroes who were killed at Abbey Gate and the Biden botched Afghanistan withdrawal, which was one of the worst humiliations in the history of our country. | ||
| President Trump announced that we have detained Mohammad Sharif Fula, the monster who was responsible for that horrific attack, and he was delivered to Dulles Airfield earlier this morning. | ||
| On his first day in office, President Trump's national security team across the federal government prioritized intelligence gathering to locate this evil individual. | ||
| President Trump's team shared intelligence with regional partners such as Pakistan, who helped identify this monster in the borderland area late last month. | ||
| Mohammed confessed to his crimes related to Abbey Gate and other attacks in Russia and Iran as well to the Pakistanis. | ||
| And U.S. law enforcement officers traveled to Pakistan over the weekend where he again confessed his crimes to the FBI. | ||
| As President Trump said last night, this killer will now face the swift sword of American justice for these atrocities right here on United States soil. | ||
| Joe Biden was responsible for this botched withdrawal, and he had three years to find this evil terrorist, and he didn't even try to get the job done. | ||
| But President Trump campaigned on behalf of and grew very close to the Gold Star families. | ||
| He promised them accountability. | ||
| And last night, he kept his promise. | ||
| He spoke to those Gold Star families yesterday ahead of his speech in an incredibly heartwarming call to share this incredible news. | ||
| And as President Trump asked in his speech last night, how could anyone possibly be opposed to any of this action that he is taking? | ||
| Well, apparently, the modern-day Democrat Party could. | ||
| The behavior of Democrats last night was completely disgraceful and demonstrated how severely out of touch they are with the American public. | ||
| It was the most shameful moment in the history of presidential addresses in that beautiful chamber. | ||
| In what was supposed to be a unifying moment for our country, Democrat members of Congress instead screamed at the President of the United States, who was just overwhelmingly reelected by their constituents, walked out of the chamber, and worst of all, they disrespected the American people. | ||
| Democrats didn't stand for an innocent and beautiful child who is surviving brain cancer. | ||
| They opposed eliminating taxes on tips and Social Security. | ||
| They didn't stand in favor of cutting taxes for hardworking Americans. | ||
| They couldn't even clap for two mothers whose daughters were killed by illegal aliens. | ||
| One of the only things that could get Democrats off their feet last night was cheering for Ukraine. | ||
| Not for America. | ||
| Last night was a very clarifying moment for our country. | ||
| The Democrats exposed themselves as the party of insanity and hate. | ||
| The party that wants to put America last. | ||
| They've allowed their Trump derangement syndrome to stop them from celebrating America and our people, and we will not allow them to forget that. | ||
| And it's not just the Democrat Party. | ||
| The mainstream media still doesn't get it. | ||
| Last night, MSNBC's Nicole Wallace disgustingly looped in a 13-year-old boy with brain cancer into an attack on the president over January 6th. | ||
| And CNN's first chyron out of the speech called it divisive. | ||
| President Trump wasn't divisive. | ||
| The Democrats were. | ||
| And CNN was proven wrong by their own viewers, 69% of whom, in a post-speech poll, said they had a positive reaction to the president's speech. | ||
| It's sad and frankly pathetic that Democrats and liberals in the legacy media continue to allow their hatred for the president to override their love for our country. | ||
| But nevertheless, the president will continue to unify this nation through policies that are grounded in common sense and that uplift all Americans. | ||
| We have an individual in our new media seat today, Mary Margaret Olihan, who is the Daily Wire's first ever White House correspondent. | ||
| Congratulations, Mary Margaret. | ||
| The Daily Wire was founded 10 years ago by Ben Shapiro. | ||
| The Daily Wire now has over 1 million paid subscribers, a monthly network reach of 138 million, and has evolved into a leading conservative multimedia giant. | ||
| They are now the fifth largest podcast network in the world, and home to some of the top-ranked shows. | ||
| With that, I will take your questions, and Mary Margaret, why don't you kick us off? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you so much, Caroline. | |
| It's good to be here. | ||
| Thanks. | ||
| So I had two questions, if that's okay. | ||
| The first on last night, and the second on May. | ||
| You talked about behavior from Democrat lawmakers, a lot of disruptions, and I just wanted to kind of go back to that. | ||
| We saw Democrat lawmakers not stand for Lake and Riley, for Peyton McNabb, for the son of a slain police officer, a 13-year-old cancer survivor. | ||
| What are the optics of that nationally, just in terms of not just the people who were in the room last night, but across the nation? | ||
| And also, was President Trump expecting this type of behavior when he was crafting his speech? | ||
| So I gave a quote to one of the media outlets in this room yesterday that Democrats behaving like children would be the least surprising thing of the night. | ||
| And unfortunately, that quote did turn out to be true. | ||
| I think the president and everyone, frankly, was surprised by the Democrats refusing to stand for not the president's policies, because frankly, we expected that, but for the everyday Americans who President Trump was shining a light on their stories. | ||
| Mark Fogle, for instance, an American school teacher who was detained by the Russians. | ||
| President Trump freed him. | ||
| If Joe Biden had done that, they all would have been on their feet. | ||
| But because it came from President Trump, they weren't. | ||
| So we think it's very sad. | ||
| But we're very proud of the president today. | ||
| And the American people are the people that this president cares about most. | ||
| And the reviews are in. | ||
| And everybody loved his speech. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And then on Maine, we know that the governor of Maine has really pushed back against the president's executive order, saying the boys should not be in girls' sports. | |
| I spoke with a lawmaker from Maine this morning who told me she'd been censured by state lawmakers for calling a man a man and speaking up on this. | ||
| What is the next move for the White House in this battle to protect the integrity of women's sports? | ||
| Yeah, well, the Department of Education has sued the state of Maine. | ||
| As you know, there's ongoing litigation. | ||
| The president has made a commitment to ensure that states are being held accountable if they continue to allow men in women's sports, which he believes is an egregious violation of taxpayer dollars. | ||
| And so that fight continues. | ||
| The President won't back down. | ||
| Again, this is a common sense policy. | ||
| 80% of the American people, including more than 60% of Democrats, do not want men in women's sports. | ||
| So the President will stand by this commitment. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Gabe, good to see you in here. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good to see you, Carolyn. | |
| A couple questions. | ||
| One, can you confirm that President Hill talks with the Big Three automakers today, speaking about potentially delaying tariffs? | ||
| I can confirm, and I'm glad that you asked, because the President sent me out here with a statement directly from him on this. | ||
| I saw it was reported earlier today by Bloomberg News, and he wanted me to share this with all of you. | ||
| We spoke with the Big Three auto dealers. | ||
| We are going to give a one-month exemption on any autos coming through USMCA. | ||
| Reciprocal tariffs will still go into effect on April 2nd, but at the request of the companies associated with USMCA, the president is giving them an exemption for one month so they are not at an economic disadvantage. | ||
| So the three companies that he spoke to are Stellantis, Ford, and General Motors. | ||
| They requested the call, they made the ask, and the president is happy to do it. | ||
| It's a one-month exemption. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The president just posted on social media that he had spoken with. | |
| Prime Minister Trudeau says he's not satisfied with what the prime minister has said when it comes to fentanyl, but less than 1%, as you know, less than 1% of the fentanyl seeds last year was in the northern border. | ||
| What else does Canada need to do? | ||
| Well, the president did just put out a statement on his call with the governor, Justin Trudeau, as he calls him of Canada. | ||
| And he said that he was not pleased. | ||
| As you said, he said it's not good enough. | ||
| He told Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that directly. | ||
| The call ended in a somewhat friendly manner, as the president said, but he's not going to stop standing up for the American people. | ||
| And to answer your question directly when it comes to fentanyl, for the last four years, unfortunately, our neighbors to the north and the south, Canada and Mexico, respectively, have allowed America to be a dumping ground, not just for illegal aliens, but for illegal, poisonous, deadly fentanyl, | ||
| which is now the number one killer of young people in this country, aged 18 to 34. Through the northern border in Canada, last fiscal year alone, there was enough fentanyl seized to kill 4.8 billion people. | ||
| And that number is up 2,050% from 2023, the year before. | ||
| So there's been more than a 2,000% increase in illegal fentanyl seizure at the northern border. | ||
| Why? | ||
| Because Canada is allowing that fentanyl to come to the United States. | ||
| The president sees these numbers. | ||
| He thinks about the lives that are lost. | ||
| Everybody in this room, I'm sure everybody watching at home, everybody across the country knows someone in our lives who has been killed at the hands of this deadly poison. | ||
| There needs to be repercussions for that. | ||
| The president feels very strongly about it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It's just 43 pounds that were found last year. | |
| That's less than a carry-on suitcase. | ||
| Is that a lot of fentanyl compared to, say, Mexico? | ||
| The vast majority of the fentanyl is brought in through Mexico, not Canada. | ||
| So what else does Canada need to do? | ||
| Well, I just told you, last year alone, there was a 2,000% increase in illegal fentanyl. | ||
| You're asking me for what the president's justification is for these tariffs. | ||
| It's not up to you. | ||
| You're not the president, Gabe. | ||
| I think it's a little bit disrespectful to the families in this country who have lost loved ones at the hands of this deadly poison. | ||
| If you talk to them, and this president has, they are grateful that they finally have a president who is standing up to both Canada and Mexico, and most importantly, to China as well. | ||
| The president added an additional 10% tariff on China because this deadly poison is being produced in that country. | ||
| It's being distributed through our neighbors, and there needs to be consequences for that period. | ||
| Peter. | ||
| Thank you, Caroline. | ||
| If the US has a long-standing policy that we do not negotiate with terrorists, then why is the US now negotiating directly and for the first time ever with Hamas? | ||
| Well, when it comes to the negotiations that you're referring to, first of all, the special envoy who's engaged in those negotiations does have the authority to talk to anyone. | ||
| Israel was consulted on this matter. | ||
| And look, dialogue and talking to people around the world to do what's in the best interest of the American people is something that the president has proven is what he believes is a good faith effort to do what's right for the American people. | ||
| Is it just about the hostages, or are they also talking about the president's plan to take over, guys? | ||
| These are ongoing talks and discussions. | ||
| I'm not going to detail them here. | ||
| There are American lives at stake. | ||
| I would defer you to the Department of State for further details, but I'm not going to get into those talks here at this podium. | ||
| We know that some officials here were miffed that Zelensky showed up last week without a suit for his meeting in the Oval Office. | ||
| But Elon Musk never wears a suit. | ||
| He did last night. | ||
| So what is the dress code? | ||
| Well, Elon Musk wore a suit last night. | ||
| I'm sure you saw it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Was he spooked by Zelensky getting kicked out? | |
| No, I don't think so. | ||
| I'm just pointing out that he did wear a suit last night. | ||
| And I think the president liked that very much. | ||
| And he looked great. | ||
| Speaking of the president, he just passed me a note while I'm standing here. | ||
| He wanted me to hold this up. | ||
| This is the poll that I cited, the CBS YouGov poll that shows that... | ||
| 76% of those who watched the president's speech last night approved of his speech. | ||
| And so it goes to my earlier point that I made in my monologue about how incredibly sad it is that we have a modern-day Democrat party who is so severely out of touch with the American public. | ||
| This is a great poll. | ||
| The ultimate poll, though, came on November 5th when the president won by an overwhelming margin that he spoke about last night. | ||
| Democrats weren't happy to hear that either. | ||
| Weeja. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm back on tariffs. | |
| Last night President Trump said there will be a little disturbance, but we're okay with that. | ||
| Can you put a dollar figure amount on how much the average American family should expect to pay as this disturbance? | ||
| And why should Americans be okay with that when so many are already struggling to pay the bills? | ||
| Well, first of all, last night, the president told the truth and he was realistic and he level set with the American people. | ||
| And I think, frankly, it's very refreshing. | ||
| And everybody in this room should be very grateful that we have a president who tells the truth about the reality of the economic situation that we are in. | ||
| Unlike the previous president who lied to everybody's faces saying inflation was transitory, saying it was under control, saying that the border was secure, whatnot. | ||
| So the president is being frank and honest. | ||
| And the American people elected this president to have monumental reform and change, including rebuilding our manufacturing base in this country, standing up to foreign nations who have been ripping off our country for decades. | ||
| And that requires a little bit of disruption. | ||
| That requires a lot of effort and work that this president is focused on With that said, as the president said last night, his administration is wholeheartedly committed, of course, to ending the inflation nightmare caused by the Biden administration. | ||
| Look at the deregulation efforts. | ||
| Look at the president's push last night in his speech for Congress to pass tax cuts, to end taxes on social... | ||
| And I didn't even mention energy. | ||
| Look at the president's approach and focus on unleashing the might of our energy industry. | ||
| We know that's the number one driver of inflation. | ||
| He's been slashing back a lot of the burdensome regulation from the previous administration to unleash our energy industry here at home, which will drive down costs. | ||
| He said he is committed to making America affordable again. | ||
| He did it in his first term and Americans can trust him to do it again. | ||
|
unidentified
|
President Trump has made clear, Caroline, that he loves tariffs, but the stock market does not. | |
| How does he factor that into his decision making? | ||
| Well, the president does love tariffs. | ||
| He said it's one of his favorite words of the English Dictionary. | ||
| And he believes in tariffs because they'll ultimately make America rich again. | ||
| They're going to raise revenue. | ||
| They're going to help us pay down our debt. | ||
| Most importantly, they're going to bring American jobs here back home. | ||
| So I think for folks on Wall Street who may be concerned, look at what this president did for you in his first term. | ||
| Wall Street boomed. | ||
| Stock market boomed. | ||
| The president expects that to happen again. | ||
| But most importantly, Main Street is going to boom. | ||
| And that's why the president has this whole of government economic approach, which includes tax cuts, tariffs, regulation cuts in an energy industry that will bring down costs for American consumers. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Sure. | |
| Monica. | ||
| You mentioned not one Democrat senator voted to protect women's sports from males. | ||
| Not one Democrat congressman or congresswoman stood to applaud Yeah, | ||
| I think the message that Americans should take away from last night is that they have a president in the Oval Office who is committed to doing what's right for them, especially women and girls across the country. | ||
| And I think it's very ironic. | ||
| Thank you for bringing up the point. | ||
| That Democrat women were wearing pink to support our fellow females, yet they couldn't stand, again, for a young woman who was almost killed and severely injured by a man on the volleyball court. | ||
| They couldn't stand for the mothers of two beautiful young women whose lives were taken tragically at the hands of illegal people. | ||
| So you can't say you're the party of women and then support men and women's sports and not stand up for basic law and order and immigration reform that will protect women in this country. | ||
| That's what President Trump is doing. | ||
| He's the president for women. | ||
| Lindsay, good to see you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, Caroline. | |
| Good to see you. | ||
| So, speaking of tariffs, China said yesterday that they're ready for any kind of war with the U.S. because of these tariffs that have been placed on them. | ||
| And a Chinese spokesperson also said That the tariffs would not lead to a resolution of U.S. concerns about fentanyl originating in China. | ||
| Can you speak to how the administration is planning on responding to that? | ||
| Well, I think Secretary Hegseth has responded to that this morning. | ||
| He said that America will always be prepared to defend itself, especially under the leadership of this president in the Oval Office. | ||
| And that certainly remains true. | ||
| Again, when it comes to tariffs, the president has been very tough on China, not just now with 20 percent and more. | ||
| The reciprocal tariffs that will hit on April 2nd. | ||
| But look at what he did in his first term. | ||
| There were billions of dollars worth of tariffs that he implemented on China. | ||
| And it's quite telling that the previous administration did not rescind those tariffs because they realized the value that they had in not only deterring China, but also raising revenue here in the United States. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Just a quick follow-up, two quick follow-ups on tariffs. | |
| The president mentioned a little disturbance during his remarks yesterday. | ||
| The CEO of Target says that consumers will likely see prices go up on everything from strawberries to bananas to avocados. | ||
| Again, I don't have a crystal ball, but what I can assure the American people is that this president and this administration is doing everything they can. | ||
| And I would remind you and everybody else in this room that it's because of the previous administration's economic policies that Americans were left with record high inflation. | ||
| Inflation throughout Joe Biden's entire 48 months in office was at or It hit record highs, as you know. | ||
| And there's a whole list of what the Biden economic disaster this president was left to clean up. | ||
| It's been a month, but he's working hard every single day to do just that. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Just wanted to follow up on the card out. | |
| Sorry to cut you off there. | ||
| The U.S. imported $43 million worth of eggs from Canada. | ||
| I know you mentioned some of the exemptions when it comes to automakers. | ||
| Will there be any other carve-outs, including for eggs? | ||
| We know prices are soaring for Americans. | ||
| The president is open to hearing about additional exemptions. | ||
| He always has open dialogue, and he'll always do what's right, what he believes is right for the American people. | ||
| But again, as for the egg crisis in this country, the president is wholeheartedly committed to ensuring we're... | ||
| Increasing our egg supply and we're also bringing down cost. | ||
| And Secretary Rollins has been all over this issue. | ||
| She comes from an agricultural background and family. | ||
| That's why she's leading that very important department. | ||
| She wrote an amazing op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. | ||
| She's been all over the media talking about her plan. | ||
| She has a real plan. | ||
| The president endorses it. | ||
| And he even, you know, gave her an off-the-prompter shout-out last night to say, Brooke, I'm counting on you. | ||
| It's an important issue. | ||
| And this White House is working with Secretary of Agriculture every single day to address this issue. | ||
| Sure. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks, Caroline. | |
| So what does it say that the Democrats, while they couldn't stand for Americans or stand for victims, they stood for war and clapped for war and clapped for five more years of war? | ||
| Yeah, you know, the president addressed that last night, I think, when he called out Senator Elizabeth Warren and said that, again, as I said in my opening speech, very telling that the Democrats refused to clap for American people and American interests and American priorities. | ||
| But they did clap for the country of Ukraine, which, by the way, the president's working very hard to end that war. | ||
| So Democrats should be applauding him for actually doing something about it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You've spoken recently about how what happened in the Oval Office last week gave Americans an inside look into behind-the-scenes discussions with Zelensky. | |
| Is this how he treated Joe Biden and just treated him disrespectfully and received billions of dollars? | ||
| Well, it's a very interesting question. | ||
| I don't know if anybody in here asked my predecessor who stood at this podium about that, but there was a report from NBC News that President Biden also got increasingly frustrated with President Zelensky when he was handing out blank checks and President Zelensky kept asking for more. | ||
| Joe Biden was quite frustrated with that. | ||
| So again, as I've said repeatedly, Friday revealed the frustrations that this administration has had in closed-door negotiations with the Ukrainians. | ||
| However, President Zelensky did put out a statement yesterday, which we believe is a positive step forward. | ||
| And National Security Advisor Mike Waltz has been talking to his Ukrainian counterparts. | ||
| And so we're in the midst of this, and we'll see what happens next. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Caitlin? | |
| Thanks, Carol. | ||
| I have two questions. | ||
| One on the reprieve that is being granted to these three automakers for one month on the tariffs on Canada and Mexico. | ||
| How did the president settle on one month? | ||
| The reciprocal tariffs will go into effect on April 2nd, and he feels strongly about that no matter what, no exemptions. | ||
| So that's where the one month comes from. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So does he expect them to be able to shift production within a month? | |
| He told them that they should get on it, start investing, start moving, shift production here to the United States of America, where they will pay no tariff. | ||
| That's the ultimate goal. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And on the conversations between the White House and the Ukrainians and the letter that President Trump revealed last night that he got from President Zelensky, Director Ratcliffe said today that the President has paused also intelligence sharing with Ukraine. | |
| Is that temporary or is that permanent? | ||
| I believe what the National Security Council told me in regards to that was that they paused or they are reconsidering The funding for Ukraine, as you saw, the pause on the funding. | ||
| As for intelligence matters, I would refer you to either the National Security Council or the CIA as well. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But are they considering lifting or reinstating the military aid going to Ukraine, which they paused? | |
| Again, it's a pause for a review. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Follow up on that. | |
| Sure. | ||
| Parts of the letter that he received last night from President Zelensky, can you give us a sense of when President Trump now plans to sign that minerals deal after receiving that letter? | ||
| Those talks are happening as we speak. | ||
| I just saw the National Security Advisor. | ||
| He's working very hard on it. | ||
| I believe he was going into the Oval Office to give the President an update on where this stands. | ||
| But again, the President is committed to a peace deal. | ||
| He wants to see this war end. | ||
| And I think that President Zelensky's message, which he also shared on X as well, is a positive sign in the right direction. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The President also said that the United States was reclaiming the Panama Canal. | |
| The President of Panama this morning, or at some point today, said that President Trump was lying. | ||
| Wanted to get your response to that. | ||
| And also, curious if the President had a reason for not specifically mentioning BlackRock last night. | ||
| Yeah, I'm not sure if Panama has seen what's going on with their own canal. | ||
| But as you just mentioned, BlackRock is now interested in investing and taking over the two ends of the port, which is very important because the president was very vocal several weeks ago about the need to ensure that China is not controlling the Panama Canal. | ||
| This is a very important place for the United States of America. | ||
| We also saw that the Panama The Panama Canal lifted fees on our U.S. naval ships that are going in and out of the canal. | ||
| That's a win for the United States of America. | ||
| And the president will continue to ensure that the Chinese government, the CCP, cannot be infiltrated in the Western Hemisphere and certainly not in the Panama Canal, which is a very important place for our country. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The President continues to call the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, Governor of Canada. | |
| I'm curious what he means by that, and if there are any plans that are moving forward with trying to make Canada the 51st state. | ||
| I have a follow-up on the economy as well. | ||
| Sure. | ||
| Well, the President put that in his true social account, or his true social post earlier today. | ||
| He feels strongly that it would be very beneficial for the Canadian people to be the 51st state of the United States. | ||
| They wouldn't be paying for these tariffs. | ||
| We'd have much lower taxes if they were part of our great country. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You and I traveled the country during the campaign. | |
| This is an issue that so many voters decided to cast their ballots on, and they voted for President Trump. | ||
| He has started to have that realistic conversation with the American people, that disturbance comment last night. | ||
| But I'm curious if you can be real with Americans right now as all of these factors are playing out. | ||
| Are things potentially going to get worse before they get better? | ||
| Look, I've now been asked and answered this same question just given to me in different verbiage of three different times. | ||
| And I will answer it again in an effort of transparency to the American people because this is an important issue and the American people, this president understands that it is. | ||
| And again, that's why in his joint address to Congress last night, he addressed this issue with a realistic and honest approach. | ||
| He talked about what this administration is doing to unleash American energy. | ||
| And to make America affordable again, and this administration is wholeheartedly committed to doing it. | ||
| And I would remind the American public that the first-term record of this president speaks volumes. | ||
| That's why they re-elected him, because they know that he can fix our broken economy, and it's very, very broken from the previous administration. | ||
| Stephen. | ||
| Thank you, Caroline. | ||
| I've got two questions, one on press access. | ||
| the other on fentanyl and tariffs. | ||
| On press access, your predecessor, Korean Jean-Pierre, presided over many novel press access restrictions, criticized the recent changes to the press pool made by your office. | ||
| She said in an interview, quote, "What we're looking at is what North Korea is doing." What's your response to that? | ||
| And can you say anything to allay concerns that I think that's the same individual who said from this podium numerous times that the commander-in-chief was mentally and physically up for the job, which we knew was a lie. | ||
| Many people in this room knew it was a lie. | ||
| Many of you were admonished for asking questions about that truth. | ||
| And so when it comes to truth and transparency, this administration, this White House, is setting the example. | ||
| This president is taking far more questions than his predecessor, Joe Biden, did on a daily basis, and that will continue. | ||
| And on fentanyl tariffs, fentanyl produced largely in China has killed 334,000 Americans over five years. | ||
| According to CDC data, that's about one in every thousand Americans. | ||
| President Trump has cited this for applying new tariffs to Canada, Mexico, and China. | ||
| But in addition to China's talk about being ready for any kind of war, they said yesterday, the foreign ministry said that, quote, "the fentanyl issue is a flimsy excuse to raise U.S. tariffs," and, quote, "the U.S. not anyone else is responsible for the fentanyl So what's the response to China that... | ||
| Well, of course, the country that is getting very rich off of distributing this deadly poison to American citizens is going to say that. | ||
| Again, the president knows where the American people stand on this issue. | ||
| Fentanyl overdoses. | ||
| Dasha brought up all of us campaigning all across the country. | ||
| They talked about inflation. | ||
| They also talked about the border, the illegal immigrants that were pouring through, but also these deadly drugs. | ||
| And again, the president keeps in mind those We'll see you later. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks, Caroline. | |
| Thanks, Caroline. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks. | |
| What? | ||
| Wrong answer. | ||
| Be nice. | ||
| We're good to go. |
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