| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
| The absolute best in fact I would argue that she is the best politician in Minnesota. | ||
| That's somebody that we're always chasing. | ||
| Okay. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Does President Trump have any interest in hockey? | |
| And will we ever go to it? | ||
| Only when the U.S. and Canada are playing, yes. | ||
| Ice fishing or open water fishing? | ||
| Now you've just given me two different worlds. | ||
| That's like saying, you know, Florida or Montana. | ||
| I mean, it's, I really enjoy ice fishing, which I haven't gotten a lot of time to do the last few years because of the quiet, right? | ||
| You sit in an ice house. | ||
| I don't usually get to sit in the nice one. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We're going to leave this here and take you live to the Federal Reserve Building here in Washington, D.C., where President Trump is taking a tour of their facilities this afternoon. | |
| Live coverage on C-SPAN. | ||
| We had a Trump Hotel, and we sold it to Waldorf Astoria, and it was a great success. | ||
| And we had great luck with the building. | ||
| We did a good job. | ||
| We built it quickly and relatively inexpensively for about $200 million. | ||
| And that was a big hotel, big, big project. | ||
| But we looked around, and Tim Scott's here someplace. | ||
| Tim, come on up. | ||
| Just you saw what we saw. | ||
| And the big thing is to get it done. | ||
| They have to get it done. | ||
| They have to get it finished. | ||
| And very importantly, we have to get interest rates lowered in our country. | ||
| Our country is the hottest in the world right now, but the one section, people are pretty much unable to buy housing because the interest rates are too high. | ||
| We have no inflation. | ||
| We have a lot of cash coming in. | ||
| The tariffs have been unbelievable now. | ||
| People that didn't even believe in tariffs are saying what a great move that was. | ||
| We have hundreds of billions of dollars coming in. | ||
| Japan, just on one deal, is paying us $550 billion. | ||
| And they opened up their economy. | ||
| It's incredible, the deal. | ||
| And they're happy. | ||
| We're happy. | ||
| Everybody's happy. | ||
| But we should have the lowest interest rate of any country. | ||
| And we don't. | ||
| We should have. | ||
| Every point is worth $365 billion. | ||
| So we want to get the rates down, but we also want to get the Fed building finished. | ||
| So I met with the contractors, we toured it with the chairman, and we had a very good tour, and we'll talk to you about it sometime. | ||
| But Tim and I, we sort of understand what happened. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Too expensive. | |
| Bottom line is this, that Americans deserve to become first-time homebuyers. | ||
| President Trump has created the best economy in the world. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The one thing that would make it better is lower interest rates. | |
| Full employment is even more possible. | ||
| Wages rise faster as interest rates come down when your employment is at 4.1% because of your leadership. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We have revenues coming in at record-breaking. | |
| Maybe last month, even more revenue coming in than bills going out, which is remarkable. | ||
| They found $25, $26 billion. | ||
| They said, where did that come from? | ||
| Nobody, I think that's been many, many decades since that happened. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I can't remember that. | |
| They found $26 billion last month. | ||
| And they said, where did that come from? | ||
| I said, why don't you try the tariffs? | ||
| And it was true. | ||
| We're taking in hundreds of billions of dollars. | ||
| And our country is doing great. | ||
| And we have no inflation. | ||
| And the numbers, the job, everything is good. | ||
| The one thing we have to do is get housing prices down and the interest rates down so people can buy the house because they're all making money, but they can't get the interest rate down. | ||
| We have to. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Amen. | |
| All right. | ||
| And he's been my friend for a long time. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You've been on a number of construction sites. | |
| Did you see mismanagement going on or funds that aren't? | ||
| Well, I see a very luxurious situation taking place, let's put it that way. | ||
| And I was given a very nice tour by the head of construction. | ||
| And, you know, look, if you look over here, they're trying to open up the basement. | ||
| When you open up a basement, first of all, it's the worst space. | ||
| Always a basement is the worst space in a building. | ||
| And it's also the most expensive space to build. | ||
| And especially here because you have a water line. | ||
| You know, they're going down into the water, so they have to build a reverse, what's called a reverse bathtub. | ||
| The water has to be kept out. | ||
| It's very expensive construction, so it would have been good if they didn't build it. | ||
| Would have been good if they didn't do certain other things. | ||
| If you look at the kind of protection in the hall, have you been able to get in the hall? | ||
| You saw the protection of plywood. | ||
| I mean, that was a lot of money just to protect it for a period of time. | ||
| I would have done it very gingerly and easily and not have to spent, you know, millions of dollars on protection. | ||
| And there are things that could have been different. | ||
| Look, look, there's always Monday morning quarterbacks. | ||
| I don't want to be that. | ||
| I want to help them get it finished. | ||
| It's been going around for years, and I want to help them get it finished. | ||
| And what we really want to do, and I think I can speak for Tim, and I think I can speak for the entire Senate, we can speak for everybody, frankly, is we want to see interest rates come down. | ||
| Our country is booming, and the interest rates is a final little notch. | ||
| And if you look at Europe, they've lowered 11 times, 11 times in a short period of time. | ||
| We've lowered zero. | ||
| And you know, they are competition, although we're in the process of probably making a very good deal with them, too. | ||
| They want to make a deal very badly, very badly. | ||
| So we're making a deal. | ||
| We just completed our deal with Indonesia. | ||
| We just completed our deal with the Philippines. | ||
| We're making unbelievable deals, and the money is pouring in. | ||
| We want to get interest rates down. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But on interest rates, at some point, does the level of interest rates now slow economic growth? | |
| Yeah, it never helps it if it's high. | ||
| Never helps it. | ||
| Well, it's already as good as we're doing. | ||
| Think of how well we'd be doing. | ||
| We'd be like a rocket ship. | ||
| As good as we're doing, we'd do better if we had lower interest rates. | ||
| And we should. | ||
| We're prime. | ||
| Don't forget, without us, the whole world collapses. | ||
| So we should have the lowest interest rate because, you know, you can talk about Switzerland, you can talk about wonderful countries, no debt, no, but without us, everything collapses. | ||
| We should have the lowest interest rate. | ||
| And if you took it down three points, not a little bit, but three points, if you got us down to one, we would save more than a trillion dollars basically with just a paper transfer. | ||
| You wouldn't be cutting costs of anything. | ||
| You wouldn't be building anything. | ||
| Just a move of the hand saying we're going to lower interest rates. | ||
| You would save a trillion dollars a year. | ||
| And there's nothing you can do to save that kind of money. | ||
| Well, we had a little talk about it, and I thought it was a very productive talk. | ||
| He'll be able to tell you at his next meeting, but I will say that he did say the country is doing really well. | ||
| And the country is really doing well. | ||
| Yeah, please go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
How would you describe your talk with him? | |
| Did you say that the energy was tense? | ||
| Did you come to the table? | ||
| No, I didn't think it was tense. | ||
| No, I thought we had a good meeting. | ||
| No, there was no tension. | ||
| There was no tension. | ||
| I think he had more tension with my great senator to the right. | ||
| He's pretty tough cookie. | ||
|
unidentified
|
He was, you might say, well, bottom line is we had an honest, candid conversation about some of the overruns at this building. | |
| We had it in my banking committee, and he said we were wrong. | ||
| And it turns out we were right. | ||
| Thank God President Trump and his team took enough time to dig into some of the details and the details are clear. | ||
| We need to get this project done. | ||
| We would like to keep it where it is or a little lower. | ||
| But at the end of the day, the point is that instead of talking about interest rates, instead of talking about first-time homebuyers, instead of talking about the heat in our economy, that's a good thing. | ||
| We're talking about an overrun on the Federal Reserve building as opposed to the Federal Reserve objective of lowering and keeping our economy full. | ||
| You know, as an example, they built parking spots under a building next door. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Really expensive. | |
| It's very expensive when you're starting to build parking lots, underground parking lots. | ||
| That's a very expensive thing. | ||
| A lot of people I know, they park their car and they walk a block or two blocks or something. | ||
| But it is a very expensive thing. | ||
| But that is what it is, and that's okay. | ||
|
unidentified
|
This is a project of fireball offense for Jerome Howell. | |
| Look, I would love to see it completed. | ||
| I don't want to put that in this category. | ||
| It's a very complex thing that could have been made simple. | ||
| I built a great hotel, and the great hotel that everybody in this group knows very well, it's called the Old Post Office, and it's a much bigger project than this. | ||
| And I spent $200 million building it. | ||
| And it was down, it was taken down to the steel for the most part, taken down. | ||
| You know, you've seen it go up. | ||
| And I built it quickly, and I built it for $200 million. | ||
| That was a much bigger job than this. | ||
| Spent $200 million. | ||
| And it's got marble bathrooms, the top fixtures, the best of everything, all brand new. | ||
| So, you know, this is a very expensive job. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I don't know. | |
| It got out of control. | ||
| And that happens. | ||
| That happens. | ||
| It's a shame. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Are you negotiating on auto tariffs? | |
| Your auto tariffs are fine. | ||
| No, I'm not negotiating on auto tariffs. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The EU looking at 15% like Japan? | |
| Well, it depends. | ||
| Japan, what Japan did is they bought down their tariffs. | ||
| They gave us $550 billion because they didn't want to pay $20 billion. | ||
| They were 28%. | ||
| And they gave us $550 billion up front. | ||
| 100%, 500. | ||
| We get 90%, they get 10%. | ||
| 90%, they get 10. | ||
| And there's no payment. | ||
| It's not a loan or anything. | ||
| It's a signing bonus, I call it. | ||
| But they gave us $550 billion and took down the tariffs a little bit. | ||
| And then they agreed to open their economy to everybody. | ||
| This was not easy. | ||
| This took, you know, a lot of people walked out of rooms and things. | ||
| Sometimes they walked out of rooms, went back to Japan. | ||
| I said, where are they? | ||
| They went back to Japan. | ||
| And then they called and they said, can we make a deal? | ||
| They came back a couple of times. | ||
| This happened. | ||
| This was, as you know, it was over a period of months. | ||
| And ultimately, they agreed to open their economy. | ||
| Now, the opening of the economy is worth more than $550 billion, the payment that they made. | ||
| It's worth more. | ||
| So between that and the payment, we reduced it down to 15%. | ||
| But they were at about 28%. | ||
| And then they bought it down, basically. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But could other countries buy it? | |
| Yeah, I would let other countries buy it down. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Does the presidency feel better than what you're late? | |
| I feel good about it. | ||
| I mean, look, I have one dispute, and the dispute, there could be some things with money and, you know, where it comes from, how it's come from, how it's printed, where it's printed, all of the standard things with the Fed. | ||
| But I just want to see one thing happen, very simple. | ||
| Interest rates have to come down. | ||
| If the interest rates don't come down, we're knocking it out of the park with high interest rates. | ||
| If interest rates come down, then that final little element kicks in, and that's housing. | ||
| And the sad part is that people, wonderful young people, young couples starting off, they can't get a mortgage because the rates are too high, I think. | ||
| Tim knows that better than anybody, I think. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But Mr. President, if the rapes are hurting families in the country, why let that keep going for another eight months? | |
| Why not just fire? | ||
| Because to do that is a big move, and I just don't think it's necessary. | ||
| And I believe that he's going to do the right thing. | ||
| I believe that the chairman is going to do the right thing. | ||
| I mean, it may be a little too late, as the expression goes, but I believe he's going to do the right thing. | ||
| The fact is, it's so big what's taking place in America. | ||
| Where the king of Saudi Arabia says you have the hottest country anywhere in the world, and I thought you were dead one year ago. | ||
| I thought we were dead. | ||
| I just left NATO, as you know. | ||
| They're agreeing to pay 5%. | ||
| We're not paying anything. | ||
| We send them the equipment. | ||
| pay for 100% of everything now for the war, Ukraine. | ||
| But I just left NATO and every one of those leaders said every country they said, and very smart countries, very success, you know, very successful countries, frankly. | ||
| And every one of them said you have the hottest country in the world. | ||
| We did that over a period of a year. | ||
| Less than a year, I mean, if you think. | ||
| I mean, less than they say a year ago we were dead. | ||
| And today, so I'm here six months and we did it over. | ||
| And we had the help of men like this and people like standing right behind me. | ||
|
unidentified
|
They're great. | |
| They're great professionals. | ||
| They really are. | ||
| They're great professionals. | ||
| And in a short period of time, we made it the hottest country of the world. | ||
| With all of that being said, we'd like to see we can always do better and we can do better if interest rates come down. | ||
| Good job you do. | ||
| You do a nice job. | ||
| I watch you a lot. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I appreciate that. | |
| Mr. President, do you have a name in mind to replace a chairman? | ||
| I do. | ||
|
unidentified
|
One person. | |
| Two people. | ||
| Maybe three. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Any clues? | |
| I'd pick him, but I think he's not leaving the set. | ||
| I picked him. | ||
| No, there's no pressure. | ||
|
unidentified
|
No. | |
| We want to have, you know, his term comes up soon. | ||
| I think he's going to do the right thing. | ||
| Everybody knows what the right thing is. | ||
| Even people that believed in, you know, the higher rates, they're all on board. | ||
| They all want to see the interest rates come down. | ||
| It's very important. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Mr. President. | |
| He doesn't interrupt the hunting countries, as he said when you mentioned it. | ||
| I don't think we're going to do that. | ||
| I don't think so. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Investigate the newly declassified documents by Abraham. | |
| Yeah, that's a terrible thing. | ||
| I have great respect for Tulsi and the documents they found on President Obama. | ||
| Frankly, it was an Obama thing, but it was the people that worked under him also working with him. | ||
| And now it's a very, very serious thing. | ||
| Thank you very much, Jimmy. | ||
|
unidentified
|
What was your final straw? | |
| Thank you. | ||
| Mr. President on Goha, what was your final straw? | ||
| American History TV. | ||
| Saturday is on C-SPAN 2, exploring the people and events that tell the American story. | ||
| This weekend, as the nation prepares to celebrate its semi-quincentennial, American History TV begins a year-long series, America 250, on the American Revolution and its impact on the country. | ||
| At 8 a.m. Eastern on Lectures in History, Ithaca College professor Michael Trotty on the escalating tensions between colonists and the British government before the American Revolution. | ||
| Then at 11 a.m. Eastern, we'll visit Fort Ticonderoga in upstate New York for a Revolutionary War reenactment. | ||
| And later, historian Bruce Venter explores the significance of the May 1775 capture of Fort Ticonderoga by American commander Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys. | ||
| And at 1245 p.m. Eastern, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum's annual book festival in Hyde Park, New York, where historians discuss the history of the U.S. Navy, American spy craft, and the role of breweries in the New Deal. | ||
| Exploring the American story, watch American History TV Saturdays on C-SPAN 2 and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at c-span.org/slash history. | ||
| Book TV, every Sunday on C-SPAN 2, features leading authors discussing their latest nonfiction books. | ||
| Here's a look at what's coming up this weekend. | ||
| Book TV continues the celebration of America's 250th with author conversations on the American Revolution. | ||
| At 2 p.m. Eastern, contributors to the book Waging War in America, 1775 to 1783, discuss the operational challenges that American, British, French, and German military forces face during the conflict. | ||
| And at 6.45 p.m., U.S. Marine Corps Major General Jason Bohm explores the origins of the Marine Corps, including the formation of the Continental Marines during the American Revolution, in his book, Washington's Marines. | ||
| Then at 8 Eastern, Rick Atkinson shares his book, The Fate of the Day, examining the middle years of the Revolutionary War, from the 1777 capture of Fort Ticonderoga to the 1780 siege of Charleston. | ||
| Also this weekend, at 5.30 p.m., how did the like button become so ubiquitous? | ||
| Author Martin Reeves explores the origins of the thumbs-up symbol and how it changed the internet with his book, Like, The Button That Changed the World. | ||
| And at 10, Martha Blanding broke a color barrier at California's Disneyland, becoming the park's first black official tour guide in 1971. | ||
| She tells the story of her 50-year career with the Walt Disney Company and of social and cultural change in her book, Groundbreaking Magic. | ||
| Watch Book TV every Sunday on C-SPAN2 and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at booktv.org. |