Donald Trump signs an executive order for the first IndyCar race in D.C. since 1801, touting Roger Penske’s 20 Indy 500 wins and economic gains like steel production surpassing Japan after 28 years, $7K S&P highs, and $18–20T in projected investments. He defends Fed nominee Kevin Warsh—dubbed a "sock puppet" by Elizabeth Warren—claiming he’ll cut rates despite past hawkishness, while dismissing her inflation critiques. Trump also highlights a military flotilla near Iran, larger than Venezuela’s, and touts law-and-order policies, crediting border crackdowns for D.C.’s 2,000 criminal removals and safety gains, clashing with Warren’s warnings about politicizing the Fed and economic instability. [Automatically generated summary]
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unidentified
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President Trump signed an executive order to bring the IndyCar race to Washington, D.C. this year.
The race would be part of America 250 celebrations.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, Interior Secretary Doug Bergh, and Penske Corporation CEO Roger Penske were at the Oval Office for the announcement.
The president also answered reporters' questions on several topics, including his nomination of Kevin Warsh to serve as the next chair of the Federal Reserve.
So I have some incredible people, and this is a very exciting thing that we're doing.
And it was fast.
They've wanted to do it.
I understand they've been here hundreds of times over the years trying to do it.
And they're going to give you a little bit of history.
Roger Penske, everybody knows he's a legend in many different things, but certainly in racing, he's won the Indianapolis 500 20 times.
On the 18th time, I said, he's been a friend of mine for a long time, but on the 18th time, I said, I think I'm going to give him the Presidential Medal of Freedom because, you know, how do you do that?
Japan, Germany, Roger, right?
Everybody, they want to win the Indy 500.
They spend billions of dollars getting a car.
This guy wins it like every year.
He won it so many times that he ended up buying the track.
So now he owns a track, he owns a race, it says pretty good.
Now he's won it, though.
He won it two times since he got it.
And it's a total of 20.
And didn't you win the Daytona 500?
How many times?
Four times.
That's all?
That's terrible.
I can't believe it.
Anyway, if you win it once, it's like great.
The guy's amazing.
He's a genius and a real genius at cars and racing.
And they are going to put up something that's really amazing.
It's really having to do with our great 250th birthday where we're having so many wonderful things.
UFC is coming, as you know, in front of the White House with a building literally a stadium.
We're going to have over 100,000 people.
And this is going to have a lot of people.
I won't even say how many people because I think it can set a record for racing.
It's going to be very, very important.
We're celebrating greatness with American Motor Racing.
That's going to be the name of the event.
It's going to take place on August 21st through the 23rd.
And it's going to be so exciting.
And I love the race.
I don't have a lot of time to watch it, but I love the racing.
But Roger Penske is the chairman, as you know, of Penske Corporation.
He's got everything you can imagine, mostly, I think, to do with automotive.
And I'd like to ask him to say a few words about the event because this is going to be, they're putting everything behind it, and I think it's going to be really exciting.
Roger, please.
unidentified
Well, thank you, Mr. President.
This is a really amazing time for us as a company to support the 250th anniversary for the country.
And there's no better way for us to bring automotive and speed into the DC area and to have the opportunity to be able to compete here with our IndyCars.
As you know, we own the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
We are taking that history of over 100 years and the speed and what's taking place there with the different manufacturers and bringing it here to this race will be amazing.
Certainly the Freedom 250, when you think about it, it's just a byproduct of what the President has done during this year.
And this will be an event, obviously, in August, which will make a huge difference.
And we're excited.
It'll be areas for people to see.
Most of the grounds will be free, so it's going to be an economic benefit to the area, to the city, and obviously with our Fox partner, Eric Shanks, will be our media partner.
And believe me, what they did for us at Indy this past year, they're going to take that and put it on steroids, really, and take it to the next level.
So thank you, Mr. President, for allowing us to come into your service.
We just don't come in and ask the president to sign.
There's a lot of work that goes into this.
As you can tell, Bud and my chief of staff, Pete, all had a lot of meetings on the Hill.
We couldn't be more excited about this.
Again, I'm going to repeat, this is free for the American people to come to your nation's capital and see a great road race, freedom, America, speed, and road racing.
It doesn't get more American than that, Mr. President.
So thank you for signing this and thanks for all your support.
This birthday that's coming up, the 250th anniversary of America Freedom 250, is the most monumental birthday maybe of any country ever in the history of the world.
And President Trump, with his directive to celebrate this thing, we've got a, what's more American than race car driving?
What's more monumental than the Indy 500 as an icon of what's going on in our country?
And so merging the history and the tradition of our capital, Washington, D.C., with the speed and the innovation that goes on in the IndyCar series is incredible.
And it's a great metaphor because the speeds we're talking about is the speed of President Trump.
I want to reiterate, there weren't 81 meetings with the Trump administration.
One week we have a race as opposed to like four months of talking.
So I think there's also a metaphor here about President Trump, who's an incredible sportsman.
He's an athlete himself, but he loves sports.
And so whether it's soccer, UFC, the football draft, NFL football draft coming, IndyCar, and all the teams that he hosts here, I mean, to any American who loves sports, you've got to love this president because he's bringing professional sports to our capital.
And again, August 21st to 2030, you talk about the economic impact.
By the time all these reporters get done telling the story, there's not going to be a hotel room available in this city on that weekend because everybody's going to want to be here.
People that maybe have wanted to see an IndyCar race their whole life are now going to have an opportunity to come to their capital, celebrate 250, and see an IndyCar race for free.
And they're going to be able to see it on the national mall.
And wherever you put down your lawn chair and watch this race for free, you're going to be staring at the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial.
And I'm sure there's going to be fireworks this weekend too.
I'm sure of that.
And if you need a permit, you can get one from the chariot.
So anyway, it's absolutely incredible.
And congratulations to Sean, the Penske organization, Fox Sports, everybody for putting together this is going to be a great celebration for America.
Don't go for second or third because there are a lot of different routes.
I said, pick, even if it's more difficult to get, to get approved.
Pick the absolute best site.
And they were actually looking at another site, and when I said that, they said, well, the best site is this site, the site we're doing.
I said, let's take a look at it.
And we think it's the best site too.
It's actually better than the original site they were looking at.
But if we're going to do it, we want to do it right.
So this is going to be something in terms of the road width, the crowds, and everything else that we can all best site, one of the best sites they've ever seen, actually.
It'll be beautiful.
So I'm going to sign this.
And if you have any questions on this subject, that'll be great.
I mean, I don't want to talk about anything having to do with what I'm doing militarily, but we have a tremendously powerful fleet there.
We have the most powerful ships in the world.
We have the most powerful military by far in the world.
We showed that on numerous occasions.
I mean, I rebuilt the military in my term.
If I didn't do, I wouldn't, I think, be able to say that.
But I rebuilt the military, the entire United States military in my first term.
And now we're building it bigger, better, stronger than ever before.
I'm adding to it.
We're adding something called the battleship.
You would find this interesting.
You know, the old-fashioned, beautiful battleships.
And we're adding up to 25 of them.
Each battleship is 100 times more powerful than the battleships of the 1940s, so to speak, powerful ones with the guns, because of what the ships carry.
But we're going to build 10, and then we'll see how we like them.
And we're going to go and do another 15 after that.
Could be up to 25 battleships.
100 times more powerful.
Can you imagine that?
And it's peaceful strength.
We don't want to use them, but if we have to use them, we will.
unidentified
Mr. President, on the Fed, should the DOJ continue with its investigation into Jay Powell?
That seems to be a sticking point for Senator Telles.
Mr. President, on Minneapolis on Minneapolis, Governor Tim Walz recently likened the conflict on the ground to Fort Sumter, sort of implying that this is the beginning of a civil war.
Does he know what Fort Sumter was, or do you think somebody wrote it out for him?
No, this is, I was elected on law and order.
I was elected on a strong border.
We had a border that allowed 25 million people to come in.
Many were murderers.
They murdered people.
We had 11,888 murderers.
We had prisons, including Venezuela, but Venezuela opened its prisons.
So did the Congo.
The Congo in Africa opened its prisons and dumped people into our country.
Many countries did that.
I would have done that if I were leading a country.
I would have dumped the prisoners into our country.
We had open borders.
We had all these things.
I was elected on law and order.
I was elected on the economy.
I was elected on a lot of reasons.
Because when I took over, we inherited a mess.
Prices were too high.
Inflation was the highest it was in 48 years.
I say ever, but the media always corrects me by saying it's only 48 years.
I think 48 years almost sounds worse.
But when I was elected, I was elected to do a job, and one of the big things I was elected to do is law and order.
We now have the lowest crime rate in the history of our country.
We have the lowest murder rate in the history of our country.
We have Washington, D.C., which was a dangerous place to walk, is now a totally safe city.
You can walk with your husband or your wife.
You can walk with your children right down the middle of the city.
Nothing's going to happen.
We did a great job.
We had the National Guard.
We have soldiers.
We have people that nobody's going to mess with.
And we've taken out.
Remember, it's not just that.
In Washington, we've removed over 2,000 criminals.
And you know, if you look at the numbers, a very small percentage of your population, 2%, 3% of your population, causes 90% of the crime.
So when you move a small, it's amazing how that works.
But the criminals go over and over and over again.
So 2% to 3% of your population can cause over 90% of your crime.
So it's not that complex.
We moved 2,000 people out of Washington.
We brought them back to their countries where they came from.
They came through open borders by sleepy Joe Biden.
And I will tell you, Washington is safe.
If you look at New Orleans, as you know, we went there about four weeks ago.
I was with the mayor of New Orleans last night.
He was at the premiere.
And she was at the premiere.
She was great.
I believe she's a Democrat.
She came over.
She thanked me so much.
She said crime is down more than 50% in just a few weeks.
And you couldn't even walk down the street in New Orleans.
It's so bad.
And now they let us in there.
And she is thanking me so much, so profusely.
She was great last night.
I'd do that.
If I were a Democrat, I'd say call Trump in, let them do what they do.
But we remove people, criminals, from the cities, and they become safe cities.
If you look at Minnesota, Minneapolis, we have crime down there because we took out thousands of people, despite all the mess and everything else.
But do these people really want to have rapists?
Do they really want to have drug dealers and people from prisons and murderers?
Do they really want to have them in the community?
You know, it's really insurrectionists and agitators, and they're paid.
And you can tell a lot of reasons.
Number one, they're professionals, you know, with their mouth.
But they're also, you look at the signs, the signs are all professionally made.
They have signs that are gorgeous.
In fact, I want to get the sign because I'm a big, I need a lot of signs for different things, and I want to find out whoever does their signs.
They do a beautiful job.
You know, everybody has this beautiful sign with brand new wood.
It's like leather panels.
They have a leather handle on the bottom.
These are not people.
These are people that are handed signs.
And we know pretty much, we're getting very close to it, but we know pretty much who's funding this stuff.
These are paid insurrectionists, paid troublemakers.
But I was elected by a landslide.
I won every swing state.
I won the popular vote by a lot.
I won everything.
I won everything.
And I was elected by a landslide on law and order and on strong borders.
We had a border that was so bad, so open, where 25 million people came in over a period of four years and now nobody comes in.
Nobody even tries to come in.
And I can only say, I think, we'll say it very plainly, elections have consequences.
The people want law and order.
And we have a silent majority.
You know, we have a silent majority of people.
They don't go and riot and everything else, but they like what we're doing.
They like having a safe city.
I get calls every single day.
Every person I see working in the White House, people I don't know, many people work here, and they say, I'd like to thank you, sir, why you made Washington so great.
We walk to work.
They walk to work.
You people know it very well.
You walk to work now.
You used to take an Uber or a taxi or something, and you even felt like in danger there.
Every person in this building, I mean, virtually every time I see somebody, they thank me.
Because a year and a half ago, they lived in hell and now they can walk to work and they're totally safe.
Following President Trump's announcement that he was nominating Kevin Warsh to be the next Federal Reserve chair, Senator Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, responded to the president's pick.
She talked to reporters about the central bank's future independence.
The problem we've got here is that Donald Trump is trying to execute takeover of the Fed.
And that's a real problem for American families.
Because if the President of the United States is in charge, that means monetary policy, the interest rates, will be set for political reasons rather than economic reasons.
And over time, that drives up costs for families and it puts unemployment, puts employment very much at risk for families.
So right now, Donald Trump has said that he's basically going to take control of the Fed.
He would not appoint anyone to be chairman of the Fed who did not pass his loyalty test.
Donald Trump has made clear he wants a sock puppet and Kevin Warsh evidently passed that test.
Today the president attacked Senator Tillis for his blockade.
He called him an obstructionist.
What do you think of Senator Jones' blockade of these homes?
Remember why it is that Senator Tillis has said it is inappropriate to consider any new nominees that Donald Trump puts forward for the Fed.
He has said that because Donald Trump has tried to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve, or he threatened to.
Then he's launched a bogus criminal investigation on him.
He's trying to fire Lisa Cook on bogus charges because he's trying to exercise control over the Fed.
What Senator Tillis and I don't agree on a lot, but we do agree on Fed independence because we both understand that having a Fed that is making decisions based on economic information rather than on political pressure is ultimately best for everybody.
And that's true.
Whether you've got a Democrat in the White House, Republican in the White House, doesn't make any difference.
Senator, we're going to shut down talks.
I mean, how do you?
Can we just do Fed first and then I'll come back and do a government shutdown?
unidentified
Even with this, what do you want to see more happen?
I know that you're just talking about Trump and him attacking Tillis, but is there more that you want to see, especially?
I want to see the Federal Reserve maintain its independence.
That means stop this bogus attack on the chairman of the Federal Reserve.
Stop this bogus attack of trying to fire one of the members of the Federal Reserve.
And let's have people who are picked for their economic expertise rather than their willingness to bend to whatever Donald Trump wants.
Remember something that we already know about Kevin Warsh, and that is he has a proven track record of being an inflation hawk.
He's already been on the Federal Reserve, and he was the guy who wanted to keep those interest rates high.
He wanted to keep them high even after the 2008 crash, when millions of people were thrown out of work, when the economy is in turmoil.
It was Warsh who would say, keep those interest rates up.
He's known as an inflation hawk.
Oh, until Donald Trump becomes president.
Donald Trump says he wants a Federal Reserve chair who will lower interest rates because that's Donald Trump's view of the world.
And suddenly, last fall, Kevin Warsh thinks that inflation should not be a problem, interest rates should be dropped.
And he also says prices are down, down, down.
I'm sorry.
He's reading the same economic data that anybody else can read publicly that shows that prices are up and shows that the president was lying when he said it, that prices are down, and Kevin Warsh is willing to just keep repeating the same lies.
That's not who we need for a Federal Reserve Chair.
And one last thing I'll add.
Chairman Scott just walked by.
Did you speak to him about this nomination at all?
unidentified
And did you get any heads up from the White House?
Remember that, as you know, Fed chairs have very long tenures as governors.
They may not be there as Fed chair for more than five years unless they're reappointed and confirmed a second time, but they have long reigns as governors, as all of the governors do.
Whether he stays or not should be entirely up to Jerome Powell, not to influence from Donald Trump.
unidentified
Is there anything Mr. Warsh could say during his confirmation hearing that would lead you to vote to confirm him?
Yeah, I'd like to hear him say when he thinks President Trump is wrong.
You know, well, yes.
So, for example, Donald Trump keeps telling us that prices are down.
And so far, all of the Trump nominees come through and just repeat the same nonsense.
Anyone can look at the data and see what's not true.
Kevin Warsh has already stood up in public as part of his tryout for attracting Donald Trump's attention and just claimed that up is down, in is out, black is white, he doesn't care.
He wants to say whatever Donald Trump wants him to say.
He needs to show some independence.
So far, all he has done is shown that he would be an excellent sock puppet for Donald Trump.
unidentified
You and the president opened a conversation and a dialogue about a number of things, lowering housing costs, credit card caps.
Have you been able to continue the conversation there?
And talk to me a little bit about Senate Democrats in the White House being involved in these appropriations negotiations, but now we have, of course, Senator Graham standing in the way of that.
So for years, for years, Kevin Worsh has made his name as an inflation law.
During the 2008 crisis, he was on the board of the Federal Reserve, and he was the guy who kept saying, even as millions of people were thrown out of court, he was the guy who kept saying, keep those interest rates high because he was worried about inflation.
Once Donald Trump is looking for a Federal Reserve chair, and Donald Trump says the test is going to be somebody who will lower interest rates, suddenly, butter won't melt in his mouth.
He says, absolutely, we should lower interest rates, and he repeats Trump's.
And he repeats Trump's lies about the economy itself.
Trump says prices are down.
Kevin Worsh repeats that.
Posts on Fox News says, yep, prices are down when they're not.
Do you have concerns that this is going to get through the House if anybody's getting added?
Republicans are in charge of the House and the Senate.
They're in charge of the amendment process.
This thing's in a mess because the Republicans can't seem to go.
unidentified
We got to go.
Sorry, just one.
Sorry, I got it.
Bridging Political Divides00:04:37
unidentified
Today, on C-SPAN Ceasefire, at a time when finding common ground matters most in Washington, join host Dasha Burns for a bipartisan conversation with two U.S. mayors on the top issues facing American cities, including immigration enforcement and affordability.
Bridging the divide in American politics.
Watch Ceasefire today at 7 p.m. and 10 p.m. Eastern and Pacific, only on C-SPAN.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, our live forum inviting you to discuss the latest issues in government, politics, and public policy from Washington and across the country.
Coming up Saturday morning, Federal News Network's Jory Heckman discusses the impact of the partial government shutdown and guidance for federal workers from the Office of Personnel Management.
Then Eric Pratt of Gun Owners of America talks about the response by the Trump administration to the shooting of Alex Pretty in Minnesota and Second Amendment concerns.
And Omar Nureldin with the government watchdog group Common Cause on the administration's push to obtain private voter data.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal.
Join in the conversation live at 7 Eastern Saturday morning on C-SPAN.
C-SPAN Now, our free mobile video app, or online at c-span.org.
Travel through the history of America's space program on American History TV all day on C-SPAN 2, featuring classic NASA films and historical newsreels from past space missions.
Watch Saturday, starting at 8 a.m. Eastern, as American History TV sits down with Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Apollo curator Tiesel Muir Harmony to explore Americans in space from the creation of NASA in 1958 through the early Gemini flights to Neil Armstrong's historic first steps on the moon in July 1969.
She also looks ahead to the upcoming Artemis missions with the goal of returning astronauts to the lunar surface.
Plus, relive the race to the moon, Skylab, and the Space Shuttle program.
And hear first-hand accounts from legendary NASA flight directors Gene Krantz and Gerald Griffin.
The crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you.
Watch the history of the American Space Program all day Saturday, starting at 8 a.m. Eastern on American History TV on C-SPAN 2.
Sunday, on C-SPAN's Q ⁇ A. In his book, Baldwin, a Love Story, Nicholas Boggs discusses the personal life and activism of American writer James Baldwin.
Mr. Boggs, who spent more than 20 years working on his book, also talks about Mr. Baldwin's many writings, his life outside the United States, and his involvement in the 1963 March on Washington.
And Baldwin had, in fact, written a speech to be read there, and he had written it in France.
He'd gone over to France for a march over there.
These were black Americans in France who were doing a march along the scent in support of the March on Washington.
And then Baldwin brought this speech with him.
And the exact reasons and specifics of how this happened, we don't know, but somehow or other, he didn't end up reading it.
But a very famous person, actor at the time, without saying that it was James Baldwin's words, read these words about black global liberation coming out of the mouth of, you guessed it or not, Burt Lancaster.
unidentified
Nicholas Boggs with his book, Baldwin, a Love Story, Sunday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN's Q ⁇ A. You can listen to Q ⁇ A and all of our podcasts on our free C-SPAN Now app or wherever you get your podcasts.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries spoke to reporters ahead of a potential partial government shutdown.
He talks about the current funding package in the Senate, the arrest of former CNN anchor Don Lemon, and a GOP bill requiring voter IDs.