All Episodes
Previous Next
Plain Text
June 17, 2025 - Uncensored - Piers Morgan
39:09
20250617_weve-been-targets-for-a-long-time-eric-trump-trici
Transcriber: nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
|

Time Text
Don't Underestimate The Man 00:08:26
Got lawmakers being targeted in their homes.
We've been targets of this nonsense for a long time and I can't tell you how many times I've opened up white paper that's blown up in my face in my kitchen.
Listen, there's whack jobs out there and it can't happen on either side.
Don't underestimate the man.
There's a lot of people in this world who have lost a lot of money underestimating Donald Trump and they've done it too many times and they're always wrong.
Never fully trust anyone and he always beat that into us.
You know, I thought it was okay your parade.
It was all right as the first one.
It was okay.
But it wasn't Pierce.
No disrespect of the British.
We beat the pants off of the past.
I was going to say that when it comes to politics, we still love the tree, Eric.
Nobody does it better than us.
Has what's happened to him made you more or less interested in running for president yourself?
Now I feel like I can see everything coming three years before it comes.
I know their games.
I know their playbooks.
To pretend that these are just day labors at farms is just inaccurate, Pierce.
We are fully going forth on farms and hospitality.
Law enforcement are not going to be deterred.
I think that was the main goal of these riots.
We're going to keep going.
We're not going to be deterred, Pierce.
Well, 10 years ago, a real estate mogul and reality TV star rode down a golden escalator and gave a big thumbs up to the world's media.
And whether you love him or loathe him, you can't deny that nothing's been quite the same again.
My next guest is certainly in the love him camp, or I assume he is.
Eric Trump is executive vice president of the Trump organization and one of the president's sons.
Eric, great to have you.
It's your uncensored debut.
Yeah, well, Pierce, I very much do love him.
He's an amazing man.
He came down that escalator 10 years ago today and he changed American history.
He certainly changed world history, right?
And, you know, America was having real problems.
And I think a lot of those problems have been solved.
And I think our country's on the right track.
And, you know, I think there's a lot of love in the political spheres in this country and around the world for my father.
And he was a hell of a brave guy as he did it.
You watch what they tried to do to him.
You've been a friend of his for a very long time.
You've been a friend to our family for a very long time.
But you saw what they tried to do to him, Pierce.
And they tried to take him out.
They tried to bankrupt their company.
They tried to literally kill him.
And you mentioned it in the last segment with the crazy gunman at the golf course and obviously what they did at Butler, Pennsylvania.
They tried to impeach him twice.
They, you know, they weaponized all aspects of deep blue states here in America to go after him criminally for doing absolutely nothing wrong.
And they tried to take him off the ballot.
They restricted his free speech.
And I mean, I can go on and on.
They raided his homes and everything else.
But the guy is incredibly courageous and it's hard to believe it's been 10 years.
And what a journey it's been for not only my father, but obviously the entire family, especially those who've kind of stood on the stage every second of every day with him and fought by his side.
You know, it's interesting you mentioned him coming down the escalator because I remember that vividly.
I read a column for the Daily Mail that day because so many people were kind of mocking your father and suggesting he didn't have a prayer.
This was ridiculous.
It was a PR stunt, making a mockery of politics and so on.
And I read a column and I read it, I reread it the other day and I said, you know, Donald Trump has a habit of proving people wrong and having the last laugh.
And I've got a funny feeling we might be seeing another example of this coming because I was aware, actually, from when I did the Apprentice, Celebrity Apprentice show, when you walk around with your father and you see actual people come into his orbit, this is before he was ever a politician.
He had an extraordinary appeal.
There was no question about that, which I saw very clearly.
And I thought if you underestimate this guy's appeal with regular Americans, you're going to make a very big mistake.
Well, Piers, you and I sat at the same boardroom table many times together and I remember those days well.
And I think you're 100% right.
In fact, I was coming back from the military parade on Sunday morning with my kids and a little video popped up on Instagram.
And it was all those kind of scenes of Obama mocking him and all the people on Saturday Night Live mocking him and Obama saying, you know, the difference between me being a bad president and Donald Trump is at least I was president and you've got the next person, right?
And I mean, you know, Tom Hanks, you know, just saying horrible, horrible things and, you know, calling him a joke.
And as you said, don't underestimate the man.
There's a lot of people in this world who have lost a lot of money underestimating Donald Trump.
And they've done it too many times and they're always wrong.
And so, again, you know, that's the nonsense we had to fight through.
We had to fight through pretty corrupt media, as you know better than anyone.
You saw how unfair some of the things were that were thrown at him and all of us.
And listen, the American people love my father.
They love our family.
And they love everything that he stands for, most notably just being unapologetic, no BS and hard charger and being a guy who's just a great cheerleader for the United States of America.
And that's certainly what they have back in the White House right now.
So again, Pierre, as you know him very well, I'm very proud of him as a son.
And it's hard to believe it's been 10 years.
The one thing I'm always bemused about with you, Eric, is not that you've had a stellar career yourself, obviously running the Trump business, but you also have a very successful winery, I happen to know.
And yet your father is resolutely teetotal.
How has he allowed you to become such a passionate and successful producer of the dreaded alcohol?
Yeah.
Well, we fed in, we fell into it in the most unconventional way.
There's kind of Mar-a-Lago of the South.
It's in Charlottesville, Virginia.
One of the, you know, we've become the largest.
I've grown into the largest winery east of the Mississippi.
It's a phenomenal property.
But we were able to buy a property in a real estate deal at pennies on the dollar.
I mean, this was a property that was many hundreds of millions of dollars, and we were able to pick it up through kind of a complicated set of transactions.
The person wasn't doing well.
We ended up picking it up.
And all of a sudden, we look at each other one day and we're one of the largest wine producers in the country.
And I put a lot of heart and soul into it and a lot of passion into it.
And it became absolutely amazing.
And everybody wants to go there.
It's right.
Carter Mountain Road, you've got three presidents on that road.
You had James Monroe, you had Thomas Jefferson.
And right in between the two, you have Donald Trump.
So it's a pretty interesting little piece of history where we are there.
But no, it's been a fun project.
We've had a lot of fun.
And listen, people love the brand.
It's actually what we're doing today.
We launched Trump Mobile today.
And it's just, it's overwhelming.
The demand is overwhelming.
Within five minutes of launching it, the website crashed because people love what we do.
People love the products that we're part of.
People love the companies we build.
People love the hotels that we operate and construct around the world.
People love the golf portfolio.
We have an amazing company.
And we've never had more enthusiasm ever before.
You mentioned your wine there.
I mean, I'm a French wine fan.
Are you ever going to be able to persuade me that American wine can even live in the same stratosphere as a great French Bordeaux?
Well, I will in two ways, Pierce.
All right.
I'm glad you're a French wine fan.
First, we're on the exact same parallel.
Charlottesville, Virginia is on the exact same parallel as France, right?
And so we produce many of the same varietals.
And second of all, here's how I'll persuade you.
At many of the biggest wine competitions around the world, including San Francisco, which you know is probably the biggest in the world, we beat the pants off of many of the French wines.
And I love that.
And when they do the blind taste testings and they pull the brown paper bag off of the Trump bottle, and in the middle of San Francisco, it has a big Trump across the label.
You have half the people, maybe a 40% to San Francisco, who start applauding.
And you have 60% of people whose heads want to explode.
But it always brings me incredible joy.
But we do some of the best sparklings in the world.
We do some of the best Vienners in the world.
Our sparkling program is unbelievable.
I mean, we've beaten every champagne.
We've beaten all the best American sparklings.
We do that very, very well.
climate similar to France, high, you know, acidic levels.
And, and so, you know, very good at producing, you know, the sparkling wines.
But no, we're doing a great job.
I look forward to trying it, Eric.
I just want to, having known you guys a long time, nearly 20 years now, from when you were much younger, obviously, I was always struck by how close you are as a family.
And I've always struck about what a good father Donald seemed to be.
I just saw it at firsthand and how close you all were and how respectful you guys all were to him and him to you.
France's Sparkling Wine Legacy 00:04:10
What were the things that he instilled in you when you were young, do you think, which have served you in good stead?
First of all, you lead by example.
And the guy was a workaholic, never took vacations, never just put his head to the ground and worked and worked and worked and worked.
Second of all, every day I'd go to school and I'd go give him a little kiss before I left.
And every day, starting at four or five years old, Eric, no drinking, no drugs, no smoking, no tattoos.
Those were always, I don't know why he added the last one in, but no drinking, no drugs, no smoking, no tattoos.
And by the way, oftentimes, especially when he was going through his hard times, I never trust anyone, never fully trust anyone.
And hard lessons as a little kid, you're sitting there saying, Dad, I don't understand the concept of drinking.
You mean apple juice?
I mean, you're too young to really fully embrace it.
What's smoking?
Those things hadn't come into your life.
But he always beat that into us.
And then, you know, as of 11 or 12, it's, you know, you want a bike?
Guess what, Eric?
You could go freaking work for it.
You know, like, you know, I was cutting rebar with acetylene torches every summer.
I was, I was doing, you know, hard labor, you know, pulling conduit, doing piping.
You know, I mean, literally everything in the construction field you can imagine, you know, I was doing.
My hands tell the tail.
I mean, I rewired half of my house when I bought it.
My wife thinks I'm going to kill myself.
And, you know, it literally is what I did every single summer.
And so there were no free rides.
You know, you want something, you want to buy something for yourself?
Guess what?
You know, go get a damn job.
There were no Ferraris at 16 years old.
There was no Porsches.
And he tired us out.
He taught us a trade.
He tired us out.
He gave us very little money.
Listen, we were spoiled in the ways that we were living in Trump Tower, but it wasn't, you know, there were no handouts.
And so guess what?
At the end of working nine, 10 hours on a construction site, guess what?
You didn't want to spend the $4 an hour that you were making.
You didn't want to spend it on drugs and you didn't want to spend it on drinking and you were tired as hell.
All you wanted to do was go to bed.
And he was a remarkable father, remarkable father.
I had a remarkable mother as well who was tough as hell and great.
And I know you knew her, Pierce, but great, great parents.
And man, they instilled fighting us.
They instilled grit in us.
Had they not, honestly, maybe he wouldn't have won the presidency.
I mean that, you know, we're all we had, this little small family unit, the same family unit that you saw at the apprentice when you were sitting at the boardroom table with us.
The only thing we had was us.
We didn't have anybody else.
No one believed in us.
The media didn't believe in us.
The politicians didn't believe in us.
We believed in us and the American people believed in us because we had some level of sincerity and they knew he was going to go in and shake up the system.
And great guy, Pierce.
He's my best friend in the world and I love him to death.
I mean, no father, I've got three sons.
No father could want for more than that.
Yesterday was Father's Day.
Your dad turned 79 at the weekend.
What on earth do you buy Donald Trump if you're his son for his 79th birthday?
Well, it's hard.
We actually, we all went over to the White House.
We celebrated on, you know, the night before and actually on Friday night, the night before his birthday.
And we had the greatest time.
We got a massive cake and it was the whole family there.
And it was great to have everybody together.
And you always pinch yourself a little bit.
You're sitting in the White House, right?
And sometimes you look around, you're saying, how the hell did we get here?
I mean, just how the hell did we get here through everything?
But it was a very special birthday for him.
And obviously we're very close.
And the parade was amazing as well.
You want to talk about a sign of unity in this country.
People are Singing the national anthem and saying the Pledge of Allegiance.
And it was just, it was a beautiful day to commensurate the 250th year anniversary of maybe the greatest military that's ever fought.
No disrespect to the British.
I know we had a lot of people.
I was going to say, you know, I thought it was okay, your parade.
It was all right as the first one.
It was okay.
But it was.
No disrespect to the British.
We beat the pants off of you.
I was going to say that when it comes to pomp, Eric, when it comes to pomp and pageantry, nobody does it better than us.
This is trooping of the color in my country at the weekend.
I mean, you cannot beat this.
You can't beat that.
By the way, listen, you know, we knew the Queen very well.
And I've been to Buckingham Palace several times.
And you guys do an amazing job with that.
It's beautiful.
There's very few places in the world that are more beautiful than Buckingham Palace.
And the Royal Guard and everything.
And the horses.
Pomp And Pageantry Rivalry 00:13:08
And you understand the pageantry extremely well.
And we're very close to, we're very lucky to have such a great ally in the UK.
So, you know how much time I spend over there between Turnbury and Dead Green and so many of our properties.
And I love the country and I love the people.
And you have an amazing country, truly.
And I know you love your golf, Eric.
Would you give up absolutely everything you've got to do what JJ Spawn did last night in holding a 65-foot putt to win the U.S. Open?
Well, we've got a lot of good things going on.
So listen, would I like to win the U.S. Open?
There's no question about it.
How good was that?
You know, tough conditions.
I know Oakmont very well.
I know that course very well.
I have a lot of friends that have been there.
I've been there, obviously, a million times.
And, you know, we've got some of the greatest golf courses on Earth.
So it was nice to see another one that was, you know, it's fantastic and highly regarded.
But man, was that tough?
The rough was about five inches deep and they couldn't hit out of it.
And, you know, what a wooden that was by JJ.
So what do you play off, Eric?
You know, I play off of, I play off of extremely hard work and, you know, 210 days on a plane every year.
That's what I play off of.
But, you know, I'm probably, you know, I'm an honest, probably 10 handicap.
And I think I could be low single digits if I got to play every day.
But my father always asked me, Pierce, he goes, you know, honey, why aren't you a, you know, why aren't you a par golfer?
I go, the second I become a par golfer, I want you to fire my a word I won't say, but you won't be working long enough.
You know, yeah, listen, I run one of the biggest real estate companies on earth.
And, you know, obviously stood on that stage for many years with him and doing great projects like Trump Mobile, obviously, which we announced today, and you know, so many other things, so many technology ventures.
And, you know, the day I'm a scratch golfer at 41 years old, I'm probably doing something wrong.
So I'll get there, but it's probably going to be another 15 or 20 years.
We talked at the start of this about the rising amount of violence against lawmakers in America.
Your dad, as we said, he had someone shoot at him from 150 yards with an AR-15 assault rifle, which grazed his ear because he turned at the last second.
Otherwise, he'd be dead.
And then a few weeks later, he was on a golf course where if it hadn't been for a very sharp-eyed Secret Service agent, he might well have been assassinated again.
To have two moments in a matter of weeks where you could have lost your dad, knowing how close you are.
What was that like for you as his son?
Infuriating on a lot of fronts, on every front, heartbreaking on others.
I was watching that rally, as everybody remembers, they were speculating, the media was speculating that JD Vance was going to be announced obviously during that press conference.
And so it was being live streamed by everybody, CNN, Fox, even many of the hater channels were broadcasting.
And my children were on my lap.
I was on my laptop writing an email and I heard those shots.
And Pierce, I've been in the competitive shooting world virtually my entire life.
I know that world better than anybody.
130 yards with a modern day rifle is a chip shot, right?
That's a four-inch putt for JJ, as you were just talking about, right?
That's a shot that you do not miss anytime.
My seven-year-old son will make that shot every single time.
And it was unthinkable, right?
And you got to realize he was wearing a dark suit.
I didn't know if he got hit in the torso.
I didn't know if he got, you know, hid in the kidneys or the liver.
You couldn't, you couldn't tell through a dark suit.
And obviously, we're all sitting there watching it live, including a seven-year-old and a five-year-old on my lap when that happened.
And it's insane.
I mean, it's insane on more fronts than you can possibly imagine.
How these people exist in this world is like beyond me.
It doesn't make any sense.
And I hate the violence.
I hate the nonsense.
You see what's happening in California right now where they're lighting cars on fire and they're destroying police vehicles and they're attacking police officers.
And you just shake your head.
You're sitting there saying, What is this, right?
Especially when they're holding flags of foreign countries and marching around these vehicles, as you clearly probably have put on this program a million times.
And yet, you see the military parade the other night, which was really a beautiful birthday to the 250th anniversary of the greatest military that's ever existed.
And it was love, it was kindness, there's no fights, there was no bad words, there was nothing, there's no adversity.
And you just see these two parallel universes.
And it's hard for my brain to fathom.
But what I can tell you is 99.999% of Americans disapprove of the nonsense.
They disapprove of any kind of violence.
We've got one of the greatest, one of the safest, one of the most prosperous countries on earth.
And I can tell you, universally, people absolutely condemn that stuff.
And listen, if you need proof in case of that, Donald Trump won every single swing state, won the popular vote by the biggest margin of Republicans ever won it by.
And you better believe that some of that had to do with a lot of that kind of targeting aggression toward him during that period of time.
And by the way, toward me.
I can't tell you how many times I've opened up white paper that's blown up in my face in my kitchen.
Or Laura's had the same thing happen.
And that's happened to myself, and that's happened to Don, that's happened to Tiffany, and that's happened to Ivanka, and that's happened to everybody in our family.
So listen, we've been targets of this nonsense for a long time.
And, you know, at the same time, there's, listen, there's whack jobs out there, and it can't happen on either side.
Under no circumstance in any way, shape, or form, can it ever happen on either side?
And, you know, it's got to stop.
What was the first thing you said to your dad when you spoke to him after the shooting?
Hey, I'm Caitlin Becker, the host of the New York Postcast, and I've got exactly what you need to start your weekdays.
Every morning, I'll bring you the stories that matter, plus the news people actually talk about.
The juicy details in the world of politics, business, pop culture, and everything in between.
It's what you want from the New York Post wrapped up in one snappy show.
Ask your smart speaker to play the NY Postcast podcast.
Listen and subscribe on Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
He actually tried to create, you know, crack a little joke.
I think I was the first person to speak to him.
I'm not even sure if I remember what it was at this point, but humor is often kind of our protection mechanism.
And you're sitting there saying, you know, listen, I'm just glad I hear your voice, right?
It could have been very, very different, you know, a quarter of an inch, and it would have been different.
Had he not turned, it would have been different.
And you also had a dead person in that crowd that day.
You know, Corey, who was a remarkable human being.
I've gotten to know his family extremely well, and two others that were seriously injured.
And by the way, a lot of other incredibly brave people, including some incredible Secret Service agents who I love to death, who dove on that stage.
And I know every single one of them and jumped on him and would have taken a bullet in a heartbeat.
And so listen, that's a pretty raw moment to say the least.
It was a raw moment for the nation.
In a certain way, though, unlike 9-11, as horrible of a moment as that was for our country, the next day you saw these American flags hanging on every house in a certain way.
It kind of brings the nation together.
Travesty brings the nation together.
There's no question that Butler did that in a very big way.
Pierce, exactly 48 hours after that, I was the delegate from the state of Florida who put my father over the line and made him the Republican nominee for president of the United States.
I did that, obviously, in Milwaukee at the convention.
And you want to talk about highs and lows of life.
I mean, you're sitting there on a couch with two young infant children, as somebody tries to blow off somebody's head.
And then exactly 48 hours almost to the minute, I'm up there standing in front of 40,000 people in the entire world voting myself as delegate for Donald Trump, which otherwise, again, made him that Republican nominee for president.
And you want to talk about the highs and lows of life.
That's, you know, we certainly saw that in that short period of time.
Yeah, I mean, I spoke to your dad a week after the shooting when he was back on another rally stage.
I couldn't believe that.
And I just said, wow, that takes balls to get back on a big stage with a bunch of strangers again, seven days after someone tried to kill you.
And you know what else takes balls?
The fact that he called me on that phone call, he goes, nothing changes.
We go to Milwaukee tomorrow night.
Nothing changes.
It doesn't change by one minute.
I go, I don't even know if you have an ear left, right?
Like, you know, half of your ear is just blown off.
We're still going to Milwaukee.
He goes, nothing changes.
We're going to Milwaukee.
And I'll never forget that.
I actually thought the moment he got back up and did the fight, fight, fight, I said to him, I think that was the moment.
This was a week later.
I said, I think you won the election with what you did there.
I said, whatever people think of you, whether they love you, hate you, whatever, and there's never any middle ground with your dad, as you know.
But I just felt that people saw in him a courage that maybe they doubted he had.
You never know how you're going to react when you literally get shot at, but also an instinct to fight for the country, right?
And I think that's what resonated so hard with people and what propelled him back to the White House.
Yeah, there's no question about it.
Listen, you know, people want toughness.
You know, America is the greatest economy of the world.
It's not even close, right?
We're, what, $8 trillion bigger than China, and we've got one-fourth the population.
We're the greatest economy of the world.
You know, per person, it doesn't even come close, right?
And people want a tough person.
People want to see America lead the way.
By the way, including the UK, right?
You know, a strong, prosperous America is a strong, prosperous UK.
It's a strong, prosperous Europe.
It's a strong, prosperous Middle East.
We haven't had strength.
Our leaders have been anything but strong.
I mean, you know, frankly, the last one was an embarrassment to this entire nation for a four-year period of time.
And I know you felt that over there.
And I know the entire Middle East felt that and all of Europe felt that.
And, you know, we went a really bad direction.
And people want to vote for strength.
And when you have blood running down your face and you stand up with your fist in the air while somebody's still shooting, or practically, you don't know if the guy's been taken down at that point and you're willing to stand up and say fight, fight, fight.
Hey, Pierce, listen, you know a lot of them, right?
You know some of the most successful people in the world.
I'd argue you probably know most of them.
Name another billionaire that would take this job, right?
Name another billionaire that would have persevered through that.
My father could have retreated back to Mar-a-Lago, lived the greatest life, been with my kids, been with me, played golf every day, flew around in Air Force One, been the Republican kinemaker, did whatever the hell he wanted to do personally, politically, and not have to take the arrows.
And yet he stands up on that stage and he doesn't give a damn.
He doesn't give a damn that he's missing part of his ear.
He wants to save America, right?
He didn't care if it bankrupted the company.
He didn't care if they threw him in jail.
He wanted to save our nation.
And, you know, it's a stubbornness.
It's a resilience.
It's, you know, call it whatever you want, backbone.
You know, the guy's a remarkable human being.
And I think he's going to be a great kind of model for hopefully many future generations of politicians to come.
Has what's happened to him made you more or less interested in running for president yourself?
Yeah.
Well, I called him the morning, the morning after the election.
So we still hadn't slept.
It was the morning of the sixth.
And I go, Pops, I love you to death.
I've been by your side every single second of every single day for the last 10 years.
I've been on every show in the world.
It's not even close.
I did probably three or four of these every single day for that period of time.
I'm officially retiring from politics.
Love you.
We won the Super Bowl.
There's no more plays I can run.
And it's been an honor of my life.
I'm getting back to our great company.
I'm getting back to the 8,000 to 10,000 employees that we have worldwide.
I'm getting back to the best hotels, the best residential buildings, the ventures I really care about.
The people I care about, our extended family, which is really our company.
And so proud to have fought this fight, so proud to have won that fight.
And I know this country's in great hands.
And so listen, never say never, Pierce, with anything in life.
I've learned that.
And I think we've all become very good at it.
We understand.
We understand the game.
Remember, we entered politics, Pierce.
I didn't know what a damn delegate was, right?
I was a guy who built skyscrapers around the world and hotels.
And we didn't know anything about this system or the structure, what they were going to do.
Now I feel like I can see everything coming three years before it comes.
I know their games.
I know their playbooks.
I think we'd be really good at it.
It puts a big toll on your family.
And I would certainly be thinking about my son.
I'd certainly be thinking about my daughter throughout the fight because they better be ready because the animals will come and they do.
They come in ways that you can't even comprehend.
It's been a great interview, Eric.
Thank you so much for taking the time.
I'm going to give you a last 30-second burst to convince me to buy Trump mobile.
Off you go.
Hey, a mobile phone that does everything better that's made in the United States, $47 a month.
So there's a little irony to that number.
But, you know, we're making a product in America for Americans.
You know, because we believe in this nation, we also believe that we can make the actual product in the United States.
ICE Operations And Immigration 00:12:57
So many people kind of poo-poo that at this stage.
America can't make things anymore.
No, we can make things better.
We can make things cheaper.
And we're going to do it better than anybody else.
And so we're going to revolutionize.
We're going to certainly shake up.
We're really good at shaking things up here as we're going to shake up the cell phone industry and incredibly proud of this venture.
Well, best of luck with it, Eric.
Most of what you guys touched turns to gold.
So I should look forward to it.
Most of it's colored gold, as we can see from what's behind it.
A lot of it's colored gold.
Good to see you, my friend.
It's good to stay too long.
Take care.
All the best.
Protests against raids by immigration officers are sparked protests across the United States in days of unrest in Los Angeles.
President Trump is undeterred.
He's now ordered federal agencies to increase their enforcement and deliver what he calls the single largest mass deportation program in history.
Tricia McLaughlin is the Assistant Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
And she joins me now.
Well, welcome to you, Tricia.
Thanks for coming on our sensor.
Thanks for having me, Pierce.
First time.
I had a big debate with Dr. Phil last week about immigration in America, trying to get to a kind of big picture of where the Trump administration really wants to get to here.
And it's been quite interesting the reaction we had to it, because it seems to me there's kind of universal agreement that if somebody's in the country illegally and commits a crime, in other words, they've entered the country illegally and they commit a crime, no one has any problem with that person being deported.
It gets more difficult for people, it seems, from the arguments that have unfurled when you've got someone who's maybe come in illegally, been in the country, say, 10 years, started a family in the United States, got a job, paying taxes, and so on.
If somebody like that then gets uprooted and removed, maybe without their family and so on, there is less agreement about that kind of person being deported.
As you've gone through this process with Homeland Security and ICE and so on, how is the administration now viewing this in totality?
Well, Pierce, there doesn't need to be a single arrest of people without prior convictions.
The Trump administration has given those who are here illegally the option to leave now.
The U.S. taxpayer will generously give them a $1,000 exit bonus and pay for their transportation home.
If they choose to self-deport, they preserve the option to come back the legal right way.
However, if they decide not to leave to let themselves be arrested, they face financial penalties as well.
They are no longer eligible to come back to the country illegally.
So I think the U.S. taxpayer has been incredibly generous in this endeavor.
We inherited a very broken border, as you know, 20 million people have come into this country illegally, hundreds of thousands, maybe upward of a million, who have violent criminal histories.
So this is a tall task that unfortunately we have to grapple with, Pierce.
I mean, there's been no doubt that the strategy on the southern border has been spectacularly successful.
I mean, I don't think Donald Trump gets nearly enough credit for his achievement in reducing the number of people coming over that border illegally by 96% in four months, whatever it is.
It's a staggering thing to have happened.
It exposes how porous that border was under the Biden administration.
And I think he deserves full credit and everyone on the team does.
But again, that I think has universal agreement.
You know, people undocumented who commit crimes, get them out of the country.
But what about, for example, the reports that Donald Trump has been hearing from farmers who are really concerned about the number of people they may be losing under this pretty stringent deportation program and that it may leave them incapable of being able to operate in a functional, efficient manner.
It seemed to me from Donald Trump's rhetoric about that, that he's at least giving it some thought about people in that position.
Well, Pierce, the president put out a true social last night saying he fully has the backs of ICE law enforcement, that the rioters will not deter law enforcement and that we will be conducting mass deportations.
But I think that there's this misroamer out there that illegal immigration is a victimless crime.
I mean, simply look at these workforce operations.
The fact that these migrants, they're facing, they're being exploited for cheap labor.
They're facing unsafe work conditions.
Oftentimes, there's labor or human trafficking involved.
So to pretend that these are just day laborers at farms is just inaccurate, Pierce.
But is it true that the president's asked for a pause on ICE operating on farm workers while this gets worked out?
No, Pierce, we are fully going forth on farms and hospitality.
You name it.
Our ICE law enforcement are not going to be deterred.
I think that was the main goal of these riots over the weekend where they were getting, our law enforcement was being pummeled by rocks, Molotov cocktails being thrown at them, fireworks being thrown at them.
They were being assaulted.
But we're going to keep going.
We're not going to be deterred, Pierce.
You've got a lot of celebrities who are beginning to get more vocal.
They went a bit quiet after the election, but I've noticed them getting more vocal now.
Kim Kardashian, you called her out online.
After she posted, when we witness innocent, hardworking people being ripped from their families in inhumane ways, we have to speak up.
We have to do what's right.
You responded, which one of these convicted child molesters, murderers, drug traffickers, and rapists would you like to stay in the country?
And you shared photographs of various criminal, illegal immigrants detained by ICE.
Now, again, I would simply say I thought that was a very good response, but you're specifically saying in your response there that these are undocumented people in the United States who've committed pretty awful crimes, which I don't think anyone's got any problem with.
But again, there are other people who look at the general deportation, the rate of it, and some of the people who may be slipping through the net who perhaps are not as deserving as the people you put in your post.
And they're saying, is there not a slightly fairer, more humane way of differentiating people who may be in the country illegally, but have actually been very law-abiding citizens contributing to society since they've been in the United States?
Pierce, to the media's chagrin, 75% of migrants that have been arrested over the past 100 days have had prior criminal convictions.
But again, I remind those who are here illegally, you don't have to be arrested.
We will generously give you $1,000, a free flight home, and you preserve the opportunity to potentially come back the legal right way.
But Pierce, this is a nation of laws, and we have to enforce those laws.
If people want to change the law, go to Congress.
But would you like, I mean, just as a general observation, would you like every undocumented person in the United States to now leave the country imminently?
Yes, absolutely.
Self-deport now.
How many people is that?
Do you know?
We know that there's around 15 to 20 million people who illegally entered this country in the last four years alone.
I mean, that's part of the problem, Pierce, is when you allow unvetted mass migration into the country, you don't know who's here.
And that includes gang members, terrorists.
So yes, we want people to self-deport.
It is also far more safe for these migrants and far safer for our law enforcement as well as economically.
I mean, it isn't incredibly expensive to carry out mass migrations.
And that's part of the reason we're pushing this big, beautiful bill, Pierce, is because 10,000 ICE enforcement officers will get new jobs because we need more of this workforce.
You've had Sabrina Carpenter, the singer, urging her followers to donate to the National Immigration Law Center, which supports low-income migrants in the U.S. Olivia Rodrigo, another big singer, wrote as a lifelong LA resident, she's deeply upset about these violent deportations.
So you're getting a lot of celebrities who skew liberals, no doubt about that, who are coming out trying to foster a lot of angst about this.
You've had the mini riots in Los Angeles.
I don't think I call them any more than that, but they still involve violent acts and arson and attacks on law enforcement and ICE and so on, which is completely outrageous and unacceptable.
What do you hope as an administration, as this carries on, do you think that you can keep the protests to a reasonable level?
Or are you concerned it's going to develop to a much bigger thing?
Well, Pierce, in regards to Olivia Rodrigo and Sabrina Carpenter, I like their music, but I sure wish that they would share their platform to talk about the victims of these illegal immigrants.
I mean, in the last 72 hours, we've arrested convicted murderers, child rapists, drug traffickers, really heinous individuals.
And yet it seems very inconvenient for these celebrities.
They want to ignore the stories of those American victims.
In regards to the riots, and we're going to continue on with these ICE operations.
So those protesters can be damned.
I want to just turn briefly to the Minnesota shootings because they were obviously utterly horrific where you've got lawmakers being targeted in their homes.
We don't know the full motivation yet for the person who's been taken into custody, but we do know there's been an increase in attacks on lawmakers in America in recent years.
Indeed, there was an assassination attempt, two assassination attempts on President Trump, one of which nearly killed him and one of which could have killed him very easily, the one on the golf course, if it hadn't been for an eagle-eyed Secret Service agent.
How concerned are you at Homeland Security about this escalation of violence against lawmakers in America from the president down?
I think we're absolutely concerned.
In regards to the Minnesota case, our Homeland Security investigators are working with the FBI and other law enforcement partners to get the American people answers and make sure that this depraved individual faces justice.
But I mean, Piers, I have to bring up the fact that just last week, Secretary Noam was giving a press conference in a secure building, invite only in Los Angeles.
And Senator Padilla interrupts, doesn't say who he is, and starts screaming questions at her as he gets closer and closer to her.
So I think it's, you know, we can't give excuses to U.S. senators who have this kind of behavior as well.
I mean, there's a reason that he was manhandled the way he was because you cannot approach a U.S. Secret Service protectee with such aggressive behavior, especially when the temperature has been so turned up.
We've got that clip for those who haven't seen it.
So let's just take a look at that.
Hands up.
Hands up.
Senator Alex Padilla, I have questions for the Secretary.
Because the fact of the matter is, a half a dozen violent criminals that you're rotating on Europe.
Hands off.
Many of our heist agents have been dot org.
I mean, all I would say watching that again is he does obviously clearly state who he is.
Why did he, once it was established he was who he was, why did he have to be manhandled in quite that way?
Or was it a question of the agents didn't believe him or weren't sure?
We didn't know who the heck he was.
I mean, he starts, she's, Secretary Noam, she's about 60 seconds into her opening remarks and then a random person who we just thought was a protester barges in and starts interrupting her.
I mean, it's not very becoming of a U.S. senator.
I don't think anyone assumed he actually was who he said he was.
He wasn't wearing his pin.
And obviously it was very aggressive behavior.
So I think that Secret Service handled it exactly the right way and we're proud of them.
They kept their protectee safe.
Does Secretary Noam, does she get a lot of threats herself?
She does.
I mean, the political environment, absolutely, it's kind of getting out of control and the temperature needs to be turned down.
Have you had threats as well?
I have, Pierce.
How do you feel about that on a human level?
I think on a human level, it's disturbing.
Just because you don't agree with somebody or you don't agree with the policy decisions that they take doesn't make them any less human.
It's despicable.
And I think that we have to call it on both sides of the aisle when we see it.
Trisha McLaughlin, I appreciate you coming on.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Pierce.
Turning Down Political Heat 00:00:24
Piers Morgan Uncensored is proudly independent.
The only boss around here is me.
You enjoy our show.
We ask for only one simple thing.
Hit subscribe on YouTube and follow Piers Morgan Uncensored on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
And in return, we will continue our mission to inform, irritate, and entertain.
And we'll do it all for free.
independent on censored media has never been more critical and we couldn't do it Without you.
Export Selection