FULL TRANSCRIPT: Tulsi Gabbard and Donald Trump Hold Town Hall

I was in Congress at the time traveling. I would carry the medicine that I had to administer shots to myself sometimes in an airport bathroom. And ultimately, the most difficult part was every time going to the doctor for another transfer and hoping that it would result in a positive pregnancy test and then being heartbroken over and over every time that test came back negative.

Now, I know some of your opponents, your political opponents are saying that you want to ban IVF. While it didn’t work for us, it’s worked for a lot of families. And I just know that there are women and couples in this crowd or those who are watching here tonight who may be going through this same struggle and are concerned about being able to have this option, either because they might not be able to afford it or they’re concerned that it just may not be available. And I’d love for you to talk to them about how they should feel.

DONALD TRUMP: Well, thank you very much, Tulsi, and I didn’t know about your situation. It’s tough stuff, right? Life is pretty tough. It can be beautiful, but it can be difficult. We are doing something with IVF because IVF, as you know from friends and people you know, it’s really worked out very well for a lot of people. It gave them a child when they would not have had a child. And I told my people I wanted to look at this a couple of weeks ago, and as you know, we have no taxes on a thing called tips. You know that?

And I said, tell me. We did three things. We did that, and we did no tax for seniors on Social Security benefits. We want to have that. And I’ve been seeing a lot of IVF, and I kept hearing that I’m against it, and I’m actually very much for it. In fact, in Alabama, where the judge ruled against it, and I countered the judge and came out with a very strong statement for it, and the Alabama —

TULSI GABBARD: Very quick in your response to that.

DONALD TRUMP: I was, but they were too. They were amazing. The legislature approved virtually my statement, I mean, full IVF, and it has really gone. It’s terrific. And I said, so with the tips and with the Social Security, no taxes on Social Security, I said maybe for IVF, and I’ve been looking at it, and what we’re going to do is for people that are using IVF, which is fertilization, we are, the government is going to pay for it, or we’re going to get or mandate your insurance company to pay for it, which is going to be great. We’re going to do that.

TULSI GABBARD: I can’t tell you how life changing that would be for so many families, because it costs a lot of money. A lot of people go into debt just for the hope of being able to start their own family.

DONALD TRUMP: Well, it’s big, and you know what? We want to produce babies in this country, right? We want to produce babies. So I think it’s going to be something we told, we sort of announced it a little bit. We were in a great place. Michigan, we all love Michigan, right? We’re going to bring back the car industry, and we’re going to get a lot of it back to Michigan. They’ve been taking our cars away. They’ve been taking our manufacturing away over years, over decades, and if you look at it today, it’s a shell of what it was years ago, but we’re going to bring it back. Mexico is right now building massive car factories, actually being financed and built by China.

They think they’re going to sell their cars back into our country. It’s not going to happen. That’s not going to happen. Oh, listen to that. That is not going to happen. But so much, so many things have gone wrong in the car industry. The union leadership has been horrible. I think I’m going to win by 85 percent the union, but because we’re bringing it back.

And we’re going to have electric cars, but we’re going to have gasoline-powered cars, and we’re going to have hybrids. We’re going to have every kind of car. We’re not going with just that, but I just felt that it would be a good place to announce it, and we did sort of the announcement there a little bit, and now we do the big announcement tonight in front of all of these television stations, all of the fake news. They’re all over the place.

Discussing the Town Hall Format

They’re all over the place. I don’t know what’s going on. We don’t even know, I was saying, because we’re doing this, and I finished and I figured I was going to come here and we’re going to make a speech. I had the speech all set for you. I was ready. They said, sir, you’re actually doing a town hall. I said, oh, nobody told me that. I said, who’s doing it? They said, Tulsi. I said, well, that’s at least good news. I’ve been a fan of hers for a long time, I have to tell you. So I didn’t even know I’m in the plane and I’m looking over some material and we’re going to give you a hell of a speech tonight.

We were set to give you one hell of a speech. They said, no, sir, it’s a town hall. I said, why didn’t somebody tell me this stuff? And I don’t even have any idea who we’re doing it for. I don’t know, is it for a network or what? I see a lot of television all over the place, so maybe it’s on all of them.

Criticizing Political Opponents

But I did get to see the strangest thing today. I looked at the news conference of Kamala. I call her comrade. Comrade Kamala. Comrade Kamala. She’s a, you know that she’s a Marxist. Her father was a Marxist before her, so she was brought up in the family tradition and she really is, and this country is not ready for a Marxist. We don’t want a Marxist as a president. She destroyed San Francisco. She destroyed California. And we’re not going to let her destroy our country. I’ll tell you, it’s not going to happen. So…

But just to finish, so for some reason she doesn’t want to talk to anybody. So she’s either not the smartest light in the ceiling. I’m trying to be nice to her. I want to be nice to her. You know, it’s hard to be nice when somebody is destroying your country and wants to destroy your country. It’s hard to be like that. But she was a terrible vice president. She was a terrible border czar. Worst in history, probably.

Not just in this country. But the border, you know, millions and millions of people, I say 20 million plus, have poured through the border during their term. I have the safest border in the history of our country. They have the most unsafe border in the history of the world. And they’re coming through and many of them are from prisons and jails. There’s a slight difference, as you know. Prisons and jails. Many are from mental institutions and insane asylums.

And many are terrorists. And they’re pouring into our country at a level, I don’t know if you saw the news today, Tulsi, they had a group of a lot of them Venezuelan people with lots of machine guns taking over a building someplace. I’m looking, I’m saying, where is that? They went in and they took over a building.

This is just the beginning. They’re taking their criminals from all over the world, not just South America, not just Venezuela, which you’ve been reading about. All over the world, they’re taking their criminals and they’re dumping them into the United States. Kamala, that’s Kamala, is allowing it to happen. And they actually want to give them papers. They want to make them citizens and they want to give them your Social Security. They want to give them your Medicare and your Social Security will collapse under her. I’m the one that’s going to protect the Social Security.

But they’re coming. I will totally protect, as I did for four years. And there was no age increase. There was no anything. We’re going to protect. You know, they destroy you with inflation and then they want to destroy your Social Security. That’s not going to happen. But this is going to be the most important election in the history of our country.

So I just want to say that it’s an honor to be with you tonight. It’s a forum that’s very different because I have no idea who the hell is broadcasting it. But all we’ll do is we’ll talk because we’re friends. I love this state. I gave them Marinette. We gave them a very big, you know, Tulsi, we have a ship contract. And as you know, we gave Marinette yards, but we gave them a tremendous contract. They wanted her all over the country. I said, we’re going to get it for Wisconsin. And it’s a big one. And they’re doing a great job. I understand.

So we got that. And we’re going to have a good time tonight. So let’s go.

Addressing Immigration Concerns

TULSI GABBARD: Mr. President, you talked about immigration. We actually have Amber here who’s quite concerned about that. And she’s got a question for you.

AMBER: Mr. President. Hello. My name is Amber, and I’m from Cameron, Wisconsin. I have three beautiful children, and I’m torn on who to support. My youngest daughter is here tonight. My oldest son is 18, and he just started trade school this week. Very proud of him. My concern is that illegal immigration is threatening opportunities for my children. I worry that it’s taking away jobs from Americans. I’m wondering, what will you do about that?

DONALD TRUMP: Well, it’s great. I think I’ll stand up and do you mind if I turn around? Thank you, Amber, very much. And you’re right. I’ll tell you, we have the people that I’m talking about. They’re pouring in at levels never seen before. They’re coming in by millions and millions, and a lot of them are taking the jobs for the black population, the Hispanic population, and unions are going to be very badly affected because – and I was talking to some of the union heads who I actually do get along with – but they’re very concerned about it because the jobs that are – the people that are coming in are just taken.

And it’s going to start with the black population. African Americans are losing their jobs. And I don’t know if you heard the latest statistic that of the jobs that these people created, which is very little, every single job was taken – about 107 percent – was taken by illegal immigrants.

There’s been no job creation from them. The jobs were filled by illegal immigrants. With all of that being said, I want to give you a very positive answer. We’re going to win this election. We’re going to turn this country around. We’re going to become an unbelievable growth country. And your boy is going to have the greatest job. And you want to have a lot of choice with jobs. You know, you want them to go up and they get up and they – it’s hard to believe I have that with the way I get treated, but I look forward to every day because we’re going to make America great again. So I really do. I look forward to it.

But we’re going to – we’re going to create a lot of jobs. We’re going to create – does he want to stay here? Does he want to go to a different state or anything?

AMBER: Yeah, someplace in the Midwest.

DONALD TRUMP: But this is a good place to stay, right? Wisconsin. So we’ll be creating tremendous jobs for our country. And we’re also turning away. You know, we’re going to be closing the border – really closing it. By the way, did you see – so Kamala was for defunding the police. She was for open borders. She was for everything that you’re not against. I could go through 14 different – she’s changed in every single one of them. In fact, I think we should make – see the man in the red hat and the beautiful woman in the red hat? Says, Make America Great Again. Perhaps we should give Kamala a Make America Great Again hat, right?

But the problem is that’s not her belief. Her belief is open borders. Her belief is getting rid of Social Security. Her belief is doing all of these plans, like for health insurance, where you have one big government-run mess. And if you have private plans – a lot of the people in this room have private plans. They’re incredible plans. They worked hard to get those plans, and that’s what they want. But with her, she wants to have – it’s really a communist type of government.

And I just saw her, Tulsi, on – she was sitting behind a desk doing this interview. And I said, Dana Bash, you could make yourself big tonight. All you have to do is be fair. I haven’t seen the questions, but they gave out a sample – in fact, she’s going to be on later on tonight – with a tape. It was a tape. We’re doing it live. Why are we doing it live and she’s doing it taped? But –

TULSI GABBARD: That’s right. He’s real.

DONALD TRUMP: But she was sitting behind that desk, this massive desk, and she didn’t look like a leader to me, I’ll be honest. I don’t see her negotiating with President Xi of China. I don’t see her with Kim Jong-un like we did with Kim Jong-un. So we’re going to have to see what happens. I’ll tell you what. November 5th is going to be the most important day in the history of this country.

Addressing Economic Concerns

TULSI GABBARD: Mr. President, there are a lot of people who want to feel hopeful about our future. I want to introduce you to Luke, who is one of those people.

LUKE: Hi. Hello, Mr. President.

DONALD TRUMP: Good-looking guy.

LUKE: Thank you. My name is Luke Pulaski and I’m a junior here at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. I’ll be voting for the first time in November and I’m researching each candidate and I have two questions for you.

First, as I’ve been living on my own and buying my own gas and groceries, I have noticed that everything has become more expensive. For me personally, I try to eat healthy and stay lean. A pound of meat has gone from $4 to almost $7. I also would like to buy a home someday, but that seems just impossible now. What’s your plan to make life more affordable and bring down inflation for someone like me?

DONALD TRUMP: Very good. Thank you.

Addressing Economic Concerns (continued)

DONALD TRUMP: It’s probably the question I get most. You know, they say you’re going to vote with your stomach. I don’t know if you’ve heard it, but it’s a little bit true. And groceries, food has gone up at levels that nobody’s ever seen before. We’ve never seen anything like it. 50, 60, 70 percent. You take a look at bacon and some of these products and some people don’t eat bacon anymore. And we are going to get the energy prices down when we get energy down.

You know, this was caused by their horrible energy wind. They want wind all over the place. But when it doesn’t blow, we have a little problem. This was caused by energy. This was really caused by energy and also their unbelievable spending. They’re spending us out of wealth, actually. They’re taking our wealth away. But it was caused by energy.

And what they’ve done is they started cutting way back. We were in third place. When I left, we were by far in first place, beating Russia, beating Saudi Arabia. And we were going to dominate to a level that we’ve never seen before. And then we had a bad election. I’ll be very nice. I’m supposed to be nice when I talk about the election because everybody’s afraid to talk. Oh, please, sir, don’t talk about the election. Please. You know, if you can’t — if you can’t talk about a bad election, you really don’t have a democracy if you think about it, right?

But what they did, they took back the oil production. The oil started going crazy. That started the inflation. Then they went back. They said, go back to where Trump was. The problem is that we would have been three times that level right now. We would have been so dominant over Russia and Saudi Arabia. Look, Saudi Arabia, Russia, a lot of oil. We would have had more. You know, we had something in Alaska, ANWR, that we that I created. I mean, Ronald Reagan wanted it. You remember? Ronald Reagan wanted it. They all wanted it.

And I got it approved. Nobody was able to get it approved. I got it approved. And they — the first week in office, they turned it back. They said, no, it’s the biggest site possibly in the world. Could be bigger than Saudi Arabia. Well, we’re going to start that up. We’re going to become the energy capital of the world. We’re going to pay down our debt, and we’re going to reduce your taxes still further, and your groceries are going to come tumbling down, and your interest rates are going to be tumbling down, and then you’re going to go out and you’re going to buy a beautiful house. Okay? You’re going to buy a beautiful house. That’s called the American dream. The American dream. Thank you.

TULSI GABBARD: Mr. President, I want to ask you a question about national security, but first, I think it’s important to point out what Luke is talking about. The cost of groceries, the cost of gas, the cost of housing, mortgages, rent, everything has gone up. Kamala Harris’s plan that she has announced is government price controls, and I think it’s important to touch on. You just laid out your plan. What’s going to happen if Kamala Harris institutes price controls?

DONALD TRUMP: So that’s a communist plan. It’s never worked, and it’s been tried by others. Believe it or not, Richard Nixon tried it. A lot of people tried it. It’s been tried many times, and it always leads to the same failure. Tremendous inflation, lack of product. You don’t have anything. The stores are not stocked. It has never worked. It’s called control. They want control, and it’s been so often, and everybody that comes in, they say it. It sort of sounds great. We’re going to go price control. Actually, when she announced it, she got absolutely slaughtered by even Democrats because it doesn’t work. It’s a known loser, so now she doesn’t talk about it.

Do you notice she doesn’t talk about climate change anymore? She’s not talking about it. Do you know why? Because people don’t want to hear it. They want to live a good life. They want to live a life. They don’t want to stop your industry with climate change. They used to call it different things. Global warming, remember? That wasn’t working because it was getting a little bit cooler, so they said, what are we going to do? We’ll call it global cooling. So they came up with the words climate change because that takes care of everything. Climate change.

So climate’s changing, but according to them, we’re all going to be gone in about, what do we have, three years left? They had 12 years, remember? So in about three years, let me tell you, we do have a problem, though. It’s climate change, but a different kind of climate change. It’s called nuclear global warming. We can say that’s global warming, and if we don’t have a smart president, you know, you have five nations now with pretty massive nuclear power. Some have very massive, including us and Russia. China’s behind, way behind, but within four or five years, they’ll catch up, and we don’t want them to catch up.

Look, we, the biggest problem, in my opinion, the biggest problem our country has, the biggest problem the world has is nuclear weapons. They are a destructive force, the likes of which nobody has ever seen before, and we have to make sure they’re never used. We have to make sure it’s not going to happen.

TULSI GABBARD: You’re exactly right. You brought up Ronald Reagan already. Ronald Reagan famously said, a nuclear war can never be won and should never be fought. I think it’s interesting. You talked about climate change, Mr. President. The Democrats and Kamala Harris, they were quick to talk about how climate change is an existential threat, but what they’re not talking about is the existential threat of nuclear war and World War III, which is exactly where we sit today because of the war mongers and their puppets, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

And they don’t want to talk about it because the consequence of where they have taken all of us, the American people and the world, is economic hardship around the world, the destruction of our economic well-being and an annihilation of humanity, our families, our kids, our communities around the world.

There’s a recent poll that YouGov did that pointed out over 60% of Americans feel that World War III and nuclear war is going to happen within 5 to 10 years. And when I heard that, I felt so sad because they’re at a point where they feel like this outcome, the annihilation of the world, is inevitable. So I wanted to ask you about this because it’s important that people understand what kind of leadership you bring, what you will do to stop this slide towards nuclear war and World War III so that we can feel hopeful again.

DONALD TRUMP: Well, thank you. So Viktor Orban, a very strong leader from Hungary, Prime Minister of Hungary, they asked him recently about what’s the problem in the world. A few years ago during my term, we had no problem. We didn’t have Israel being attacked. We didn’t have Russia attacking Ukraine. And they asked him, why is it so bad now the Middle East is on fire? So many places are on fire, and there are plenty of places that could very well and very quickly catch on.

What’s the problem? He said you have to bring Trump back as President of the United States. You will have no problem. He single-handedly kept things… And it’s true. And I could do it with telephone calls by being smart, but literally he said you have to bring Trump back.

Now, he used a term I wouldn’t use. He said everybody was afraid of Trump. You know who was afraid of Trump? They said China was afraid of Trump. Russia was afraid of Trump. And I don’t want to say that. I will say this. They respected me, and they respected our nation. They don’t respect our nation anymore. They don’t respect our nation anymore.

Think of it. What would the world be like if Russia didn’t do what they did, and they would have never done it? I used to speak to Putin about it. I had a very good relationship. No chance. You know what happened, I think? Afghanistan, when he saw the horrible leadership that we displayed in Afghanistan, I think he said, wow, this is the time to go in, because I wasn’t there. He would have never done it if I was President.

And Israel would have never been attacked. Think of it. What would this world be like? You wouldn’t have had that disaster. And it wasn’t leaving Afghanistan. And they should have kept Bagram. That’s the big air base. It’s one hour away from where China makes its nuclear weapons. They didn’t keep it. You know who occupies it now, Tulsi? China occupies it.

So we have — if you have the right President and we don’t right now. Right now, do we even have a President? He just came in — Think of it. He just came in from wherever the hell he went. You know, there was a coup. He just doesn’t know it yet. But there was a coup. How about that? He got 14 — I’m not a fan of his. He was the worst President. But think of this. He got 14 million votes. She was the first one to leave, you know. Kamala was the first one to quit. She never made it to the first state in the primaries, which was Iowa. Never even came close. Other people did, but she never even came close.

And all of a sudden, she was picked. And she’s now running for President. And look, it just started, really. It just really started. The polls have us up here. We’re up in this state. We’re up in states, but it’s close. It’s close. It’s close. And, you know, they cheat like hell, so we don’t want to have it too close. Because we have to get — we have to win this. We’re not going to have a country.

But with him, I was so far up. We had a thing called How did he do in the debate? Did you think he did well? Not too good? No, they wanted to have a debate. And I said, Okay, it’s a little bit early, isn’t it? I was trying to talk them out. I said, Well, it’s a little early for a debate, right? And they said, Well, I think we’d like to do it. And that was not a good debate for them. That was not a good debate. So that was the beginning of the end for him.

And they started looking. But they picked a woman that had absolutely no votes. She got no votes. And now she’s running. So when you say threat to democracy, they are a threat to democracy. I’m not a threat to democracy. I’m not a threat. Thank you.

Addressing Crime Concerns

TULSI GABBARD: Mr. President, crime and the rise of crime is on the minds of a lot of people. I want to call on Danielle here who has a question for you.

DONALD TRUMP: Hi, Danielle.

(Question Inaudible)

DONALD TRUMP: Well, you need. Yeah, you get a lot of those questions from Minnesota, but you get a lot of those questions because Minnesota, I mean, they picked this guy. He is weird. I’m not weird. Now he’s a weird guy. He’s a weird dude. You know, see, they come up with soundbites. They always have soundbites. And one of the things is that J.D. and I are weird. That guy is so straight. J.D. is so… He’s doing a great job. Smart. Top student. Great guy. And he’s not weird. And I’m not weird. I mean, we’re a lot of things. We’re not weird. I will tell you. But that guy is weird. Don’t you think?

You know, he called. He signed for… And this is… Who would think that this is even happening in our country with men playing in women’s sports and all of this? But he has it. He has it at a level that nobody can believe. A bill that every boy’s bathroom will have tampons. Hence his name. Tampon Tim. But think of it. Think of it. Think of it.

And you know, on the question of abortion, he is the one. Abortion in the ninth month. And if the baby in Minnesota… And I’d love to win Minnesota because those people aren’t digging this guy. They’re not digging this guy. But think of this. Six states. Six states. Minnesota’s one of them. If the baby is born, you’re allowed to execute the baby. Think of that. After birth, in Minnesota, you’re allowed to execute.

And you remember the former governor, not the current governor, who’s terrific, Glenn Youngkin. We’re going to win maybe Virginia. We could do that. But the former governor, and he said, you sit the mother down and the father down. You sit them down and you talk. And the baby is born and you make a decision what to do. He meant, do you execute the baby after birth? And according to what they have passed and legislation, in Minnesota, they’re allowed to execute the baby after birth.

And this guy is a participant. And that’s why she picked him because she is in fact a Marxist slash communist. Remember, I’d say all the time, our country will never be socialist. We will not have a socialist… I was right. We skipped socialism. We went to communism. This woman has to be stopped.

Final Question: National Security and Terrorism

TULSI GABBARD: Mr. President, we have time for one final question. I don’t know if we can get a mic to Bernardo. He’s got an important question given very soon we will be honoring the anniversary of September 11th and all of the lives that were lost on that tragic day and that tragic attack where we were attacked by radical Islamist terrorists. And Bernardo wanted to share his thoughts and had a question for you on this.

BERNARDO: Thank you. Mr. President, my name is Bernardo. I’m a voter here in Wisconsin. Live in the wonderful La Crosse County here. And… I’m also a father of eight. I have seven here with me. And the anniversary of 9-11 is coming up. I’m concerned that we’re more vulnerable now than ever. And we have a Democrat nominee who doesn’t even want to say the words… says we shouldn’t say the words radical Islamic terror. How are we going to protect America from a terrorist attack?

DONALD TRUMP: First of all, it’s a great question. And you know, we have radical Islamists pouring into our country along with everybody else right now. They’re coming in at levels that nobody has ever seen before. We kept them out. We had one year where Border Patrol put down, it was, I believe, 2019 where they… and I don’t believe this, I don’t believe it’s right, but I’ll take it. They said zero came in in 2019. That was my term. Zero. Now we have thousands.

I’d like to say that was true. It’s probably not because I can’t imagine that. But we were very tough on that. Now they have thousands and thousands coming in along with the prisoners and along with the crime. And remember, a lot of these countries like Venezuela, their crime is way down because they’ve moved their criminals into our country. It’s not even believable.

But your question on Islamists and all of the jihad and all of the things that they talk about, they have to respect your country, they have to respect your leader. You know, I had no radical Islam crime for four years, and I didn’t want to talk about it. I wanted to… I talked about it after, but I didn’t want to talk about it. I don’t want to say, like, I had absolutely and the next day you get hit. But we had none four years of it because they respected your president, they respected your country, and they have to… we have to bring back that level of respect, and we’re going to do it. We’re going to do it. And we’re not letting the wrong people into our country. Okay? Thank you very much. Great question.

TULSI GABBARD: Thank you, Mr. President. I know you have run out of time here, but thank you for having this conversation with the people of Wisconsin and people across the country who are watching and concerned about these very same issues. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, everyone, for being here.

DONALD TRUMP: Thank you, everybody. Vote! Vote! Thank you, everybody. Thank you very much.

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