Pod Force One Interview: w/ Donald Trump – June 2, 2026 (Transcript)

But we seem to be getting along quite well.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Would you like to meet him or meet any of the Iranians in person?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’ve never thought of it actually. It’s a very good question. I’ll think of it. Yeah, I’d like to meet him. I’d like to meet everybody. I’d like to meet him. We probably will meet at some point depending on how it all works out.

Where Will the Country Be by Labor Day?

MIRANDA DEVINE: And how do you see the economy, Iran, by say Labor Day, September 7th? Where is our country going to be?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think we’re going to be in very good shape. We’re in good shape right now. We have the blockade, which is amazing. Our Navy is great. Our military— we have the strongest military in the world. I built the military during my first term, and I’m using it during my second term. I didn’t think I’d be using it this much, but we had a big success in Venezuela that was over in one day.

We have a great relationship with the people in Venezuela. The oil companies are moving in now with us. And that’s been tremendous. That’s been a tremendous success, even from the economic standpoint, the oil standpoint. But that was essentially much less than a one-day war and a great success. And we’re having a very great success in Iran militarily.

MIRANDA DEVINE: So you think the blockade will still be in place by Labor Day?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t know. I mean, I think it could be, but I think it’s unlikely. I think that we’ll have it. I think this will resolve itself fairly quickly.

Iran’s Military Weakness and the U.S. Economy

MIRANDA DEVINE: The media is almost universally saying, oh, Iran’s got you in a corner, that the Hormuz Strait is a big problem. That’s their trump card. What do you say to that?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, you know, they know that it’s fake news, just fake news. And most people, I mean, the professionals, the ones that aren’t just jaded and sick, you know, they’re mentally ill or Trump Derangement Syndrome. Let’s put it this way. Iran has no navy. They have no air force. They have very few soldiers. They have no leadership. The leadership, I mean, the original leadership is wiped out. And as I said, the second leadership is wiped out. Some of the third leadership is wiped out. Their economy is crashing. They have 250% inflation. They have everything that you can have that’s bad, they have. And then if you read the New York Times, you think they’re doing fantastically. It’s amazing.

Now, our country, on the other hand, has the best stock market we’ve ever had. We have, with the exception of the oil for a short period of time because of the war, other than that, we have very little inflation. The country is doing fantastically. We’re leading the world. We have $18 trillion being invested in the country in just 11 months, whereas the past administration, Sleepy Joe, had less than a trillion dollars, and we have $18 trillion, which is a record for any country anywhere in the world. The record was $3 trillion, and we have $18 trillion coming into our country. That’s 11 months.

MIRANDA DEVINE: And when will that be felt by people?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It’s being felt in gas prices. Well, you see it in construction jobs because factories are being built all over the country, auto plants, every— it’s being built. We have more auto plants under construction now than we had during our prime, and that was the prime automobile.

MIRANDA DEVINE: In your first term, that was, I think, one of the hallmarks, was that people’s wages, especially working people’s wages, were rising much faster than inflation.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Do you see that happening now?

MIRANDA DEVINE: That— right.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Oh, it’s— we don’t have very much inflation. Look, if you take away just the price of gasoline, the energy, we have very little inflation. We’re doing very well other than this. So, but that’s a big, that’s a big puller, you know, energy and gasoline and all. That’s a big factor. People feel it. So it’s, you know, it’s a very important item. And that’ll start coming down very rapidly as soon as this ends, when it ends.

But what we will have is we’ll have a situation where Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. Yes. And that’s really more important than all of it. We want low gas. You know, I had it, I had it down to $1.85 a gallon. Think of it, $1.85 in Iowa. I was in Iowa just before the war started, and I had it down to $1.85 a gallon in various parts of the country. And it’ll be back there again at some point in the probably not too distant future.

I think as soon as it ends, it’s going to come. It’s already, by the way, it’s already way down. You know that. I mean, I saw it the other day. It’s $98 a barrel. Yeah. So everyone said it was going to be $300, $400 a barrel. It’s $98 a barrel. But that’s not a big price to pay if you look at the possibility of them having a nuclear weapon. It’s not a very big price to pay.

The Art of the Deal and Keeping Iran Off Balance

MIRANDA DEVINE: And are your tactics where you say something and then change it and then do a peace deal and then break the ceasefire or whatever, is that all about trying to keep the Iranians off balance? Are you sort of messaging to them? No, because people at home sometimes, I think they feel anxious and confused.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That’s good, that’s good if they’re confused and the Iranians are confused, right? But, no, it’s just the way I am, which changes. I mean, I could leave here, I could give you an answer, and then in 20 minutes go into the Oval Office and say, how are things going? And I realize my answer is now incorrect, okay? I could come back and say, “Miranda, do me a favor, let’s change the old answer because it’s incorrect.”

MIRANDA DEVINE: But I think it was— Is that part of the art of a deal?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, it changes. Facts change. And this thing, and some things quick. This is rapidly changing. We’ve dealt with Iran for 47 years. And they’ve killed many of our people and they killed many people all over the world. The state sponsor of terror, number one in the world.

And it’s rapidly evolving, and it’s evolving good. It’s going to be very good. We’re not going to— they’re not going to have a nuclear weapon. Lots of other good things are going to happen. And we’re going to have something that we— I say we did a little excursion down to the beautiful country of Iran, or as they say, the Islamic Republic of Iran. And we did that little excursion knowing that, you know, hey, I just hit the highest stock market price in history and very little inflation. And I said, “Gentlemen and ladies, we’re going to now have to make an excursion now because we can’t let them have a nuclear weapon.” And that’s what we do.

Timing of the Strike and the Midterms

MIRANDA DEVINE: Wish you waited as soon as we— after the midterms.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I could have, but I know because this is— this is too important. If I did that, they would have had a nuclear weapon. So they would have had a nuclear weapon 2 weeks after the B-2 bombers struck. So if I did that, they would have had a nuclear weapon. It would be wonderful to say, “Oh, let’s wait till after November.” But, no, this is, this is too important.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Has it set you back, you think, in terms of how Republicans will do in the midterms?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I don’t know. I mean, everybody I endorse wins. I mean, everybody. You saw that, right, last week? Every single person I endorse wins. So I don’t know about that, but again, this is a very important moment in history. We can’t let this happen. What was going on 47 years— this should have been done for 47 years. This should have been done for a lot of presidents and other people. Other countries should have, should have done this.

The Dirty 51 Letter and Election Integrity

MIRANDA DEVINE: Now, Axios reported that you had a phone call with Bibi Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel, in which you were angry with him. You said, “Are you effing crazy? What are you effing doing? I helped you stay out of jail.” Is that true? Did you speak to him in those terms?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I did. I wouldn’t say angry. I was a little bit perturbed at his constantly fighting with Lebanon. You know, at some point I said, “Bibi, we got to stop this. We got to stop it.” But I have a very good relationship. We’ve done well together. He always says we could never have done it, but everybody knows that we could have never done it without the United States.

But we’ve, I’ve worked very well together. I like Bibi a lot and I’ve worked very well with him. We had a, you know, where he, I’m a wartime president, he’s a wartime prime minister, very important part of the world. And I think we’ve done, you know, very well. We’ve gotten along very well together.

MIRANDA DEVINE: What do you say to people who claim that Bibi Netanyahu tricked you into going into Iran?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, they’re just, you know, the enemy. They’re just, you know, the Democrats, the UN. These are Democrats. These are people that don’t know what they’re doing. They want men playing in women’s sports, and they want open borders so the world can pour into our country, and they want transgender surgery for everybody, and they want transgender mutilation of our children. No, these are just words, you know. That’s all they do. It’s all they’re good for is words.

Like, I heard that the other day for the first time. I said, “He tricked me.” I mean, I’m the one that started it because, again, I don’t want to bore anybody, but I started because we can’t let them have a nuclear weapon. Now, that pertains to Israel because they probably would have been the first one to get hit. There would be no Israel. Tell you what, if there wasn’t me, there would be no Israel right now.

And it started off when I terminated the horrible Barack Hussein Obama Iran nuclear deal that he penned, and that would have given Iran a nuke. That was a road to a nuclear weapon, and I terminated it, which was lucky I did. And then I stopped it a second time with the B-2 bombers flying in and bombing the hell out of them. They would have had a nuclear weapon — if I didn’t do that attack, which, you know, very few people would have done it. If I didn’t do that attack, Iran would have had a nuclear weapon, and they would have used it almost immediately.

The Dirty 51 Letter and the CIA

MIRANDA DEVINE: And speaking of Barack Obama, there’s a senior intelligence official that worked under Obama who’s now come forward to the inspector general and said that he’s analyzed that Dirty 51 letter that falsely claimed Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation. And he said that was a deliberate, concerted deception operation by the CIA to stop you winning the election.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, you wrote a good book about it. Maybe the best. And I always appreciate it. That’s one of the reasons I’m doing this interview, because I shouldn’t be here right now. I’m supposed to be someplace else. I’m doing it because it’s you.

You wrote really a great book. It was a whole fake. The whole thing was a fake. And they were trying to say that his laptop — you called it “the laptop from hell.” And you said you got the term from me. You called it that. And I never asked you for 10% or 25%. I should have said, “Give me 20,” because that book was a big success. And you called it The Laptop from Hell. It was a great term, you have to say.

But think if they didn’t have that laptop. Think if he didn’t give it to the repair shop. Or if he picked it up. You know, the guy kept calling him, “Pick it up, pick it up.” After, you know, 10, 15 phone calls, he opens it up and he sees what’s in there and he couldn’t believe it.

MIRANDA DEVINE: But polls show that you would’ve won the election if people had known about it, and it was censored. And the Dirty 51 letter, those CIA former directors, they rigged the election. Is the Department of Justice looking into it?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I won’t get into that, okay? But they’re looking into plenty of things. No, the election was rigged 100%. Now, the only thing I can say is that I think we’re probably having a better term than if — I won it 3 times. But I think it’s a more important term than it would have been if I did it the other way.

MIRANDA DEVINE: A lot of damage done to the country by Joe Biden.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That’s right. The one thing is that we wouldn’t have had 25 million people pouring into our country. That’s a big thing. And we wouldn’t have had the war with Russia and Ukraine either. There are so many people that have died. They’re losing 25,000 people a month. That wouldn’t have happened.

He was the worst president, had no idea what he was doing, should have never been president. He lost the election in a landslide. And, you know, we have a very corrupt election process. When you think of it, the Democrats fight because they don’t want to have proof of citizenship. Think of it. Who wouldn’t have proof? They fight. They hire law firms, the biggest law firms, most powerful law firms in the world, so that they can not have proof of citizenship. They fight because of voter ID, voter identification — they don’t want voter identification. By the way, Democrat people do. If you interview Democrats, not politicians, Democrats, they want voter identification.

They fight because of the ballots. They have mail-in ballots. We’re the only country in the world that has mail-in ballots. No other country does it anymore. They’ve done it, used to have a lot, and they realized it was totally corrupt. So we have a very corrupt election process.

Voter ID and Election Reform

MIRANDA DEVINE: Why can’t the Senate just pass the Save America Act for voter ID?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They should do that. They don’t have the votes.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Can you put it into reconciliation?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: One Democrat vote. I’ll give you an example. The Senate doesn’t, or the House doesn’t have one Democrat vote saying we want voter ID, we want proof of citizenship, and we don’t want votes being mailed all over the place and coming back touching 15 different hands. We want to have no mail-in ballots.

Now, France had no mail-in ballots this last election, and it was very nice. But they used to have vote by mail, and they found it was very corrupt. It’s going to be corrupt, 100% corrupt. It has to be — it touches all over the place. You know, in California, they mail out, I think, 38 million ballots. And some people get 3, 4, 5 ballots. Republicans get oftentimes none. They have to call in, “Where’s my ballot? Where’s my ballot?” Last minute.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Do you have a plan to get it through? I mean, you have the Republican majority in the Senate.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, we have a majority, but we have a few Republicans that, believe it or not, like Lisa Murkowski and Rand Paul, are against voter ID. Would you — why don’t you call them up and say why? They’re against this. Say, “Why would a Republican — why would a Democrat —” you have to understand, the Democrats are like 86% in favor of it. It’s only the leadership because they want to cheat. The only reason you would not want it is cheating. But we have a few Republicans that — nobody can explain it. They’re against it. And Mitch McConnell is against it.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Do you think he has personal animus towards you?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Even though I was the best thing that ever happened to him. I did the judges. Without me, he wouldn’t have any judges. I guess he does. Look, without me, he wouldn’t have been elected. It was my endorsement that got him elected. He was losing by a lot. I endorsed him and he won the election quite easily along with everyone else. So you saw that the other night. I think I was 112 and 0, 138 and 0. But it’s been a very interesting period of time.

But you do have to ask that question. Why would you have 3 or 4 Republicans not in favor of voter ID, proof of citizenship, and no mail-in ballots? And you can have mail-in ballots if you’re in the military, because I don’t want to make it sound so harsh. If you go away on vacation, like you’d like to visit your country, which is a very nice country, although they’ve gone a little bit sour. I don’t know what’s going on with them. I know they’ll come back. They’ve got a Labour government. Well, they have to come back because we’ve sort of lost them. The people want to have voter ID or proof of citizenship.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Surely. Could you — Larry Kudlow’s idea — put the Save America Act into the reconciliation bill?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, we’re going to eventually do it, but they have to do it. I say you have to do it, fellas, because people are not happy about it.

MIRANDA DEVINE: And there’s a plan to override the parliamentarian who’s so powerful. Well, the parliamentarian shouldn’t be there. No, but if she is —

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The parliamentarian — I don’t care, she shouldn’t be. If she is, she shouldn’t be.

MIRANDA DEVINE: J.D. —

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Vance can overrule her. John Thune has the right to change the parliamentarians. So the parliamentarian was put there, I think, by Barack Hussein Obama.

MIRANDA DEVINE: 2012. So immediately I know she’s no good.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yes. Okay. She’s no good. She rules against us and they don’t change her and they can.

MIRANDA DEVINE: So do you talk to Thune about this?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I do. I do.

MIRANDA DEVINE: I say, “Why don’t you do it?” What does he say?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’d rather not say. Because I have a very good relationship with him and I’m going to try as long as I can to keep it that way.

The Democrats’ 2026 Candidates

MIRANDA DEVINE: Now the Democrats have got a huge problem. Graham Plattner in Maine is one example, that terrible Senate candidate.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, he’s a major sleazebag. I mean, you look at him. I can’t imagine that he — but yet he’s up in the polls against Susan Collins, but she’s always down in the polls and, you know, she survives.

MIRANDA DEVINE: But they have James Talarico in Texas. I think he’s one of the worst.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Actually, I think Talarico is worse. You want to know, of the two of them, I think Talarico is probably worse. Talarico is better than Jasmine Crockett, no relation to Davy Crockett. You know Davy Crockett? Raccoon hat, king of the wild frontier. But Jasmine Crockett — I think she’s a better candidate than him. Oh, she’s better? So I think she would have been better, and she’s, you know, grossly incompetent. She’s a low IQ person. There are a lot of low IQ people. But oh, he’s horrible. Talarico is horrible with the 6 genders. The mask — a couple of months ago, he’s wearing a mask. Vegan in Texas doesn’t work. He’s heavy vegan.

MIRANDA DEVINE: God made 2 genders.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Now he’s going, “No, no, let’s have a barbecue.” Did you hear the other day? Said, “We’re going to have a barbecue.”

MIRANDA DEVINE: Why can’t the Democrats find a normal red-blooded white male? They have all these frauds.

Democrats, Iran, and the 2028 Race

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Anybody, it doesn’t have to be a white— they could find anybody that, you know, we have like 350 million people. Of course, nobody has any idea because they poured in so— but, you know, during Biden, they poured in here like 25 million people. But we have 325 to 350 million people, and you would think that we would have some great ones. We do have great ones, but they don’t seem to be chosen by the Democrats.

Now, of course, the Republicans chose one of the finest intellects in the history of our country, you know, the cream to the top. But I’m amazed, including Republicans, but especially the Democrats, they don’t appeal to men. Well, look at that. Look at the— yeah, they’re not appealing to anybody.

We had Kamala. Kamala was a disaster. The border czar. She was the border czar. She was the queen of the border. She never called. She never went there and she never made one phone call. You know, I know all the border guys, you know, the Border Patrol. They’re great. ICE, Border Patrol. They’re very, you know, they’re patriots. Yeah. They’re great. A lot of them are veterans. They spoke to me a lot. I called them all the time. How are we doing on the border today?

So now the border is sealed. We have nobody coming in. Nobody. We actually had for the last 11 months, zero people coming because they don’t even try. Yeah, they don’t come up. They don’t go into the caravan. They don’t come up.

But look, our country is the hottest country in the world. So we had numerous people, leaders, but in particular, so I was with the King of Saudi Arabia. He said, you know, and at that time it was just 7, 8 months ago, but he said, essentially a year and a half ago, you were a dead country. Now you’re the hottest country in the world. We’re the hottest country in the world. We have the strongest military in the world. Everybody knows it.

You saw that with Venezuela. You see that with Iran. I mean, their navy’s wiped out, their air force is all gone. After 3 days, their military was virtually wiped out. Now I have to make a determination. Do we sign a deal or we do it the other way? And the other way’s not nice.

MIRANDA DEVINE: What will the other way achieve though?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Certainty. It would be over. There wouldn’t be any bullshit. There wouldn’t be any talking. There wouldn’t be any delays. There wouldn’t— but, you know, I’d rather do it the nice way from a humanitarian standpoint.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Can you do it just with bombing?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The other way? Yeah, you don’t have to, we don’t need boots on the ground now. Well, we did it, you know, we wiped out much of their military with just bombing. We didn’t put anybody on the ground. You don’t want to do that. You’re so far away. You don’t want to do that if you can avoid it.

But it’s been an amazing period of time. No, we have, think of it, a year ago, year and a half ago, we had a dead country. It was a dead country. It was a laughingstock all over the world. We had a president who couldn’t climb up a flight of stairs. He was an incompetent guy.

Jill Biden’s Claims and the 2024 Debate

MIRANDA DEVINE: Jill Biden said this morning that she would’ve— he would’ve beaten you, Joe Biden, in last year in that election.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: There was never a candidate that was down as much as he was. He was down by so much and his debate performance— by the way, he choked. You know, they were saying, why did he do so badly? I got no credit for the debate. They said Trump was great, but they didn’t say Trump made him choke. He choked. Just like a golfer that can’t sink a 3-footer, like stands over it. You know, it’s choking. A baseball player, a basketball. Joe choked. Now, I wouldn’t say it was in the greatest condition to start off with. Do you believe Joe Biden? That was an amazing man.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Do you believe Jill Biden when she says she thought that he was having a stroke?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, I don’t believe it. No, he wasn’t at the top of his game. But you have to understand, if you go back 35 years ago, he was not considered a smart person. He was never a smart person. He was a horrible president. Obama was a horrible president. Barack Hussein Obama. He was a great divider. Horrible president. And there haven’t been too many good ones over the last period of time, to be honest with you.

But Obama was an absolutely horrible divider. And that played into this whole nightmare that we had with Biden, who couldn’t do anything right. The whole world was laughing at us. We can never let— think of what happened. Number one, Russia, Ukraine wouldn’t have happened. And number two, we wouldn’t have people pouring into our country from jails and from drug dealers and from mental institutions and terrorists. And from, I mean, literally, they emptied out jail, the jail populations. The whole jail was emptied into our country. And many of them were, we had 11,888 murderers, most of whom committed more than one murder, allowed into our country.

And we can never forget what the Democrats, and they are dumb, what the Democrats, and that’s my name for them. You change the U, for the E, and nobody knows that dumb has a B. So you just put it— but the Democrats, what they’ve done to this country, and you can never forget it.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Jill Biden was also in her book. She’s written about your wife, the First Lady Melania Trump. She claims that she was kind of cold to her on Inauguration Day when they shared a cab. She’s quite rude about her, says that she rejected her offers to have cups of tea, et cetera. What do you think the First Lady would make of that?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I don’t know. I mean, I didn’t see the book. I don’t think I’ll be reading the book. I think the debate was very interesting though, because you know, the man was, he was a bad debater anyway. Yes. But he certainly wasn’t on his game that night. But I think I put him off his game.

I think, you know, so, I have a friend who was in a big golf tournament and he played great and his primary competitor didn’t play great and they always blamed it on the other primary competitor. He said, but nobody ever talks about the fact that I played great. Well, I mean, I had a great debate and I think that contributed to Joe not doing well because Joe was all right. People saw him before the debate and he was fine. I wouldn’t say it was Winston Churchill, but he was fine. He was all right. He went to a Waffle House that night. Yeah. I mean, so she said he had a stroke, but why would she bring him to a Waffle House if he had a stroke?

MIRANDA DEVINE: Would your wife have allowed you to go off to a Waffle House if she thought you were having a stroke?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Even in good times, you know, although I would actually, it’s not so bad. But now it was, it was an amazing evening actually. I walked in, he was very white. You know, did you notice the makeup or something? But they hired a very expensive makeup artist who really liked white powders. Then he was on the white side because I walked in, and for some reason they introduced him. So it’s like a boxing match, you always introduce the champion, the one that’s higher rated. You— well, he was the president, I wasn’t. I thought I was going to be, but I wasn’t. And they introduced— I was waiting to go first, and they introduced him first, which is very unusual. And when I went up, I looked at him and I said, he’s so white. You know, that was the big thing. I said, what happened to him?

But he didn’t— it was not a good debate performance. But I think I did well. I think maybe I was a contributing factor to the fact that he didn’t debate well. I don’t know. You spooked him. I don’t know. I mean, something happened. Yeah, something happened.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Strange. And you’ve just—

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But it was a great thing because we got rid of him. Yeah. And he was way down in the polls and we got somebody else. And you got rid of Kamala. And then we had Kamala. So I’m the only person that’s ever beaten two people. This could only happen to me. So I have one guy and I’m killing him. It’s like a fighter. You’re killing a guy and they take him out and they put another fighter. So what happened? This is a fresh fighter. And then they put Kamala there. She wasn’t too good. No, she wasn’t the best either.

2028 Candidates: JD Vance, Marco Rubio, and Gavin Newsom

MIRANDA DEVINE: Yeah. And for 2028, the Democrats, who knows who they’re going to field? They don’t have great candidates. But you have a cornucopia of talent.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We have a lot of talent.

MIRANDA DEVINE: And you’ve talked about J.D. and Marco Rubio. And I think you like sort of—

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Good. Putting them in this team. They’re both great. Yeah, I like them both. And I like them together, you know, it would be great. I don’t know how you beat them if they’re together. That would be a great team. JD and Marco would be a great team. I don’t know, you know, they have to agree to it, right? We haven’t touched, we still have, you know, we have a long time left. We have more than 2 and a half years, substantially more than 2 and a half years.

MIRANDA DEVINE: So— Marco’s a lot older. Would you—

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, not a lot older, but he’s older. But they’re both young guys. Yeah, I mean, they’re both very talented. They get along really well. I mean, I watch them all the time, you know, I study them as they’re with each other. I find it very interesting. I sort of like politics, but I would think that JD and Marco as a team would be very hard to beat.

How do we compare that to these low IQ people that we have on the other side? You know, Gavin Newsom is an example. He said he’s a stupid person. He said he’s stupid. He said that he’s— look, I’m not going to knock dyslexia because people have it, but it’s not ideal if you’re president. Why boast about it? Well, listen to this. He can’t read a speech. He said he can’t read a speech. He cannot do it. I think it was the worst interview by a professional politician I’ve ever seen. He said he’s a stupid person. But he said he’s smarter than the people in the room. So then now they’re going after it because it happened to be a black audience. It was the most incredible thing. He’s smart. He said he’s stupid, but he’s smarter than the people in the room.

I’ll be honest, there’s something wrong with him. That was the worst interview I’ve ever seen given by a professional politician. He’s a professional politician. And he said he’s just not a very capable person. In fact, I thought he was trying to get out of the race when he did that interview. That interview should be played over and over again. Whoever runs against him, if he’s going to run, I’m not sure. I think that interview actually knocked him out of the race because they said he had terrible boards. They said he just said, and he said, I cannot read a speech. I’m incapable of reading a speech. I never heard that before. Sometimes you better off reading a speech, but he said he’s incapable of reading a speech. I thought he was actually looking to get out of the race. And I think he’s not because I think he’s still running. I’m so interested. Anybody, by the way, anybody that runs against him, just get that interview and play it.

MIRANDA DEVINE: It’s a good idea. And I was interested when you talked about how you studied Marco Rubio and J.D. Vance as they interact. What is their interaction? It’s good. And how do they relate?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I study to see if they like each other. I just find it interesting. Life. It’s big-time stuff.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Do you do that with everyone in the cabinet?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I do it with everybody outside of the cabinet too. I study everything. Yeah, I’m a studier. Why? Because it’s interesting. Human— it’s the human thing, the human equation. So I watch them together. They get along great. They have a good relationship. They’re sort of similar in a lot of ways, but they’re very talented. And I think the two of them running together as a team would be very unbeatable.

Bill Pulte and Tulsi Gabbard

MIRANDA DEVINE: Now you’ve just announced Bill Pulte, who’s your housing finance director, as the new Tulsi Gabbard, the new director of national intelligence. Do you think Tulsi Gabbard did a great job of declassifying— she did— information that told us a lot about the deep state? Well, it told us they’re corrupt against you.

The 2020 Election and the Save America Act

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: It told us they’re corrupt. It told us that the election was rigged. Yeah, the last election. And it talked about COVID but it talked about the rigging of the election. The election was rigged. The 2020 election was rigged. Sure as you’re sitting there, you are sitting there. Yes. Yeah. But as sure as you’re sitting there, it talked about how the election and just aspects of it.

And now it’s a terrible thing when a country like us can have a rigged— we’re worse than some third world countries when it comes to elections. And that’s why we have to pass the Save America Act. And what that is is very simple. It’s really, you know, you say Save America, it’s just a term, but it’s voter ID, right? It’s proof of citizenship. And you don’t have mail-in ballots. You don’t have, you don’t send the ballots all over the place and maybe get them back.

MIRANDA DEVINE: It’s a big priority.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, no, think of it. Think of it. People get 7 ballots. Some of the Democrats, the Republicans, for whatever reason, tend to get none. You know, they cheat very well. If they didn’t cheat, you wouldn’t have them in. They do one thing that is good. They stick together. They can have the worst policy. Think of it. Men in women’s sports. Open borders so the rest of the world can pour into your country and destroy your country. Again, the transgender mutilation of your children, where they can take your children and have a boy made into a girl. And this is wonderful, they say. So their policies are no good.

MIRANDA DEVINE: That’s why they have to rig it.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, they have to— no, they couldn’t win otherwise. If they didn’t cheat, they could not win because their policies are so bad.

Bill Pulte, the DOJ, and Ron DeSantis

MIRANDA DEVINE: So Bill Pulte, why did you choose him? And is he going to accelerate this declassification? And what can be— like, something has to be done. You can’t just expose it.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, he’s the DOJ. Yeah, he’s a very talented guy. Todd’s doing a very good job DOJ.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Will he be Attorney General, or have you decided? I think you will. Yeah, you haven’t got someone else in mind? No, not Ron DeSantis.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I wanted to see how he’s received. You know, we put him as acting, and he’s done a very good job, but I’ve known him a long time.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Someone mentioned Ron DeSantis might be in the mix.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Attorney General? No, Ron’s very good. Ron’s very good. I mean, you know, people have thought of different names. There are some good names. No, I, I had never thought— Ron never talked about, you know, he’s a governor doing a good job. But Ron’s good. He’s a friend of mine. Just named an airport after me, you know. They named the Palm Beach International Airport the President Donald J. Trump International Airport. Yeah. So that’s a great honor, you know. Now, there are a lot of great people with the Republican Party. We have great people.

The Department of Justice and the Rigged Election

MIRANDA DEVINE: So are you happy with the pace of what the Department of Justice is doing? There’s so much trying to find out.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Now than at the beginning. Yeah, they are. Yeah, there’s a lot of things going on right now.

MIRANDA DEVINE: There’s a lot of problems inside.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Look, we had a rigged election. We can’t have a rigged election. You know, we can be nice about it, we can be politically correct. Oh, I don’t want to say— I used to say that a year and a half ago, the election was rigged, and the cameras would literally turn off. Yeah. And the anchor would say, “Sir, you’re not allowed to say that,” you know. Now nobody ever turns off the camera because it’s been proven to be rigged. Look at what happened in Georgia. Look at all the stuff that we found out. It was a rigged election. Biden lost in a landslide. Yeah.

And it’s, you know, to think that this could happen now because of that, we have Russia, Ukraine. That would have never happened with me because of that. We had open border with 25 million, in many cases criminal, not all.

MIRANDA DEVINE: And fentanyl deaths.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Everything. Yeah, he was the worst president, and we were laughed at all over the world as a country. We’re not laughed at anymore. We have the hottest country anywhere in the world. So how do we—

MIRANDA DEVINE: Successful country anywhere. So someone has to be punished though for that. So how do you do that? Well, I don’t have to punish them all.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, I know. I’d rather not get into it, but are you confident something will happen? I don’t want to talk about it. Yeah, let’s see what happens. The election was rigged. We know who rigged the election. We know it. We know everything now. You know, we have information that nobody thought was possible. But when you get to office, all of a sudden people start giving you things.

You know, it was a great— I’ll tell you, 2024 was a great election. That was a lot. There’s a lot of rigging going on there too. Because you know what? I wanted a landslide, but there were areas that were just rigged. I could see it. So in other words, rigged against me. Yeah, of course, of course.

The Anti-Weaponization Fund and Biden’s Legacy

MIRANDA DEVINE: The Anti-Weaponization Fund, have you dropped that?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No, a court ruled against it. Yeah, but, but just so you understand, these are people that have been decimated. These are people that lost their lives over nonsense, where the FBI said, “Go in, go in, police, go in, go into the van.” And they were supposed to serve 5 years, 10 years in jail. People committed suicide. People were treated— there’s never been anything like this. What happened to those people? And these were many great people. And I gave them pardons. I’m very proud to have given them pardons. And I think they should be reimbursed for a crooked government. The government was crooked. This was the Biden group.

And it’s not Biden. Biden was too gone. Biden was a stupid person. He was stupid 30 years ago, long before anybody talked. And corrupt. Yeah, he’s also the worst thing to ever happen to old people, because I know people that are 95 years old that are 100% sharp. Gary Player, the great golfer, he’s 90. He’s 100%. He’s the same guy I’ve known for 35 years. I know people in their 90s.

Health, Cognitive Tests, and Memory

MIRANDA DEVINE: I know people just had your health thing and you’re 14 years younger. Cardiac health and cognitive.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, they said I’m very healthy. I just, I do physicals. Because I just want, I think I have an obligation to do it. But I just came out with very, very good results. And I took a test, a cognitive test, and I got 100% on it. I got, as the expression goes, I aced it. And the doctors told me it’s very, very few people can ace that. It’s actually a tough test. You know, once you get past the first half of the questions, those questions get difficult.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Is it a memory? What is it that, have you got a good memory?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I have a great memory. I have a good, look, so far so good. I hope I’m going to keep it that way. Yeah. If I don’t, you’ll be the first to know. You say, “This interview, this isn’t the same Trump.”

MIRANDA DEVINE: “I think he’s lost it.” Well, Scott Pelley interviewed Joe Biden in ’23, just after he did that Robert Herr interview where Robert Herr said that Joe Biden couldn’t be charged ’cause he was an elderly man with poor memory. And Scott Pelley covered up apparently the edit screen.

Scott Pelley, CNN, and the Media

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think Scott Pelley’s got his own problems. He’s terrible. Look, Scott Pelley’s a stiff and he’s afraid and he’s part of this, you know, gang of crooked, stupid people that don’t care about our country. I watched that interview. That interview was a joke.

But I watch him on CNN. How about CNN where Anderson Cooper or George Stephanopoulos, who gave me $16 million because he lied about me. He gave me $16 million. It was nice. He did. He said the wrong thing. And we said, take it back. They wouldn’t take it back. And so he was forced to pay $16 million.

But I watched George Stephanopoulos, who is a tough little cookie, and I watched an interview. I’ve watched all these guys for years, right? And I watched George Stephanopoulos give the softest interview that he’s ever given after the Afghan disaster. The worst. Yeah. And I was looking forward to it because he can be a very tough interview. And I said, “This will be interesting. Let’s see if Biden can get through this.” And it’s like he’s giving them the answers. Yeah, it’s like it’s a rigged system. It’s crazy.

And you know, the crazy part is, why wouldn’t you want to have borders? Wouldn’t you want to have good education, low interest rates, a strong military, no crime? We don’t want crime. These people are crazy. There’s something wrong with them. And they do suffer from Trump derangement. And yeah, there, there’s something I’ve gotten into their brain and it’s— you’re effective. Yeah, because I’m doing a good job.

Look, we have the lowest crime numbers we’ve had in 125 years, despite the fact that we’ve taken in people from Sleepy Joe Biden’s horrible administration. Now, he said he had some of the worst people in his Oval Office. Mean, vicious, radical left smarts.

MIRANDA DEVINE: Smart and stupid.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Antony Blinken. Stupid. In many ways stupid. Brilliant and dumb. They had a combination of both and lack of common sense, maybe. Yeah. But they wanted open borders. They wanted men playing in women’s sports.

You know, as an example, it’s such a great example because who would want that? I had the quarterback of the New York Giants, young handsome kid, the other day introduced me. And people criticize him, the radical left, stupid people, they criticize him. And he just sold $4 million worth of shirts. Right. His shirt, Jackson, his shirt is through the roof. It’s the hottest shirt there is.

MIRANDA DEVINE: He’s a great kid.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Oh, he’s a great kid. Handsome kid. He’s introduced me. And I didn’t think of it. He was a beautiful little introduction. Yeah. And he’s a very— I think he’s got a chance to be a really good quarterback too. But he’s a very young guy and he went through hell. They’re going after him, the radical left lunatics. Well, here’s what he got out of it. He’s got the number one selling shirt.

The Rally and the Celebration

MIRANDA DEVINE: Yes, in the world right now. Yeah. The concert that you were going to do, yeah, all those musicians have fallen. Yeah, they’re cowards.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: People like— no, it’s not that. They get some free publicity. Look, they’re not really cowards, but I never even heard of these people, right? I never heard of any of them. They’re boring. I don’t, I don’t even want them. And when I heard a couple of them canceled out, I said, “Cancel the whole thing.” I don’t want to. We’re going to do a rally. Yeah. And a rally, nobody’s ever gotten crowds like I get at a rally. I had 118,000 people at one. I had, I have 25,000.

MIRANDA DEVINE: 25,000 is like a small crowd. And your music’s great.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The only reason I only have 25 is because we have the basketball arenas and like at Madison Square Garden. I went to Madison Square Garden. Jim Dolan’s the owner, he’s a good guy too. And he said he’s never ever had a crowd like— so the place was packed and the crowds went down to the Hudson River and down past Fifth Avenue.

MIRANDA DEVINE: I was there, it was incredible.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They could have, they could have sold that out, Miranda, 10 different times. He said, “I’ve never seen anything like it.” So we’re going to have a rally. I told— I don’t want the music, I don’t even know who they are, I don’t know their music, I don’t want to know their music. But no, a couple of them said, “We don’t want anything that’s partisan.” I said, “That’s okay, go someplace else.” And we’re not looking to be partisan. We’re celebrating the country. But we’re going to do a rally, a great, beautiful rally to 250, 250 years. And it’s going to be great. And I think we’ll get much bigger crowds. I mean, I’m not looking to work, you know, I’ve got myself a good job.

MIRANDA DEVINE: That’s right. I thought you’d be a bit busy.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But I do get the largest rallies in the history of politics by maybe 10 times.

Legacy

MIRANDA DEVINE: Your legacy. What do you hope people think of you?

Trump’s Legacy

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I would like my legacy to be good guy and all of those things that we don’t have to waste a lot of time with, but that I took our country and I made it great again. This country was going down the tubes. We were a laughingstock all over the world.

I took this country and today you have the hottest country anywhere in the world, the most successful country anywhere in the world, that everybody, even President Xi— I was with him in China, he looks up to us, we had a great visit, but he has great respect for what I did. He said, “You’ve done it so fast, I’ve never seen anything like it.” I’ve taken something that was in deep trouble and I’ve made us the hottest country anywhere in the world.

Closing Remarks

MIRANDA DEVINE: Fantastic. Thank you so much, President Trump. Thank you. Well, that’s it for us from the White House. Thanks for watching this episode of Pod Force One. I’m Miranda Devine. Let us know what you thought about this interview in the comments below, and don’t forget to hit like and subscribe. We’ll be back next week with another big interview.

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