Remarks transcript, Aug 3, 2026 (Donald Trump)

You've got to say—have you ever seen such a transformation of a city?

It's unbelievable if you live here. It's just—you don't want to go back. Democrats——

And now you can walk to work. You can walk to the White House.

Metro. Same thing.

The people in the White House—they work in the White—they tell me, "Sir, thank you" all—they're thanking me all the time.

They used to have to take Uber, and the Uber would be robbed. Okay? [ Laughter ] They weren't even safe. They'd go to a restaurant, and they'd feel safe in a restaurant, and then the restaurant would be robbed.

Do you know the restaurants were all closing? And now you can't—if you're a restauranteur, you can't get a restaurant. You—I mean, you literally can't. The restaurants are booming. Crime is down 92 percent, maybe more. I want to get it down a hundred percent.

You know, the greatest statistic, though, that you have is that 2 percent of the people create 91 percent of the crime. You can really handle that, and we've moved almost 5,000 people out. They're criminals—career criminals. We removed them or, in some cases, they're in jail.

In some cases, they were just—they were so bad—they came in through Biden. They're so bad, we don't want to move them out. We want to put them in jails because we're afraid they're going to come back in somehow.

So I appreciate you saying that.

Would you revoke—would you consider going to Congress if they come in and try to roll it back, the new Democratic mayor, and——

Well, you had a mayor——

and invoking Home Rule?

——who's—I guess she's a Communist. I mean, she says she's a Socialist. But I guess she's a Communist, based on what she says.

But I have not met her yet. I look forward to meeting her.

Would I federalize—basically, you're saying federalize DC?

Yes.

Yes. Well, I'm allowed to do that. Would I do it? If they want to——

We took something that was in deep trouble. It was a graffiti-filled, crime-filled mess. We turned it into Shangri-la. We turned it into a great place.

Look outside. Look what's happening. Look at the beautiful ballroom and military center. It's a military center, much more than—we have a drone port on top it.

We—look at the grass in front of the White House being all replaced with the top stuff. The parks are all being replaced. It starts very soon, actually. We'll do one at a time. It's about 700 acres of parks. They're all going to have brand-new—the best grass you can get.

Scotts—you know Scotts? Scotts Miracle-Gro. They're doing it. [ Laughter ] They do great grass. What can I tell you? I've got to give them a plug because they did the White House for free. "Sir"—a friend of mine, a guy that—he's terrific. "We'd like to give you new grass at the White House." I said, "I'll take it. How much?" He said, "Free." "I'll take it." [ Laughter ]

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Mr. President, this is at least the fifth time you've turned off airstrikes against Iran since April——

Yes.

to negotiate. What is your message to the American people who are wondering what has changed this time? Why should it be any different?

Well, you don't know. I don't know. I think we're going to, maybe, get something, but I want to give him every last chance before decapitation. Very tough to do what I—what we have planned. It's still planned. We'll see what happens. But it's a very, very tough thing to do. I think—I'm very proud of the fact that I will give people—I'll give people a chance. This is a big move. To do an attack that big on a country, I'd rather not do it.

Now we've already threw lots of large attacks, but they were normal large. Hopefully, they'll come to their senses, because what happened, you cannot have a nuclear weapon, but hopefully they'll come to their senses.

So they called me, and they said: "Please don't attack. We'll make a deal." That's the real truth, and everyone knows it. And who wouldn't call? And they found out through leaks and sleazebags—you know, a lot of sleazebags leak—leakers.

Leakers should be put in jail. They should. They have to strengthen up the laws for leakers.

But in this case, leakers helped, because they said the severity of the attack, and Iran knew it. They knew what was coming. It was going to come last night. And it would have gone on for a long time, and there'd be essentially very little left. There'd be nothing left. And if I am given a chance to let a lot of people live, I want to give that chance.

So I have—I'm under no time constraint. You know, I don't happen to be running, but a lot of very good Republicans are running. And you have a sick ideology taking place right now that—you know, hopefully, they'll be defeated because they'll destroy the country if they ever take over.

But this desk is like a blocking desk. No matter who gets in, if it's bad, I block. And I'm good at blocking.

If it's bad, if it's stupid things like the things they want to do—"We want to get rid of the U.S. Senate." I don't like a lot of Senators, to be honest with you. [ Laughter ] I don't want to get rid of the Senate. "We want to get rid of the Supreme Court." They want to put, now, 21 or 23 people—those—that's the real—on the Supreme Court, or get rid of it.

They want to get rid of the Presidency. They want to have an appointed executive running. That's a communist thing, you know? That's a communist thing. These are sick people.

And you know, I said it the other day, and it maybe—doesn't sound that important, but when a country goes bad—like, look at the blue cities. What do they have in common aside from massive crime? Much more crime. The Republicans have very little crime. But what do the blue cities have in mind? And also, you could say this with nations, when they go bad. The blue cities have something in common: crime—high crime; vicious, violent crime.

But what do they have in common? They're all dirty. They're filthy dirty. Their streets are dirty. Their streets smell. Their storefronts are broken. Their trees are all gross. Everything about the place is dirty. And I don't want to mention any specific city. It's really all of them. But you go into these cities that are blue, they're crime-ridden, and they're filthy dirty.

They're like Washington, DC, was a year and a half ago, with graffiti all over the place, with crime all over the place, with people afraid to be here. You had to be ashamed of your Capital. Some of the most beautiful buildings built in the real time. Like, you look at the Supreme Court building, and they put graffiti on it—the most beautiful columns I've ever seen.

In fact, our columns are going to be nicer at the ballroom. I said, "I want the Supreme Court but better."

But you look at those columns, how—and then you see graffiti on the side of the building. No artistry, just bad people.

But the one thing they all have in common: crime. Two things—crime, but they're disgusting. They're filthy dirty. The streets are dirty. They have people lying all over the street doing you-know-what. They're all the same. And this is what we're going to put in our—not going to happen in our country.

Go ahead, please.

Yes, in the back.

Yes.

When someone—me, sir? Or her?

Go ahead.

Okay. Have you——

When a group—sir, when a group loses——

Well, let him go, then you.

I'm sorry, ma'am.

He was very rude to you, right? [ Laughter ] Go ahead. Who are you with?

I'm with Real America's Voice, sir. Sir, when a group such as the Haitians lose their temporary protective status, how soon should they be bused and flown out?

Well, we had the—a big victory in court on temporary—you know, the protective status. And I largely leave it up to my people.

But we've had people here for many years and they were here temporarily. You know, we had people coming in, and they've been here for many, many years. And they had a tragedy in their country. They had—sometimes it was storms, or it was—you know, it was hurricanes. And they come in and then, you know, they're here for 12 years, 14 years. So something's got to be done.

Yes, please.

Mr. President, have you spoken to Jeanine Pirro about her decision to drop criminal charges?

No, Jeanine Pirro made a mistake.

Have you spoken to her about it?

It was vandalism.

I just told you we did, I think, 78. One of the things was the reflecting pool. Hasn't worked since 1922 because it always leaked. It always leaked, from 1922. You know, it's the largest, longest pool ever, all that. The concept is beautiful, but it always leaked because of the size, because of maintenance, whatever. But it was built in 1922, and from the day it was built, it—it leaked.

Biden spent $58 million. Barack Hussein Obama spent much more than that. He said: "I have an idea. Let's take the river from—let's take the water from the Potomac." So they took the water from the Potomac, and it was putrid. It was putrid. It was a disaster. Biden was a disaster.

I said, "I'm going to get that fixed," along with Doug Burgum and Department of Interior, and we worked hard on that.

Now, we worked hard on all 70—it's actually, I think, 81 now. You saw the new horses that just opened by the bridge with the gold. That was the way they were many years ago. Now they look better than they did many years ago.

But these monuments look better than they did when they were originally built. Not just a little fixup. We made them the way they were plus, and everyone's so proud.

The biggest—one of the bigger jobs was—not really the biggest, believe it or not, but one of the biggest was the Reflecting Pool, and we did a great job. We sandblasted the stone outside. It was granite, so it has a long life. We did a great job. We got very expensive material to put on top of the surface that always leaked because it was stone. It was a stone surface. Always leaked. And we put it on, and it was beautiful.

Now, we have photographs or tapes—like, movie cameras, right? We have them where people are on the side cutting it with a box knife, with a—so—now, I'm not saying I was a-hundred-percent thrilled with the contractor, but the contractor was rushing. We wanted to get it —open for July 4, and we got it done. But in addition, there was vandalism.

Number one, look at the grass, where the grass was all knocked out with a very, very powerful ingredient that we know very well what it is. I'm not going to say the name because people get ideas. But—and they put a terrible phrase—I won't say that either—but a terrible phrase on a massive piece of grass that we had just replaced. Killed the grass. We had to replace the grass—a lot of grass.

In addition, they took knives or cutters and they cut the material—it's material. And they put their hands and they pulled it.

And there was also some maintenance things that we would have routinely fixed, but we had that up and it was perfect.

And then you had the bubblers, which get rid of the—you know, the—what forms in the water. And that works great. But they turned it off because of the fight, because it competed. A little bit of noise during the fight. They turned it off, and it grows very rapidly in the water. But that actually works very well, and that's all.

So now, we're just about set to reopen it, and we had to replace cut areas where they cut it and ripped it.

But there's a tape, and Jesse Watters, by the way, did a whole big thing on it. There's a tape that's out there, that I posted on Truth, where you have people leaning over the side—the weakest part because of the flexibility. You know, it moves. It's very complicated. It moves. And the softest part has to be flexible, and that's the stuff you can cut. And these guys knew what they were doing, and they cut all the way along the base. Cut, cut, cut.

Now, when Jeanine looked at it, it was the day after the Fourth of July with the largest fireworks display in the world. And the stuff was laying all over the pool—the fireworks, because they—they used the pool as one of the—and it was all over the pool. It was the day after, or very shortly thereafter. But that was working beautifully, and it was vandalized.

And if you look at the tape—now, the tape isn't a great tape in the sense that you—it's a little hard to say who it exactly was, but it was people cutting this very expensive material, waterproofing material.

Anyway, it looked beautiful, and then they cut it, and they vandalized.

And we weren't necessarily thrilled with the contractor, but they did a job, and they were fixing any problems. But then it got carried away, because the judge was extremely unfriendly to Jeanine. And frankly, I think she choked, because the judge was really vicious.

Instead of going after the people that did it, the judge went after her and went after her department, and I guess she choked. I don't know what the hell happened.

Are you reconsidering her role—Pirro's role?

I don't know what—you don't. You're fake news. Don't—don't ever talk again. You're fake news. One of the worst in the business. Fortunately, nobody watches you.

But something happened. There was vandalism there, and there was some, I—things from the contractor, which you—which we would fix.

But it's almost complete. And when it opens, it's incredible. It's really incredible.

But remember this: It leaked from 1922. It opened in 1922. They never solved the leak problem because it was stone, and the cracks with the stone. It's not a—stone is really not a waterproofing material. We essentially use a very high-grade swimming pool-type material, which was my idea. I was very proud of that idea.

And by the way, I didn't know the contractor. Everyone said the contract-—I didn't know the contractor.

But when it was completed, it was perfect. But then somebody went in and cut it, just like they did the grass. You know, nobody talks about the grass. The grass have helicopter pictures of what they did. Wasn't it 87—right? Do you know what they did? Right? Did you see what they did? Did you see what they wrote? What did they write?

"87"—or, sorry, "86 47."

That's right, "86 47." They—86 him. So it's 86, 47. They didn't do 45. At least they left 45 out.

But they—in massive letters on the grass, "86 47." And nobody talked about that. That was vandalism too. We had to replace all that grass. It was a tremendous amount of grass, because when you hit it with this poison—it's acid—it kills the grass, no matter how—you can't even clean it, even if you got there right after. It's very powerful stuff. I know it well.

So people did great damage to this thing because they're sick people.

You know who's representing the man is a man from CREW, a sleazebag who's been suing me for my whole political—hasn't won. He's lost all the time. But CREW. Do you know what CREW is? It's a third-rate operation that's supposed to be a charity, but it's not. They used it for political reasons.

So we should be proud of our monuments, and we should be proud of our city.

And you know, that was opened. Before they did the damage, that was opened. It never looked more beautiful. It looked like a mirror, and that's what it was supposed to be.

It was a very dark color—because otherwise you don't see it as a Reflecting Pool, and it looked beautiful.

Well, it will look just as beautiful. It will be fixed and open over the next week and a half, 2 weeks.

Mr. President——

Who are you rooting for in Michigan——

Okay. One more.

Yes.

Who are you rooting for in Michigan tomorrow, Mr. President?

Well, you have a very interesting group. I—who I'm really voting for is Mike Rogers, because I think he's going to be a great Senator.

But you have a Communist versus a Socialist. That's the way I look at it. You have a Communist versus a Socialist. It looks like the Communist is leading. We're talking about for the Democrat primary.

But, for the Republican, you have a very good man, and he should be able to—he should be able to win. Yes.

Okay. One more.

Go ahead. In the back. Yes, go ahead.

Mr. President, when are you going to open up—when are you going to open up Lafayette Park?

Lafayette Park, it's great. Did we do a good job in Lafayette Park?

It's phenomenal.

So Lafayette Park is right across—on the other side of the street. And I made a donation of $10 million. That was me, personally. And it's unbelievable.

It was so dirty and so disgusting, like everything liberal becomes dirty and disgusting. Social—socialism, liberalism, progressivism. You know the word "progressive" is such a nice word. They love using it, but the radical left isn't letting them use that word anymore.

But Lafayette Park is a large park. It was known as the gateway to the White House, and it was disgusting. The monument is beautiful. Graffiti all over it. I won't say what was on the sidewalk, but horrible, horrible, horrible, disgusting stuff.

And not only did we fix it, we have military standing there watching it. And if anybody touches it, we—that was the one mistake with the reflecting pond. They hadn't put up the cameras yet. They had enough up, because you see what's happening. But if they would have had them up, we would have had a lot of—it would have been a lot easier.

But—and I was disappointed with Jeanine Pirro. Really disappointed with Jeanine Pirro. She folded like an umbrella.

Do you have confidence in her?

And people get away with things, and it's a disgrace.

But we're very proud of Lafayette Park.

Now, we have a big decision to make: Do we take the pavers that are red—you know, the red brick pavers—and do we change them into a granite—to gray granite? They're beautiful, but they're not the original. So we're going to have to make that decision.

You have a good sense of taste. What would you do?

Yes.

Huh?

Yes, change it.

You would change the red brick into the granite?

Yes. Heartbeat. Yes.

The granite is much stronger. It holds up much better. Different color.

Legacy.

Change it? Okay.

Are you considering firing Pirro, Mr. President?

Go ahead, please.

Thank you, Mr. President. Today is the MLB trade deadline, and there's been talk lately about a potential lockout next year, I think, over salary cap concerns.

Yes.

A proposed salary cap.

Do you support a salary cap in the MLB, and what are your thoughts about a potential lockout?

Well, we're going to talk about that at a different time. You know, it's a complex situation, but not too complex for me.

Yes. Please. In the back.

New York Yankees General Manager and Senior Vice President Brian Cashman/Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) Compensation Programs

A follow-up. What did you think of the Nationals trading Luis García to the Yankees? And do you think Brian Cashman——

The which one?

Luis García from the Washington Nationals to the New York Yankees—your New York Yankees.

Yes.

And what do you think of the job Brian Cashman's doing?

Well, I've known Brian Cashman for a long time. Look, he's done a good job. I think Randy Levine is great. He's a great executive.

And by the way, the NIL—or whatever it is—is very close to getting solved—college sports. And Randy Levine and Nick Saban and a whole group of people have done an unbelievable job. That was a case that should have been appealed by the NCAA, and they never appealed it. Whoever ran the NCAA, they never appealed it.

The original case was thrown out by a judge that knew nothing about sports—nothing about sports or college sports. And that case should have been appealed. They didn't appeal it. They didn't know. I think they forgot. Something happened.

And college sports was and is in turmoil right now. Turmoil.

And Randy Levine from the Yankees—he's the president of the Yankees—got together with a lot of people. We had it right here. Sixty people that were in that world, including legal people. And from football it was Nick Saban, who won six or seven championships. Fantastic coach and very respected. And many other people. Very, very respected. And we have a bipartisan deal as of right now, so we'll see what happens.

We have to—they'll be voting on it soon. I hope they get it done.

Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you for that question. I loved his question.

Have a good time. Thank you, everybody. Good luck.