Remarks transcript, Aug 14, 2026 (Donald Trump)

Thank you. Thank you very much. Wow. There's a lot of people outside trying to get in. A lot of people outside.

But I just want to say a very special hello to New York and a very, very special hello, Long Island. I love Long Island.

I'm thrilled to be back in the State I love. And I do love it. I'm so proud of it. But it's going in a bad direction. We're going to change it around. We'll get Bruce in there. We'll change it around. We're going to change it around.

Bruce! [ Laughter ]

You watch. He's going to do well.

But to be with the hard-working patriots of Nassau County, appreciate it.

And we're especially grateful to be joined by the incredible men and women of Nassau County Police Department and a lot of other law enforcement.

I've known them a long time. There's never any problems. I'll tell you, they're winners. They're just winners, pure and simple.

And thanks as well to your brothers and sisters in New York's Finest, the New York PD. We love our New York PD.

And we're here today to celebrate the historic progress our administration is making together with law enforcement partners nationwide to restore law and order in America. Very simple. A very simple phrase, isn't it?

And with these professionals, it's a very easy thing to do. You have to give them—you have to let them do their job. That's all there is. You won't have any problem.

That includes, right here on Long Island, where, under the leadership of your county executive—a great person, a friend of mine for a long time. A great political leader. A great politician, but I don't want to say that negatively. It's a—he's a great politician. He wins all the time. He won in a big surprise like 8 or 9 years ago. I remember. I said, "Man, that's tough for you to win in that location." And then he's won in landslides ever since, and he's a winner: Bruce Blakeman.

Bruce! Bruce! Bruce!

And I said it. I said, when Bruce is—when Bruce's name got up, I said, "You know, if they give that guy just a little bit of a chance, just a little bit of fair treatment from the fake news and everyone else, he's going to win." No, he's going to win. I mean it.

But under Bruce—think of this—Nassau County has been rated the number-one safest county in the United States of America. That's not bad. That's not bad.

Think of that: the number-one safest county in the United States of America. There's, I think, 6,700 counties. That's not bad, Bruce. Keep it up. Do a little bit better next time. [ Laughter ] How do you top that?

U.S. News and World Report gives you a perfect score in terms of crime: 100 out of 100.

And under the Trump administration, we're working every day with leaders like Bruce and local police like we have here. We have some of the greatest police officers in the world in this room, and a lot of them, unfortunately, they're standing outside trying to get in. Should we let them in? I don't know. We don't have any room, but let's let them in anyway. Who the hell cares? [ Laughter ]

Who cares? Let's let them in anyway.

But dangerous offenders off our streets. And they've taken them, they've brought them off our streets, put savage criminals behind bars. And you know what they're doing? They're making America safe again. They've done a fantastic job.

And, in the past 4 years, before I took office, our country was overrun by violent criminals. I mean, you remember just a couple of years ago how bad it was, right? It was really bad. Foreign gangs. Savage thugs with Biden.

Sleepy Joe. [ Laughter ]

Boo!

What a horrible 4 years. That was 4 years in hell. [ Laughter ] We lived in hell.

With Biden and the radical-left "Dumocrats"—we call them "Dumocrats" now because their policies are so dumb—fighting to defund the police—does that play well in this room?

No!

Is there anybody that's in favor of defunding the police in this particular——

No!

You'd be afraid to say it if you were. [ Laughter ]

And wide-open borders with millions and millions of people pouring in from all over the world, including prisons and jails and mental institutions, insane asylum. You know what that is? That's a mental institution on steroids. You know that. They come from both.

Including 11,888 murderers, many of whom have killed more than one person. More than 50 percent killed more than one person. And we took them in with open arms. How stupid could we be?

But we're getting them the hell out. They're moving out fast. We're getting them out, and you're helping.

And the biggest problem we have, the biggest impediment we have are sanctuary cities, you know, where they protect criminals. It's called a sanctuary for criminal. We ought to change the name: "a sanctuary for criminals."

But the day I took the oath of office as your 47th President, we ended the border invasion.

By the way, we have the best border now in the history of our country. We ended the war on police, and we declared a very strong war on crime. It's been really amazing.

We've led our outstanding new Attorney General—happens to be with us—I was surprised to see him; he just got sworn in 2 days ago—Todd Blanche. He's going to be a legend. Where is Todd?

I know him very well. I know him very—[ laughter ]—for a long time. He's going to be the greatest maybe ever. And we had some good ones in the country. I think he's going to go down. He's got a shot at being the greatest ever, if he remains tough and strong. He'll never change. Are you going to change your ways? [ Laughter ] I don't think so. If he doesn't change his ways, he's going to go down as the best.

So I want to thank Todd even for being here. He just got sworn in.

As well as a Long Island native born right here—and he's doing a good job, and those numbers are the best numbers anybody has ever seen—FBI Director Kash Patel. Best numbers anybody has ever seen on crime.

And with your help, last year we achieved the largest drop in murder rate ever recorded, the lowest level in 125 years. That's since the year 1900. That was before my father was born. He would not have liked me saying that because he always liked to say he's quite young, but he wouldn't have liked that.

Think of it: 125 years ago. We broke the record, which is amazing. It's amazing. So, I just want to thank all of the people—all of the people in this room.

And today I'm thrilled to announce that the FBI has just released a new Uniform Crime Report showing that in 2025 we achieved the single largest reduction in violent crime in American history. [ Applause ] Pretty amazing. Pretty amazing.

And last year, there were over 3,100 fewer murders than the year before I took off-—remember this, though. And we allowed, through this stupid open borders policy, 25 million people to come into our country. Many of them are now gone, but 25 million people—that's the number; that's the real number—to come into our country. Many of them, the people I just said: drug dealers, prisoners from all over the world. They came in from the Congo. They came in from South America.

They were in—and despite that, we have the best crime record in recorded history. Two thousand—think of this—rapes. Ten thousand fewer. We had 10,000 fewer rapes than the year before. Tier—1 million fewer assaults, robberies, burglaries, thefts. The numbers—every single number—it's the first time it's ever happened. Every single number is the lowest number in recorded history.

And according to the latest data, crime has continued to plummet under our leadership in 2026, with robberies down another 20 percent and murders down another 23 percent. So the numbers you just heard, the preliminary numbers for just now are even lower than the record numbers that you just heard. So it's a great tribute to all of the people in this room.

Together, we're showing what is possible when you finally have a President in the White House who supports our police, who lets you do your jobs, and who always backs the blue. We back the blue.

And—you know, and I have been from the beginning, long before I ran for office. Who would have thought 10 years ago? I've been doing this for now a long time, but not that long if you think I'm President. If you think. It was a pretty quick trip. But I'm with you, and always was, 100 percent. One hundred percent.

And my administration is proving billions—and we're giving you billions and billions of dollars to hire, equip, and train new police officers. We're giving you more money than you've ever been given in history. More money. And you're going out and you're buying the best equipment you can buy.

As President, I will always protect our qualified immunity. Would you like qualified immunity, everybody? Qualified immunity. It's always very important.

I also deployed the National Guard and Federal law enforcement to restore public safety in our Nation's Capital, Washington, DC. And in DC, Memphis, and New Orleans, we've removed over 30,000 criminals from the streets in a single year. In Memphis, crime is down 71 percent. In New Orleans, crime is down 75 percent. And in DC, crime is down 81 percent.

I'll tell you, because DC is very personal for me, but in DC, crime is now—it was so bad when I got there. A year and a half ago, people were being murdered 3 a week, on average. We have very few murders anymore. We have very little crime anymore. We've taken it from the worst, one of the most dangerous cities. Can you imagine, our Nation's Capital, one of the most dangerous cities in the country? We've taken it to one of the safest cities of the country—in the country.

And we moved them out. We moved almost 5,000 people out of DC.

And you know, it's a very interesting stat: 2 percent of the people create 91 percent of the crime. I love that stat because we can handle 2 percent of the people. If it was 60 percent of the people, we got problems. It's 2 percent. They're repeat criminals. Sometimes three, four times a day with this cashless bail stuff, they repeat. They go into court. The judge says, "Oh, you can go," and they go out and create another crime. But think of it: 2 percent create 91 percent of the crime, and it's—that's something we handled very well.

We moved out, in Washington, almost 5,000, in many cases, career criminals. They're not there anymore. And every day I come to the White House, people are thanking me, "Thank you, sir. Thank you. Thank you, sir."

No, these young, beautiful girls—these young, beautiful girls—these young, beautiful girls in the White House, you know, they come in—now I'm not supposed to say "beautiful," but what the hell? [ Laughter ] These young—these gorgeous, beautiful girls, they want to be safe, and they come, "Mr. President, may I speak to you?" "Yes." "Thank you, sir. Thank you." I said, "Why are you thanking me?" "Because a year and a half ago, I was afraid to leave—I was afraid to open the door of my apartment, and now I walk to the White House every morning, and I have absolutely no fear. Thank you, sir."

No, I get it all the time. Men, women, older men, younger men, and older women and younger women, they're all saying thank you, and I know exactly what they mean.

We lived in a hellhole. Two years ago, we were in a hellhole, and now we have one of the safest cities. And it should be safe. It's our Nation's Capital. We represent the whole universe, frankly, because there's nothing like the United States. Look at what we've done.

U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

Thank you.

And you know, for other cities like New York, Chicago, L.A., all they have to do is call us, and we will stop that crime. We'll stop that horrible crime. We come in with the right people. We come in with the power to move people out of the country if they're here illegally, and a lot of them are criminals that were let in through that open border—that horrible—remember the scene? Remember the scene?

Well, you saw it the other day in Spain, right? Okay. Now envision that—they allowed 65,000 people in. Now, you—remember, 25 million people. We were worse. That was like that every single day in our country, and that went on for months and months.

And then we had a border czar, as you remember—Kamala. She was the border czar. She never went to the border.

Boo!

And she never once called Border Patrol. Other than that, she did an excellent job. She did. [ Laughter ] She was a great candidate. I think they should run her again. She was a great candidate. [ Laughter ]

But since I took office, Federal law enforcement has arrested, incredibly, 1.2 million criminals nationwide and bad ones. We want to make sure we get the bad ones.

And we've increased Federal criminal prosecutions by over 50 percent.

And under the Trump administration, the FBI has nearly doubled its arrests for violent crime. The violent criminals are being arrested, and that's why you see the good crime numbers. I mean, you're seeing crime numbers even in places that do not do—let's say they don't have good leadership. Like Chicago has very bad leadership. But we have the numbers down because of what the Federal Government is doing. We get no credit for it because they say, "Well, they get"—they—we get no credit for it. They like to take all the credit, but everyone knows we've done an amazing job.

The U.S. attorneys and the FBI, all the people—Kash, and Todd has been unbelievable. They get all the credit.

And as of this week, we've captured 9 out of 10 fugitives on the FBI's Most Wanted List, and that's a virtual record. We have a list. We have a list of 10 not-nice people.

These are not nice people, David Mack. You know, you—hi, David. Stand up, David. One of the wealthiest guys. He's got so much cash. He's got so much cash, he doesn't know what to do with it. [ Laughter ] And he wants to be safe. They save your ass, David, I'll tell you. [ Laughter ] You have no idea, David.

Anyway, I—it's good to see. I haven't seen you in a long time. He's a real estate man—a very good real estate man, and he used to be my enemy, but now he's very nice to me. [ Laughter ] Now he's very nice. He used to be my competitor, but he's a good man. He's a great, brilliant real estate person too. It's good to have you, David.

Shortly after taking office, I signed a historic Executive order directing that anyone convicted of killing a police officer should face the death penalty.

And last year, deaths of law enforcement—well, think of this: Deaths of law enforcement officers in the line of duty fell to an 80-year low. That means people aren't playing games anymore. It's an 80-year low. Still too many, but it's an 80-year low.

Despite all of our extraordinary progress to restore safety to every community in our land, the radical-left Marxists, the Communists—they're Communists. These aren't Socialists. Socialists are no good, but Communists—remember, I said at the State of the Union speech, the last one, "We will not be a socialist country." I was right. They want to make us a communist country. They've skipped socialism. They skipped socialism. Can you believe it?

So at least I was right. I like being right. [ Laughter ]

But they continue their war on police and their destruction of the rule of law. The Communists want to turn America into a third-world country, into a hellhole of crime and filth.

You ever notice—I said it a week ago for the first time: The first thing you see, I see—before you even see the crime, the crime becomes staggering—is the streets become filthy dirty? They're disgusting. They smell. They rot. But everything becomes dirty, and then you see the crime and you see all the other things.

But I don't know, I'm not sure you've ever heard that said by anybody else. Most people wouldn't say it. But it's true.

And squalor—and, you know, it just becomes so bad. And then the death comes, and it becomes really a true hellhole.

And we're not going to let that happen to New York, New York State. And that's why we have to get Bruce into office. We've got to get Bruce in there.

Nowhere is the communist attack on American society more clear than here in New York State. The radical-left Governor Kathy Hochul has been——

Boo!

——has been very, very bad on crime—a nightmare for crime. She supports New York's disastrous no-cash bail law. You know, it all started, if you think about it—because I've been here for a long time. I love this place, but it gets harder to love. It really does.

But if you think, it really started with the no-cash bail. Remember that? That was a Cuomo beauty, right? That was a Cuomo beauty.

In other words, no cash. Don't worry about it. You kill somebody. "Oh, that's okay. Go ahead." Then you go and kill two, three people a day. It's the craziest thing I've ever heard. And you can't—

It's like men playing in women's sports. It's so crazy. You can't believe it.

Boo!

It's like transgender mutilization of your children.

Boo!

And all these people believe in all this stuff. But they came out with that one with the no-cash bail. Just think of it: no cash. You kill somebody, you rob a store, you go right back out on the streets. It is the craziest thing I've ever seen.

And I don't know, from its political standpoint, I guess it's good, —because, Bruce, how the hell can you lose to that? Can you—you're going to be ashamed. If you lose, you're going to be ashamed for the rest of your life. [ Laughter ] You'll be ashamed. Bruce would say, "How did I lose to that?" [ Laughter ]

No, I mean, think of it. Open borders. "Let's have open borders. Have the entire world pour into our country." Twenty-five million people in 4 years.

She supported the release of convicted murderers who killed New York City police officers. She wanted people that killed our great police officers. One in particular, in Long Island, where I went to the funeral. And I just met the people that gave this—law enforcement chapels, rabbis, and met a whole group. And they were there, and they gave the most beautiful sermon.

But they kill. These are absolute killers. And then you're not going to change them. You've got to get them the hell out, or you've got to put them away. And if you don't do that, you're just wasting a lot of time.

This whole concept of what they do—the only thing is, from a political standpoint, it's so easy to run against because it's just common sense.

You know, I guess I'm a conservative guy, but I'm a commonsense guy more than a conservative guy. It's all about—politics is all about common sense. Bruce is a commonsense guy. Bruce is a commonsense guy.

All of our Congresspeople that are here—you know, we have all our Congresspeople here. That's a big deal. I think I'm all—I—if I—if you said, "Would you rather have Bruce Blakeman win or all of your Congresspeople," I don't know, Bruce. I think I'm going to have to give you up. I want to—[ laughter ]—I might have to take the Congresspeople. It's so important. Okay? They're very happy.

She signed a law weakening the parole enforcement for convicted felons, really weakening it. She spent millions and millions of dollars providing taxpayer-funded lawyers to illegal aliens. If you didn't—if you weren't an illegal alien, you didn't get a lawyer, but if you were an illegal alien, you got lawyers, and they were very good. They were radical-left lunatics, but they were very good, very effective.

She's in favor of the sanctuary city. She thinks the sanctuary cities are wonderful, which are killing our country.

And less than 3 months ago, Kathy Hochul signed a deadly and seditious new law, making New York a so-called "sanctuary State."

Boo!

So she took it from the city to the State, meaning Kathy Hochul wants to release migrant criminals from jail and set them loose on innocent New Yorkers all over. Every street has people that are not supposed to be here, and the reason they left their country is a lot of bad reasons.

You know, I know a lot of the leaders of these countries. They're very smart. More than smart, they're street smart. Very street smart. And they don't want these people. So what they did is they sent them into the United States of America through the open border.

And people like Kathy Hochul, they want to keep them in New York. We don't want to keep them in New York. We don't want them. We don't want to take a chance. Yes, maybe they'll get better. You know what the chances are? About 2 percent. Maybe they'll get better.

But Hochul and the radical left stand with the gang members, child predators, violent felons.

We stand with hard-working New Yorkers. We stand with the great people of law enforcement.

And Hochul and Mayor Mandami—[Mamdani; White House correction]——

Boo!

——were against securing our border. They were against our massive tax cuts. They were against no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and no tax on Social Security for our seniors. They were against all of that. They were—they fought it like hell.

Is that right, Congressman? Am I right? Nick, right? They fought like crazy. I mean, we didn't get one vote.

We have no tax on tips, no tax on overtime. And you cops get a lot of overtime. I'm just being—you get a lot of overtime. [ Laughter ] I made you a lot of money. But you deserve it.

But—and no tax on—for Social Security—think of it—for the seniors, and a lot of seniors—is anybody happy about that? Seniors, are you happy about it?

Who—let me do a quick poll. If you had your choice of only having one, clap for the one you like best.

No tax on tips. [ Applause ]

No tax on Social Security for our seniors. [ Applause ]

No tax on overtime. [ Applause ]

I know. —[ laughter ]—I knew the one they'd like the best. [ Laughter ]

But she wants to raise your taxes. Think of it. She and all these people are against these things. And if they get in, they're going to take them all away. They're all going away.

How about the income tax? [ Laughter ]

Yes, that will be next. Yes. [ Laughter ] That could happen, actually.

If we keep making money like we're making—we're the hottest nation anywhere in the world right now. Hottest. We're building more plants and factories than any country anywhere in the world in history. Think of it. We're building, and the jobs are going to be fantastic.

You know, in a couple of years, 2½ years, somebody is going to be elected, and will you please—will you please remember one thing? Trump is the one that did it. These factories are all going to be opening up. They're going to be all opening up. They're going to be opening up, and they're going to say how brilliant they were. Right, Todd? They're going to be saying "brilliant."

Think of it. We have $19.2 trillion being invested in our country. You know why? Tariffs. We're making a fortune with tariffs. They like to say, "Oh, tariffs." They have no idea what they are. Basically, if you build your plant here, if you make your product here, you don't pay tariffs. If you make your product in another country, I say, "I want you to pay 50 percent." We don't want your product if you make it—so they're all moving in, and they're building—they're spending $19.2 trillion so far. It's actually more than that because that's as of the first 13, 14 months, and it's been a little bit longer than that.

But think of the next Governor and think of the next—for your State. But think of—more importantly, think of the next President. Your Governor, your next Governor, is going to say, "What a great job."

Do you know how many—you know how many factories and places are being built in all of the States? And your next President is going to say, "What a great job I did." He'll be sitting around watching television, a real stiff. [ Laughter ] Unless you vote Republican, of course.

But no, you'll—they'll be sitting, say: "Darling, look at the great job I did. I don't know what the hell is happening, but this country is going"—I'm telling you, we have the hottest country anywhere in the world. Nineteen-point-two trillion is more than invested ever in history in any country.

And another little stat. I love these stats. I love these. I hate reading these boring speeches because—be honest with you. [ Laughter ] So most—isn't it nice to have a President that doesn't have to read a teleprompter? Isn't it?

Teleprompters are easy. They're—bored—you get a little bored with teleprompters.

But here's a stat that they never write down, but I think it's one of the most—at this moment right now, there are more people working in the United States of America than ever before. We've never had anywhere—not even close.

Think of that stuff, right? Think of that stuff. And one other thing I have to say. You know, they keep talking about affordability. "Affordability." You know, I walk in, I'm in office one day, and those fake—look at all that press back there. Wow. Fake news. [ Laughter ] But——

Boo!

But they keep talking about affordability.

When I got in, you remember the first news conference? It was 1 day. They started screaming: "What about eggs? What about eggs? Eggs." I said, "Tell me about eggs. What's the problem?" [ Laughter ] "They're up five times higher than they were just a year ago." I said, "I've just been here 1 day." [ Laughter ]

And then they started screaming, "Affordability." And you know, I made the statement, but they always misread it and everything else because—but I said the Democrats saying that is a hoax because they're the ones that caused the affordability—we're bringing the prices way down. Look at what's happening: coming way down.

And after we finish defeating Iran, which is being very badly defeated—pretty soon I'll be declaring the Hormuz Strait a territory of the United States. [ Laughter ] Soon. Soon.

Essentially, that's what it—we have the blockade. No ships get through unless we want them to.

But—and how about Venezuela? Venezuela was a 1-day war, and now we work great with them. We've taken in millions and millions of barrels of oil. But we're doing really good. We're doing good in every way.

You know, I built the military, and now I used it a little bit more than I wanted to, frankly, but that's okay because we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. Do we agree? Can't let it.

So most things are down, and I had—you know, before I started that, I had to make a journey. I said to my guys, I said to Howard, Scott, Marco—they're all fantastic—what a great group we have. But I said, "Fellas"—we had just had the best month ever—anyone has ever had as President. The numbers had just come out. I just got back. I was in Iowa helping some people. And I was in office, and we're looking at the pump, and it's $1.95 a gallon, and another one was $1.85. I was at $1.85 a gallon.

And I meet them the following day. I said: "I have bad news for you guys. We have to make a little journey to the Middle East because we have to put out a potential disaster, a potential very big fire, fire like you've never seen. We can't let Iran keep going." They would have had a nuclear—if we didn't hit—the B–2 bombers, if we didn't hit them, you would have had a nuclear weapon, and it would have been a very sad day for this country and for the entire world.

So I said, "We're going to have to put out the fire in the Middle East," and we've done that. They're never going to have a nuclear weapon. We have loaded up.

So I just say this. So for you to pay a tiny, little bit more for your gasoline, just remember you're doing it so that a very evil country cannot have—a country—really, it's the number one State sponsor of terror in the world. We don't want to have them have a nuclear weapon. So remember that when you have to pay a little bit more. You're at $4. It's okay. I mean, it's—I'm not—I'm not—I'll never apologize. I did the right thing.

But you could—you know, if you didn't have, you'd be at—I mean, I had it down to below $2 in many States, but—and California you can't include because they keep taxing, taxing, taxing. You lower the oil price, and they end up taxing you more than what you lower it.

But you just have to remember that what we're doing is a great service for the world—not only for ourselves; for the world. And we're really doing a great job. Our military is unbelievable. The blockade is unstoppable. It's a wall of steel. The blockade is a wall of steel.

But the policies of Hochul and the Democrat colleagues, like crooked—oh, she's the worst. Is she the worst? Crooked Attorney General Letitia James.

Boo!

She is the most dishonest. A real—slob. A real slob. [ Laughter ] You know, they had her. She got off on a technicality. They had her, but she got off on a technicality. But let's see what happens.

You remember when she was campaigning and—"We will stop Donald Trump"? She's not supposed to say that. She's the attorney general. "We will stop"—she didn't know anything about me, but she campaigned on "We will stop Donald Trump."

Well, I think I'm here as—am I here as President? Yes, I am, right? That's nice.

She's—by the way, Letitia James is a disgrace to law, order, law enforcement. She's a disgrace. She's a dishonest person. Very dishonest. Very crooked person.