So we had incredible job numbers today, you saw that. And we have good everything, good numbers, but the job numbers just came out and they were fantastic. Far better than even anticipated. They anticipated pretty good, but they had no idea it was going to be that. And unfortunately, we're in a world where for the last 15 years or so, when you have good numbers, the market goes down. When you have bad numbers, the market goes up because too much emphasis is placed on inflation. And you don't have to have inflation by having growth, and we have great growth, but that doesn't mean inflation. In fact, it can be anti-inflation growth. So I hope the market starts to learn that when you have good numbers, the market should go up, not down. Question.
President Trump Gaggles with Press on Air Force One En Route Chippewa Falls, WI, Jun. 5, 2026
Mr. President, given those job numbers, do you think the Fed should cut rates at its next meeting? And do you think new Chair Kevin Warsh can convince the rest of the...
I'll let Kevin make that decision. I'd like to see lower interest rates because each point, think of this, is 600 billion dollars. Okay? So, you know.
You said yesterday you're interviewing some candidates for permanent Director of National Intelligence. Who's under consideration for it?
I have five interviews and we'll have a very good person watching things, Bill Pulte. But I have five interviews. So cutting rates, though, just getting back to that, you save hundreds of billions of dollars when you take one point off. Hundreds of billions of dollars. Two points, you save double hundreds of billions of dollars. And so I therefore, you know, from that standpoint. But someday we're going to have to go back to the old theory when we're doing so good. We have more auto plants being built than we've ever had. We have more plants being built than we've ever had. All these numbers are good. But when the numbers are good, we should be allowed to grow, not to stymie the growth. We had... we had a Fed chair that didn't understand...
Financial markets are now pricing in a cut, actually, for the October meeting.
I'd like to see that, but I leave that up to Kevin. I'd leave it up to Kevin. But I've always said, and I've said it for years, when you have a country that's doing well, the market should go up. The market should... and the reason they go down is if it's doing well people say 'oh we have to stop inflation' and it doesn't mean inflation. In fact, it can be just the opposite.
What would a hike before the midterm elections mean though? If they were to hike before the...
Well, you'd save 600... 600 billion dollars every point. You know.
Mr. President, why do you want Bill Pulte to cut the office... Mr., why do you want Bill Pulte to cut the office of the Director of National Intelligence? And how long is he going to be in that role?
It depends on how long it takes to get somebody approved. He'll do a very good job, he'll watch it. A lot of sleep, but Bill Pulte's very good, he's very talented. Did a great job at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac. The value there is close to a trillion dollars, we built the value there that's incredible. So he's done a very good job in that, he'll do a good job. He's watching for, you know, during this time period.
And you want him to cut the number of people working there?
Well, I've heard that's way too high for way too long. Yeah, I wouldn't mind if he cut, I wouldn't mind that.
On artificial intelligence, are you considering the possibility of the US government taking stakes in some AI companies?
Well, it's something I did with Intel. So I made a deal on Intel, you know, we made... I made for the country 50 billion dollars. We took a stake in Intel which was given to us by our helping, I said 'Look we'll help you but you have to give us 10% of the company'. That was Intel just nine months ago and as I think you know we made about 50 billion dollars on that deal. I did a very good job, I should be a stockbroker.
Mr. President, yes sir. I'm going to change the subject if you don't mind. Did you get a chance to watch game one of the NBA Finals? What'd you think?
Well, I'll be going to game three I guess, it's game three on Monday. I thought it was amazing, I think the Knicks have an amazing team the way they played. Started off slow and it just got stronger and stronger. Wemby looks like he's going to be a great player, but they really played well.
Quick follow up, did you see Wemby crossing his arms during the US national anthem? Did you have any thoughts on that?
I did not see that, is that what he did?
He did, yes.
What did he mean by that?
Nobody asked him.
Well, I guess you have to ask him.
Well, who's your favorite Knick?
Brunson's fantastic, Towns is fantastic. They just have a great team.
What do you think that the game you're going to, the cheapest price for the game three you're going to is 8,000 dollars. Everyday Americans can't afford these sporting events.
Well, they can watch it on television. It's sort of semi-free to watch it on television, but that's the way life goes. You know, you have some and now if the game wasn't a big, if the team wasn't a big success you could go very easily. So, you know, you can... you can do that too, but that's the way life is. You know, they've had great success and don't forget they've suffered also losses and they've suffered during the bad time. Now they have a good time, they have a team that's amazing. I don't think they've lost a playoff game, right? Very unusual, has that ever happened before? Has anyone ever had this kind of a run in a playoff game? I don't think so.
On the new promenade you announced yesterday Mr. President, where is the funding going to come from?
It's not a lot of money and it's going to be beautiful. You know, it's always been the Lincoln Memorial has always been very tied to the Potomac River but they built two roadways behind it unexpectedly at the time, many years ago, but after the memorial was built. It used to have a tie to the river and then the highways cut it off and we have a really beautiful plan where it goes over beautiful, a beautiful series of platforms that bring you right down to the river, it's beautiful. It's not a lot of money, it's a beautiful promenade. Probably, well it could come from a lot of... we have a lot of sources of funding, we won't have to go back to Congress or anything. We have a lot of sources of funding and a lot of people have asked me to stay involved with the Kennedy Center. We had a judge who's totally conflicted but that's alright, he's a totally conflicted judge, should be ashamed of himself, but they've asked me in the strongest of language to stay involved with the Kennedy Center. We want to see because the building... I mean it's very... it's very dangerous number one. Number two it was losing for years tremendous amounts of money. So I'll be... I'm considering that, but a lot of people have asked me to get it fixed. We have to fix the Kennedy Center, both physically and from the standpoint of attendance.
Mr. President, on oil and gas prices. I know you're saying that the oil prices and gas prices will fall after the conflict ends. Would you limit exports of gasoline if prices in the short term go up?
No, no, we have a lot of alternatives, but the beautiful thing from our standpoint is we have more oil and gas and coal and everything else than any other country on the planet and then when you add Venezuela to it we have probably 64% of that type of energy, that's unbelievable. Venezuela is working out very well, we're getting along incredibly, the country is happy, the people love the USA and we have a lot of, you know, the big oil companies are moving in there now as we speak and we're going to be taking out millions of barrels of oil.
Are US oil majors doing enough to boost output in the US? Are you asking them to do more?
Well, we have... we have everything we need, the world doesn't, but I will say people thought it was going to be a lot worse. You know, today I looked at 96 dollars a barrel, people thought that was going to be 300 dollars a barrel and in the meantime we're having great success with Iran, they're not going to have a nuclear weapon and they're in no position to have a nuclear weapon.
Senator Tillis says he won't support Todd Blanche's confirmation unless Todd Blanche condemns January 6th. Do you have a reaction to that?
Senator Tillis is a loser. That's why he didn't run, he didn't run because I wouldn't support him and he's just an angry man because he's not going to be a Senator any longer. He wasn't respected in the Senate, he fought a lot of people, he fought Pete Hegseth, Pete Hegseth turned out to be a gem. No, Senator Tillis is a loser, stone cold and he's an angry man because I basically... he... he was forced to leave the Senate because I wouldn't support him and he quit. So now he's trying to make trouble by, you know, opposing anybody. Todd Blanche is a brilliant guy who everybody likes and everybody respects and Tillis is always like 'I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that', he should have done it before when he was a Senator. He would have gotten wiped out in a race but he needed my support and I said 'I can't give you my support', he's not qualified, he's... he's not good for the position of Senator. I didn't hear about what he did with Todd Blanche. Todd Blanche is fantastic.
Mr., on the AI companies potentially taking these equity stakes. Have you spoken to Sam Altman or any of the other Anthropic...
Concept out there, there's so much money and it's so big that there are concepts where pieces could be given to the American public, where the American public essentially becomes a partner with the company, with the companies and I will tell you, yeah I have... I have spoken to all of them. There's something very interesting about it where it almost becomes a partnership with the American public and we'll look into that. We're going to... we are looking, I actually have a meeting scheduled in the very short, very near future with, did you know that? With all of the companies and we're talking about it, where the American people can benefit from the success of AI and by doing so they're going to like it better, because we're leading China, we're leading everybody in the world with AI and we want to keep it that way. It's probably the biggest industry maybe that we've ever seen.
Which companies in the meeting? Anthropic, OpenAI, SpaceX, xAI?
They're all coming to the White House probably next week.
And is the idea that that would be dividends for the American people?
We'll see, I mean we're going to see, sort of it's like you make them a partnership in this revolution would be a beautiful thing and it would make them... it would make them rich.
Senator Bernie Sanders proposed this, 50% managed public private partnership.
I've been talking about it for the last year.
But isn't it odd to be kind of on the same page with Senator Sanders?
No, actually, when Bernie Sanders was taken advantage of with Hillary Clinton and he lost in the primaries, a lot of people think he didn't lose. I mean he had two of them, right? He lost then and he lost the second time with... with Biden. But when Bernie Sanders lost, you know that I got many of his people, they voted for me because we are on an economic plan, as far as economics is concerned, we have certain things that aren't that far apart, people are surprised. But many of, if you'll take a look, many of the people that voted for Bernie Sanders, when he was no longer there to vote for, they went to me. I picked up a lot of his... a tremendous amount of his voters.
On oil sir, just one more. How many... how much oil have you gotten through the Strait with the help of naval escorts and are you asking, are you directing US forces to guide those ships through the Strait, more tankers through the Strait?
A lot. I don't want to say how many, but a lot. A lot of oil is coming into our country and a lot of oil is coming into the world that people don't even know about and that's why it's at 97 dollars a barrel instead of 300 dollars a barrel. And when that whole thing is straightened out, shouldn't take long, one way or the other it's going to get done and when it's all straightened out you're going to have oil prices drop down to maybe even lower than they were. I was... you've heard me say this, I was in Iowa and for a gallon of gasoline it was at 1.85, that was three and a half months ago.
Last year the FBI reopened its, last year the FBI reopened its investigation into the cocaine found in the White House during the Biden administration. Have you been briefed on where that investigation stands?
No, but I might ask about it. I might ask. You mean in the shelves where they found the cocaine actually? Yeah, I might ask about it, sir.
And have you made a decision on the arms sales to Taiwan, that package, the 14 billion?