TRANSCRIPT: Lara Trump Interviews President Trump on Her My View Fox News Show, 7.12.25
[Video]
Lara Trump: Well, Mr. President, what an honor to be here in the White House with you, second time around and I think when people look at the first six months of this administration, you have had more success, I think, than many presidents in history throughout their entire term in office. A lot of people look at what you've done, though, and they say, had you not had four years in between, maybe all this success would not be possible. Do you agree with that?
President Trump: Well, experience is very important in life. I think talent is more important than experience, but if you can have them both, somehow, it's a very good thing. But experience is very important. I think it also helped. It was very bad for the country, but it also helped to have four years of horror. What went before me was horror, and by comparison, I think anything looks good. And I don't want to demean what we've done, because we've done a lot of records, but what, what they've done to our country should never be forgiven, allowing millions and millions of people to come into our country that shouldn't be here, such a big aspect of what we're doing now with the borders. And it could have been so easy. When I gave over the country, the border was great. Now it's better than it was, but we it was much worse than it was in 2016 when I took it over. That was a border problem also. But I think when people see the horror show that we had for four years, an absolute horror show, they tried to kill -- it was almost like they tried to kill our country. And the beautiful thing is now we have the hottest country in the world. You know, I was with the King of Saudi Arabia, the leader of Qatar, the leader of UAE, and many other leaders at NATO. Separately, a whole group, and every one of them virtually said, you have the hottest country in the world right now and six months ago, they also said, we thought your country was dead. They actually thought it was dead, and it felt dead. We had not only no leadership, we had negative leadership. We're going -- it was a regressive leadership. So, I think that probably makes it look good too, but, but we've done a lot.
Lara: Well, you know, throughout the four years, while you were not here at this White House. I know that there were some very dark times, some times where people counted you out, thought that you'd never come back. Yet you're here right now. So in those moments, what was it that kept you going? Why is it that you are back here in this White House now, despite so many people saying it wasn't possible?
Trump: Well, number one, I saw what was happening to the country. They were destroying our country. They were allowing people to come into our country from prisons, from mental institutions, gang members, the worst gang members in the world, make our gang members look like, you know, nice people. They were coming in at levels that nobody had ever seen before, no check in, no vetting, no anything. Just come into our country and do whatever you want. And I saw what was happening and it didn't take long. I saw that they were going to go -- I built hundreds of miles of wall. There were little sections that you had to fill in just to close it in, and I saw that they weren't going to build them. And I even called in, I said, when are you going to just put those little sections? It would have taken three weeks. And I said, you know, they want to have open borders. And that's what it was, open borders, no vetting. To me, that's, you know, inflation I've already taken care of and so many of the other things. Look at energy, look at fuel -- look, there are so many things we've done, but you know, that's a big job getting thousands, hundreds of thousands of criminals out of our country, murderers -- 11,888 murderers. Many of those people have killed more than one person. Think of it, murderers that killed more than one person, more than half of them, and he let them in to our country. It's not even -- You know, we love this country. It's not even believable. And I guess it wasn't him so much as people surrounding the beautiful Resolute Desk. And I know them all, and they're not good, they're smart, but they're not good. They're smart in a different way, but evil intention and what -- he was the worst president in the history of our country, because of them also, but he was the worst president in the history of our country, and nobody has done such damage to our country and we're fixing it and I think we're fixing it very fast.
Lara: Well, we are at the anniversary of your Butler rally, where Eric and I, along with Luke and Carolina watched on live television, as so many people across the country and really the world did when there was the assassination attempt on you. And as we come to this moment, I'm thinking back to what happened right after that. You actually called all of us on the phone, and it was amazing to me that that was what you thought to do, that you wanted us to know that you were okay. And I know that's a moment none of us will ever forget. And I'm sure for you, you know tenfold.
Trump: Well, it was unforgettable. I know exactly what was going on. I got a whacked. There was no question about that. And I fortunately, got down quickly. And people were screaming, and I got down quickly, fortunately, because I think they shot eight bullets, then one got me, and one got another one, and one got another one, and one killed Corey, the firefighter, great guy. And you know, we had a tremendous, massive crowd, tens of thousands of people were there, and our sniper, within less than five seconds, was able to get him from a long distance with one shot. If he didn't do that, you would have had an even worse situation. It was really bad. But he really did a fantastic -- his name is David -- and he did a fantastic job. He went about his business, less than -- just about four seconds, and that's when it all stopped, and he got him perfectly from a very long distance. So we got a little bit lucky in that regard.
Lara: There was so much conversation after that, though. You had members of Congress visiting the site there, people really on top of wanting to get answers to that, but I think we still are wondering.
Trump: Yes, so they briefed me numerous times -- the FBI, the Secret Service, sort of everybody, DOJ, Pamela, is doing a fantastic -- I think she's doing a fantastic job. But they briefed me, and I'm satisfied with it. I'm satisfied with it. They should have had somebody in the building. That was a mistake. They should have had communications with the local police. They weren't tied in, and they should have been tied in. So there were mistakes made, and that shouldn't have happened. And that building was a prime building in terms of what they were trying to do so -- but I was satisfied in terms of the bigger plot, the larger plot, I was satisfied. And, you know, I have great confidence in these people. I know the people, and they're very talented, very capable. They had a bad day, and I think they'll admit that they had a rough day. It is a very dangerous job being president. You know, I say a race car driver, one percent of one percent, think of that -- die. It's not a lot. A bull rider, I think that's pretty dangerous. It's like one-tenth of one percent die and with a President, it's like five percent. Why didn't you tell me this? I could have maybe made a different decision, but I wouldn't have made a different decision because we're doing so well. The country is back, and it's -- as I said, everyone is saying we've got the hottest country in the world. Even doing this interview, I feel guilty, because I'm supposed to, right now be working.
Lara: We appreciate it, though.
[Commercial Break]
Lara: Welcome back to 'My View' and our exclusive interview with President Donald Trump, who, this week, has taken decisive action to restore fair trade and position American businesses for success. Plus, with the Big, Beautiful Bill now signed into law, it's clear America's potential is stronger than ever.
Trump: We're really busy -- really busy and doing a great job. We have other countries wanting to do business with us so badly. They never appreciated it, now they do. You know, they took advantage of our country, on trade, on the military, on NATO. You saw it, I solved the NATO problem last week, and we had -- every country is now paying substantially more money, like from two percent to five percent, and they weren't paying the two, but they're paying the five, and it's over a trillion dollars a year. And we have a big voice in NATO now. We had really not much of a voice -- with Biden, you had no voice at all. He didn't know where he was. And so we're doing well. The trade thing is going to be very big, and we're sending out letters as we speak. They literally just started going out, and I signed the letters, and it is basically telling countries that we are going to give you the privilege to shop and work in our country, and I think it's very good. And in some cases, we'll make deals. You know, we'll make a direct deal, as opposed to a letter, and we've already made some of them with various countries. But it's a tremendous amount of money to this country. It's really incredible. The potential of this country is incredible. It's been run very foolishly. It's been run stupidly, stupidly, so stupidly. And some of the countries are very upset now, because they've been taking advantage of us for 30 to 40 years. And I had it stopped. I was stopping it in the process, and then we had the COVID in the last part of my administration. But we still -- we had the strongest economy in the history of our country and this is going to be better. I predict this is going to be better. The money coming in, the tariffs coming in, hundreds of billions of dollars are coming in. They're pouring in.
Lara: Well, you know, you talk about all of the money coming into the country, how big you know, the tariffs will be, and leveling the playing field, you asked to have the one Big, Beautiful Bill on your desk to sign on July 4th. You got it on America's birthday. The question I think a lot of people have is, when will they actually start to see the positive impact from the one big, beautiful bill in their lives, the tax cuts, all of the big things that we could see from that?
Trump: They're already seeing them, and we are getting investment because of that bill. We're having investment made in this country that nobody's ever believed. We're up to -- close to $15 trillion. Other administrations did -- they wouldn't do that in four years, $15 trillion and we did it in -- I mean, that was a number from a couple of months ago, and now it's substantially higher than that. We're having car companies come in and build their plants here, which they wouldn't have even thought about. They would have never done it. We have A.I., which is the big hot thing, and they're building -- they're spending trillions of dollars, trillions of dollars in this country. They wouldn't have done that without what we just did last week. And, you know, I tell Republicans, you have to speak positively about it, like when I have a chance with you, and your show is doing so well. Your ratings are so good. What's going on?
Lara: Better after this.
Trump: Congratulations. That's really a great success. So I say to people, Republicans, or anybody, explain the bill, because it's so big and so good, because the Democrats, they only do one thing good, and that's complain, and they say it's going to cause death, and this and that, they don't mean it, it's a soundbite. Somebody give them a soundbite, it's going to cause death -- it is not going to cause death. It's going to keep people alive and it's going to make our country successful, and really successful. So I always say, you have to explain, because they have soundbites like Russia, Russia, Russia was a soundbite. They make up a soundbite and they send it to the fake news, and they send it all over the place, so we have to fight back, and we have to live by our wits, and it's unbelievable. It's the most incredible bill, one of the most incredible bills ever passed, and it's the biggest. It's the biggest bill of its kind ever passed, and we have to talk about it. When you think about no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security, no tax on overtime, a big tax cut in addition to that, plus we're saving the tax cut that we made years ago, which is big, and expired -- in another couple of months, it would have expired. They would have had a 68 percent tax increase, and now they have a tax cut. And you have to explain that to people, because, you know, the public they're doing -- they're driving a cab, they're working as a lawyer, accountant or a teacher, or doing any one of a million different things. They're not into it like we are. You have to explain it. So every chance you get, because what they do is they set a phony -- you know, they're fake. The Democrats are fake. They're part of the fake news and the fake news will take it and they'll go with it, because I have learned so much about the news. I so admire honest reporting. There's not that much of it, though we really don't have that much. And I think to make America great again, you need at least, we have to get a bigger percentage than we have, and nobody understands why? Why would somebody make up stories to make Biden look good when the man was grossly incompetent? What good does it do? I mean, other than lose credibility. You know, they're down at the lowest number for credibility that they've ever had. They're way below Congress, which is very interesting. And I think Congress came a long way recently, because we have people like Mike Johnson. He's been incredible. John Thune has been incredible. All of the people under them, and you know, the Senate and the House. I've gotten to know them really well, and maybe better than ever, because of this -- this was almost an impossible thing to get approved, because, remember, you didn't have one Democrat vote, even though these are the biggest tax cuts in history, even though all of the things, it's going to bring jobs, it's going to bring everything. We didn't have one Democrat vote because they said, don't vote. And the one thing they do well is they stay together. You're reading stories now that a lot of them wanted to vote for it, but they couldn't. They couldn't do it. I read one this morning about a certain Democrat from a certain location in New York who wanted to vote so badly for it. He said, this is going to kill our careers if we don't vote and he really didn't vote, because they really do control that. It's pretty incredible. And they stick together. I admire that the stick-to-itiveness. But at the same time, I would say there's got to be something where, when you're doing something good for the country. So we had to get all Republicans -- because we have the majority by just a little bit. We had to get every single vote. And I guess it was 218 to two. Think of that 218 to two, you just don't do that. It's almost impossible. And we got it done. And the reason we got it done because it's so good. And remember this, the Democrats wanted to vote for it, most of them, many of them, because it's all good stuff. I mean, it's all lower taxes and incentives. And this and that -- so many good things. Great on energy, stopping the E.V. mandate, which you know hurts Elon, and it's too bad, but I told him long before he endorsed me, I said, you'll never be with me, because I'm going to stop the mandate, because the mandate said everybody has to have an electric car within a few years. And I said that's not going to happen? Because who wants -- not everybody wants an electric car. He said, you know what, as long as I'm in the same footing as everybody else. I thought it was a great statement, but it turned out not to be so, because he was very upset about it.
Lara: But you got it done.
[Commercial break]
Lara: There's been this devastation down in Texas, and you've said that, from the perspective of the federal government, every resource will be available to Texas.
Trump: Yes.
Lara: There's been so much heartbreak, though. What is your message to the people who are suffering down there? To the parents of the young girls at the camp who were killed, what do you want to say as their President?
Trump: Well, there can be nothing worse, losing a child to start off with, and the way this happened. There was very early warning. They warned a day before. They weren't -- even two days before. They warned four hours before. Maybe they should have had bells, something go off, but it's pretty dangerous territory when you think of all the times that they've had this problem. They were given a lot of warning, but it was late at night and people were sleeping. Some people heard the warning and they got out. They were able to get to higher land, but boy, when you hear this wave that was up to 30 feet high just came roaring through that valley, it's just a very sad thing. And I looked at the parents, they're like devastated, they're devastated, and they still think there's hope and this and that, but boy, there's nothing tougher than that tragedy. You see so much of it. When you're President, you see so many things happen, so sad, and you take it differently, because you know, you're in charge of a country, and you want nothing bad to happen. And that's not the way life goes, unfortunately. But it is so sad to see this one in particular, because so many young, beautiful, young kids, mostly girls, they were just killed, and counselors were killed. One of them was a powerful guy, and, you know, compared to the power of nature, nobody is powerful, really, nobody is powerful. But we're working with Texas. We're working with a great governor. Greg Abbott is doing a great job. Kristi is doing incredibly and they were there right away, immediately, and we gave them all the money, all the help that they can possibly use. But, you know, you can't -- you can't say things will be great, because to have that kind of death is so sad to see.
Lara: How important has family been to you? And I mean, I'm going to say the last 10 years in all of this.
Trump: Well, like your husband, is great. I mean, he's great, whether he was my son or whether he was an executive, you can't -- you can't hire anybody like him. He's so good, and he runs the business, and Don helps run the business, and Ivanka is doing a lot of things. She's an amazing person, and she's a little bit involved, a little bit, you know, when they want words of wisdom or whatever, she's -- you know, she did a very good job here. All she wanted, and she could have had any job. She said, no, Daddy, I really -- and she got hundreds of thousands of jobs. She'd go around, worked hard, never got credit for it, but she'd go out and she'd go to Walmart, she'd go to Exxon-Mobil, she'd go to all these big companies, and she'd get people jobs by the thousands, so I'd get, you know, just added up to -- I mean, I could tell you what the number is, but I don't want to say because nobody would believe it. But she worked hard and so competent, and she did a great job. Never -- if I were Democrat, they would have -- she would have been a legend. You all would have been legends. But I think you are legends anyway, if you think about it. You wouldn't be doing any better. No, no, somehow there's a different mindset. But the kids have been amazing. I have really, really good kids.
Lara: Well, you seem to have a knack for putting people around you who are successful and make you even more successful. I think this has been sort of a trait of yours your entire life. If you go back to the Trump Organization, you gave people opportunities that maybe they would never have taken themselves. And I feel like you've often seen things in people that they don't even see in themselves –
Trump: Especially women.
Lara: You did it for me. Well, I would say that for me as well –
Trump: Especially women.
Lara: But your Cabinet is comprised of so many incredible people, and people that even a year ago, so many would never have imagined, like RFK, Jr. who, a year ago, was running for president as a Democrat. Why do you think you have this ability? And I feel like it has really been to your benefit. Look at this incredible Cabinet you've put together. They're all people who are working to make America great again.
Trump: They've been incredible, actually. The Cabinet has been incredible. And I had a lot of good people in my first term, but again, I came here, I had never done it before. And I'm picking people that I never heard of, and I'm taking recommendations of, you know, people that were sort of stupid people like John Bolton, he's a stupid guy, or Esper who was terrible. I mean, he was terrible, but I took some recommendation, but overall, I got it right. I mean, we rebuilt our military. We did so many -- so many great things, but I know -- I now know the people I know so well I know better than anybody. You know, I spent four years with -- sometimes you hit and miss and sometimes you don't. But we had great people the first time, but we have really good people this time, and they get along with each other. They love each other, they love the country, and it's smoother. I think it's smoother. You know, we did -- a lot of people thought my first term was phenomenal. I did. I thought, you know, we got the largest tax cut in history, the biggest tax cut in history, the biggest regulation cuts in history, by four times. Nobody even came close. We rebuilt our military. They gave some of it away to Afghanistan in one of the most embarrassing moments ever. But, you know, we terminated ISIS. ISIS was 100 percent gone and terminated. They started making a little bit of a comeback since Biden got in, as you know, but they were gone, and we'll take care of it. But now we're doing things that maybe are on even a different level. Now, it's been, especially this last couple of weeks has been pretty amazing.
Lara: Some people have called you the bodyguard of Western civilization. How do you feel about that title?
Trump: Well, I understand what they mean. It was going bad. We were going bad. This country was going bad. A lot of people were talking to China and others about getting involved, because we were a dead country. We were gone. And in the minds of many, I tell you, in my mind, one of the reasons I ran I saw what was happening very early on, when I saw people pouring across our border, I said, no, put up that little -- it's a little. It would have taken three weeks to put up little sections of wall that we laid out because of legal reasons, with condemnation reasons, you know, different things. And because we wanted to bring our equipment back in through the wall, because we built hundreds of miles. And I said, why aren't they filling that in? It would have just been -- that would have been complete. In fact, I added a lot more. I built a lot more than I said I was going to build. I made it much longer. But I said, you know, they want to have open borders. That was the first time I realized it. I didn't think it would be possible for anybody to want open borders, because you know, who would want open borders? And open borders where people come in totally unvetted and unchecked, totally, just walk right in, walk right through. And some of the people, I know I want to be politically correct, but some of these people, you can look at them and you can say, these people are trouble. This is a rough group of people, and we're right now getting them out. And you know what? ICE and Border Patrol, Tom Homan and Kristi -- Kristi has been amazing, Tom has been amazing. You know, Tom was one of my first people that I put in. I said, you've got to just do the border. He didn't want to do anything else. He just wanted -- because that's what he wants to do. But you have a big -- you have a big deal with lots of other things there. And I said, who would be the best to head up Homeland Security? And he said, I'd like Kristi Noem. And I said, that's -- it's great. Now, I knew her very well, but I didn't know her that way. She was a great Governor of South Dakota. Really did a good job, but boy, she's been great. And every one of my -- I can't think of one who hasn't been at least very good. You know, they've all been terrific, and it's been really good, but I think we get a lot of credit on the border, because last month we had zero people come into our country. We had people come in, but they had to come in legally. They come in through a process. We want people to come in. We need people because we have a booming business climate now, and the farmers need people, and hotels need people, et cetera, but coming in illegally, we had zero. Now even I'm not sure that I can believe that number. You know, you're talking about hundreds of thousands, millions of people came in through Biden and they say zero, but -- and the people that do the list tend to be a very liberal group, I will tell you that. They have been there a long time. And I said, I'll accept it, but it was close to that number. I'll tell you that. If they said zero, and I'm going to take it, but it's hard to believe that it's zero. You're talking about hundreds of miles of border. We've done a great job. And the problem with doing a great job that fast is people forget. You know, last time, I did a great job, we had a border problem. Nothing like it was this time, but we had a border problem, and I solved it about four weeks. And I'd make speeches and talk about the border, and my people would say, sir, you shouldn't even waste your time. Nobody wants to hear about the border. Now it's starting to begin again. You don't hear about the border. We did numbers that were unbelievable, and I almost can't talk about it, because nobody wants to hear it, but it was a big problem. But we do have a different problem. We have to get the people out that came in that are really bad, because we have some bad people that came in.
Lara: Just to wrap up here, you're talking about people not remembering. I don't think anyone will ever forget President Donald J. Trump. But when history looks back on this time in our country, when history looks back on you, how would you like to be remembered?
Trump: A good person, but a person that saved our country. I really believe our country was going down for the fall. I don't know if it ever could have come back. It was very close to the edge, and I really would like to be known as the man that saved our country.
Lara: Well, I think you've started off on the right track there.
Trump: So far.
Lara: Well, Mr. President, thank you for sitting down with us. We appreciate it.
Trump: Thank you very much, Lara. Thank you.