TRANSCRIPT: Mark Levin Interviews Donald Trump on the Phone for His Radio Show, 8.19.25
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Mark Levin: We have our wonderful president with us, President Donald J. Trump. Mr. President, how are you today, sir?
President Trump: I'm very good. Thank you very much, Mark. Thank you.
Levin: It's a great honor to have you here, as you know. And you're very, very busy. First of all, I don't know where you get all this energy, but you're very, very busy. It's an amazing thing. I'm serious about this though. You wake up in the morning, you say there's things to do. I'm president for a short period of time and I'm going to do it, and I'm going to take on the hardest things in the world and do them. Is that your mentality?
Trump: Well, even in the campaign, you know I campaigned, it was 120 days out, and I said you know what, every day -- and I went every day, I didn't do anything. I didn't do anything. I didn't do golf, I didn't do sports, I didn't do anything. All I did was work and I did seven days a week and I did, you know, many, many, many rallies, oftentimes two or three a day toward the end at least and it was amazing. And I noticed that my opponent Kamala, who you have great respect for -- I know you think she's fantastic, would have been a fantastic president. [Laughter] But Kamala, she put out her sheet, you know they put it out once a week and it would be Like she's off three or four days, or she was taking these huge chunks of time and not doing anything. And I said, you know, you're going for the presidency of the United States, they would call that the gold ring, right. And you just -- you had 120 days, I would think every single day you have to be on. And she didn't do Joe Rogan. She didn't do a lot of the shows she could have done. and I don't know if she did you, but I tend to doubt it, but certainly she should have done. But she didn't do a lot of things, and she had a lot of time off. And I say when -- you know, when you have this one shot at something you have to do it. And I worked -- I don't think I've ever worked certainly more consistently than that and it's just a carryover. We're doing a lot of great things. I think our country -- right now we're the hottest country anywhere in the world. They told me yesterday in the Oval Office, Mark, they were in -- as you know, the leaders of -- the really great leaders of great countries, very substantial countries, great countries, rich countries. They said the United States is the hottest country in the world right now. And everybody says essentially in the same, pretty similar terms, that a year ago our country was dead and now you've got the hottest country in the world. And we are -- the United States is the hottest country anywhere in the world right now.
Levin: Yeah, it is, and you've done that because clearly it was one of the coldest countries when Biden was president. Let me ask you a question.
Trump: It was cold, is right.
Levin: You've got a lot of balls in the air with this Russia and Ukraine thing. You've got NATO, you've got these NATO countries, you've got our national security interests, you've got Russia and Ukraine, their interests and so forth and so on. Is there a method to this? In other words, you talk to the two main people first, then you talk to -- is there a process here or you just kind of go with the flow?
Trump: Well, it's probably instinct more than process. I have instincts and I've lived with my instinct about things. Even running for president, I had an instinct. I'd win the first time, and I did even better the second time, as you know, I did much better. But bad things happened, you covered probably better than anybody and it was a disgrace. But now I'm here and a lot of big things are being found out about the election process from the first time and the second time with all of the Comey stuff and all of the horrible things with Hillary and everything. And now this term, though, is far more powerful and I think far more important than the second term could have been -- far more.
Levin: All right, so, obviously you met with Putin, you met with Zelenskyy. You met with some of these NATO leaders. And so far, are you optimistic? I know there's territorial issues; there's security issues and God knows what else.
Trump: Well, you have to be a little bit optimistic. It's complicated. I've settled six wars, and a lot of people say seven because there's one that nobody knows about. But I've settled six wars, and we did the Iran -- I wiped out their whole nuclear capability, which they would have used against Israel in two seconds if they had the chance. But we wiped it out, did so many things, but the one that I thought would be the easiest was this one actually, or one of the easier ones. And like India and Pakistan that was getting ready for nuclear weapons, they were shooting down airplanes from each other. There was a lot of bad things happening with many of them, even the Congo. You go to Africa, the Congo and Rwanda, they've been fighting for 31 years. And I got it settled, all settled. They were all happy, everybody settled. Nobody's being killed and it's -- you know, a lot of amazing, amazing things. You saw the Aberbaijan [sic] --
Levin: Mmm-hmm.
Trump: -- that was a big one going on for 34, 35 years with Albania. Think of that, I mean going on for years. And I got to know the heads and I got to know them through trade. I was dealing with them a little bit and I said, why are you guys fighting? Then I said, I'm not going to do a trade deal if you guys are going to fight, it's crazy. Anyway, one thing led to another, and I got that one settled. And that was one that people said is not -- you couldn't settle it. Even when I had them both in the Oval Office at the end when they were getting ready to sign, they were sitting next to each other and they were trying to get away, they didn't feel good. By the end of an hour, they were hugging each other and congratulating each other. It was beautiful to watch actually, but I've done all of them. And nobody's ever done anything like that in six months and or in a whole lifetime or frankly in eight years nobody's ever done. And most presidents never did one, you know, stopping six wars and doing all of the other things. We have the greatest economy right now. We have an unbelievable economy. But I like doing it. I mean I like doing it. I love stopping the wars. I thought though that this one -- because I actually had good relationship with President Putin the first term and despite the fact that we had Russia, Russia, Russia. Don't forget, that's not easy to overcome when he sees these whack jobs. And he knew it was false because he wasn't involved. Not to say he's an angel, by the way, but he knew it was all a made-up thing. And he probably thought we were totally crazy, this country, and we were -- it was a very corrupt, bad situation and actually put us in in danger. If he and I didn't understand each other, it would have actually had us -- we would have actually been in danger as a country.
Levin: Now, we've heard talk about security arrangements for the Europeans would lead the way, and also territorial concessions. We don't really know what that means yet. Obviously, you know things and it would be foolish to reveal all this stuff. But in terms of security, they're really capable of, the Europeans, helping secure Ukraine because you have them beefing up their military. They can buy some of the best weapons on the face of the earth from us. Is that what you have in mind?
Trump: Well, they can, and you know Biden spent $350 billion, it looks like, OK, much more than $300 billion. Can you believe this? And spent all of that money, much of it in cash, much of it in weapons, but bought them a tremendous amount -- I mean it cost the United States a fortune and we have an ocean in between. You know, we shouldn't have been much involved. If we could solve a war, it's great. You know, they lose 7,000 -- 5,000 to 7,000 people a week. And if I can do that for any country, I'd love to do that. I don't care if there's an ocean or no ocean between us, but in our case, there's an ocean in between. So, Europe spent $100 billion, and that's a lot of money, but it's not $350 billion. And I was complaining about this for you. One of the reasons I ran, I said, this guy -- why is he doing this? Look, he was grossly incompetent. He was incompetent 40 years ago too. He was -- you know, he didn't change so much, but he was really bad. And he spent $350 billion, I said we're not going to do that. So, the first thing I did is I got a rare earth deal from them and that was worth more than the $350 billion. So, I felt at least better for the American taxpayer. And then, most recently, I did what I did. I made a deal with NATO that NATO will buy the missiles and buy the weapons and buy everything else. It will all go through NATO, they'll pay us. And so, we're not spending any money on the deal. People are amazed actually, but we're not spending any money. Biden used to give away $60 billion, $70 billion every time the president would come here. As you know, President Zelenskyy would come in and he'd say this and that. And Biden would give him $60 billion, $70 billion, maybe even $100 billion. And you are a man that works hard for your money. When you hear $100 billion -- not $100 million, that's a lot, Mark, right? $100 billion, with a B. And I don't blame Zelenskyy. If you can do that, you're P.T. Barnum, the greatest salesman on Earth, the greatest show on earth, right? But he got it, and to a point where we, you know, are probably in that $350 billion, Mark, nobody can even explain, nobody even knows. You know, if you say give me a reconciliation, I want to see exactly -- they don't even know where to start. The whole thing is ridiculous, but more importantly the death being caused over there is incredible. So, we're going to try and stop it and I think we have a good shot. I had a very successful meeting with President Putin. I had a very successful meeting with President Zelenskyy, and now I thought it would be better if they met without me just to see, I want to see what goes on. You know, they had a hard relationship, very bad, very bad relationship. And now we'll see how they do and if necessary, and it probably would be, but if necessary, I'll go and I'll probably be able to get it closed. I just want to see what happens at the meeting. So, they're in the process of setting it up and we're going to see what happens, but you've got to stop the killing, Mark, it's too much killing. I don't care, you know, you don't have to be -- we're not -- again, nobody from America is being killed. We're not being killed. The United States' soldiers aren't involved. We're not -- we have no boots on the ground. But when you lose 6,000, 5,000, 7,000 young people and then you also lose some people from the towns and cities as missiles get lobbed into them. Can you imagine living like that?
Levin: No.
Trump: Where you have no idea whether or not you're going to -- your building's going to collapse on top of you. And that's where it is. And we have a shot, and I think I should do that. But it's -- you know, when you do six of them and they never even talk about that, you're the only one that mentions it. And these are six big ones. These are not -- these fights were rampant, you know, they were going -- and how about Thailand and Cambodia? I mean these were serious wars. That was just starting, but a lot of people were killed on the border. And I was talking to one of them and I said, what are you doing with the war? He said, yes, I am -- I am starting, we will have war. I said, how long have you been fighting? 500 years? I said, that's a long time. But they've been fighting on and off. I said, when I heard 500 years that was a little disconcerting. You know, I said that's a long time, but they've been fighting 500 -- you know, over the years, over years and years they fight. They fight, then they go back to what they do, then they fight. And I was able to stop it. And not only able to stop it; the two gentlemen got to be very friendly in the list. I mean, you don't know what's going to happen, but I stopped the war. So, in theory, they should talk about those things, but nobody ever talks. You're the only one that talks about them. And these were serious -- look, India and Pakistan, six planes were shot down and it was getting worse and worse. You saw that. And those are two nuclear places. Serbia and Kosovo is another one. I mean, that was going to be a disaster, and I stopped it. And there's one other one that I can't talk about that I stopped before it got started, and it's an honor to do it. Do you know how many people I saved? I saved like hundreds of thousands and even millions of people. That's a good feeling.
Levin: Now let me ask you this because I posted on this. When you look at Russia and Ukraine, Russia has been very aggressive towards Ukraine. Georgia took the Crimean and so forth under Democrat and Republican presidents that preceded you.
Trump: Yeah.
Levin: And they invaded when you left office and Biden came in. It's like they waited; there's Biden and then they moved.
Trump: They would have never done it with me, yeah.
Levin: And they never did, they didn't even think about it.
Trump: Putin said we wouldn't have done it if Trump were president. He made a strong statement the other day. I didn't ask him to say it. He said this would have never happened. You know, it really started with Obama because Obama gave away Crimea. And Crimea was the heart and soul of that country. It's beautiful. It's this massive piece of land stuck out right in the ocean, right in the Black Sea, so beautiful. I mean it's so beautiful. And Obama said you give it up to Russia. Then they say I was -- they like to say that's just a soundbite. You know, saying Trump was weak on Russia. I'm the one that stopped the pipeline, Nord Stream 2, they never even heard of Nord Stream 2. I'm the one that gave them Javelins. Obama gave him sheets, and I gave them Javelins and they say Trump was weak. These people are con artists, you know, and Putin will tell you that. Putin said, I'd hate to see -- if you were weak, I'd hate to see you if you were strong because you have been brutal. But, you know, I get along with Putin and that's a good thing. It's two nuclear powers; it's always good to get along, right?
Levin: Apparently, Hillary got along with Putin in her own strange way, trying to turn all that against you. Let me ask you this. I think this is probably why -- OK, I have no inside information. It's probably why Zelenskyy's nervous. He looks back and he says, OK, the only guy that stops these people is Trump. Now what the hell are we going to do when Trump's gone? I'm supposed to rely on some Democrat or some weak Republican? So, that's probably going through his head, don't you think?
Trump: Now what the hell are we going to do when Trump's gone? I'm supposed to rely on some Democrat or some weak Republican? So, that's probably going through his head, don't you think? So, they gave it up to Russia and that was really the beginning of a disastrous long period for that country. That was the beginning, and nobody talks about that. If I gave up that land, I'd be on the front page of every paper for the next 20 years. When Obama gave it up, they don't even talk about it. Can you imagine. And then they talk about Donald Trump is friendly with Putin. You know, I didn't give him Crimea. Crimea is massive, I would say like the size of Texas or something, in the middle of the ocean, it's gorgeous, and they gave it up because of Obama. And the press doesn't even talk about it.
Levin: Well, they don't talk about part of Georgia was taken under a Republican president. They don't talk about a lot, but nothing was taken under you, was it?
Trump: No, no, they took the whole thing. The way I look at it, if I didn't come along, they took the whole thing under Biden. They took Crimea under Obama. And they took a big chunk of Georgia under Bush.
Levin: Right.
Trump: But with me, what was taken? Nothing was taken, nothing. I just -- look, I came in, this thing was raging. I think it was heading to World War III, and you're not going to have that anymore. That's the nice part. You're not going to have to worry about that. But we'll see what happens in terms of getting it settled. But this was heading to World War III. This is the worst thing that's happened -- in terms of war these are the biggest numbers that we've had since World War II.
Levin: We don't have a ton of time left, but I wanted to ask you about this. Qatar and Egypt say, we think we have a cease fire with Hamas. You know, the American people watch this over and over and over again. You had Witkoff there, you've been involved. Everybody's trying to get Hamas to give them -- and what is it? We'll give them half the hostages. I think probably people have had enough of this, don't you?
Trump: Well, you saw my statement a few days ago.
Levin: I sure did.
Trump: So, first of all, they weren't going to give back any hostages, I'm the one that got all the hostages back. By the way, Steve Witkoff does a great job. It's a very hard job. But I used him because he's a very wonderful person that everybody likes, and he's a good deal maker and he's done a great job. But these people also change their mind. So, what happened is we worked hard, we got all these hostages back. I've had so many letters from parents and from the kids themselves and the people that got out. But I got them back, Mark. You wouldn't have even had any -- you wouldn't have gotten any -- none of these people would have been back. But I got them back, worked with your friend, Bibi. He's a good man. He's in there fighting. He's fighting -- you know, they're trying to put him in jail on top of everything else. How about that?
Levin: Nuts.
Trump: He's a war hero because we work together. He's a war hero. I guess I am too, nobody cares, but I am too. I mean, I sent those planes. You know, 22 years the pilots came, I rewarded them. I brought them all to the Oval Office, the people having to do with that whole operation, which was so perfect, which was a total -- just an obliteration. You know, when CNN -- they tried to say, well, maybe it wasn't as good as Trump said it was. They're just such bad people. It turned out that it was even more so than I said, it was obliteration. The Atomic Energy Commission said this place is gone. They can maybe start up, but they're not starting up there. These guys -- and you know what that is? That's sort of a hurting of our pilots. But when you look at it, when you look at what we've done and the success that we've had, and they're putting Bibi through a lot. But as far as Hamas is concerned, I said two weeks ago, and I said it a long time ago, ultimately, you're going to have to fight like hell. They -- everyone's forgotten about October 7th. You know, they don't like to think about October 7th. You have some people, I guess it's a sound bite, pretty much a Democrat soundbite. It's amazing that Democrats -- like Schumer is a Palestinian. He's right now a Palestinian Senator. We call him the Palestinian Senator from New York City or New York. But I don't know, I think his career is probably over, I guess. I see polls where he gets obliterated just like we obliterated the nuclear weapons, the nuclear stockpile. That would have been -- by the way, I think they would have had nuclear weapons in a period of four weeks when we hit them.
Levin: I think you're right.
Trump: I was going to say, the pilots came to the Oval Office, and they said, sir, our predecessors and us have been practicing this flight for 22 years, the same flight, right to the same place where they stored the stuff they've been practicing it. You're the only president that had the guts to let us go do it. And if we didn't do it, they would probably by this time, just about this time, have a nuclear weapon and they would have used it, you know that.
Levin: Well, Mr. President, we're running out of time. I just want to tell you this audience loves you; this audience backs you.
Trump: We love them.
Levin: We don't give a damn what the media have to say. They're wrong about everything and they're on the wrong side of history, too. So, we want to wish you all the best in your dealings here. These are tough with Russia and Ukraine. Thank you for what you're doing with the border and the economy. Thank you for what you're doing really for Israel, quite frankly, and your support of the state of Israel. There's a lot of a lot of Israel hatred and anti-Semitism and all the rest of this stuff swirling around and you stand there and you fight it. So, God bless you my friend, and you are my friend.
Trump: Yes, we are, but so do you fight it. Nobody like you. And you and Sean and a few people, it's not a huge group of people because it seems to be heading in the wrong direction in many ways. But in the end, we win all the time, but I just want to thank you too.
Levin: And the best to the First Lady. That was a beautiful letter. God bless you, Mr. President.
Trump: Thank you very much.
Levin: All right, what a man, just fantastic.
Transcript courtesy of CQ Factbase