TRANSCRIPT: President Trump Holds a Bilateral Meeting with Kim Min-seok of South Korea, 10.29.25
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Prime Minister Kim Min-seok: [In progress] [Via translator] -- occasions. And you are indeed one and only foreign head of state who has made two state visits to the Republic of Korea. And it is the first time that, uh, that you are the first US president that has been conferred the Grand Order of Mugunghwa by Korea. So indeed, our meeting is very meaningful. And what is also significant and impressive is that it's been nine months since your inauguration, and around the world in eight conflict zones, you brought peace, so you are indeed a peacemaker. So it's almost once a month. So many people have been killed and so many damages were done, but you have been successful in bringing peace to many parts of the world.
And I hope that your peacemaking skills can be applied to the Korean Peninsula so that we can bring peace on the Korean Peninsula as well. And if that happens, I believe that you will be recognized forever in the history of humanity. And also, this will be indeed welcomed by Korean people, because bringing permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula has been a long desired goal for our country.
And as I mentioned many times, you have wonderful capabilities and skills as a peacemaker. And if you can help us and if you can establish peace on the Korean Peninsula, then, uh, we will support you so that you can become a peacemaker on the Korean Peninsula as well. Chairman Kim, I hope we'll, um, see your true heart and intention. This time, uh, your meeting with Chairman Kim did not happen, but I am very happy that you're willing, uh, and open to having a dialogue with Chairman Kim. And the posture itself is a lot for us. And so far, Chairman Kim has not really accepted your good intention and your gesture. So this time, it did not happen, but I believe that we've been planting good seeds for a better future.
And I hope that your gestures and your words will serve as an opportunity to further, uh, open up opportunities for better relations, and we will continue to support your endeavor. As you may know very well on the Korean Peninsula, a war is going on, technically speaking. So the two Koreas are at war technically. But with the help of the US and the international community, we have been able to grow our economy and advance our country. And going forward, our bilateral relations are going to focus on modernizing our alliance so that our alliance can become more comprehensive and strategic. Korea has decided to increase our national budget for defense, so military spending and defense budget will be expanded to further strengthen our military capabilities.
As you may know very well, the current defense budget of the Republic of Korea is about 1.4 times of the total GDP of the DPRK. So our budget, our, um, military spending is quite significant and we're ranked number five in terms of our military spending. So already, it's quite a lot of money. However, I know that it is important to continue to lessen your burden, military and defense burden for us, so we will continue to increase our, uh, military spending. Furthermore, I'd like to mention a few things. When I met with you last time, I didn't have a chance to explain in further detail, so there may be some misunderstanding. But when it comes to submarines powered by nuclear energy, I hope that you will support so that we can get supplied of nuclear fuels for submarines.
We're not aiming for nuclear-armed submarines, but rather conventionally armed submarines powered by nuclear energy. Because our conventional submarines, uh, have limited capabilities, they cannot really effectively monitor and counter any undersea activities from other countries. So if you allow and support the supply of nuclear energy and nuclear fuel for submarines, then we will be assisting building submarines and military vessels. And if we are, um, equipped with nuclear-powered submarines, we can help your activities around this region by providing the patrol and other, uh, activities. I understand that you have already expressed support for reprocessing of spent fuel and enrichment of uranium. And if you facilitate the working-level consultations between our two countries regarding that, we will be able to achieve good results.
And you are now working to make America greater again. And I can see that there has been a lot of achievements. And last night, I checked that your stock indexes have hit another record high. So you are indeed making America great again. And so against this backdrop, Korean companies will continue to invest in the U.S. and we will continue to support your endeavor in revitalizing your manufacturing sectors. And shipbuilding sector cooperation will also continue because this will benefit the Korean economy as well, and it will benefit the U.S. economy. And all these efforts will further advance and strengthen our bilateral alliance and relations. We have 50 million people in Korea and along with our Korean people.
Once again, I welcome you to the Republic of Korea and I hope that we will continue to work together for better Korea, for better U.S. and also for better bilateral alliance. Welcome once again. Thank you very much.
President Donald Trump: Thank you. Well, I'd like to thank you very much and I want to thank all of your people, many of whom I know. And then we've been dealing. They're very tough negotiators and that's the way it should be. And I will say that, uh, we're working together. There's a great love between our communities, between our, uh, people, between leadership and, uh, we're all friends. I know you showed me a picture from a long time ago of you and I and, uh, you're looking better now than you did then. That was quite a while ago. So you're doing something well. But I, I will say this, that, uh, the Korean Peninsula, and I know you are officially at war, but we will see what we can do to get that all straightened out.
We're, uh, We've been very lucky. I've been very fortunate to be able to, um, solve a lot of problems in the world. I didn't even know there were so many problems. There were countries that nobody knew that they were even fighting, and yet they were killing millions and millions of people. And we got 'em, with the exception of one, which we -- I think we're gonna get straightened out, Russia-Ukraine. But we got 'em all done, all finished. Uh, and you know that I'll be working on this very hard with you, with your team, with a lot of other people. See if we can do something that makes sense. I know Kim Jong Un very well. We get along very well. We, we really weren't able to work out timing. We have President Xi is coming tomorrow, and it was, that was something that obviously is very important to the world, to all of us. You'll be watching very carefully.
We're meeting right here and, uh, we're all looking forward to that. I think it's gonna work out very, very well for everybody. And we, I look forward to seeing him, and that was our focus really for, for this visit. But we'll have, uh, other visits and we'll, uh, work very hard with Kim Jong Un and with everybody on getting things straightened out, because that makes sense. You know, I have a, a couple of phrases that I like. One of them is common sense. It's common sense that that should work out. And, uh, I feel certain that it will. It may take a little time to, you have to have a little patience, but I feel absolutely certain that it will. In the meantime, what you've done is amazing.
What you've, uh -- first of all, the welcome and the beautiful honor you bestowed on me, as the only American president, that's, uh, that's really a, a great tribute to our country. Not to me. It's a great tribute to our country, but I had it focused toward you as opposed to against you, which some people did. Uh, what you've done and what you've created, what you've done, really a very short period of time, relatively speaking, is, uh, is amazing. It's really amazing. And you're working with us now on shipbuilding because you've become a master of shipbuilding. You know, uh, during World War II, we were the biggest.
We were number one by far, the United States. And then through a series of very bad decisions or lack of caring, we really didn't make ships very much anymore. We made other things very well, but we didn't make ships. Well, making ships is a necessity. And I know we're working in the Philadelphia yards and in various other places in the United States where you're coming, we're gonna make ships together in the United States. So we're gonna start up shipbuilding and we'll be right at the top, or at least toward the top in a pretty short period of time. But, uh, we have a lot of industries that are together, and we have a lot of industries where we're leading. We're leading in AI now, we're leading in a lot of the different things.
We have many car companies coming back, as you know, to the United States. Uh, yesterday I was in Japan and, uh, Toyota is, uh, investing $10 billion on building car plants, numerous car plants throughout the country with American workers, largely American workers, and we have many, many, uh, of them opening. So we have a lot of industry coming back. We're gonna be having, I think by the end of my first term, we should have 21 or 2, 22 trillion dollars invested in the United States from other people and countries. And that's a record, uh, that's not even close. Uh, I think the record could be, uh, just about a fifth, one-fifth of that and, uh, the previous administration had less than 1 trillion in four years, and we're gonna have maybe 21 trillion, could be even higher than that in one year.
So nobody's ever seen anything like, no, no country's ever seen anything like that. But I just wanna let you know, it's a, it's a special bond that we've had. We've had it for a long time, but you've never had it as strong as you've had it with me and, uh, it's a tremendous honor. I, I will tell you, driving up in The Beast, that's called The Beast, uh, driving up in The Beast, the limo, uh, with those very powerful people carrying very vicious-looking weapons, uh, it was something, that was some spectacle and some beautiful scene and I know what goes to making that happen. But it was so perfect, so flawlessly done, and all of us, I can speak for my entire cabinet and all the people with me, uh, I don't think we've ever seen anything like that. So I just wanna thank you for that, that was a very special welcome. And, uh, it will be remembered. And Marco, I think, uh, uh, you're working extremely well with, uh, the defensive side, defense and offense.
You know, we have both defense and offense and, uh, they're equally as good. In fact, our defense, uh, is very important from the standpoint of helping other countries. But we're gonna take care of, uh -- we're gonna work with you and we're gonna take care of the one lingle- -- it's a lingering cloud. I would call it a lingering cloud that's over your head and we're gonna see if we can get that straightened out. And I just wanna thank you again for the welcome. And I wanted to, uh, say we've been friends for a long time, and you are going to be a great president. You already are. And if we can do this together, then you'll go down as the greatest of them all, and we'll try and make that happen. Thank you very much. Great honor. Thank you. Thank you.
Kim: [In English] Thank you.
Aide: Thank you press. Thank you press.