TRANSCRIPT: President Trump Holds a Pull-Aside Bilat with Mark Rutte of NATO, 6.25.25
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President Trump: Hello, fellas. Big weekend. Great weekend. See you in the plane. They travel with them, they have better seats than I do.
Question: Mr. President, what are you telling the prime minister about your goals for NATO and Article 5 today?
Trump: We're with them all the way. I mean, if you take a look at the numbers, we're with them and they have very big things to announce today. I don't know if you've taken the vote or you're going to take the vote, but I've been asking them to go up to 5 percent for a number of years and they're going up to 5 percent. And that's a big -- from 2 percent. And a lot of people didn't even pay the 2 percent. So, I think that's going to be very big news. NATO is going to become very strong with us, and I appreciate doing it. Perhaps you want to talk.
Mark Rutte: Yeah, absolutely. Let me first -- before we go to the spending, I just want to recognize your decisive action on Iran. You're a man of strength, but you're also a man of peace. And the fact that you are now also successful in getting this ceasefire done between Israel and Iran, I really want to commend you for that.
Trump: Thank you very much.
Rutte: And I think this is important for the whole world. Then on spending, it's absolutely true. I want to state here, without President Trump this would not have happened. In three stages, when you became president in 2016-2017, you forced Europeans and Canadians to pay more. At this moment, the result of that phase is 1 trillion extra aggregate defense spending by the Canadians and the Europeans. Then came Phase 2 when you became president in January of last year. Phase 2 is that all the countries not yet on 2 percent have now committed to the 2 percent. This is the old goal from Wales in 2014. Seven were not on 2 percent. Some were saying somewhere in the 2030s. Now this year, all of them, including Canada, including Italy, including Belgium, they have all now committed to the 2 percent. And now comes the big splash. Today, we will decide to go to 5 percent. We have to keep ourselves safe from our adversaries, but also because it is fair to equalize with the United States. With this 5 percent, the Europeans and the Canadians will equalize their defense spending with the United States. So, this is not about American taxpayers paying more; this is about Europeans, Canadians paying more. And again, this would not have happened. I'm really saying this here, and some people might criticize me, but then when I speak with them, they all say yes, you are right. This would not have happened if you would not have been elected in 2016 and reelected last year, and back into office in January. So, I want to thank you.
Trump: Well, thank you very much. It's a great victory for everybody, I think. And we will be equalized very shortly and that's the way it has to be. It's going to be a lot of money too, a lot of defense.
Rutte: Trillions [Inaudible]
Trump: And we have a great relationship, and we've had a great relationship from the beginning, highly respected man. And yeah, we appreciate you being here too, everybody. We really do. We have a tremendous group of people on my left and a tremendous group of people on my right, they might be even better than my people, I don't know.
Rutte: No, no, no.
Trump: Let's have a fight, let's figure it out. Anyway, but we appreciate it, and we've had a tremendous [Inaudible] working on. And we've really worked on this subject for a long time. When Biden was here, it just died, it just died like everything else died. And now it's -- you're going to take, I guess, a vote today, right?
Rutte: Actually today, we will decide unanimously to do this. That's my absolute conviction.
Trump: So, we can't talk about it until the vote is taken because sometimes strange things happen to a vote.
Rutte: I'm not too worried.
Trump: I think you're going to do very well. Everyone's very happy about it. Go ahead, yes.
Question: Mr. President, how is the Iran/Israel ceasefire going in your opinion?
Trump: I think very good, I think very good. Israel came back yesterday. I was so proud of them because they came back. They went out because they felt there was a violation, and technically they were right. But it just wouldn't have worked out very well and they brought the planes back. They had gone on to another journey because there was a little bit of a violation. And I said you got to get them back and they came back, and it was a great thing and it's going very well.
Question: Mr. President, what are your sort of responses to the foreign minister saying he still wants to enrich nuclear?
Trump: Hello Katie, she's so great this one. Any questions she asks, I'll answer. Well, maybe I'd better not say that. What was your question?
Question: What is your response to the Iranian foreign minister continuing to say Iran will enrich uranium and pursue nuclear weapons?
Trump: Well, I don't know if they've said that, but I'll tell you, the last thing they want to do is enrich anything right now. They want to recover. And we won't let that happen, number one, militarily, we won't. I think we'll end up having somewhat of a relationship with Iran. I see it. Look, I've had a relationship over the last four days. They agreed to the ceasefire, and it was a very equal agreement. They both said that's enough. They both said it. But no, they won't do that. The last thing they want to do, Katie, is enrich, they're not looking to -- can you imagine after all of that they're going to say, oh, let's go and do a bomb. You know, there could be a day in the future -- and then somebody else taking our place will be saying don't do it and maybe they won't do it as well. I don't know, but they're not going to have a bomb and they're not going to enrich. And we believe all of the stuff is down there. We don't think they had nearly the time, because to get that out is a very difficult thing. It's not like it's not like moving a package or taking this carpet up and moving it. It's very difficult, very dangerous to do. We believe it's all down there. We had a tremendous victory, a tremendous hit and because of that, they -- I don't think they would have been down there because they knew we were coming. When they know we're coming, they're not going to be down in that, 30 stories underground. So, no, I think it was just a tremendous victory for everybody, including Iran. Look, you know, they've got a country, and they've got oil and they're very smart people and they can come back. Israel got hit very hard, especially the last couple of days. Israel was hit really hard. Those ballistic missiles, boy, they took out a lot of buildings. And they've been great. Bibi Netanyahu should be very proud of himself. And they've really been great, but they're not going to be building bombs for a long time.
Question: Mr. President, what's your reaction to the intelligence reports saying that the Iranian nuclear sites were only partially devastated, not entirely.
Trump: Yeah, well, they said it was -- actually the report said it could have been very -- they don't know. I mean they did a report. I could have Pete talk to it because his department did the report. They really don't know. I think Israel is going to be telling us very soon because Bibi is going to have people involved in that whole situation. We hear it was obliteration. It was a virtual obliteration. When you take a look at the ground above, don't forget the flame is all underground, but everything above. If you look at the before and the after picture, everything above is burned black, the trees, everything. There's one building, but that's a building that sunk substantially into the granite, so that the fire goes right over it. I believe it was total obliteration. I believe they didn't have a chance to get anything out because we acted fast. If it would have taken two weeks, maybe. But it's very hard to remove that kind of material, very hard and very dangerous for them to remove it. Plus, they knew we were coming and if they know we're coming, they're not going to be down there. There aren't too many people that are going to be down there. Pete, do you have something to say about that?
Pete Hegseth: Well, Mr. President, when you talk to the people who built the bombs, understand what those bombs can do and deliver those bombs, they landed precisely where they were supposed to. So, it was a flawless mission.
Trump: Flawless.
Hegseth: Right down where we knew they needed to enter. And given the 30,000 pounds of explosives and capability of those munitions, it was devastation underneath Fordow. And the amount of munitions, six per location, any assessment that tells you it was something otherwise is speculating with other motives. And we know that because when you actually look at the report -- by the way, it was a top secret report. It was preliminary, it was low confidence. All right? So, you make assessments based on what you know.
Trump: And they said it could be very devastating, very serious in that report. Moderate to severe and we believe far more likely severe and obliterated. So, this is a political motive here.
Question: Was there a leak investigation?
Hegseth: Of course, we're doing a leak investigation with the FBI right now because this information is for internal purposes, battle damage assessments and CNN and others are trying to spin it to make the president look bad when this was an overwhelming success.
Trump: We had we had a tremendous success and this is the New York Times, I call it the failing New York Times, it's gone to hell, and CNN, which as you know, very few people are watching. And you would think they'd do the opposite. You would think they'd want to say this was an unbelievable success. And the thing that hurts me is it's really demeaning to the pilots and the people that put that whole thing together, the generals. That was a perfect operation. And when you look at the holes -- and this was done from 52,000 feet, there was no moon, there was no light and those three holes are right together. And also -- and nobody talks about this, we shot 30 Tomahawks from submarines, in particular, one submarine, but that was 400 miles away. And every one of those tomahawks hit within a foot of where they were supposed to hit, took out a lot of buildings that Israel wasn't able to get. We took them out with Tomahawks. We don't even talk about that. This was a devastating attack and it knocked them for a loop. And you know, if it didn't, they wouldn't have settled. If they had won, if we didn't take it out, they wouldn't have settled. Somebody mentioned that to me last night, if that thing wasn't devastated, they would have never settled. Marco, do you have something to say?
Marco Rubio: Yeah. No, first of all on the stuff about the intelligence, this is what a leaker is telling you the intelligence says. That's the game these people play, they read it and then they go out and characterize it the way they want it characterized and their leakers. This is the game they play, so that's number one. Number two, here's a fact, the conversion facility, which you can't do a nuclear weapon without a conversion facility. You can't -- we can't even find where it is, where it used to be on the map. You can't even find where it used to be because the whole thing is just blackened out. It's gone.
Trump: It's wiped out.
Rubio: It's wiped out. Then we dropped 12 of the strongest bombs on the planet, right down the hole in two places. Everything underneath that mountain is in bad shape. And I refer you to the statement of the IAEA, Mr. Grossi, you know what he said? He said there was Iran the way it looked the day before the attack and what their nuclear program looks like now, two very different things. They are way behind where they were just seven days ago. Now anything in the world can be rebuilt, but now we know where it is and, if they try to rebuild it, we'll have options there as well. But all this leaker stuff, these leakers are professional stabbers. That's what they are, they go out and they read this stuff and then they tell you what it says -- against the law, but they characterize it for you in a way that's absolutely false. There's no way Iran comes to the table if somehow nothing had happened. This was complete and total obliteration, they're in bad shape. They are way behind today compared to where they were just seven days ago because of what the president did.
Rutte: Marco, can I just alert you to one other aspect? So, the great thing is you took out the nuclear capability of Iran. This was crucial. You did it in a way which is extremely impressive, but the signal sent to the rest of the world that this president, when it comes to it, yes, he's a man of peace. But, if necessary, he is willing to use strength, the enormous strength of the American military. So, I think that signal to the rest of the world, this is far beyond Iran, is extremely important. So, let me also point us to that aspect of what happened.
Trump: They went down; Iran went down to the site afterwards. They said it's so devastated, and they settled when they saw what we did to it. And frankly if we didn't do that, they would have had a lot of ammunition to keep going. They wouldn't have settled. Somebody brought that up and two Iranians went down to see it and they called back and they said this place is gone. So, it's just fake news by CNN, which has got no ratings, it's a failed network. Anybody here from CNN by the way, because you're a really disgraceful network. MSNBC I think is actually worse, but they're all pretty bad. But yours is good, Katie, I'll tell you. You know what Marco reminded me -- he did such a nice job there. It was nine years ago, I had to debate this guy. He was not easy. [Laughter] I think he even got better. But when you were into your little thing, I said this is what I had to debate this guy, you think it's easy debating him? It's not easy.
Question: How long do you think that the Iranian nuclear program has been put back by these strikes, years or -- totally obliterated –
Trump: I think basically decades because I don't think they'll ever do it again. I just don't think they're going to do it. I think they're going to take their oil, they're going to have some missiles, and they'll have some defense. I think they've had it. I mean, they just went through hell, I think they've had it. The last thing they want to do is enrich. They've been trying to do it -- by the way, it's hard to enrich. And you know, when you look at a site like that, very, very hard to build -- very, very hard, very expensive. They spent trillions of dollars trying to do this thing and they didn't come up with it, and we're actually getting along with them very well right now. But had we not succeeded with that hit -- that hit ended the war. That hit ended the war. I don't want to use an example of Hiroshima; I don't want to use an example of Nagasaki; but that was essentially the same thing. That ended that war. This ended that with the war, if we didn't take that out, they would have been -- they'd be fighting right now. Mr. President, if the Iranians do rebuild would the United States – If they rebuild.
Question: Would the United States strike again? And I have a question about Russia.
Trump: Sure. Look, I'm not going to have to worry about that. It's gone for years -- years. Very tough to rebuild because the whole thing has collapsed. In other words, inside it's all collapsed. Nobody can get in to see it because it's collapsed. You can't go in to see a room that has 10 million tons of rock in it and the tunnels are totally collapsed.
Question: What if they rebuild?
Trump: Well, they've already looked at the tunnels. This was an unbelievable hit by genius pilots and genius people in the military. And they're not being given credit for it because we have scum that's in this group and not all of you are -- you're some great reporters. But you have scum. CNN is scum. MSDNC is scum. The New York Times is scum. They're bad people, they're sick. And what they've done is they're trying to make this unbelievable victory into something less. Now even they admit that it was hit very hard, OK, but it wasn't hit hard, it was hit brutally and it knocked it out. The original word that I use, I guess it got us in trouble because it's a strong word, it was obliteration, and you'll see that and it's going to come out. Israel is doing a report on it now I understand. And I was told that they said it was total obliteration. You know they have guys that go in there after the hit and they say it was total obliteration. And you know, I don't want it for me. I want it for the pilots. I want it for the military. They did such a good job. If you were in the situation room with me, with the generals and all of the people that did such a good job and then they get demeaned by these idiots at CNN who can't get ratings. The place is dying; nobody wants to even waste their time going on their shows. So, they form with the New York Times who's dying also. Without Trump, you wouldn't have a New York Times.
Question: And then just changing gears to your meeting with Zelenskyy later today, can you give us any preview of what the two of you might be discussing
Trump: Well, we'll discuss the obvious, we'll discuss his difficulties. He's got a little difficulty, Zelenskyy. He's a nice guy. I mean, I'm going to meet him today. I don't know. I assume we're going to be discussing Ukraine. It seems like the most likely subject.
Question: Is there any restart to talks there or anything that you might do.
Trump: Well, we're going to see. I mean, I've spoken to Putin a lot and he actually was very nice. He volunteered help on, as you know, on Iran. I said no, I don't need help on Iran; I need help on Russia, OK? I said, do me a favor, help us on Russia, not on Iran. But he was very nice. We're going to talk about that. We're going to talk. I think progress is being made. I think great progress is being made on Gaza. I think the -- because of this attack that we made, I think we're going to have some very good news. I was talking to Steve Witkoff, who by the way is terrific and who knows more about this subject than anybody, the subject of what we were just talking about. He was on last night with Jesse and with Laura and with Sean and, boy, he has a -- seems he has a great take on it. He just explains it so easily. He's really very knowledgeable. But he did tell me that Gaza is very close.
Rutte: Donald, we have to go to [Inaudible]
Trump: Oh, OK.
Question: One follow-up on Iran. Both you and Secretary Rubio and Hegseth mentioned the leak, but can you clarify, is the intelligence correct or is the intelligence wrong?
Trump: Well, the intelligence was very inconclusive. The intelligence says we don't know, it could have been very severe. That's what the intelligence says. So, I guess that's correct. But I think we can take that we don't know. It was very severe, it was obliteration. And you think that a media outlet would say isn't that a great thing. I mean, more importantly for the pilots, for the military, you take their guts out, you take their absolute guts out. They had a tremendous attack. It was a complete obliteration. The other team, the other group, Iran, said, let's stop this. And you know what? Israel said it too. Very smart, they fought like hell. And then they said, let's stop and they're going to build themselves -- and I really see it as sticking. I mean, we may do papers on it, Marco, maybe we're going to do papers. I don't even know if you need them. They're not going to be fighting each other. They've had it. They've had a big fight like two kids in a schoolyard. You know, they fight like hell, you can't stop them, let them fight for about 2 or 3 minutes, then it's easy to stop them.
Rutte: Daddy has to sometimes use strong language.
Trump: You have to use strong language. Everyone said, well, you have to use a certain word.
Rutte: I think we have to join the others [Inaudible]
Trump: Yes, we're going to join some other group. Yes, thank you. Katie, one other –
Question: One last question. Do you believe –
Trump: She's so good, but [Inaudible]
Question: Thank you, Mr. President.
Trump: She used to be very difficult for me. Go ahead.
Question: Do you believe that the strike on the Iranian nuclear program will lead to the release of the hostages in Gaza?
Trump: I think that it helped a little bit. It showed a lot of power. Yeah, I think it helped, but we're going to get -- separately, even before this, we were very close to making a deal on Gaza. I think this helped. Yes. OK? Thank you, Katie. Thank you.
Transcript courtesy of CQ Factbase.