Because pakistan is one of the countries and well talk about that as to you know, what your feeling is on that. But we have a situation in pakistan where we want to talk about the polio, the possible polio vaccine and i think well have great meetings and spending a long time together. We have our representatives meeting right after were finished and we just came out. Mr. Prime minister, with tremendous economic numbers in the United States. The best weve had. We have the best economy weve ever had and i think we can shift that over to pakistan and we can do tremendous business together. I look forward to it. And it is an honor to have you. Well, id be looking forward to this meeting against i assumed office as the Prime Minister of pakistan. I think that the United States is vital for pakistan. We have links which have gone back since pakistan became independent. You know, weve been fighting wars together. First, soviet invasion of pakistan was a front line state allied to the u. S. And the war on terror, which was after 9 11. So, i look forward to my conservative. Between pakistan and [inaudible] how do you plan to [inaudible question] okay. Thats a big question. Could go on for hours, that answer. I will say that we have a very Good Relationship with india. I know that your relationship is strained a little bit, maybe a lot, but we will be talking about india for a big part of our conversation today and i think maybe if we can help intercede, do whatever we have to do, but i think its something that could be brought back together and well also be talking about afghanistan. Weve reduced our number of troops there by quite a bit. We are continuing to reduce troops in afghanistan. Were working with pakistan and others on getting an agreement signed, as you know. And well see what happens, but we will be talking about india and afghanistan very much so. Before you say that, how was the relationship with north korea and our i know all about it, i know all with huawei, i know about 5g and were working on it and we have companies that are now getting very, very strong in that department. We are going to have the best 5g in the world. Our Silicon Valley cannot be competed with. Theres nobody that can compete with Silicon Valley for the brain power or what we do and nobody was focused on 5g and now they are. We have Great Companies that go into 5g and a lot of them are happy with what theyre doing. At my request theyre going into 5g. We dont need anything from anybody. The post is reporting about huaweis relationship with north korea. Our relationship with north korea has been good. Weve established a Good Relationship with kim jongun. I have personally. Theres no rocket testing. Theres no missile testing. Were getting our remains back. Weve got our hostages back and we have a very, very Good Relationship, the two of us and thats important. Theres been no Nuclear Testing and what theyre doing with 5g will be, you know, well have to see. Ill find out. And say it again. [inaudible question] i think were going to have a great meeting today and an important meeting. I consider this a very important meeting because i dont think weve met the potential of either country. I think the potential with pakistan and likewise, the opposite way, i think we have not even come close to meeting it. There is tremendous potential between our country and pakistan. I think pakistans going to help us out to extricate ourselves. Were like policemen. If we wanted to fight a war in afghanistan and win it, i could win that war in a week, i just dont want to kill ten million people. Does that make sense to you . I dont want to kill ten million people. I have plans on afghanistan, that if i wanted to win that war, afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the earth, it would be gone. It would be over in literally in ten days, and i dont want to do that, i dont want to go that route. So were working with pakistan and others to extricate ourselves. Nor do we want to be policemen. Because basically were policemen right now. Were not supposed to be police me mepolicemen. Weve been there 19 years in afghanistan, its ridiculous. I have a plan that would win that war in a short period of time, you understand that better than anybody. Weve been in there not fighting to win just fighting to building gas stations, theyre rebuilding schools, the United States, we shouldnt be doing that. Thats for them to do. But what we did and what our leadership got us into is ridiculous, but we will, i think well have some very good answers on afghanistan very quickly. Mr. President the Mueller Report high crimes and misdemeanors go ahead. Does that concern you about wednesday . Pakistani army has [inaudible question] are you going to restore any for pakistan thats right, we were paying 1. 3 billion to pakistan as aid, for many years. The problem was pakistan, this is before pakistan was not doing anything for us. They were really, i think, subversive. They were going against us and this is something that well be i ended that a year and a half ago, 1. 3 billion. To be honest i think we have a better relationship with pakistan right now than we did when we were paying that money, but all of that can come back depending what we work out. Were working out things that are very important. This, i consider this very important. Were working on things that are very, very important and i think at the end of this, at the end of a very short time were going to have a great relationship with pakistan and we should. Its a great country. Its a great theyre great people. I have many friends from pakistan, living in new york i have a lot of pakistani friends, i will tell you that and theyre great people. Smart, tough, they are tough, theres no question about that. Theyre like him, theyre tough. No, im not going to be watching, maybe ill see a little of it. Im not going to be watching mueller because you cant take all those bites out of the apple. We had no collusion, no obstruction. Obstruction. We had no nothing. We had a total collusion finding the democrats were devastated by it. Theyre not lowering drug prices. First time in 53 years drug prices went down, first time in 53 years and im doing it without the help of congress which is tougher to do. I could get drug prices down in half, but the democrats dont care about drug prices, all they care about is a phony investigation where the report was written and it said no collusion. The report was written, and the attorney general based on the report was easily able to find there was no obstruction. Theres no nothing. Theyre wasting their time and robert mueller, i know hes conflicted, theres a lot of conflicts hes got including the fact that his best friend is comey, but hes not conflicts with me, too, hes got big conflicts with me. As you know, he wanted the job of the fbi director, he didnt get it and we had a business relationship where i said no, and i would say that he wasnt happy, then all of a sudden he gets this position, but you know what . He still ruled i respect him for him, ruled no collusion, no obstruction, and this thing has been going on two and a half years and we are never going to allow this to happen to another president again most wouldnt be able to take it. On top of everything else, we have the strongest economy, we were just discussing this with the Prime Minister. We have the strongest economy that the United States has ever had, we have the highest stock market yesterday, literally, the highest stock market weve ever had on friday, thursday, weve broken the record, i think 109 times for highest stock market, but on, i believe thursday of last week, we hit the alltime highest in the history of our country. Our countries is doing phenomenally well. Unemployment is the lowest in 51 years. Soon to be the lowest in history. If it keeps going this way in a short period of time. Black, hispanic, asian, unemployment the lowest in history. Women the lowest in 72 years, nobody is ever done what weve done. Nobodys done in two and a half years what weve done, the biggest tax cuts in history, the biggest regulation cuts in history. So many things for health care. We got rid of the individual mandate, which was the worst part of obamacare it could end up if we end up winning the house back, we keep the presidency, we should keep the senate, we should keep the presidency i would think easy when you have the strongest economy in the history of our country and somebodys going to run against that particular president even though in this case its me. In theory i have a big advantage, i dont know. Im going to have to ask you. But in theory i have a big advantage so a lot of great things are happening. But the democrats, they dont want to talk about that they want to stay off the economy subject and what theyre doing is just hearing after hearing after hearing. Its nonsense, okay . They tried an Impeachment Vote and got slaughtered last week, they got absolutely slaughtered the most ridiculous i didnt know they were going to do it and ill tell you in finishing. I have a lot of respects for the democrats most voted against impeachment last week. And i have a lot of respect for those democrats that did that because theyre doing the right thing for the country. No collusion. No obstruction. Okay. A deal soon were talking about it, secretary mnuchin is talking about, very good talks with speaker of the house nancy pelosi, and good talks with schumer and kevin, kevin mccarthy, we are, i think, doing very well on debt. If you look at debt limit, however you want to define that, but were doing well on that and i think were doing pretty well on a budget. Very important that we take care of our military, our military was depleted and in the last two and a half years weve undepleted it, okay, to put it mildly. We have made it stronger than ever before, we need another big year. So we had 700 billion, we had then 716 billion. And this year were going to be asking for a number slightly larger than that. Were putting our military back to the shape that its never been in before. The best missiles in the world ap the best equipment in the world, the best military equipment, the submarines the finest, nobody can think about what were competing with what were building. We have new submarines. A new Aircraft Carrier coming on large, the largest ship in the world. So large maybe i could even land a plane on top of it, okay, but its a big one. President gerald ford. Its a phenomenal, phenomenal ship. So, what were doing what were doing is incredible things for our country and just about and i might i might say this about the military equipment. Its all made in the usa, everything, 100 . All made in the usa and you know, its one of the reasons our job numbers probably are so good. Lowest unemployment. Yeah. Yeah. [inaudible question] so i cant say yet because so far he has not extended me an invitation and after todays meeting maybe he wont. But have a feeling he might. Id love to go to pakistan. Is there any time frame of u. S. Troops withdrawal are you talking about from afghanistan . Yes. Yeah, we have already withdrawn quite a few and were doing it very slowly, very safely, and were working with pakistan and with, as you know, were negotiating with the taliban, and we are doing, i think, very well in that regard. Again, its something we could do. We could go one of two ways. We could do a number the likes of which weve never seen before and win it quickly. I dont want to do that. I dont want to do that because youre talking about millions of people and i dont want to do that. And were working with pakistan on getting a solution. And i think, i think its being worked very well, wouldnt you say . On afghanistan well, i dont know, were moving a lot of them out, and weve done what were supposed to do. Weve been there for 19 years and weve acted as policemen, not soldiers. And again, if we wanted to be soldiers, it would be over in ten days. One week to ten days if we wanted to, but i have not chosen that. Why are we why would we kill millions of people . It wouldnt be fair in terms of humanity it wouldnt be fair. So, were doing very well and i think that pakistan is going to be a big help. [inaudible question] say it. The Prime Minister, same question to you, in order to bring peace in afghanistan. You see, this is the closest weve been to a peace in afghanistan and there is as the president said, if you go all out military there will be millions and millions of people who will die. And there is only one solution and i feel and i feel we will discuss this, its the closest we have been to a peace deal. And we hope that in the coming days we will be able to urge the taliban to speak to come to a political solution. And what the Prime Minister excuse me, what the Prime Minister just said is a very big story. And thats 100 true. Weve made a lot of progress over the last couple of weeks and pakistan has helped us with that progress, but a lot of great things are happening. A lot of things are happening to the United States, and i think a lot of great things are happening for pakistan, too, under your leadership. I really feel that. Okay . With Armed Conflict . I think that iran doesnt know where they are. Ive been watching and reading a lot of reports and right now theyre a very mixed up country. They dont know whether theyre coming or going. They have tremendous problems, economically. Their country is in turmoil. Theyre having demonstrations all over iran and their inflation rates of 75 . They have a lot of problems so whatever it is it is. Im just going to sit back and wait. Lets see what happens, but i will say theyre doing very poorly as a country. And well see what happens. We did actually cause they said no, its a redishes countries or religious leaders, but they lie a lot. We did shoot down unfortunately we had to shoot down a drone. The drone came down. You know how it came down, with a new technology thats actually quite amazing, but we took down one of their drones. Instead of saying, yeah, that happened. They lied, they said it didnt happen so theres a lot of proof. Its called take a look at it on the ocean floor. Just go down there, take your scuba gear and go down one of you would do that, i know. We took down a drone. I think very importantly, i read a report today about cia, thats totally a false story, another lie. They put out propaganda, they put out lie. I dont think that pakistan would ever do a thing like that. Pakistan never lied. But iran does, unfortunately, so lets see what happens with iran. We are ready for the absolute worst and were ready for sense, too, were geared up and they are really the number one state of terror in the world. Now, i have to say theyve pulled back because their money is running very low. The deal that president obama made was a disaster because it was such a shortterm, it didnt could have Ballistic Missiles and they couldnt see the important sites. Under this you couldnt inspector the important sites and many things wrong and of course gave 150 billion plus 1. 8 billion in green, green beautiful cash. Thats call many i think that pakistan would like to have some of that cash, but they gave 1. 8 billion in cash which is unthinkable and instead of being respectful and thankful, which frankly they should have been to the United States and to president obama for making that ridiculous deal, unstead of being respectful, they put their finger up in the air and this finger, the thumb, they put their finger up in the air and they disrespected the United States. They shouldnt have done that. Thats a big mistake. One of the best things ive done is terminate that ridiculous deal. If they want to make a deal, its frankly, its getting harder for me to want to make a deal with iran because theyve behaved very badly, theyre saying bad things, and ill tell you, it could go either way, very easily. Very easily, and im okay either way it goes. [inaudible question] i like that much better than our report the question is what do you think pakistan could do in 18 years and you have so much hope now you mean what they didnt do to end the war . Well, i dont think that pakistan look, i dont think pakistan respected the United States. I dont think pakistan respected its president s, and i think pakistan could have done a lot. I think that pakistan can do tremendous amount with respect to afghanistan. They didnt do it and i dont blame them because theyre dealing with the wrong president , who knows. But i think that pakistan could have gone, theyre helping us a lot now. I think they could have helped us a lot in the past. We have a new leader, going to be a great leader of pakistan, sort of new, two and a half years now, getting to be three years. Can you believe it . Youre going to find time flies. But, no, i think that pakistan could have done a lot and they chose not to and thats because they did not respect u. S. Leadership. Well, ill let you know that very quickly. Ill let you know. Im going to know soon. Its not going to be like a longterm thing. I figure things out very quickly and the question was, its fully the best question youve asked in a long time. Always asking mueller, mueller, mueller. Shes been asking this mueller thing for three years. Your best question so i have to focus on that. Thats a great question. I think pakistan is going to do a lot. I really do. I think that pakistan is going to make a big difference. I think that pakistan will save millions of lives in afghanistan because i really believe they can they have a power that other nations dont have with respect to afghanistan. And i will say as of this moment, theyre working very hard and very nicely. [inaudible question] protesters in hong kong and these long going protests being beaten by gangs, and essentially, the hong kong and Chinese Government sort of looking the other way and allowing the protesters to be beaten. Have you seen any of that footage and briefed on that. I have and i know president xi, were working on trade deals right now. Well see what happens. In the meantime theyre paying us billions and billions in tariffs, which is fine with me, but i know that theyre working i know that its a very important situation for president xi and you know, you could say what you said, but you could also say that he has allowed that to go on for a long time and you know, its been its been relatively, i think its been relatively nonviolent. Do you believe that protesters should be allowed to protest on the streets of hong kong . Well, they are. They are. I dont think that china stopped them. China could stop them if they wanted. I think that, again, im not involved in it very much, but i think that president xi of china has acted responsibly, very responsibly. Theyve been out there protesting for a long time. Ive never seen protests where theres been that many people, it looks like two million people, but i hope that president xi will do the right thing, but its going on a long time, theres no question. [inaudible question] do you have anybody you want to take a question from . Mr. Prime minister, [inaudible question] so what solution, what have to pu push the process in afghanistan and show to the u. S. Number one, this is the longest war that the United States has ever fought. Its almost 19 years. Number two, i am one of those who always believed that there was solution because anyone who knows the history of afghanistan you just have to look back at the history. There was always going to be a political settlement at the end. And i have to compliment President Trump because he has not forced people to end the war, to have a settlement, and thats where i think pakistan is playing a very Important Role because pakistan has a 1500 mile border with afghanistan, and all the areas where the trouble is, which is eastern side. This is a critical time. Im looking forward to my talks with President Trump. We have our military leadership here because this is obviously a security situation and what we want is understanding between the two countries. I can assure President Trump that whatever we will be saying will be the we will be evaluate with them, there will never be any questions on pakistans intent. Because apart from afghanistan, the country that wants peace in afghanistan more than any other country is pakistan because we get directly affected by it and pakistan needs stability. We have had 15 years of fighting this war on terror over 70,000 pakistani casualties. Over 150 billion lost to the economy so we desperately want peace and im happy that President Trump has pushed this forward so we hope im looking forward. [inaudible question] now are you going to [inaudible] okay, hes got it. I will be asking President Trump, its the most powerful country in the world, the United States. It can play the most Important Role in bringing peace in the subcontinent. There are over a billion and a quarter people in the subcontinent. Theyre held hostage to the issue, and i feel that only the most powerful state headed by President Trump can bring the two countries together. From my point, i can tell you, we have tried our best. We make all overtures to dialog and unfortunately we havent made headway as of yet, but im hoping that President Trump will push this. So i was with Prime Minister modi two weeks ago and we talked about this subject and he actually said would you like to be a mediator or arbitrator, i said where . Casimir, its been going on many, many years. 70 years. I think it can be resolved, id love to be a med mediator. That two countries cant solve a problem like that. If you would want to me to mediate or arbitrate, i would be willing to do that. President , i can tell you that right now, you will have the prayers of over a billion people if you can mediate and resolve the issue. It should be resolved, but he asked you the same thing so i think its something, maybe well speak to him or im speak to him because ive heard something about kazmir, its supposed to be a beautiful part of the world and bombs all over, they say everywhere you go there are bombs going on many years, if i can do anything to help that let me know. Let me give you one thing on afghanistan as an example. A lot of you dont know this, but we dropped the largest nonnuclear bomb ever built in history. We dropped it in afghanistan. We were getting ready to make many of those bombs. This left a hole that was it took out a lot of the tunnels and everything else, but left a hole in the earth that looked like the moon, like a crater from the moon, still there. Nobodys ever seen anything like it. People heard it 15 miles away. They said what was that . It shook the earth. Nonnuclear, the largest ever made by far and they were going to make many of them and i said no. We dont have to i dont want to drop that. I dont want to do that. So many easy solutions. Thats actually the easy solution and theyd come in and say, lets have peace, but you dont have to do that. I think were going to be very successful without having to go that route and i have tremendous confidence in the Prime Minister. About one or two more, go ahead, go ahead, please. I am going to raise the issue of [inaudible question] freedom of the press in and on the journalists. Go ahead. Pakistan press, to call Pakistan Press as if there are pakistan has one of the Freest Presses in the world. All you have to do is, since ive been the Prime Minister in the last ten months, i mean, the criticism i have received from my own press, unprecedented. And so to say that theyre curbed Pakistan Press is a joke. When you say unprecedented wait a minute, wait, wait. Theres no way youre treated worse than i am. [laughter] that cant be. Youre going to have to speak because i didnt hear your words. First of all, im going the Freedom Freedom of the press . [inaudible] we will do that, were talking about hostages. Were talking about hostages being held at various places, ive had very good luck with hostages, with north korea, with many places, theyve treated us with respect and i appreciate it, made it big difference. We have two or three hostages that were talking about, thats one. Yes gentleman that weve heard about and well be discussing that with many other subjects. And President Trump just a minute. President trump, we will be giving you good news about the two hostages. Thank you. [inaudible question] okay. Go ahead. Ask it again. Where you escalated with the four congresswomen well, i think theyre very bad for our country. I think they must hate our congress. I think the four congressmen were talking about the congresswomen what theyre said about israel, about our country when they talk about disgusting people, when they talk the way they talk, when the one mentioned that brown people should speak for brown people and muslim should speak for muslim people, and you hear all this, its not what our country is all about. No, i think theyre very bad for our country, i think theyre bad for the democrat party, i think you see that and theyre pulling the democrats way left. Nobody knows how to handle them. I feel theyre easy to handle. To me theyre easy to handle theyre just out there. Theyre very bad for our country, absolutely. No, i dont think, no, no, no racial tension. No, no, theres no racial tension. Look, i had my best numbers recently and its because of the economy and what ive done for the africanamerican. When you look at africanamericans are doing better than theyve ever done in our country. Were creating numbers. Look at the poverty numbers. Look at so many different look at unemployment numbers, the best theyve ever had. No, we have fantastic relationships with the africanamerican community. Certainly youre going to see that in 2020, i believe. They say that youre going to win the 2020 election and youre obviously very confident about that. Sir, you are also having a big war against corruption in pakistan would you can you give a comment on that . I think hes going to win. What whats going to happen hes got a little ways to wait. Im going to campaign for you, im going to help him win [inaudible question] Prime Minister has said that pakistan is looking for are you willing. Yes. [inaudible] i agree and i think thats very true, thats a very good question. The answer is, yes, i see great trade with pakistan and im not talking about a little bit more, im talking we can go ten and 20 times that were doing now. Pakistan is a big country. Its actually a very big country and they have tremendous product. They make great products. They make tremendous i bought from pakistan over the years when i was in the private sector. They make incredible product. Brilliant people, hardworking people and fantastic trade relationship. I dont mean increase by 20 . You could go ten times more, 20 times more. What we do now is not much and we should do a lot. And it has so much to do with great peace, having a trade trading relationship has to do with peace and extremism, i think it can i think we will within a short period of time start having very significant trade with pakistan. Scheduled at this point since you met with kim jongun no, we just have a very Good Relationship and probably they would like to meet and well see what happens. There was a little correspondence recently, positive correspondence with north korea. Theres no Nuclear Testing, no missile testing, nothing. I think na when theyre ready, when theyre ready well be. Go ahead. [inaudible question] well, things discussed that would be for afterwards. Well discuss. Well be discussing it. Mr. President people from europe and other places and [inaudible] i think i can very well. I have a very Good Relationship with Prime Minister modi and i think were going to have a phenomenal relationship with the Prime Minister of pakistan. I do think that its a twoway street. You know, you say india is coming in and destabilizing pakistan, but india is saying that pakistan is destabilizing. Theres a way to right now did he step down . Look, hes a terrible governor. I think you have an even worse mayor of san juan, shes horrible. I think shes horrible. I watched her. My people did nothing, but complain about her when we helped them with their hurricane problem. The mayor of san juan, puerto rico is a horror show. Shes incompetent, grossly incompetent. At the same time the governors not good. So the United States congress, you wont believe this, please close your ears because this would be gave puerto rico 92 billion dollars last year for hurricane relief. Now, they havent gotten the money all of it, gotten a lot of it, but scheduled to get the congress of the United States handed them 92 billion dollars and that 92 billion dollars is in the hand of incompetent people, and very corrupt people, but the governors done a terrible job and the mayor of san juan has shes horrible, i think shes terrible. So bad for her people, and i think the government of the United States have to be careful, im the best thing that ever happened to puerto rico because we did a great job in puerto rico. They dont like to give me the credit for it, but we did a great job. I have Many Puerto Rican friends, i have a real understanding of puerto rico. Ive had jobs in puerto rico. I had i think the most successful i owned the Miss Universe contest, pageants and we had them in puerto rico twice and i tell you, we had tremendous successes. In fact, they said literally 100 , this never happens, almost, i think it was close to 100. But 100 of the island itself was watching, they liked those pageants so ive had a great relationship with puerto rico. Im the best thing that ever happened to puerto rico, but congress has given them 92 billion, pakistan would like some of that, 92. Not 1. 3 because pakistan was getting 1. 3. 92 billion dollars and the money is squandered and wasted and stolen and i tell you what, the senators are not happy about it and congress is not happy about it because you really do, you have incompetent, totally grossly incompetent leadership at the top of puerto rico. The people of puerto rico are great. And the people of puerto rico, like me, and they should because nobody has given them what i give them. But the leadership is corrupt and incompetent. Thank you very much, everybody. [inaudible questions] where did that come from . No, well, that was okay, but the one before it. Im very impressed. Thank you, everybody. Thank you, thank you. Mr. President this way, thank you. The senate is back in to work on a number of executive nominations at noon eastern, lawmakers are expect today old a confirmation vote on mark esper to be the next secretary of defense. And also the f. A. A. Nominee. The house passed 9 11 Victim Compensation fund bill. Youre watching live coverage of the senate here on cspan2. The president pro tempore the senate will come to order. The chaplain, dr. Black, will lead the senate in prayer. The chaplain let us pray. Lord of the harvest, we continue to seek you, for we desire to please you. You, o god, are our light and salvation, so we refuse to be afraid. As our lawmakers seek to walk with integrity, provide them with a