mexico and canada, and it's now before them and they'll have to make a decision. but that's one the farmers love, the manufacturers love, the unions love. it's a great deal for this country, and nafta was i think one of the worst trade deals ever made. made the wto was worse, the wto from the time that happened in '95. from the time that happened china baem like a rocket ship. it was pretty much flat lined and all of a sudden it joined the wto and they became -- i mean they went through the roof. and very much to our liability it's -- we lost tremendous amounts of money over the -- from that time we just lost tremendous amounts. it was a terrible deal, wto world trade. and if you look at nafta, nafta has been a disaster for our country. the usmca is a great deal for our country. i think canada is happy, but they're not happy like we're happy, but they're very happy. it's a good deal for canada, a good deal for mexico. mexico just approved it, and canada is waiting for us to approve it. and it's with the prime minister just left him a little while ago, and they're thrill would the deal and everybody wants it. and hopefully it'll be a bipartisan deal. i told that to nancy pelosi. i said view this as a bipartisan deal because a lot of democrats want it i would say especially the farmers but really the industrial areas also. the unions, we have things on wages and the environment that few people have ever been able to get into an agreement. and it's a very big deal. it's a very big deal, and it's a great deal. tremendous support so they have to put it up for a vote, and i think you'll get a great vote in the house and you'll get a great vote in the senate. and you'll have a tremendous trade deal between the united states and canada and mexico. and it's going to be something very special. so we spent a lot of time with a lot of countries. we do business with a lot of them. australia is an example. japan, we're negotiating with them because they send us millions of cars and we send them wheat, which doesn't work. but what happens is japan is -- you saw some of the things you're doing, but they're opening up many car companies and factories and plants throughout our country especially in michigan. we have a lot of activity in ohio. beyond japan activity we have a lot of activity now where companies are coming pack to our country with the hottest show in town. we're the hottest show in the world right now. our economy is one thing that virtually every leader i dealt with said congratulations, it's incredible what's happened to the american economy. we're the best economy in the world. and it started from election day. i put it out yesterday because we took a trumepd s boost from the day after i got elected, the stock market went crazy from that point until essentially now. we hit the all-time high again for many, many times. i can't tell you what it was but many, many times we broke the record. and we're -- our stock market is great, our jobs are great. we're at the best job numbers essentially we've had the minimum you could say is in 51 years but now it's going to be more than that. african-american, asian-american, you saw that. hispanic, american. the best numbers in history, the history of our country we have the lowest unemployment numbers, the best number. and many other steel blue collar workers are doing fantastic. they're the biggest beneficiary of the tax cuts. blue collar, we talk about for the rich and it's really for everybody. and it's also for big companies when they're moving here. and remember who owns the stocks because the people who own the stock it's not the big companies but numbers whose 401 ks are at all different numbers that are tremendously high where the other spouse thinks that the spouse that's investing in the 401k is a super genius, but those 401 ks are very high, but if you've been listening to what i've been listening to but with that kind of attitude their 401ks would crash and the market would crash. because what they want to do you would crash the market and the amount of wealth that would be lost would be incredible. but i'd rather wait until later in the campaign to say that, because to be honest with you i want them to go and take these policies -- i don't want them to change them anytime soon. but it's very interesting to watch what's happening. with that, we'll take a few questions and then i'm heading out to south korea. and i may or may not see kim jong-un, but we'll be heading out to south korea, spend about a day and a half there with president moon who's a really good guy. i saw him, i met with him also, and we'll see what happens. >> mr. president, thanks so much for joining us here. we all appreciate it. it's always good to ask questions directly. can you tell us more how this china deal may work going forward because chinese officials have told fox news they will not make concessions until all the tariffs have been lifted. they want huawei, want you to take it off the black list. they want you to stop pursuing extradition. can you tell us how you see all this unfolding and if you do meet kim jong-un at the dmz tomorrow would you step across the border with north korea? >> sure, i feel very comfortable doing that. i would have no problem. with respect to china, basically we agreed today we were going to continue the negotiation, which i ended a while back. and we're going to continue the negotiation. we agreed i would not be putting tariffs on the $325 billion that i would the ability to put on if i wanted. that we're -- you know, we're fairly advanced depending on where you want to look at and where you want to start, pretty advanced. we discussed -- we did discuss numerous other thing. we mentioned huawei. i said we'll have to save that to the very end. we'll have to see. one of the things i will allow, however, a lot of people are surprised we send and we sell to huawei a tremendous amount of product that goes into the various things they make. and i said that's okay, we will keep selling that product. these are american companies, john, that make product. and that's very complex, by the way. highly scientific, and in some cases we're the ones that do it, and we're the only ones that do it. we're the only ones with technology. what we've done in silicon valley is amazing actually, and nobody's been able to compete with it. and pretty easily i've agreed to allow them to continue to sell that product so american companies will continue. and they were having a problem, the companies were not exactly happy they couldn't sell because they had nothing to do with whatever was potentially happening with respect to huawei. so i did do that. we talked about education and students. someone was saying it was harder for chinese students to come in, and that's something that if it were, if somebody viewed it that way, i don't. we want to have chinese students come and use our great schools our great universities. we did discuss it. it was brought up as a point and i said that would be just like anybody else, just like any other nation. and we're actually going to a point where we're looking for you graduate from a college because our great companies would talk about silicon valley and other places, we have a problem in our country that you graduate number one in your class from the best school in the country and they say you have to leave. we can't keep them. and we're going to make it -- we're going to call it the smart persons waiver, but we're going to make it so that they can not only stay but maybe they have access to green cards. we've got to keep these people here. sure, that could happen. but we're holding on tariffs and they're going to buy foreign product. but that could happen, john. this doesn't mean there's going to be a deal but they would like to make a deal. i can tell you that. and if we could make a deal, it would be a historic event. we've never had a deal with china. we've had tremendous deficits, tremendous amounts of money was put into china, 500 million a year. and i mean not just surplus and deficit, i'm talking about real hard cash. and it should have never, ever been allowed to happen for all of our presidents over the last number of years. go ahead, please. >> yes, mr. president. from the voice of america. after your discussions with prime minister abe here are you still thinking about withdrawing from the u.s.-japan security treaty, and what did the prime minister say to you about that? >> no, i'm not thinking about that at all. i'm just saying it's an unfair agreement and i've told him that for the last six months i've said, look, if somebody attacks japan, we go after them, and we are in a battle full force. in effect, we are locked in a battle and committed to fight for japan. if somebody should attack the united states, they don't have to do that. that's unfair. that's the kind of deals we made. every deal's like that. i mean it's almost like we had people that they didn't either care or they were stupid. but that's the kind of deals we have. that's just typical. i told them, i said we're going to have to change it because, look, nobody's going to attack us i hope. but, you know, should that happen, it's far more likely it could be the other way. but should that happen and somebody attacks us, if we're helping them they're going to have to help us and he knows that, and he's going to have no problem with that. yes, please. >> thank you, mr. president. i actually have a russia question, but i wanted to quickly clarify is -- case also going to need to wait until the very end, or is it possible the u.s. would want to drop the extradition. >> what? >> ms. may from -- >> we did discuss huawei, but we didn't discuss her situation. >> thank you. on russia respectfully it seemed like maybe you didn't really mean it when you said yesterday don't meddle in our elections, mr. president and then you start laughing. >> you're going to have to take a look at the words. i did say it, and we had actually a great discussion president putin and myself. i thought it was really a trumenace discussion. i think they'd like to do trade with the united states and they have great product. they have great land. they have very rich land, a lot of oil and minerals and the kind of things we like. and i can see trade with russia, we could do fantastically well. we do very little trade with russia frankly. so i could see some positive things happening. as for your question, though, i did say it and i did discuss it a little bit after that, too. >> yesterday former president jimmy carter suggested your presidency is illegitimate and you only got the white house with help from russia. >> russia, russia, isn't it crazy? jimmy carter, look, he was a nice man. he was a terrible president. he's a democrat, and it's a typical talking point. he's loyal to the democrats, and i guess you should be. but as everybody now understands i won not because of russia, not because of anybody but myself. i went out, i campaigned better, smarter, harder than hillary clinton. i went to wisconsin. i went to michigan the night of the vote. i had 32,000 people at 1:00 in the morning on election day. i won michigan, i won wisconsin, i won pennsylvania. i won states that traditionally haven't been won by a republican, for many years haven't been won by a republican. and this had nothing to do with anybody but the fact i worked harder and much smarter than hillary clinton did. now, i'll say this. jimmy carter, i was surprised that he would make a statement -- i saw it, it was not a big thing but i saw the statement. a lot of democrats like to make that statement. he's been trashed within his own party. i felt bad for him because you look over the years he's virtually like the forgotten president. and i understand why they say that. he was not a good president. look at what happened with iran. that was a disaster. what iran did to him, they tied him up in knots. the reason ronald reagan probably became president. so, you know, it's a democrat talking point. yeah, please, go ahead. jim. >> yes, mr. president, if i could follow-up on the question about your comments with vladimir putin about russia meddling. you did seem to be joking there with the russian president. are we taking that to be wrong? and what is it with your coziness with some of these dictators and autocrats at these summits? with mohammed bin salman the crown prince of saudi arabia, when you were asked about the case of jamal khashoggi, you did not respond to that question -- were you afraid of offending him on that subject? >> no, not at all. i don't really care about offending people. i sort of thought you'd know that. >> well, you passed up an opportunity -- >> by the way, congratulations. i understand you have a book. is it doing well? >> it's doing well. >> i want to see it. send me a copy. no, i get along with everybody except you people, actually. i get along with a lot of people. i have a tremendous relationship with president xi. nobody else would have the deal that we have. we're getting tens of billions of dollars from china coming in, and despite that we're moving along towards something that could be very historic. but i get along with president putin, with mohamed from saudi arabia. look, i spoke to saudi arabia when the oil prices a year ago were getting very high. and i wasn't so nice. and i said you've got to get some more oil into the system because what's happening is no good. and they did, and people are driving at, you know, very low numbers right now. in the old days you'd have spikes where the gasoline went to $5 and more and it wasn't so good. but i also get along with people that would be perceived as being very nice. you have a lot of very nice leaders of countries -- wait a minute, i was with prime minister may today. i was with so many. you take a look, the new head of australia, look at japan. abe, prime minister abe is fine -- they're all fine. some are stronger than others, some tough than others. >> it i may though, mr. president, on the case of jamal khashoggi you have a lot of journalists in this that reject to be the saudi governments assassination and dismembering of a journalist. and when you were given the opportunity to call mohammed bin salman out on that you did not do it. did you do it privately, and do you agree that it is despicable for a government to kill a journalist? >> yes, i do. i think it's horrible or anybody else, by the way. but i think it's horrible. and if you look into saudi arabia you see what's happening. 13 people or so have been prosecuted. others are being prosecuted. they've taken it very, very seriously and they will continue to. i'm very unhappy about that whole event. and right now in saudi arabia they're prosecuting additional people. there's a lot of things happening. at the same time i will also say -- and nobody said -- nobody so far has pointed directly a finger at the future king of saudi arabia. i will say i spoke to his father. jim, i spoke to his father in great length. they've been a terrific ally. they're creating millions of jobs in this country. they're order not only military equipment frut $400 billion worth and actually even more than that over a period of time worth of different things. and with that being said i'm extremely angry and unhappy about a thing like that taking place. but as of this moment more than 13 people are being prosecuted, and i hear the number is going to be going up. but it's a good question. yes, please. >> thank you, mr. president. with shanghai media group. very quickly you note the further escalations of trade tensions with china, and cuyou share some details with your interaction with president xi this time? and also if i may another quick question on north korea. do you think it's possible there will be a third one-on-one summit with chairman kim within this year ? >> it might happen tomorrow. we won't call it summit, we might call it handshake. i wouldn't mind doing it at all. i'm literally visiting the dmz and so -- but i will for your question about president xi, he's a brilliant leader and brilliant man. you know better than i he's probably considered to be one of the great leaders in 200 years in china, and we just have a very -- he's strong, he's tough, but he's good -- we have a very good relationship. and i said, you know, we can't have it where the united states loses this kind of money for the privilege of building up china. it has to be a fair deal. and he understands that. but as you said nobody ever came to us. it's true, no other president came to him. m presidency could be a lot easier not only for that but many other reasons. it's a point in time. i have a chance to do things nobody else has ever done. so we're making a deal with china or we're attempting. and if we don't we'll go back into, you know, we have a tremendous right field of tremendous money that would be coming into our country. but i have a feeling over a period of time, and again i'm not rushed and i told him that i want to get the deal right. it's extremely i wouldn't even say complicated but very intricate. but in the meantime i think our farmers are going to end up being the great beneficiary. and what i did with the farmers because they did lose a certain amount of money, i went to sonny perdue our secretary of agriculture and said how much money in the best year did china spend on our farms, in our farms buying? he said the best year, about $16 billion. i said, okay, well we're taking in much more than that now every year in tariffs. and i took $16 billion out of those tariffs and -- essentially out of those tariffs, and we're distributing it among farmers who have been hurt because they've been used as a pawn so that china could get a good deal. but in the end the farmers are going to be the biggest beneficiary. but i've made up for the fact that china was, you know, targeting our farmers because they know the farmers like me and i like them. i love them. and they sort of love me, i guess, when you get right down to it. and it was $16 billion, that's a lot of money. but i took it out of the tariff money essentially and we are in the process of distributing it. the farmers could not be happier, other than they're unusual. i had them around the table, many of the farmers and about five weeks ago they said we don't want money, we want just a level playing field. i said you're right, most groups want money. any way you want to give it to them, they'll take. the farmers are nat class by themselves in so many ways. they don't want subsidies, a hand out. all they want to do is have level playing field. they're unbelievable people and unbelievable patriots. >> you made a personal invitation to kim jong-un. will it be a bad sad if he doesn't show up? >> i thought about that. everyone is going to say oh, he was stood up by chairman kim. it's very hard to -- he follows my twitter and it's very hard -- >> he does. >> we got to call very quickly. a lot of people follow it, but you know they've contacted us and they'd like to see if they can do -- and we're not talking about extended. just a quick hello. and we get along. i get along with him and i get along with other people. like, you know, for instance on jim's question it's a fair question, but i really have great relationships with everybody. i think, you know, i said a long time ago maybe i'll be a sleeper on foreign policy. and if you look at what's happening on foreign policy, now we are working on iran. we'll see what happens. i think they'd be very smart to make a deal. but we're going to see what happens. i have all the time in the world. they're doing very poorly and brutal when i first came in. 18 sites of confliction, meaning where they were behind. but i think on foreign policy if you look at what's happening, and we're not being taken for suckers anymore. we have countries where we'd lose on defending that because we defend a tremendous percentage of the world, and they don't pay us for it. and on top of it, we lose money with that same country on trade, and it's changing. and they understand it's changing and they expect it to change. they can't believe honestly like i'd ask prime minister abe, how does this happen where you'd send us billion and billions worth of cars and we'd send you practically nothing, and he said nobody ever complained. same thing with china. i said, you know, you send a car to us, we charge you essentially nothing, it's 2.5%. but there are ways around that. we send a car to you made in the united states and we have to pay a 45% tariff. how did that happen? he said we just kept lifting it, lifting it, lifting it. i mean they're being honest with me. we kept lifting it and nobody called but i called. >> you at least some of the democratic debate. i'm sure you saw the exchange between joe biden and kamala harris on the issue of federally mandated busing. biden thought that was a bad policy, he tried to stop it. kamala harris said it was an important part of desegregation including in her own experience. where do you stand on that issue of federally mandated busing? >> first of all, before i get into that i thought she was given too much credit. he didn't do well, certainly. and maybe the facts weren't necessarily on his side. i think she was given too much credit for what she did. was it that outstanding? and i think he was hit harder probably than he should have been hit. and as far as that i will tell you in about four weeks because we're coming out with a certain policy that's going to be very interesting and very surprising i think to a lot of people. jennifer, do you have a question? >> but do you think kamala harris would be a tough opponent for you given what you saw in that debate? >> you never know who's going to be tough. you never know. one you think is going to be tough turns out to be not much. and i've seen it. because i had 17 -- we had actually a total of 18, a lot of people think 17, governor of virginia, remember. of the 18 many of them were -- all of their lives they wanted to be politicians. i never thought about being a politician until two days before i decided to run, a little before that but not too much before. you look at some of them, they're very talented. and sometimes the one i thought would be the toughest were not the toughest at all. i could write a book -- i should write a book. we had 18 and i guess they have 24, 25. but some of the ones i thought would be absolutely without question the toughest turned out -- i didn't think they were tough at all. i think she was given far too much credit for what she did. that was so far-out of it can what she said and i think it was right out of a box. and i thought that he did respond great. i wouldn't say -- this is not winston churchill we're dealing with, okay? but it wasn't i don't think nearly as bad as they portended it to be. jennifer, go ahead. >> thank you, mr. president. could i clarify your negotiations and what you agree to with china on huawei. did you agree that huawei can sell to the u.s. or u.s. companies can sell -- >> u.s. companies can sell their equipment to huawei. you're talking about equipment where there's no great national emergency problem with it, but the u.s. companies can sell their equipment so we have a lot of the great kaecompanies that e extremely complex equipment. we're letting them sell to huawei. >> and then on turkey, sir. will turkey face sanctions if it goes ahead with the s-40 purchases? >> so turkey is an interesting case. there's another one, jim, i get along well with and he's a tough cookie. president erdogan. he's tough, but i get along with him. maybe that's a bad thing, but i think it's a really good thing because frankly he wanted to wipeout -- he has a big problem with the kurds as everyone knows. and he had a 65,000-man army at the border and he was going to wipeout the kurds who helped us with isis. we have 100% of the caliphate. and i called him and i asked him not to do that. they are i guess natural enemies of his or turkey's. and he hasn't done it. they were lined up to go out and wipeout the people that we just defeated, the isis caliphate, and i said you can't do that, you can't do it. and he didn't do it. so i have a relationship, and let me tell you he goes out during the obama administration. he wants to buy our patriot missile. they wouldn't sell it to him. in theory he could be an ally if he respected the president and he's got a big army. they're fighters. turkey, big fighters. and we're working on the idlib province together because he doesn't want see 3 million people and near do i in syria. that was another thing i mentioned to president putin. i think if i didn't put out a statement six months ago, that would have been catastrophic. but they have 30,000 terrorists in idlib province. you have 3 million people, and, you know, getting terrorists is okay. but you don't want to kill 3 million people or a million people to get the terrorists. anyway, so we get along great. but what happened with turkey -- and i will tell you when it's fair or not fair. he wanted to buy the patriot missile. president obama's group said, no. he kept wanting to buy it, they kept saying no, no, no. couldn't buy it. he needed it for defense. so he then went to russia and he bought the s400. this administration previous to mine would not let him buy it. so he goes out, he goes to russia, and he makes a deal for the s400 and let's assume it's not nearly as good but he paid a lot of money, put up a lot of money and he bought it. as soon as he bought it, people went back to him from our country and they said, listen, we don't want you to use that system because it's not the nato system, et cetera, et cetera. we don't want you to use that system. do us a favor, there was nothing he could do. in the meantime he brought over 100 f-35s, the greatest fighter jet in the world. it's stealth. you can't see it. it's really hard to see it when you can't see it. i think he bought over 116, and now he wants delivery. he's paid a tremendous amount of money up front to our company, our jobs, everything, and now they're saying he's using the s400 system which is incompatible with our system and russia and other people can gain access into the genius of the f-35. but honestly i'm all for our country but he got treated very unfairly. all of a sudden he ends up going and getting something else. and then they said first they said we'll sell it to you, you can have it in four years and then they said we'll get it to you immediately. and he said i can't do it, i fought, i spent a fortune on buying another system, a similar system from russia. the problem is he already brought the planes and the planes aren't compatible from our standpoint, not from the standpoint of compatibility. but from our standpoint national security wisemism soy it. so it's a mess. it's a mess. and honestly it's not really erdogan's fault. so now we have breaking news. donald trump loves turkey. donald trump is on the side of turkey. no, i'm not. i love our country, but i have to tell you president erdogan who has done -- gave me our pastor back, pastor brunson, nobody else could get him back. president obama, he was in jail for 35 years. he was going to be in jail forever. he was an innocent man and i called him and after a short period of time he was standing in the oval office with me and he was back. so, you know, it's been from my standpoint -- and he's a tough guy. when you talk about tough, he's tough. but i get along with him. i was he was unfairly treated. we were told you can't have it, and after they bought another system we said we can't use it. so it's a complicated deal. we're working on it. >> can i ask you one last question quickly on china. so there was a negotiation on huawei, welcoming students, holding off on tariffs. so it sounds like china has agreed to buy more ag, but is this a lopsided agreement? >> it's actually a good question. i did agree to allow our companies -- you know, i like our companies selling things to other people. so i like that to happen. very complex things, not easy. this is not things that are easy to make. very few companies are able to do it, but a tremendous amount of money. you know all of them. but they weren't exactly happy with them. we're allowing them to sell, but we agreed to leave that until the end. huawei is a complicated situation. we're leaving huawei toward the end. we'll see where we go with the trade agreement. yes, please. >> thank you, i have a question about the border but i wanted to follow up quickly on the issue of busing. do you see it as a way to integrate schools. >> it has been something they've done for a long period of time. there aren't that many ways you're going to get people to schools. so this is something that's ben done -- in some cases it's been done with a hammer instead of a glove. but this certainly has been a thing that's been used. i think if vice president biden had answered the question somewhat differently it would have been a lot -- it would have been a different result because they really did hit him hard on that one. but it is certainly a primary mect udof getting people to schools. >> is it -- does it relate to the policy you're going to unveil you just floated? >> it relates to everything we're doing and you'll be hearing about it over the next couple of months. >> i want to ask you about the border. it seems there's officially a week to go until the i.c.e. raids begin under that deadline you imposed. is it realistic to think you're going to get a deal to actually reform the asylum laws? >> well, we could do it -- i say to people, i used to say 45 minutes, but we could do it quickly. we could do it in a day, we could do it in an hour. we could reform asylum very quickly. we could get rid of the loopholes very quickly. these are horrible loopholes. and the reason that mexico is so good because they do have very, very tough immigration. they don't have the kind of things, the kind of stupidity we have. where somebody touches one foot on our sand and we now have to bring them into a court. we then have to register tem, catch and release them, and they go and live in our country and they're supposed to come back in three years for a court case and about 2% come back. as you know. you know it just as well as anybody i think, maybe better than most. but the fact is they come back, but nobody comes back -- 2% comes back, it's a horrible system. now, what we're doing is they come in illegally and we're bringing them out legally. but at the request of, you know, some very good democrats, they asked me if i could hold it and i did for a couple of weeks and we have a week left. but the fact we did get in a very bipartisan way and i appreciate speaker pelosi because she worked with us, it was humanitarian money. and don't forget nobody's ever had this problem before. we're running hospitals. we're running so many different things for the kids. and the kids are brought up because under the laws the kids are used, legally used to get other people to come in. if you have a child it's much easier to come into our country. it's easy anyway but if you have a child it's much easier. we have these kids that have been horribly abused and we could stop that with a minor change in the law. it's a terrible thing they're not doing it. so here's what's happening. i said, all right, let's see if you can give that to us. we have the $4.5 billion in humanitarian aid. but we can have that number go way down if we stop people from coming up. for instance, if we had walls up and had it hard the father and beautiful daughter who drowned and, you know, the rio grande is very tough. all of a sudden it becomes violent and people get swept away. but if they thought it was hard to get in, they wouldn't be coming up. so many lives would be saved. so essentially if they would change the laws and i said it would take us an hour, but let's give you two weeks. at the end of the second week we'll be removing people, legally removing -- >> so you're still planning for that deadline? >> unless we do something pretty miraculous, but the democrats it seems to me they want to have open borders. it's one thing because i want people to come into our country. we need them because we have all these companies coming in. we have so many companies coming in, auto companies. just today i was with president abe, he told me another auto company is going to bring a big plant. they need people. i'm all for that. the only problem is they have to come in through a process and legally. they take tests, study, they have to go through a very complicated process. and these people have worked hard. and then somebody walks in and they're welcome to the united states. honestly, it's very unfair. but we will be removing large numbers of people. people have to understand, yes, the laws are -- >> in a week. >> starting in a week some time after july fourth. >> so the deal that was just passed does nothing -- >> that's different. that's humanitarian. we needed that just to take care -- because we're running now hospitals. the border patrol these are incredible people. they're doing what they -- you know, nobody ever thought they were going to be doing this. and the reason people are coming up is because we're doing so well as a country. in past years we weren't doing well. past years, you know, they took 32% of our -- now we're the hot economy. and the reason people are coming up is because we had a separation policy. president obama built those cells. in 2014 they were built. they all said look how horrible, and then it turned out it was built by president obama. and i'm not blaming anybody. they had a separation policy and you're ending it. you're saying now the child can stay with the parent. so i said ending it is nice in one way, but in terms of what we're doing, it makes it even tougher. but the really bad thing is the cartels -- and i really think that mexico because they did 6,000 and now they're doing 16,000 on our border. what mexico is doing for us is great. by the way, without the tariffs they wouldn't have done it. we've been after them for many years to do it, but they have really so far -- it's only a week -- the numbers are way down. and so far a lot of good things have happened. yes, please. yes, please, in the second row. my only problem is this, i don't need stories he stayed up there too long. if i stay up there quickly, they're why did he not give us enough time. if you promise you're not going to say because everybody's got a hand up. and if you want i'll go on. should i go on or not go on? what do you think? and you're not going to say he went on too long, because we have time. i have a flight that actually leaves pretty much when i want it to. okay, let's go. >> thank you, mr. president. two questions about iran. a week ago you called off a strike because you were concerned it would kill iranians. >> disproportionately absolute certaintiy. >> did the military leaders provide you an alternative, like a derelict oil rig that could have been hit. >> i have 50 alternatives, i have many alternatives. you don't know what the sites were. you said oil rig, but i had many alternatives. when we chose and designated certain areas we were thinking about i said how many people are going to die? i mean i'm talking about on the other side. that means a lot to me, too. how many people are going to die. they said probably about 150. you don't know. could be much worse than that. could be less, too. but could be much more than that because this is heavy stuff going in. we have the greatest military in the world. i deal with them all the time. these people are incredible people. lethal. and hopefully we don't have to use it much. i mean, we've spent you look at the numbers $716 billion this year. we had planes that were so old. now we have brand new f-35s, brand new super harnts and f-18s. i mean the equipment we have is incredible. the army now has beautiful new things. everything is -- we have a military that's really great. hopefully, we don't have to use it very much. but, no, they came in, i said this and they came back a short time later and said about 150 people. i said that's really disproportionate, i don't like it. >> my second question is here at the g-20 summit what can you tell us, has the ball been moved in any particular direction towards easing the tensions with iran in some of the meetings that you've had? >> well, i've had a lot of countries come up to me. for instance, france has come up. if you look at president macron, good guy. he came up to me and said, you know, i do a lot of business, meaning france does a lot of business with iran. i'd love to go see them. i said, sure, i think talking is great. i think john carrie shouldn't have been talking to them. i think john carrie speaking to iran a lot maybe saying things like, gee, you know, if you wait another 15 months maybe trump wll lose the election and then you can deal with a person that's a lot easier than trump. you'll deal with a stiff that'll give you everything you want. and that makes it a little tougher for me to make a deal, but that's okay. yeah, please go. >> mr. president, during the week you tweeted out your displeasure with the supreme court's decision on the census and you suggested -- >> i think it's very unfortunate. >> are you in fact going to try to delay the -- >> we're looking at that legally because they're asking us to do a census. and, you know, the census was shocking to me. i figured it would be, you know, not expensive to do a census. it's billions of dollars. you know that, right? billions. they knock on doors of every house in the country, and they get everything -- they're not allowed to ask whether or not someone is a citizen of the united states. how horrible and ridiculous is that? so we are looking at that, yeah. it was like now, right, now. it depends on what happens, i guess. it was a very strange decision. it was a very sad decision not in terms of voting, not enterms -- just a very sad because it was so convoluted. to get to that decision had tee be very, very hard. >> the justice said your guys were playing politics -- >> hey, who's really playing politics, okay? check it out. go ahead, please. >> i think i heard you mention with vladimir putin you had said you spoke about election interference privately as well. did you speak in a sterner tone -- >> we talked about it before. you know he denies it, by the way. how many times can you get someone to deny something? but he's denied it also publicly. we've talked about it and a lot of other things. i'll tell you, we talked about something i think is very important, and that's putting a cap on what he's buying and we're buying from a nuclear standpoint and other arms control. and i think he'd like to see arms control and so would we. i think it makes a lot of sense. >> did you raise what was in the mueller report -- >> well the mueller report was a ver good report. i had 18 people that hated me, i had mueller who's totally conflicted and obviously didn't like me. he was totally conflicted, and yet no obstruction, no collusion. and, you know, that was a good report. yes, please. and, you know, the democrats want a do-over or five. they want to get it right. they're working to get it right. they want a do over or five. yes, please. >> president trump, your administration just unveiled the economic portion of the deal of the century. my question to you is why were no palestinians members of the peace plan committee? >> well, they are a very important part of it, but they don't really have to be. we're just getting started. we have -- and as you know we have a very good david freedman, great gentleman, successful in new york. jared kushner, and with me being president if you don't get that deal done, it'll never happen. we'll have to see what happens, but i think the palestinians, basically i'm not sure -- i know they want to make a deal and they want to be a little bit cute, but that's okay. as you know i've ended the money that was we were paying them $550 million a year. because a year ago i heard they were saying nsa things. i said, wait a minute, we're trying to make a deal and help them and they're saying these nasty things, we're not going to pay. if a deal was made we would go back on a humanitarian basis not so different from the border because you see the problems what's going on. but i think we have a good chance of making a deal, and a lot of people think oats probably the toughest deal of all, a lot of people think it can't be made. over the years a lot of people would say that's a deal that can't be made no matter what. but, hey, i like to -- we're going to try, but i really believe that -- i went to other negotiators from past years, for many, many years they've been trying to make this deal. and i said did you ever take the money away because they were always very hostile and they said no, we wouldn't do that, that's inappropriate. why is it inappropriate. they're saying bad things, why is it inappropriate? look, if you're not negotiating and you don't want to help make peace, we're not going to pay you. let's see what happens. i think they want to make a deal, and i've had a very good relationship with some of their leaders. and obviously i've had a good relationship with israel. now, the transaction was thrown up in the air a little bit because of what happened with netanyahu's election. they thought he won and all of a sudden they couldn't put together the coalition and now they're back to campaigning again. who would have expected that? maybe that will happen faster. there's a chance -- i won't even say good chance on that one because people say it's the hardest deal. when i was young i'd say what do you think of this, oh, that's tougher than the israel and palestinians. that used to use that as the metaphor, as an excuse about the toughest deal to make. yes, white shirt -- no, the gentleman behind you. we'll get you. >> can i ask first one clarification? are you saying you're taking huawei off the -- >> no, we're doeg to be talking about huawei. our companies make billions and billions of dollars worth of equipment. but we are not discussing huawei with president xi yet. i want to see before we start getting into that, i want to see where we end up. we have a national security problem, which to me is paramount. very important. >> but are you taking huawei off the commerce department or the list -- >> we have a meeting on that tuesday. >> you don't talk about the national security concerns about china. what do you worry about china -- >> i think that goes without saying. look what i've done. i took zte off, remember. that was a personal deal and then president xi called me and asked me for a personal favor which i considered to be very important. he's the leader of a major country and it was important to him. having to do with where the employees are located and they were almost out of business and he agreed to pay a $1.2 billion penalty and some changes which is much smaller than huawei but very big. and they paid us $1.2 billion. part of the problem is the democrats go out and say if i got $200 trillion they'd say this is terrible, what a terrible deal because that's the way politics is it's sort of sad. we closed it and opened it. they made changes to the board, they made management changes and they paid a lot of money and they also have to buy american product. buying american product is important to me. it's a big thing. go ahead blue. are we going to continue onward? yes? does anybody say, no, huh? >> thank you. one question -- >> we just left angela. she's another friend of mine. people don't think so. we have a great relationship. we spent a lot of time together, too. >> you praised this g-20 summit as extremely successful. yes it was a g-19 at one summit if we look at climate change. why is it you still think ignoring climate change is in the interest of america? >> i don't ignore it. we've had the best numbers we've ever had recently. and i'm not looking to put our companies out of business. i'm not looking to create a standard so high we're going to lose 20%, 25% of our production. i'm not willing to do that. we've had the cleanest water we've ever had, the cleanest air. you saw the reports come out recently. we've had the cleanest air we've ever had, but i'm not willing to sacrifice the tremendous power of what we've built-up over a long period of time and what i've enhanced and revived. i'm just not willing to do that. and they understand where i stand, and, you know, i'm not necessarily sure i agree -- i can tell you i'm not sure i agree with certain countries, what they're doing because i think they're losing a lot of the power of what they can do with factories -- and i'm not talking about political power although that comes with it. i'm talking about the powering of a plant. it doesn't always work with a windmill. when the wind goes off, the plant isn't working. it doesn't always work with solar because solar is just not strong enough. and a lot of them want to go to wind, which has caused a lot of problems. and the wb with wind, the united states, we're subsidizing these wind towers all over the place because wind towers don't work without subsidies. the united states is paying enormous amounts for subsidies on wind. i don't like it. we'll take a few more. go ahead. go ahead. >> thank you, sir. two questions on iran, please. >> one. >> one question on iran. >> pick the better one, pleads. >> will do, sir. iran says it'll be on the verge of violating enrichment for the jcpoa potential as next week? what will be your response when that happens? >> we'll see. i can only say you'll see. we cannot let iran have a nuclear weapon. just can't do it. please. >> thank you, mr. president. you met yesterday with president putin and you touched the subject of venezuela but can you explain a bit what was said in the meeting about venezuela? >> first of all we're following venezuela very closely. it's a catastrophe. it's what socialism can do. it was one of the richest countries 20 years ago. it's got one of the largest oil reserves and they don't have food, they don't have water. it's really actually incredible. i've discussed it with almost every leader this weekend. we've discussed venezuela because we don't want that to ever happen to us or their countries. >> you mention change of regime takes time in venezuela -- >> oh, sure it takes time. probably so many people are leaving venezuela, it's like probably going to be a ghost town. it's a very bad thing happening in venezuela. nobody's seen anything quite like it, actually. especially from the standpoint they were so wealthy. i know so many people from venezuela living in miami. they're incredible people. a lot of them live in dural, miami. they call it little venezuela. i know it so well. these are people hard workers, warm. they're just incredible. and to see what's happening to venezuela is heart breaking. >> president, do do you think it's time to change the strategy and do you still believe juan guaido is the person to lead the country? >> you have a lot of strategies, but in the meantime we're helping them from the the standpoint of aid. i think they're making a big mistake because they're not making the aid very easy as you know. they're not making it easy to get to people, but people are starving to death, and their water -- they have no water. they have oil, but they don't have any water. no, we have a lot of things in store if we have to do that. we don't want to do anything, but, you know, we don't want to get involved to the extent you may be thinking, but we have a lot of alternatives. we have five different alternatives for what happens with venezuela. it's doing poorly and maduro is doing poorly. it's just not working. it's not working. yes, go ahead. where are you? >> politico. anita kumar, politico. i just wanted to follow up on the questions asked about -- >> question. >> question about the crown prince you met with earlier today. i didn't hear you answer the question. did you raise the killing of jamal khashoggi with him? >> i asked him what was happening, and he was telling me that i think he said 13 but could be more and i think he said more in the works, that there are large numbers of people being prosecuted. he's very angry about it, very unhappy about it. and i did mention it to him very strongly, but they're prosecuting large numbers of people. that was a