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President Trump Holds Cabinet Meeting. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired April 10, 2025 - 13:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[13:00:02]

LEE ZELDIN, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY ADMINISTRATOR: I was honored.

And you were very specific and clear in what you wanted us to accomplish. We understand our mission. And at the Trump EPA, we're going to make it proud.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Great job. You're doing a great job. And you have a lot of applications for approvals for power plants, which are going to really power the regular plants, and they're going to be right next to each other, because we can't rely on our grid.

It's old and it's tired. And it's very subject to being attacked, whether by rain or by bombs or by anything else. And we're letting people build their own power plants. And these are -- a lot of them are being built with the A.I. and beyond the A.I. chips.

And we're letting them build their own power, and never been done before. And we're going to get it done quickly and approved quickly. As part of a plant, they will have a -- sort of being their own power company. And it's very exciting.

They couldn't believe it when I told them that. I said, we're going to get you the approvals very fast. As part of your regular plant, you're going to build electric-producing plants. And it's very exciting. And they're able to do it very quickly and very well. And you made it possible. Thank you.

You have a lot of applications for some of the biggest plants that have ever been built in the world. These are serious plants, aren't they, huh?

ZELDIN: Approved. Approved. Approved.

(LAUGHTER)

(CROSSTALK)

ZELDIN: We're open for business. We're going to have Secretary Burgum, Secretary Wright. We are going you proud.

TRUMP: Good. Great.

Sean?

SEAN DUFFY, U.S. TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY: First off, Mr. President, it's Brooke's birthday today, so...

(CROSSTALK)

DUFFY: So happy birthday to Brooke.

BROOKE ROLLINS, U.S. SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE: Thank you. Thank you.

DUFFY: I want to thank you as well for the ship building E.O.

Again, to build ships, you also need mariners to sail those ships. I was just up at Kings Point for the Merchant Marine Academy a couple days ago. And we have some of the greatest young men and women who are learning how to be mechanical engineers, to rebuild and fix the engines on those ships, but also how to sail ships.

I would tell you that, over the past decades, this academy has become, -- it needs some love. It's been a little bit dilapidated. We have to invest in sailors. And I appreciate you taking the initiative. To be a global power, we have to build ships and have sailors to sail those ships.

These are the very people that help Pete should be coming into points of crisis to support the military. So thank you for that. Number two, the last administration announced 3,200 projects, big beautiful roads and bridges. Most of them are good. But they announced them. They didn't sign a grant agreement, 3,200.

So the money doesn't go out the door to build the infrastructure in the country. And it's fun to do an announcement. It's actually the harder work to put together these grant agreements. So we're doing the work right now at DOT to get these grant agreements done and build the projects. Most of them are good.

And they also put in all of this green and social justice requirements on roads and bridges.

(CROSSTALK)

DUFFY: We're pulling all that out and putting the money toward the infrastructure, not the social movement from the last administration.

TRUMP: Good steel, right, as supposed to green papier-mache.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: OK, thanks. Great job.

ROLLINS: Sir, first, we are, I would say, more than friends. We have all become family. And I think that what you have assembled in your vision is a turning point and an inflection point in American history.

And so just being a part of that is the greatest honor. So thank you for that and, again, just the relationships here and the honor and respect we have for each other is a reflection of you and your leadership. So I just wanted to say that first.

The second thing I want to say is that, on behalf of the farmers and ranchers, food security is national security. We have to be able to feed ourselves. And your idea of using tariffs along with deregulation and tax cuts, but your idea of using tariffs to ensure that we are putting forward and putting America first, no one understands that better than our farmers and our ranchers.

But, having said that, emerging from four years of Biden with a 30 percent increase in inputs for our farmers and ranchers, with an almost $50 billion trade deficit, when we left the first time, it was zero, meaning that they are hurting.

So the period of uncertainty we're in, they know that your vision will move us into an age of prosperity for all Americans, but for my people, for the farmers and ranchers, unlike any they have seen before. And I think they are really, really excited and so grateful for your leadership.

But also, you have never failed to say that you have the backs of our farmers and our ranchers. It was the first phone call that I had after I was voted with the Senate. And that message just resonates with almost an 85 percent support of you in the last election. They're with you.

[13:05:03]

Interestingly, the biggest budget driver at the United States Department of Agriculture is not farming and ranching or agriculture. It's food stamps. And so, as we emerge and embark, Secretary Kennedy and I, on...

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: So we have been listening to a Cabinet meeting at the White House. That's agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, who we just learned from the transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, celebrating a birthday today.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: That's right, yes.

SANCHEZ: More importantly, she is describing to President Trump support on behalf of farmers across the United States amid his ongoing tariff war, specifically now focused on China.

Important to point out to put into context some of the ag secretary's comments there. During Trump's first term, the administration had to bail out farmers who were targeted by Chinese tariffs, specifically on soybeans, to the tune of some $28 billion. This time around, the ag secretary clearly pointing to what is going to be a period of uncertainty for U.S. farmers.

There are a lot of questions about how the United States might try to assist farmers undoubtedly over what will be a difficult time. Brianna, you and I have had conversations with folks in the agriculture sector over the last few weeks who are clearly concerned.

Some of them say that they didn't actually make ends meet even with that bailout from the Trump administration from his first four years in office.

Let's actually dip back in and listen to more of this Cabinet meeting.

SCOTT BESSENT, TREASURY SECRETARY: Bring your best deal on the budget. It's moving quickly in the House and the Senate, thanks to your leadership.

We're also going to have debt ceiling in there, so we're going to get an increase in the debt ceiling. So, and that will be done and dusted for...

TRUMP: Part of the bill that we just got a vote on today. So...

BESSENT: Part of the bill. It'll be done and dusted for two years. We won't have to worry about that.

And then I gave a speech yesterday to 1,400 small and community bankers, and they were so happy to hear from your administration. And I told them Wall Street's done great for the past four years, 10 years, 20 years. It can continue doing great, but it's Main Street's turn now. And it's those small bankers through deregulation, through emphasis on Main Street, your Main Street agenda, bringing back jobs, that is going to power the smaller communities.

And then, finally, the bond auction went very well yesterday. We had a lot of foreigners show up as the support, showing that the U.S. is still the best place to invest. The inflation report, as you said, was quite good. And energy prices are down more than 20 percent since January 20.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Amazing. That's great.

TRUMP: That's really good, good numbers.

BESSENT: Great numbers.

TRUMP: Thank you.

Pam?

PAM BONDI (R), U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: President, we have got -- had some great wins in the last few days, that you were overwhelmingly elected by the biggest majority.

The U.S. Americans want you to be president because of your agenda. And the courts are ruling that you have the authority to determine how the money of this country will be spent. That's what the American citizens wanted, and that's what they're getting.

An example of that Friday was the Department of Education, that you can determine how the money will be spent, no more DEI. And that impacts every agency across the board. On the civil side again, NLRB, we had a big win in the Supreme Court there. OPM, a big win there, but also 16,000 workers there. But also on the criminal side, the Alien Enemies Act, we are winning

there. And your directive to me was to keep America safe, and that's what we're doing, whether it's the alien enemies, all of these gangs, and they are enemies of our country. They are terrorists. They are organized crime. They have come here.

They are extremely organized.They are spread throughout our country, and they are creating terror, and no more under your directive. And that has stopped. Yesterday, in South Florida, we charged the 11 defendants with half-a-billion dollars of pure cocaine coming into our country to kill our kids.

They were caught. They will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. These gang members are going back to where they came, or they're going to an El Salvador prison, at your directive. And you also gave us a directive to prosecute the people who are going after Tesla to the fullest extent of the law, some of the greatest police work I have seen.

We have made four arrests. There will be no negotiations, at your directive. They're all looking at 20 years in prison. And within the next 24 hours, you're going to be seeing another huge arrest on a Tesla dealership, President. And that person will be looking at least 20 years in prison with no negotiations.

TRUMP: That's great. That's great. That will stop it cold.

[13:10:04]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Domestic terrorism.

TRUMP: Thanks. You're doing a great job too. Thank you very much.

Lori, please.

LORI CHAVEZ-DEREMER, U.S. SECRETARY OF LABOR: Mr. President, accountability matters. That's what we're recognizing.

With our partners at the Department of Labor for government efficiency, just a few weeks ago, we realized there's about $4.4 billion in COVID funds that were not used that the state coffers were just holding on to. Out of that, we have returned $1.4 billion back to the state treasury, so essentially to the American people.

And we will go back and claw the rest of those billions of dollars back. And on the heels of that, last night, late last night, we're understanding unemployment insurance fraud. That trust needs to be whole for the American people. When we need it, we need it for who deserves it. That's not what we're seeing.

And the numbers that we saw last night, again, exposed by our partners in -- at DOGE at the Department of Labor, since 2020, over $400 million of payments have gone out already. And when you hear these numbers, apparently, in the United States, we have over -- almost 25,000 people who are over 115 years old who are collecting $59 million that we have sent out to people. Talk about fraudulent behavior. Mr. President, 28,000 people between 1

and 5 years old have collected fraudulent payments at the tune of $254 million has gone out. And, lastly, 10,000 people who have not been born yet, 15 years into the future, $69 million.

(LAUGHTER)

CHAVEZ-DEREMER: And they haven't even been born yet. But, in one case, they will be born 129 years from now. The United States government sent them $41,000, and they're not born yet.

So, under the Department of Labor, those are the things that we're uncovering. I couldn't be more honored to tell the American people that we're bringing back their dollars and we're saving them and returning them to the United States Treasury.

Also, jobs numbers. Last Friday, 228,000 new jobs were reported. That is good for the American people. That is my primary job, is to grow that work force under your leadership. So we have kicked off the America at Work Tour, and we will be visiting all 50 states. And I will be working with my colleagues here to do just that.

So, thank you, Mr. President. We're going to grow this economy. We're going to keep our focus on the American worker.

TRUMP: So you're finding tremendous fraud, though. Those numbers are really bad, when you...

CHAVEZ-DEREMER: Unheard of.

TRUMP: Over 115 years old. And I think you had mentioned the oldest person in our country is 114 years old. That's pretty good.

CHAVEZ-DEREMER: Fourteen, reported. One was living in Pennsylvania, but, apparently, there's 24,000 more of them that are 115 or older that we're...

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: I hope you hear that. So we have 24,000 older than the oldest person.

ELON MUSK, DEPARTMENT OF GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY: Definitely dead.

(CROSSTALK)

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: That's terrible. And what are we doing about that? How do we get that money back?

CHAVEZ-DEREMER: Yes, so we're working with our I.G.s to do that further investigation.

The House and Senate, we had a five-year statute of limitations. We have got an extension that another five years. And so the goal, in my opinion, we should never have a statute of limitations to return the American dollars back to the Treasury when there's fraud. But, at this point, we will continue to work hard and double down and return that -- those dollars to the Treasury.

TRUMP: Great. Thank you very much.

CHAVEZ-DEREMER: Thank you.

TRUMP: Great job.

Kristi?

KRISTI NOEM, U.S. HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: Well, Mr. President, thank you for your leadership at the border.

For the second month in a row, you have broken the record in the history of the nation for the lowest number of encounters at the border, which is absolutely remarkable. You have said that America's laws matter and that they will be enforced, and we're hard at work now to get people to go back home that are here illegally.

So the Alien Registration Act has been in place long enough now that those individuals that are here illegally, if they haven't registered, then they can be charged criminally, and they can face fines up to $1,000 a day and face deportation if they don't go home. And they will never get the chance to come back to America.

So we're encouraging people to use the CBP Home app to register. And we're working on the resources and funding to buy them a plane ticket to send them home. I went to El Salvador, Colombia, and Mexico, and those countries and others are thinking about setting up programs to support these individuals when they get back to their country, so when they get there they will have housing and food assistance..

And so making sure that these folks have the opportunity to go home, so that they can get the chance to come back to America is important to...

TRUMP: Sure. It's a very big self-deport operation that we're starting.

NOEM: It is. Thousands of people have already self-deported.

TRUMP: Yes.

NOEM: We're just going to -- when you have 20, 21 million people that need to go home because they're here breaking our laws, then we need to facilitate that.

And I have been working with the governors a lot lately on several different issues. One of them has been on FEMA for recommendations on how to do exactly what you have directed us to do. And then, also, I sent a letter and communicated with them that they need to be setting up a SCIF.

[13:15:10] Some of our governors don't have secure facilities to have national security issues. I think one of the jobs Homeland Security has is to give communication down to states, to local cities and communities. And so recommending they get a SCIF, they have secure comms with them at all times or nearby, so that they can have national security conversations, and then to have somebody in their office designated that is their communications person.

A lot of them have emergency management officers, but they don't necessarily have somebody designated when it comes to a national security issue that we may need to communicate with them on. And I think American people need to know that REAL ID will be required to travel on May 7.

So those governors have been notified to communicate that at home. We don't want anybody to get delayed and not be able to travel when they get to an airport. And this will also help us bring integrity back to all of our I.D.s and how they're used, how they're used for issuing driver's licenses.

And governors know how I feel about making sure their driver's licensing system has integrity, because a lot of people use their driver's license to vote. And the backbone of our country and the foundation is election integrity. So we're giving all those directions to our governors and communicating that so they can lead on it as well.

TRUMP: And we're going to work with people so that, if they go out in a nice way and go back to their country, we're going to work with them right from the beginning on trying to get them back in legally. Is that right?

NOEM: That's right. They will get the chance to come back.

TRUMP: So it gives you real incentive. Otherwise, they'd never come back. They will never be allowed once a certain period of time goes by, which is probably going to be 60 days.

We're also going to work with farmers that, if they have strong recommendations for their farms for certain people, we're going to let them stay in for a while and work with the farmers and then come back and go through a process, a legal process. But we have to take care of our farmers at hotels and various places where they're using -- where they need the people.

And we're going to be working with you very carefully on that. So, a farmer will come in with a letter concerning certain people saying, they're great, they're working hard. We're going to slow it down a little bit for them. And then we're going to ultimately bring them back. They will go out. They're going to come back as legal workers, OK?

NOEM: Yes, sir. Thank you.

TRUMP: Which I think will be a -- I think it's very important to do.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: OK, thank you very much. Great job.

Jamieson, I watched you testify for the last couple of days.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, he did great.

TRUMP: You were on every night at 3:00 in the morning.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: And you did great.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did great, yes.

TRUMP: You were fantastic. Thank you very much.

JAMIESON GREER, U.S. TRADE REPRESENTATIVE: It's just what I like to do for fun, sir.

(LAUGHTER)

GREER: You have been keeping us very busy.

Last week, you started a reordering of international trade, something that hasn't happened for 80 years, something that should have happened decades ago. And you know that. You have known that for a long time. That's why you have us all working on this.

You came into an emergency situation, where President Biden left us with a $1.2 trillion trade deficit. It's the largest of any country in human history, the largest. So you declared an emergency. You took action.

TRUMP: You say the largest in history, right?

GREER: In history.

TRUMP: There's never been anything like what he left us. He left us a mess. His whole administration was a mess. So go ahead.

GREER: So, you declared an emergency. You imposed a trade action. So now you have a tariff on the world. It promotes U.S. manufacturing. It protects U.S. workers. And you have also given room for negotiation during this time so we can open export markets for our farmers and other producers and American workers.

And this is why the unions vote for you. This is why the workers vote for you. This is why the families want you to be the president, because you're standing up for American workers and American communities. We have had countries come in over the past couple of weeks that represent more than half of global domestic GDP, more than half.

That's who's coming in to talk to you and to your advisers about how to have reciprocal trade, how to have fair trade. Wouldn't have happened without you.

TRUMP: Thank you very much. Great job. (OFF-MIKE)

MUSK: Well, thanks to your fantastic leadership, this amazing Cabinet and the very talented DOGE team, I'm excited to announce that we have anticipate savings in FY26 from reduction of waste and fraud by $150 billion.

TRUMP: That's a lot of money.

MUSK: And some of it is just absurd...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

MUSK: ... like people getting unemployment insurance who haven't been born yet. I mean, I think anyone can appreciate whether -- I mean, come on. That's just crazy.

So some of these things, people ask me, like, well, how are you going to find waste and fraud in the government? I'm like, well, actually just go in any direction. That's how you find it. It's very common.

(LAUGHTER)

MUSK: It's, as the military would say, target-rich environment.

(LAUGHTER)

[13:20:00]

MUSK: So, then we're doing a lot of good in excellent collaboration with the Cabinet to achieve these savings. And it will actually result in better services for the American people.

And then we're going to be spending their tax dollars in a way that is sensible and fair and good.

TRUMP: And your people are fantastic. In fact, hopefully, they will stay around for the long haul. We'd like to keep as many as we can.

MUSK: Yes.

TRUMP: They're great, smart, sharp, right, finding things that nobody would have thought of, very computer-savvy.

MUSK: Yes. We're working (OFF-MIKE) to get that the Trump gold card operational, hopefully in the next week or so.

TRUMP: That will be very exciting.

MUSK: It's really exciting.

TRUMP: That's a pathway to citizenship into the United States. It's...

MUSK: It's a big deal. TRUMP: Yes, it's a big deal. Thank you very much. Great job you're

doing.

TULSI GABBARD, U.S. DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Thank you, sir.

Thanks to your leadership and setting the mandate of transparency and accountability across the U.S. government, I'm bringing that transparency and accountability to the intelligence community, first and foremost, to make sure that you and your Cabinet have that real- time, relevant, apolitical, objective intelligence to best inform, whether it's negotiations for peace, negotiations around tariffs, the great work that you are leading around the Cabinet today.

Secondly, working with the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI to increase our information sharing to achieve your goal of countering the narcotic trafficking and the -- our ability to go after cartels now designated as foreign terrorists.

I met with the National Sheriffs' Association this week, being able to work to make sure that the information that they are getting on the ground, that local law enforcement is getting on the ground is being fed back up through to our National Counterterrorism Center and that we have all of the federal agencies, state and local law enforcement all on the same page as we are working to make our country safe again.

And lastly, sir, as you know, declassification and rooting out weaponization, politicization of the intelligence community is a huge priority. You know more than anyone else the very dangerous and negative consequences of that.

I have got a long list of things that we're investigating. We have the best of the best going after this, election integrity being one of them. We have evidence of how these electronic voting systems have been vulnerable to hackers for a very long time and vulnerable to exploitation to manipulate the results of the votes being cast, which further drives forward your mandate to bring about paper ballots across the country so that voters can have faith in the integrity of our elections.

And lastly, we have been scanning. I have had over 100 people working around the clock to scan the paper around RFK, Senator Robert F. Kennedy's assassination, as well as Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. These have been sitting in boxes in storage for decades. They have never been scanned or seen before. We will have those ready to release here within the next few days.

TRUMP: That's great.

Bobby, how do you feel about that? That's hitting...

(CROSSTALK)

ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR., U.S. HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: I'm very gratified.

TRUMP: That's hitting close to home...

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: ... when you think -- I'm thinking about Bobby, when that statement's made.

KENNEDY: I'm very grateful to you, Mr. President.

TRUMP: Good.

And you will let Bobby see some of this, because it's very personal stuff. But it's time.

GABBARD: I have asked him. I have asked him. And his response is, put it out. The world needs to know the truth.

TRUMP: And his uncle, that's been out, and anything that hasn't been out will -- they can go to your offices and see, right?

GABBARD: Everything that we have within our possession, it's either online or it's physically at the National Archives and Records agency. We also have hunters going out, Mr. President, and looking in the storage lockers at FBI and CIA and other agencies specifically to find if there are -- if there is anything else that has not been reported.

We're actively going out and trying to search out the truth.

TRUMP: Yes. OK. Yes. We want to get it all out.

Gabbard Yes.

TRUMP: A hundred percent. Good. Thank you very much. Good job, guys.

GABBARD: Yes, sir.

KELLY LOEFFLER, ADMINISTRATOR, SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION: Mr. President, on behalf of America's manufacturers, I want to thank you for standing up to the Chinese Communist Party and fighting for our Main Streets, for our workers, and for those that make things in America.

I'm out on a made in America manufacturing tour. And as I go across the country, people are grateful to have a president who's not just fighting on the tariffs front, but to get inflation down, to create jobs.

After Biden destroyed 110,000 manufacturing jobs in just his last year, you have already brought back thousands and thousands of manufacturing jobs. So the American worker is grateful. Main Street is grateful for you. And at the agency level, we're making sure that manufacturers have access to the capital they need.

[13:25:05]

But we can't do that if we're not fighting frauds. So we have modified our loan applications to have citizenship verification, to make sure we have birth dates, commonsense principles around lending that the Biden administration had waived. They waived $450 million of fees in one year.

We're restoring that for the American taxpayer. And the American taxpayer, as Tax Day approaches, April 15, they need to know that this Cabinet, this administration -- and, thank you, Elon Musk and DOGE, for fighting for the American taxpayer to make sure that their hard- earned dollars are well spent, that they have a return on investment for this country, and that we're fighting for them, just as you are every single day.

So thank you, Mr. President.

TRUMP: Thank you. Thank you very much.

KENNEDY: Mr. President, we're doing -- we are working at HHS to advance your agenda to make America healthy again.

I'm working with Lee Zeldin to reassess the fluoride rules based upon the August release by the National Toxicity Program of new science that shows a direct inverse correlation between exposure to fluoride and I.Q. loss, particularly in children.

Lee and I were in Utah this week, Utah -- to announce that Utah became the first state in the country to ban supplemental fluoride. I'm working with Brooke on -- and governors now in 24 states who are advancing MAHA legislation to get soda pops off of the food stamp program, off the SNAP program.

We have launched Operation Stork Speed to get the bad chemicals out of a baby formula. We're working with governors across the country to get good food into the school lunch programs and to get rid of food chemical dyes and other bad chemicals that are in our food.

We have shown now that this directly affects academic performance, violence in the schools and mental health, as well as physical health. We are working with governors across the country to get a cell -- to cell -- or (INAUDIBLE) legislation to restrict the use of cell phones in schools, which, again, dramatically impacts academic performance.

We -- today, we announced a dramatic reduction in animal testing at NIH and FDA. We're going to switch over to A.I., which we have now found is much more precise in identifying the impacts of toxics in various products. We're working with Elon, who's done an incredible job, to eliminate the redundancies and to streamline operations at all the health agencies and to recalibrate our trajectory to your agenda of making America healthy again.

And, finally, on the -- CDC has done an amazing job at getting the measles outbreak under control. We have about 680 cases now in 22 states, compared to the same outbreak in Europe, which is 127,000 cases and 37 deaths. Our numbers in this country have now plateaued.

And I want to thank CDC for that. And we're trying to refocus the press. We have had three measles deaths in this country over 20 years. And we're trying to refocus the press to get them to pay attention to the chronic disease epidemic that you have asked us to.

We have now 38 percent of American youth are prediabetic. This was unknown 30 years ago. Every child that becomes diabetic, there should be a headline about them. We have 100 million adults who are prediabetic or diabetic. And we have, as you -- we have now -- the autism rates have gone from now most recent numbers we think are going to be about one in 31, one in -- so they're going up again from one in 10,000 when I was a kid.

And we are going -- at your direction, we are going to know by September -- we have launched a massive testing and research effort that's going to involve hundreds of scientists from around the world. By September, we will know what has caused the autism epidemic, and we will be able to eliminate those exposures.

TRUMP: That would be so big. Think of that. So it was one in 10,000 children had autism. And now it's one in 31, not 31,000, 31. That is a hor -- that is a horrible statistic, isn't it?

And there's got to be something artificial out there that's doing this.