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The Situation Room

President Trump Delivers Address at United Nations. Aired 11- 11:30a ET

Aired September 23, 2025 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:00]

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: When I don't like them -- when I don't like them, I don't like them. But we had -- at least for about 39 seconds, we had excellent chemistry. It's a good sign.

But also, in the past, Brazil, can you believe this, unfairly tariffed our nation, but now, because of our tariffs, we are hitting them back. And we're hitting them back very hard. As president, I will always defend our national sovereignty and the rights of American citizens.

So I'm very sorry to say this, that Brazil is doing poorly and will continue to do poorly. They can only do well when they're working with us. Without us, they will fail, just as others have failed. It's true.

Next year, the United States will celebrate the 250th anniversary of our glorious independence, a testament to enduring power and American freedom and spirit. We will also be proudly hosting the 2026 FIFA World Cup and, shortly thereafter, the 2028 Olympics, which is going to be very exciting. I hope you all come.

I hope that countless people from all over the globe will take part of these great -- these will be great celebrations of liberty and human achievement, and that together we all can rejoice in the miracles of history that began on July 4, 1776, when we founded the light to all nations.

And it's something really that is an amazing thing came out of that date. It's called the United States of America. In honor of this momentous anniversary, I hope that all countries who find inspiration in our example will join us in renewing our commitment, values and those values really that we hold so dear together.

Let us defend free speech and free expression. Let us protect religious liberty, including for the most persecuted religion on the planet today. It's called Christianity. And let us safeguard our sovereignty and cherish qualities that have made each of our nations so special, incredible, and extraordinary.

In closing, I just want to repeat that immigration and the high cost of so-called green renewable energy is destroying a large part of the free world and a large part of our planet. Countries that cherish freedom are fading fast because of their policies on these two subjects. You need strong borders and traditional energy sources if you are

going to be great again. Whether you have come from north or south, east or west, near or far, every leader in this beautiful hall today represents a rich culture, a noble history, and a proud heritage that makes each nation majestic and unique, unlike anything else in human history or any other place on the face of the Earth.

From London to Lima, from Rome to Athens, from Paris to Seoul, from Cairo to Tokyo and Amsterdam to right here in New York City, we stand on the shoulders of the leaders and legends, generals and giants, heroes and titans who won and built our beloved nations, all of our nations, with their own courage, strength, spirit and skill.

Our ancestors climbed to mountains, conquered oceans, crossed deserts, and trekked over wide-open plains. They charged into thunderous battles, plunged into grave dangers, and they were soldiers and farmers and workers and warriors and explorers and patriots.

They built towns into cities, tribes into kingdoms, ideas into industries and small islands into mighty empires. You're a part of all of that. They were champions for their people who never gave up and who never, ever gave in. Their values defined our national identities.

Their visions forged our magnificent destiny. Everybody in this room is a part of it in your own way. Each of us inherits the deeds and the myths, the triumphs, the legacies of our own heroes and founders who so bravely showed us the way.

Our ancestors gave everything for homelands that they defended with pride, with sweat, with blood, with life and with death. Now the righteous task of protecting the nations that they built belongs to each and every one of us.

So, together, let us uphold our sacred duty to our people and to our citizens. Let us protect their borders, ensure their safety, preserve their cultures, treasure and traditions, and fight, fight, fight for their precious dreams and their cherished freedoms.

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And in friendship and really a beautiful vision, let us all work together to build a bright, beautiful planet, a planet that we all share, a planet of peace and a world that is richer, better, and more beautiful than ever before. That can happen. It will happen. It will happen, and I hope it can happen and start right now, right at this moment.

We will turn it around. We're going to make our countries better, safer, more beautiful. We're going to take care of our people.

Thank you very much. It's been an honor. God bless the nations of the world. Thank you very much. Bye.

(APPLAUSE)

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: All right, you were just listening to President Trump there at the United Nations with a nearly hour-long speech. This was a much more emboldened President Trump than the first speech he made there at the U.N. during his first term.

You heard them -- there early on essentially trashing the U.N. and pointing fingers and admonishing some of the countries there in the room, telling some of them that their countries are going to hell in terms of migration. You also talk about -- you also heard him talk about Palestinian statehood and break from some U.S. allies who are recognizing Palestinian statehood.

He said doing so would be rewarding Hamas. He also talked about the war in Ukraine, saying that he thought he could end it because of his relationship with Putin. And he also was really focused on climate change, saying that climate change is a con job. Of course, the overwhelming consensus of the scientific community is that climate change is very real and primarily caused by human behavior.

We're going to have Daniel Dale on a little bit later to talk about some of what President Trump said.

But I want to start with our Kaitlan Collins.

Kaitlan, what stood out with you with this speech?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN HOST: Well, Pam, obviously that went way beyond the allotted time limit for any world leader to come and speak at the United Nations, maybe even quadruple what the time limit typically is.

And, basically, what you just heard from President Trump amounted to a very forceful lecture to the United Nations about not just the body itself, but also how the world leaders sitting in front of him are running their own countries.

That comment that you just noted there, the president said he knows what he's talking about and said a lot of their countries are going to hell, in his view. And he started out that speech, Pam, it was quite clear where it was going to go, as he was saying that basically the faulty equipment as he came inside the building here at the United Nations symbolized the uselessness of the United Nations in its current form.

He said the United Nations has potential, but that it is not living up to that potential as it is right now. Pam, two things he was talking about, a broken teleprompter, apparently. You could see the president there was reading off of a script in front of him, though he certainly went off script many times during those remarks.

But, also, as he came in the building, he and the first lady were going up an escalator. We were actually standing there in the lobby during that moment. And the escalator kind of malfunctioned and stopped halfway through, and they walked the rest of the way up.

But the president mentioned that only moments into his speech and was basically pointing to that to make his argument, to kind of underscore his point overall here about the United Nations, as he then went on to lecture all of these nations, whether it was on climate change, whether it was on the war in Ukraine, as he was castigating European nations for still importing Russian oil.

That is something that he basically delivered an ultimatum to NATO earlier this month, saying he's prepared to put sanctions on Russia or on countries that continue to buy this oil, but that NATO countries have to stop doing so first, and so obviously nothing surprising in those comments, I will note, but still remarkable to hear the president come here to the United Nations and, as you noted, Pam, emboldened in his view of how they're running their countries and how he's running his.

BROWN: Absolutely. It was pretty stunning, actually. And, at points, Kaitlan, when he was admonishing some of the countries, he mentioned Germany, for example, that the camera would pan to that world leader.

And many of them were just stone-faced as the president was doing this. I think many of these world leaders were prepared for the kind of Donald Trump we saw here today. What do you think?

COLLINS: Yes, and he's meeting with a lot of these world leaders, I will also note, while he's here.

I mean, he's just delivering the speech, but he's got meetings with President Zelenskyy, with a lot of the Middle East later -- Middle East leaders later on when it comes to the creation of a Palestinian state, as he's been rebuking Canada, France and all of these other European nations for recognizing a Palestinian state.

So this is only just the beginning, as he's going to go and meet with all of these leaders.

BROWN: I know you will be covering all of that. Thank you so much, Kaitlan.

I want to bring in Christiane Amanpour and pick up on what Kaitlan was talking about with President Trump essentially admonishing some of these countries when it comes to migration. He talked about how the U.S. -- U.N. is funding uncontrolled migration.

Let's listen to specifically what he said and talk on the other side.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: It's actually creating new problems for us to solve. The best example is the number one political issue of our time, the crisis of uncontrolled migration. It's uncontrolled. Your countries are being ruined.

The United Nations is funding an assault on Western countries and their borders.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Christiane, what do you make of those comments?

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: You know Pamela, I differ slightly from Kaitlan.

I was actually really amazed by the level of vitriol that the president of the United States delivered to his allies, mostly to his allies, let's just face it, talking about, your countries will fail to the Europeans, saying that he had met President Lula for 39 nice seconds, but then banging him over the head again with the cudgel of tariffs.

Don't forget, the U.S. has a tariff or a budget surplus with Lula. If you remember, his first inaugural talked about American carnage. This was a speech about global carnage, as he sees it. This in every single instance was used to deliver a hammer blow against almost every nation in the world, everything, using the United Nations podium to spout conspiracy theories about green agendas.

Of course, he's correct about uncontrolled migration. He has identified that issue. But the way he talks about how your countries will fail, there are many European countries who've actually implemented European standards on various migrations and the rest.

And I'm going to be speaking to the prime minister of Spain about it, as well about Palestinian statehood. I'm going to be speaking to the foreign minister of Brazil about what the president said about Brazil. But it was an incredible broadside.

And what wasn't said was how he was going to actually intervene and use American power and its leverage, unique American power and its leverage, to stop the wars that are happening in Europe and in the Middle East. These are the biggest issues plaguing the world right now, apart from the climate and certain aspects of immigration.

But he didn't. And he kept saying that I will sanction Putin when Europe sanctions. Well, let's face it. The countries that buy the most oil from Russia right now are Putin's -- rather, are Trump's closest friends and Putin's closest allies, Hungary, Orban, Slovakia, Fico, and Turkey of Erdogan.

These are very, very admired by the president of the United States. And these are the ones who are buying the most Russian oil right now. So it was a very on script/off script kind of speech. Some of the things he said when he was on script were -- it was written fairly decently. And some of the stuff that he said when he was off script went into this idea, as I said, of global carnage and conspiracy theories and they're condemned to disaster, they're condemned to failure.

These were to his allies. Let's just say one more thing. The president of the United States could do a lot of stuff with allies. It's very, very difficult for the United States to try to achieve what the president says the United States wants to achieve without alliances.

And as these nations try to managed Trump in Trump 1.0, you can see by the reaction that the idea of managing Trump and humoring him is over now. They have got to just try to figure out how to weather the worst of this storm and hope that what he says off script is not what he means in bilateral conversations with them -- Pamela. BROWN: Yes, we will see, because he has several meetings coming up. We will see how they go, because several of them are with U.S. allies.

And to extend on the point you were making, Christiane, how he treated U.S. allies in the room there, he also further isolated the U.S. from U.S. allies when it comes to recognizing Palestinian statehood, saying that doing so would be a reward for Hamas. He also called on Hamas to release all the hostages now.

I want to play that sound and actually bring in Jim Sciutto after to get his take.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Some of this body is seeking to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian state. The rewards would be too great for Hamas terrorists, for their atrocities. This would be a reward for these horrible atrocities, including October 7, even while they refuse to release the hostages or accept the cease-fire.

Instead of giving to Hamas and giving so much, because they have taken so much, they have taken so much -- this could have been solved so long ago. But instead of giving in to Hamas' ransom demands, those who want peace should be united with one message: Release the hostages now. Just release the hostages now.

[11:15:03]

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Jim, what is your reaction for those comments at a time when, as I mentioned, several U.S. allies like Canada and France are recognizing Palestinian statehood?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, that was the one line from the president's speech that got applause from those assembled, because there is, of course, broad and understandable agreement that everyone wants the hostages to come home.

But the thing is that, even from inside Israel and even from inside Prime Minister Netanyahu's own leadership, some of the former leaders, they say that the Israeli prime minister is not prioritizing the hostages and that, by expanding military action on the ground, he's endangering their lives.

There are open questions in Israel about Israel's priorities as relates to that war, and Trump himself has expressed impatience in the past with the Israeli leaders' focus on bringing that war to an end. But now, based on his comments today, it does not appear that he is putting any limits or any new pressure on Israel to bring that conflict to the end, acknowledging fully that, of course, Hamas is very much a player in this as well and is the one holding those hostages. I will say this, to Christiane's point, that when you listened to the

broad strokes of this speech, it came across more as a MAGA stump speech than a traditional address to world leaders. Look at the targets. He picked out the U.N. -- immigration as a major focus, renewable energy, not just renewable energy, but climate science itself.

And I noticed that he spoke for several minutes, a good five minutes, about the fact that the U.N. didn't take his offer to renovate it going back some 20 years, which was longer than he spent on what is another major topic of his, and that is nuclear weapons and the danger of nuclear weapons.

But he spent more time complaining about not getting the U.N. renovation job than that issue. And it shows this is Trump unleashed, right, talking to, about the topics he wants to talk about.

And the other point as well is, when you look at his language, the language -- and I know Christiane said something quite similar -- the language he used for allies, Europe, your countries are going to hell unless you address immigration, versus the language he used, for Russia, which is, of course, the country that invaded Ukraine, it's not making Russia look good, the war.

Of course, that's some criticism from Trump, but not acknowledging that Russia has started the largest war in Europe since World War II, right? And that speaks to whether he will ultimately apply the pressure that all of America's allies in Europe believe is necessary, and that is concerted U.S. effort from Trump to move Putin.

We're not seeing that. We didn't see a new commitment here. Again, he sets that condition that Europe must stop buying Russian oil first. And it is happening as Russia is arguably expanding the war by testing NATO's defenses and reactions with drones over Poland, fighter jets over Estonia, and now these drones interfering with airspace over Europe as well.

There's daylight between the U.S. and its allies, and that daylight was very clear today.

BROWN: There certainly is.

All right, we're talking about Russia. I actually want to go over to Russia and Moscow to our Fred Pleitgen to talk a little bit more about what we just heard from President Trump, right?

I mean, he talked about, look, I thought, basically, I could end the war in Ukraine because of my relationship with Putin. That wasn't the case, obviously. He says that all of this is making Russia look bad. Certainly, as Jim Sciutto pointed out, he could have gone further on that note.

What stood out to you on what the president said about Russia?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think several things, Pamela. On the one hand, it certainly didn't seem as though President Trump is

willing to escalate his issues with Vladimir Putin any time soon. He spoke about the possibility of possibly implementing very harsh sanctions against the Russians, as Jim just pointed out, but then moved very quickly to blame India and China for buying large quantities of Russian oil.

That, of course, is something that he's echoed also in the past, and then, of course, went over to speak about the U.S.' NATO allies and how they are still buying Russian oil as well, and that that would make it more difficult for the U.S. to put forward a solidified position as far as big sanctions against Russia are concerned to try and get Vladimir Putin to change course as far as Ukraine is concerned.

In general, the vibe that we're getting here in Moscow, and I think it's very important to point out, is that the Russians feel they're in a fairly comfortable position as far as the Trump administration is concerned. If we go back to that summit in Alaska, that was really a turning point for the Russians.

It's something that they very clearly pointed out, where they managed to get the Trump administration and the president to move to their view of things of how this conflict should end. Of course, President Trump before that summit was saying that he wants an almost immediate cease-fire, that cease-fire to be in place for 30 days, and that was also something then that the U.S.' allies were echoing.

[11:20:03]

But after meeting Vladimir Putin, the U.S. and Russia now agree that a broader peace deal needs to be worked out, and, of course, the negotiations for that have pretty much ended at this point in time. If we hear some of the things that the Kremlin has been saying over the past couple of weeks, they say that there's virtually no movement as far as that's concerned, no meetings also planned at any sort of high levels between the Ukrainians and the Russians.

Nevertheless, of course, the Russians not feeling very much in the heat from -- in the way of heat from the Trump administration. So, right now, they feel that they're in a very good position with the Trump administration.

And I think one thing to also point out that's very important -- and I think that that's not something that the president disputed in any way today -- for the Russians, ending the war in Ukraine is one of the things that they have on the agenda, but a total reset of U.S.-Russia relations is really what they want and what they see in the cards in the not-too-distant future, if, of course, things go well between Vladimir Putin and President Trump, Pamela.

BROWN: All right, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

I want to go to Paula Hancocks now in Abu Dhabi.

Paula, we know that President Trump has a meeting later today with many Muslim-majority countries, and all of this comes at a time when there was there's escalation in Gaza. What can you tell us?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Pamela, we're certainly seeing that and hearing about it from our sources on the ground in Gaza City, saying that Israeli tanks have been moving into multiple new neighborhoods of that city, as thousands of civilians still try to evacuate to the south.

Now, Israel has said that it's going to take over Gaza City. It says it's the last Hamas stronghold, but it is a desperately difficult situation for civilians on the ground. The International Red Cross has called it -- quote -- "an astronomical level of need."

Now, we know at this point that something like a million people, civilians, were in Gaza City when the Israelis first issued those evacuation orders. The Israeli military says about 640,000 have left, which means there are still hundreds of thousands within the city itself, which is undergoing significant shelling from the Israeli military.

Now, we did hear in that speech by the U.S. president that he believes that there should be negotiations immediately, talking about getting back to the negotiating table, trying to secure this cease-fire deal which would release all of the hostages and thousands of Palestinian prisoners.

But, on the ground, it really doesn't appear as though this is what Israel is looking for at this point. We know that they walked away from the talks because they want to have all of the hostages released, not just a trickle here, a trickle there. That was something the U.S. president reiterated as well just moments ago -- Pamela.

BROWN: All right, Paula, thanks so much.

I want to go to David Sanger now.

David, it seems like President Trump was harder on many U.S. allies than Russia and China. What's your take?

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: He definitely was.

In fact, we didn't hear very much about Russia and China. As Jim noted earlier, there have been these remarkable incursions into NATO territory by drones and the Russian air force. The president never mentioned it. China, of course, is America's largest and most complex competitor around the world.

You just saw the show of force, the expansion of its nuclear program during its parade. The president never mentioned it. He spent his time on immigration, on denying climate change. He spent his time at some length castigating countries like Brazil for political offenses that he said justified his tariffs.

But on the traditional issues in which the United States and the United Nations might work together, arms control and so forth, he said very little. BROWN: How do you expect America's allies to respond to this? They

came in much more prepared this time around than Trump's first term.

SANGER: Well, they did. And you may remember that in the first term there was some laughter at some of his statements in the hall. There was no laughter this time. They knew this was deadly serious.

But they also knew that the president did not -- was not prepared to put out an agenda of how the United States would work with the United Nations as it passes its 80th anniversary and renew it. Certainly, there's a lot of legitimate critique of how the U.N. has gone about its business.

Instead, what the president said was that, in acting as a peacemaker in what he initially said were seven, I think he's now got a longer list of conflicts, he was doing as a side job what the United Nations should be doing as a full-time job, and basically making the case that he was more effective than the U.N.

[11:25:20]

That may be the case, but you never heard him once suggest that the U.N. in fact had a significant purpose left in the international community. And, of course, the U.S. has been -- has already cut a billion dollars of its donations and is discussing cutting another billion.

BROWN: Yes. All right, David Sanger, stand by. Thank you so much.

And it is worth noting, on the laughter front, Kim Dozier, to bring you in, this time around, world leaders were laughing with him when he was making jokes, not at him, like the first time. And I think that's telling.

And you have reporting, because you just came back from Helsinki with some world leaders, about how they were sort of preparing themselves for this speech today. And, as I noted earlier, when we would do the cutaways of some of these world leaders and the U.S. allies that the president was essentially admonishing, they were stone-faced.

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: They have learned not to let their shock or anger show.

What they're going to do with this speech, there were no real surprises in this speech in terms of, these are all things that Trump has railed on about before, be it immigration, Ukraine, slamming the deaths there, et cetera. But what they will do is cherry-pick areas where they can work with him on and build on that, things like he mentioned wanting to use A.I. to force the law against bioweapons development.

He wants to stop nuclear weapons development. So they will reach out to him saying, hey, what can we do to help? And in terms of, yes, he slammed European nations that are still buying Russian oil and gas because he's just learning about it. But the E.U. has had a multiyear plan to wean itself off oil and gas

by 2028. So now what they're able to say is, hey, looks like we agree on harsher sanctions on Russia. That's a win. Let's tell you about our plan about how we're stopping buying oil and gas. And can you give us a good deal on more oil and gas to replace Russia?

They will go point by point and build on all of this and find where they can work with him, because they have found in the past, if you get angry with him, if you spurn him, all he's going to do is find a way to punish you.

BROWN: Yes, and they definitely want to avoid that because we have seen what that looks like.

DOZIER: Yes.

BROWN: Thanks so much, Kim.

Let's go to Kylie Atwood now, our national security correspondent.

Kylie, President Trump brought up climate change repeatedly, calling it a con job.

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, that's right, Pam.

The two main targets of his concerns, his aggressive comments here were migration and climate change, specifically renewable energy, saying that renewable energy, those countries that are investing in it, it's not a good idea, calling climate change a con job, though, of course, we know that climate change is real, according to scientists, and also talking about the global green scam and saying that the United Nations is backing an unmitigated energy disaster.

Now, we have obviously seen the Trump administration pull government funding from renewable energy projects in the United States. That has been a theme of the Trump administration, but his language towards renewable energy during this speech was incredibly harsh, I think harsher than we have seen really in recent months on this topic, which begs the question as to why he narrowed in on that.

We don't have an answer to that, but I do think it's important to talk about what Kim was just discussing with you, how other countries are going to respond to this. I got a text from one diplomat from Europe who said to me, there was no foreign policy in this speech today.

They're looking for ways to come to Trump and work with Trump, but, in this speech, he made it very clear that the Trump administration doesn't see Europeans, doesn't see the United Nations as a willing body to work alongside the values of this administration, that they believe in certain principles that they don't think that the world agrees with them on.

It was so striking to hear him talk to those countries, saying, your countries are going to hell because they have their borders who are open. So we will have to watch and see really how these other world leaders, particularly the ones that sit down with him here in New York, respond to his comments today.

He's meeting with President Zelenskyy of Ukraine. President Trump did not really lay out any new ideas when it comes to ending the war in Ukraine.

BROWN: All right, Kylie Atwood, thank you so much.

Our Daniel Dale is here to fact-check some of what we heard from President Trump.

One of the claims that President Trump has made repeatedly, he made it here today, is that he has ended seven wars. And he said today that he did that without any help from the U.N.

Let's listen.