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Trump Outlines His Changes to Reflecting Pool; Trump Signs $70B Immigration Enforcement Bill; Trump Takes Questions on Iran War. Aired 11:30-12p ET

Aired June 10, 2026 - 11:30   ET

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

[11:30:00]

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: But everybody's looking at that Reflecting Pool. They can't believe it. It reflects. We used a dark blue. It's called American flag blue. I wanted to go light, but they said, sir, light doesn't reflect. And light shows leaves and garbage, if garbage.

One man said, sir, when you leave, it'll be strewn with garbage again, and you don't want that. See, when I'm here, it'll be perfect. But when I leave, I said, you're right about that. You're probably right, depending on who's president or who's running it.

But it's really beautiful. It's something for you to see. It's incredible. It's the largest, it's the longest pool in the world by three or four times. It's -- you know, it's really pretty amazing. That's where Martin Luther King made his great speech. And they say he had a million people. And I made a speech there for July 4th, a few years ago. And they said -- and I was packed and they said I had 25,000 people. They said he had a million. But when you look at the picture, I said, well, wait, the people were even tighter at mine. I had more people than him. But they said I had 25,000 and he had a million. But I'm not going to argue with Martin Luther King.

But the Secure America Act provides $38 billion to ICE, $26 billion to Border Patrol to ensure these critical law enforcement agencies have the necessary resources to do their jobs, protecting our borders and getting criminal aliens out of the country. And starting on day one of my administration, we took the most dangerous, unsafe, violent and open border people out of this country. We got them out.

I'll give you an example. In Washington, over five -- I don't even know if you know this. It's not just policing. You have criminals. You have career criminals. There's nothing you can do to make them nice. They're tough people. They're bad people. Some of them had records, 23, 23. One had 28 arrests and rough arrests for murder. And we got -- we took out almost 5,000 people out of Washington, D.C.

And if you remember, so 2 percent of the people create 91 percent of the crime. When you hear that number, it's great. I love that number because you can handle 2 percent. If it's 91, create 91. That's no good. Too many people. But 2 percent of the people. And we got -- we took 5,000, almost 5,000. People out of Washington, D.C. They'll never come back.

In addition, the National Guard, and we worked with the police department, law enforcement was great. And we have a very safe city. Everyone is going out to eat now. Restaurants were all closed. They were all closing. The few that were open were closing. And now, you can't get a restaurant in Washington. Everyone wants to have a restaurant. It's a whole different -- so, it's something we're very proud of. New Orleans, the same thing, by the way. It's a little earlier in the process.

But if -- I got a call from your governor. I got a call from Steve. They called me together, actually. And they said, we've never had a Mardi Gras like that. They had the lowest crime they've ever had in the history of the Mardi Gras, which has been going on for a long time. They usually -- Steve said, they usually have numerous numbers of murders, and they had none. But beyond murders, they -- I heard it was the best, like, the best you've ever had.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It really was. A great Super Bowl, too.

TRUMP: And Memphis -- and that's going to be great for the Super Bowl, because we'll keep it that way. I think you're bidding on the Super Bowl coming in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 2031.

TRUMP: Yes. And it's going to be -- now you can really say it was a safe city. And the other one is Memphis. We -- crime is down 77 percent. Can you believe it? People are calling me up. Friends are -- were leaving Memphis. Were all leaving, and now they're staying. And the governor's -- everyone's thrilled. It's amazing. And if they would call me for Chicago, we'd straighten out Chicago so fast. We'd straighten out New York fast. We'd straighten out Los Angeles fast. We do it really well. And part of it is you have to get the really bad ones. You have to get the career criminals out, because they will -- they'll hit you hard. And they ought to get rid of, by the way, cashless bail, and you ought to do that as soon as possible when they -- Markwayne?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's right.

TRUMP: When they walk in, they commit a crime. They go out. In the afternoon, they commit another crime, and sometimes those crimes are murder.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right back on the street. That's right.

TRUMP: Cashless -- I'll tell you what, cashless bail was a tremendous help to criminals. It's one of the greatest things that ever happened to a criminal, and they ought to end it. In every city, they ought to end it. Chicago, New York, L.A., they ought to end it.

Starting on day one of my administration, we took the most dangerous, unsafe, violent, open border in the world. We had the most unsafe border, I believe, anywhere in the world. And the numbers came out two days ago that for 11 months, not one person came into our country illegally through the southern border.

[11:35:00]

We had 25 million people come in over a four-year period. We have it good. And nobody tries to come in. All the caravans -- I came up with the name caravan. It was a -- you'd have 25,000, 30,000 people coming up. And they'd pour through the border. You've seen the scenes where they're knocking over the fences. A very, very bad, very dangerous situation. We don't have them anymore because they know they can't get through. So, when they know they can't get through, they don't come.

And a lot of lives are saved. Women were being raped on the journey up. They were being raped in numbers. 25, 30 percent were being raped coming up. You don't have that anymore because they don't come up in caravans anymore because they know they're not going to get through.

So, starting on day one, we took the most dangerous and unsafe, violent, open border in the world, and we created the most secure border anywhere in our country -- probably one of the most in the world. I believe it was the most insecure and unsecure border anywhere in the world. Because there's no country, even a third-world country, that has a situation like that, where you'd have criminals just walk across, totally unchecked.

They had a -- the Biden -- it wasn't Biden. He didn't know what the hell was going on. It was people that are radical, left lunatics who are very smart, very violent, very vicious, politically vicious. And they allowed this open border policy where millions of people came into our country -- unchecked, unvetted. People from jails, people -- drug dealers, people from mental institutions. Jails and mental institutions from all over the world were emptied out into our country. And we've got a lot of them out. We have a ways to go. It's very tough with the courts because every of these -- the judges have been very terrible. They've been terrible. Very sad.

But we're doing -- we're fighting our way through it. We have made this a much -- in fact, we've made it a country that, as you saw last month, they said we had the lowest murder rate that we've had in 125 years. Think of that. And that's despite the fact, because we got a lot out, but we do have more.

We had 11,888 people come into our country who murdered -- committed a murder. 50 percent -- more than 50 percent created more than one murder. Think of that. So, you had people coming in one -- I think seven murders. We allowed them into the country. We got most of them out.

In the last 12 months, zero illegal aliens have been admitted into the United States. We cut people off. We sent it all across our border.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. With us now is -- who has done extensive reporting on Trump's immigration policies. We also have CNN senior White House correspondent Kristen Holmes standing by. But we're just listening to the president. He is there to sign this legislation, this package for $70 billion towards immigration enforcement. He, as we heard, went on a tangent about some other things, about the Reflection -- Reflecting Pool and everything else. We're going to go to Kristen on that.

But I want to go to you on immigration, because he made a lot of claims there that we've heard over the years. Tell us more about what the facts are and the significance of the signing today.

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, he has been touting that there are no migrants that have been admitted into the United States along the U.S. southern border. And there actually is some truth to that. The numbers have been driven down so significantly that they have been able to handle those numbers and deport them back to their origin country. So, that is something that he talks about repeatedly, that there is some truth to, according to the officials I am speaking with.

But all of that aside, and some of the claims that he's also made about countries dumping people in the United States, as we've heard him talk about on the trail and at the White House, this is a massive victory for his agenda. This is $70 billion for immigration enforcement, which is his issue and one that propelled him into the White House. To give you some context, ICE will get a chunk of this, $38 billion, around $38 billion for ICE.

That is nearly four times the annual fiscal year 2025 budget for this agency. And that is not even counting the money that they got from the big, beautiful bill that passed last year. So, if you add it all together, it ends up being around 11 times what they would usually get.

So, this is an enormous amount of money for ICE after they already got a cash infusion last year. This is also true for Border Patrol. So, what does that mean? That means that they have more at their disposal to spend this money for the purpose of the administration's immigration agenda over the next few years.

Now, there is no requirements on how they spend the money, when they spend the money, how many they can spend annually. And we have heard multiple times from Homeland Security officials and from White House Correspondent Tom Homan that they are ready to go full steam ahead.

Now, I will say, Pamela, it is much harder to spend this money than some might think.

[11:40:00]

There are the logistics of where you spend it, how you spend it, say, for example, the detention warehouses. And we've seen that some of those plans had to be paused. So, it's still not easy, despite getting a lot of money, but it does help advance their agenda for increasing arrests in the country, for increasing detention and deportation.

So, yes, we heard the president talk about multiple issues there. I know that you're going to get some of that with Kristen. We also heard him revert back to some of his claims about immigration, which some of which are false.

But ultimately, when you're just looking at the numbers here, this is a very big deal for the Department of Homeland Security and what they can achieve in the next few months and years under this administration to see that deportation campaign really come to fruition again, not only for ICE, but also for the Border Patrol.

BROWN: And of course, this issue overall is a winning issue for this administration. So, the more they can keep attention on immigration, the better for them, especially looking ahead to the midterms. But also, Kristen, he talked about one of his many pet projects and really granular detail today in the Oval Office.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: I mean, yes, I think what's so fascinating about this, Priscilla's right. And this is a massive victory for President Trump and his administration. It is also one of the most Republicans believe last pieces of major legislation that President Trump is going to be able to pass before November, before those midterms. And remember, it wasn't easy sailing through. They had a lot of senators who were unhappy.

It's all came down after President Trump had primaried two of these senators. This all came down after the announcement of that Department of Justice weaponization fund that so many Democrats and Republicans were against. So, it was touch and go whether or not this was going to actually get through.

But despite the fact that this is such an enormous win for President Trump, he's spending far more time talking about everything else, particularly his pet projects, like the Reflecting Pool, talking about how he chose the color. He wanted a lighter color. Instead, they told him he needed a darker color because it wasn't going to reflect as well with a lighter color or trash would show up. He talked about fountains in various D.C. parks being turned on for the for the first time in years. He talked about the crime rates in D.C., much of it focusing on this kind of beautification process that President Trump has become seemingly fixated on.

I think if we went back and looked at the last several times we've heard from President Trump, whether it be in the Oval Office or standing at a podium, these are the topics that he tends to really stick to talking about this. And of course, the ballroom, which he has made one of his signature projects at this time, not the legislation.

It's fascinating to me as we hear him kind of go on and on about the project, particularly the Reflecting Pool, is what's happening in the rest of the world. The fact that Americans are really feeling the war in Iran. They are paying D.C. right now. Gas is roughly six dollars a gallon, and that is higher than other areas. But we know that people are suffering across the country and the war is still going on.

President Trump this morning was threatening Iran, saying that they were going to strike civilian facilities again and go back into some kind of military operation if Iran didn't come back to the table or sign an agreement. And yet up until you guys pulled out, we hadn't heard anything about that. It's really going to cause problems for Republicans who are trying to focus on what is going on with everyday Americans. If you can only have the president out there talking instead about these beauty projects that he really wants to focus on. BROWN: Right. And just out today, we got the inflation report. It is at a three-year high. So, we are monitoring the president in the Oval Office right now. We'll see if he takes any questions from reporters. No doubt. If so, he would be asked about the Iran war and these prices, like you mentioned at the pump. Kristen Holmes, Priscilla Alvarez, thank you both. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:45:00]

BROWN: All right. Let's listen back into President Trump. He's taking questions.

TRUMP: At first, he said they didn't do it. Then they admitted they did it. Sort of easy because we have the we have the bomb. We actually have the bomb. Got very lucky that bomb didn't explode. That bomb was lodged in the helicopter. It didn't explode. It was on fire, but it didn't explode. It's just those two guys, they knew how to fly, but they got very lucky.

And then we had the unmanned boat going very, very fast at speeds that you wouldn't want to go. That's why it's unmanned, I guess, because nobody can go in there. But they rescued. So, both people are -- fortunately the pilots are OK.

Now, look, I've been working with Iran for a number of months and they should sign the deal. It's a good deal. It doesn't give them the right to have a nuclear weapon. In fact, it totally prohibits them from ever having a nuclear weapon. And it was just tap, tap, tap. I don't know what they're doing.

So, they then shot out a -- shot at our helicopter. Very expensive helicopter, by the way. But much more importantly, the two men, fortunately, they're OK. But an amazing rescue. If you ever get a clip, you'll you won't believe the rescue. How cool it was. The equipment we have.

Look, we have the strongest military in the world. And I gave them a break at the request of Pakistan. The field marshal and the prime minister of Pakistan are great. We stopped them from going to war with India. You would've had a nuclear war if it wasn't for me. But they became friendly to me, very friendly. And they stayed close to Iran and they work -- and they still are working on trying them to do what's right.

[11:50:00]

But we want to deal this meaningful. We want to deal that works. We don't want to just have a Barack Hussein Obama deal. JCPOA, the worst deal. That was a path to a nuclear. It's the exact opposite. You know, I like on television. They say, oh, they should have kept that deal. First of all, it was over. It was a short-term deal. That deal was a path to a nuclear weapon. This is a path against a nuclear. You can't have a nuclear weapon. His was a path to a nuclear weapon. They were developing during his administration nuclear weapon. If they had a nuclear weapon, there'd be no Israel, there'd be no Middle East, and they would have absolutely shot at us. So, we'll see what happens. But we hit him hard yesterday and we're going to hit him again hard today. In case you miss it, in case you don't turn on your television set. And we'll see what happens with the deal.

We were really close to a deal, but they keep tapping us along. They keep playing us for suckers because you know what? They dealt with some very stupid presidents. I have to say that I'm embarrassed to say some very stupid people were sitting there. Yes?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, you mentioned the Senate race in Maine. Are you all in in supporting Susan Collins? Does she have your full support and endorsement in her --

TRUMP: She does, because she's a sane woman. She's not my best friend at all. These guys are. I get along well, but I have some -- but she's a sane person. And she's a person that never missed a vote in many years. I mean, she's like 10,000 votes. She had 10,000 votes. She never missed a vote. Unfortunately, because sometimes she voted against me.

You know, look, she's a sane woman and she's a respected person, maybe a little different ideology than me. But this guy is a thug. He's a fake. He's a fake thug. He's a phony. I made a lot of money picking out phonies. He's a real phony. He's bad -- he's a bad person. Yes?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, are you going to go back to the tower? Are you thinking of attacking Iranian power plants and bridges because you --

TRUMP: Well, I'm not going to say that to you, but I can do that. Look, I could knock out -- we have the most powerful -- I built the military with these people approving it. They approved numbers that nobody would have ever thought we would be.

But we built it and gave a lot to Ukraine through Biden. He gave a lot of money, a lot, but we're in great shape. We have a lot of storage capacity, but he gave a lot. And if you look at what's happened, I -- when I left, our coverage, our cupboards were full. He gave it. Now, I sell it to the European Union and they give it to Ukraine for the most part.

But we have the strongest military anywhere in the world. And sometimes you'll have to use it. And we have to remember -- and when people hear this, Iran very simply cannot have a nuclear weapon and they won't. And they've agreed to that. All they have to do is they have to start signing a paper. It's fully negotiated. We have a fully negotiated. But they're tapping and tapping. And I said, all right. Let's give them a couple of more days. They're tapping because it's a meaningful paper. They know when they sign that paper, it's meaningful. The Obama deal, JCPOA, one of the worst, one of the dumbest documents I've ever seen. Yes. Go ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you, Mr. President. When are you meeting with tech executives about the government taking stake in A.I. companies? And what could this partnership look like?

TRUMP: About A.I.?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, sir.

TRUMP: Well, I can say this. We're having a meeting with them. It's an amazing industry. It's bigger than any industry anyone's ever seen. We are leading China by a lot. And, you know, whoever leads that is going to really lead the world to a large extent. That's how big it is. And I'm going to have meetings with the top 12 or 15 executives very shortly. And we're talking about giving back something to the public.

And if we do that, the public will become very rich. The people in our country, because that's the kind of money we're talking about. And I think they'll do that. And I think it'll make it very popular.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have two questions. First of all, Turkish President Erdogan keeps threatening Israel. Do you think there's a chance of a conflict between Israel and Turkey? And will you sell F-35 to Turkey?

TRUMP: Well, as you know, he's a very good friend of mine. And we've worked very well together. I like him a lot. I'm not supposed to say that because the press will say, oh, he likes Erdogan. No, he's a hell of a leader and a strong person. Very strong person.

[11:55:00]

I haven't heard that at all. If I did, I'd call him, and I think I'd make sure that things were fine. I don't think that will happen with Turkey. Not as long as I'm president, because he respects me and I respect him. But beyond that, we have a good friendship. So, you know --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And I said my second question -- that's my second question. Beside peace in the Middle East, what do you wish yourself for your birthday?

TRUMP: For my birthday. Well, I'll go a step bigger. Peace for the world, OK? Peace for the world. Middle East, yes. Peace for the whole world. Yes?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, there is a New Jersey Democratic congressional nominee over in the 12th District. His name is Adam Hamawy. He has a connection to the blind shade. And I was wondering if I could get your thoughts on that.

TRUMP: I think it's terrible. OK? I think it's terrible. I've seen it. I mean, he was more -- you know, now he's trying to sort of say, yes, I sort of knew him. He didn't know me. We were very good friends. And you look at the -- you go back and look at what happened during that period of time. He was a witness at the trial for him. He was a positive witness for him. He said the most glowing things. The guy knocked down the World Trade Center. Admitted that he knocked down the World Trade Center. I think it's another one, if you look. I actually think the one in Maine is worse, because he's just an outright pig. He's like a pig. I watched him a couple of times. He's like a pig. That's what he reminds me of. You know, I come up with good names for people. I don't want to stick him with that one, although I think pigs would be very upset about it. Go ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, (INAUDIBLE). How confident are you that you'll be able to renew the USMCA? And what more do you expect from Canada at this point?

TRUMP: Well, I'm not looking to renew it. I don't -- you know, I mean, I made the deal. And the primary reason I made the deal is that NAFTA was the worst trade deal I've ever seen. And I made it better, but I had the right to terminate. And, you know, with NAFTA, we didn't have the right to terminate. I had to get these senators to approve that deal. That was a tough thing. Congressmen, too. NAFTA had no termination.

So, I mean, I've never said this before, but I'll tell you what my thinking was. NAFTA was a disaster for our country. The worst trade deal ever made, by far. You know, they had typos in, OK? And they were supposed to correct them. And they never corrected them when they were signed. They knew there were typos. And there's a process for that. You state your claim, and, you know, you get a change.

They had typos on percentages or maybe somebody wrote -- and that was -- for years, they never ran. They had horrible -- all against us. So, it probably wasn't typos. And NAFTA was the worst trade deal we ever had.

USMCA did one thing that I loved. After six years, it comes up for renewal. I don't know that I'm going to renew it because, to be honest with you, the United States does much better. We don't need anything that Canada has. We don't need anything that Mexico has. But they need everything that we have. And they have to treat us better.

You know, with Mexico and Canada, we have trade deficits. We should have surpluses with them. We don't need their cars. We don't need their lumber. We don't need their energy. We don't need anything that they have. So, the primary thing that I got -- it was a much better deal than NAFTA. Much, much better. It was sort of a good deal. But it was a great deal for one reason, it gave the right to terminate. And who would have thought that I was -- you know, they just didn't want to have it during the four-year period when I was president.

So, now they've made it so that I wouldn't be president. And because they rigged the election, the second election, as you probably hear and probably know -- most of you know that happened. And now, it's been proven. And it will be proven as time goes by even more so. We have things that you won't believe. When we release the full files, you're not going to believe how crooked the second, the 2020 election was.

But who would've thought that it comes due in my term? I mean, this was -- thank you very much. So, it was very important that we be able to do that. So, we're talking to them. We'll see if we do something. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, just before we came in here, you posted about Bill Pulte and that he'd be starting the job early. You said he's going to be downsizing the DNI. Can you talk about your thinking there?

TRUMP: Well, yes, people have wanted that downsized for a long time, but many people don't want it at all.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does that mean cutting intelligence job?

TRUMP: Yes. A lot of people thought it was a duplication. He's done a great job at Fannie Mae, and you know, you take Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae the value of that has increased so much since I've been in charge. You know, I had the right to sell that, and in my first term, a group came to see me wanting to buy it, and they offered me exactly 10 percent of what it's worth today. And I didn't want to do it because I didn't want to look foolish when they flipped it a year later for hundreds --

[12:00:00]