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Donald Trump

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I know words. I have the best words.
File:Main-qimg-021d8d22e0438179020144bbb4821733.jpg
In a certain way, I felt very safe, because I had God on my side. I really felt that[1]
If they do ‘assassinate President Trump,’ which is always a possibility, I hope that America obliterates Iran, wipes it off the face of the Earth, If that does not happen, American Leaders will be considered ‘gutless’ cowards![2]

Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States of America from 2017 to 2021.

See also:
Donald Trump on social media
Presidency of Donald Trump
Racial views of Donald Trump
Trumpism

Quotes

1980s

  • Rona Barrett: If you lost your fortune today, what would you do tomorrow?
    Donald Trump: Maybe I’d run for president. I don’t know.
  • Rona Barrett: Would you like to be the President of the United States?
    Donald Trump: I really don't believe I would, Rona. But I would like to see somebody as the president who could do the job, and there are very capable people in this country.
    Barrett: Why wouldn't you dedicate yourself to public service?
    Trump: Because I think it's a very mean life. I would love, and I would dedicate my life to this country but I see it as being a mean life, and I also see it in somebody with strong views, and somebody with the kind of views that are maybe a little bit unpopular, which may be right, but may be unpopular, wouldn't necessarily have a chance of getting elected against somebody with no great brain but a big smile im also orange.
  • Rona Barrett: How would you like to be remembered?
    Donald Trump: Well, as somebody that’s contributed something to the United States and to the City of New York, and to the various other places that I’m going, and somebody that’s done a little bit better than other people at what he does.
  • I said, 'I will build you this incredible, gorgeous, gleaming hotel. I will put people to work in the construction trades and save hotel jobs and the Grand Central area will come around.' So the city made the deal.
  • "Give them the old Trump bullshit," he told the architect Der Scutt before a presentation of the Trump Tower design at a press conference in 1980. "Tell them it is going to be a million square feet, sixty-eight stories."
  • Some people have an ability to negotiate. It's an art you're basically born with. You either have it or you don't.
  • It would take an hour-and-a-half to learn everything there is to learn about missiles. I think I know most of it anyway. You're talking about just getting updated on a situation
  • I have featured and will always continue to feature my name prominently in all my enterprises.
  • I look at things for the art sake and the beauty sake and for the deal sake.
  • I'm not big on compromise. I understand compromise. Sometimes compromise is the right answer, but oftentimes compromise is the equivalent of defeat, and I don't like being defeated.
    • Life, Vol. 12 (January 1989), p. iii
  • Of course I hate these people and let's all hate these people because maybe hate is what we need if we're gonna get something done.
  • I like to hire people that I've seen in action. I often hire people that were on the opposing side of a deal that I respect.
    • The Washington Post (September 23, 1989), as quoted in The World According to Trump (2005) by Ken Lawrence, p. 25
  • I think if this country gets any kinder or gentler, it's literally going to cease to exist.

Trump: The Art of the Deal (1987)

From Trump: The Art of the Deal (1987) by Donald J. Trump with Tony Schwartz.
  • I don't do it for the money. I've got enough, much more than I'll ever need. I do it to do it. Deals are my art form. Other people paint beautifully on canvas or write wonderful poetry. I like making deals, preferably big deals. That's how I get my kicks.
    • p. 1
  • Sometimes it pays to be a little wild.
    • p. 5
  • Experience taught me a few things. One is to listen to your gut, no matter how good something sounds on paper. The second is that you're generally better off sticking with what you know. And the third is that sometimes your best investments are the ones you don't make.
    • p. 28
  • My philosophy is always to hire the best from the best.
    • p. 31
  • Deal-making is an ability you're born with. It's in the genes.
    • p. 45
  • I like thinking big. I always have. To me it's very simple: if you're going to be thinking anyway, you might as well think big. Most people think small, because most people are afraid of success, afraid of making decisions, afraid of winning. And that gives people like me a great advantage.
    • p. 46
  • I wasn't satisfied just to earn a good living. I was looking to make a statement.
    • p. 47
  • People think I'm a gambler. I've never gambled in my life. To me, a gambler is someone who plays slot machines. I prefer to own slot machines. It's a very good business being the house.
    • p. 48
  • The point is that you can't be too greedy.
    • p. 48
  • I'm a great believer in asking everyone for an opinion before I make a decision. ... I ask and I ask and I ask, until I begin to get a gut feeling about something. And that's when I make a decision. I have learned much more from conducting my own random surveys than I could ever have learned from the greatest of consulting firms.
    • pp. 51–52
  • The worst thing you can possibly do in a deal is seem desperate to make it. That makes the other guy smell blood, and then you're dead. The best thing you can do is deal from strength, and leverage is the biggest strength you can have. Leverage is having something the other guy wants. Or better yet, needs. Or best of all, simply can't do without. Unfortunately, that isn't always the case, which is why leverage often requires imagination, and salesmanship.
    • p. 53
  • The final key to the way I promote is bravado. I play to people's fantasies. People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That's why a little hyperbole never hurts. People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole. It's an innocent form of exaggeration—and a very effective form of promotion.
    • p. 58
  • My experience is that if you're fighting for something you believe in—even if it means alienating some people along the way—things usually work out for the best in the end.
    • p. 59
  • One of the problems when you become successful is that jealousy and envy inevitably follow. There are people—I categorize them as life's losers—who get their sense of accomplishment and achievement from trying to stop others. As far as I'm concerned, if they had any real ability they wouldn't be fighting me, they'd be doing something constructive themselves.
    • p. 59
  • You can't con people, at least not for long. You can create excitement, you can do wonderful promotion and get all kinds of press, and you can throw in a little hyperbole. But if you don't deliver the goods, people will eventually catch on.
    • p. 60
Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is playing the game.
  • Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is playing the game.
    • p. 63
  • Get in, get it done, get it done right, and get out.
    • p. 65
  • The most important thing in life is to love what you're doing, because that's the only way you'll ever be really good at it.
    • p. 67
  • You can't be scared. You do your thing, you hold your ground, you stand up tall, and whatever happens, happens.
    • p. 89
  • My own mother was a housewife all her life. And yet it's turned out that I've hired a lot of women for top jobs, and they've been among my best people. Often, in fact, they are far more effective than the men around them.
    • p. 173
  • In the end, you're measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish.
    • p. 355
  • What I admire most are people who put themselves directly on the line.
    • p. 367
  • In my life, there are two things I've found I'm very good at: overcoming obstacles and motivating good people to do their best work.
    • p. 367

1990

I'm very liberal when it comes to health care. I believe in universal health care. I believe in whatever it takes to make people well and better.
When the students poured into Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government almost blew it. Then they were vicious, they were horrible, but they put it down with strength. That shows you the power of strength.
  • What separates the winners from the losers is how a person reacts to each new twist of fate.
    • Trump: Surviving at the Top (1990), p. 3
  • She turned out to be the wife of a man who was then the prime minister of a major country. I'd heard stories about this lady, but I never thought much of them until that night. We met at the house of the friend who'd phoned me. After we'd all chatted for a while in the living room, the four of us who already knew each other drifted out to the kitchen, leaving Ben and Madame X in the living room to get better acquainted. Which they did. In fact, when we drifted back in, about ten minutes later, she and Ben were involved in an incredibly torrid scene on the couch. I remember standing there and thinking to myself, "Well, Donald, you're not in Queens anymore."
    • Trump: Surviving at the Top (1990), p. 52
  • "When a man leaves a woman, especially when it was perceived that he has left for a piece of ass—a good one!—there are 50 percent of the population who will love the woman who was left," he told me.
  • "I want five children, like in my own family, because with five, then I will know that one will be guaranteed to turn out like me," Donald told a close friend.
  • I said to the bankers, "Listen, fellows, if I have a problem, then you have a problem. We have to find a way out or it's going to be a difficult time for both of us."
    • Fortune (August 13, 1990), as quoted in The World According to Trump (2005) by Ken Lawrence, p. 44
    • Cf. J. Paul Getty: "If you owe the bank $100, that's your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that's the bank's problem."

1991

  • You know, it doesn't really matter what the media writes as long as you've got a young and beautiful piece of ass.

1992

  • Wow! Just think — in a couple of years I'll be dating you.
  • He's a good guy, and he's not going to hurt anybody. . . . He treated his wife well and . . . he will treat Marla well.
Actresses, people that you write about just call to see if they can go out with him and things.
I mean, he's living with Marla and he's got three other girlfriends.
He does things for himself. When he makes a decision, that will be a very lucky woman.

1993

  • Howard Stern: So, you treat women with respect?
    Donald Trump: Uh, I can't say that either.
    Stern: Alright, good.
  • You know, if you’re young, and in this era, and if you have any guilt about not having gone to Vietnam, we have our own Vietnam—it’s called the dating game... Dating is like being in Vietnam. You’re the equivalent of a soldier going over to Vietnam.
  • I am not a law enforcement officer. I am not supposed to be going around checking Indian reservations. That is what you have the FBI for, and they are very capable, the most capable.
    • Oversight Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Native American Affairs of the Committee on Natural Resources, House of Representatives, October 5, 1993: In Implementation of Indian Gaming Regulatory Act: Oversight Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Native American Affairs of the Committee on Natural Resources, House of Representatives, One Hundred Third Congress ... Public Law 100-497, the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988, Part 5, page 187

1994

  • Well, I think that she's got a lot of Marla [Maples, Trump's second wife], she's a really beautiful baby, and she's got Marla's legs. We don't know whether she's got this part yet [gestures toward own chest], but time will tell...
  • Everybody's always blaming me for everything.
    • 16 May 1994 in "For Sale by Owner" s4e24 of "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air", video here

1996

  • Let's make a deal; if you promise not to get "personal" with me, I will promise not to show you as the crude, fat and obnoxious slob which everyone knows you are. Sincerely, Donald J. Trump.

1997

  • “It’s amazing, I can’t even believe it. I’ve been so lucky in terms of that whole world, it is a dangerous world out there. It’s like Vietnam, sort of. It is my personal Vietnam. I feel like a great and very brave solider”
    • speaking of having sex and referring to women's genitals as “potential landmines”.
    • An interview on The Howard Stern Show, 1997, archived by People

1999

  • I surround myself with the best people. I know the best people.
    • On an interview (1999 November 26)
  • The part of my life I think I'm most disappointed in is that I have not had the great marriage. And I would have thought that would have happened, because I came from a home—you know, it's not like some of my friends, they get divorced, but their parents were divorced twice or three times. I came from a home where marriage was just incredible. I mean, my parents truly loved each other.
    • Good Morning America (2 December 1999), as quoted in The World According to Trump (2005) by Ken Lawrence, p. 46

2000

  • I judge people based on their capability, honesty, and merit.
    • "Trump towers", interview with Paul Alexander, The Advocate (15 February 2000), p. 23

2002

  • I think the regulations are very tough, but I think they could be made tougher. And where they really have to be made tougher is when somebody is proven to be dishonest, not a mistake, not an honest mistake because look, people make bad business deals all the time. When somebody is proven to be dishonest, really harsh punishment has to take place.
  • I've known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy. He's a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it — Jeffrey enjoys his social life.

2003

2004

  • Now, if your boss is a sadist, then you have a big problem. In that case, fire your boss and get a new job.
    • Trump: How to Get Rich (2004)
  • If you don't tell people about your success, they probably won't know about it.
    • Trump: How to Get Rich (2004), p. xiii
  • Get going. Move forward. Aim high. Plan for a takeoff. Don't just sit on the runway and hope someone will come along and push the airplane. It simply won't happen. Change your attitude and gain some altitude. Believe me, you'll love it up here.
    • Trump: How to Get Rich (2004), p. 74
  • In business—every business—the bottom line is understanding the process. If you don't understand the process, you'll never reap the rewards of the process.
    • Trump: How to Get Rich (2004), p. 86
  • Watch, listen, and learn. You can't know it all yourself—anyone who thinks that they do is destined for mediocrity.
    • Trump: The Way to the Top: The Best Business Advice I Ever Received (2004), p. 20
  • I don't like firing people. It's not a pleasant thing and it's sad. ... In some cases, it's a terrible, terrible situation for the person who gets fired, how strongly they take it. So it's not something that any rational or sane person can love doing, but it also happens to be a fact of life in business.
    • Boston Herald (7 January 2004), as quoted in The World According to Trump (2005) by Ken Lawrence, p. 16
  • People say, "Do you have the same opportunity today as you had years ago?" And I said, "Absolutely." You always have an opportunity. There's always an opportunity, especially in this country.
  • All of the women on The Apprentice flirted with me - consciously or unconsciously. That's to be expected.
  • My life is seeing everything in terms of "How would I handle that?" Look at the war in Iraq and the mess that we're in. I would never have handled it that way. Does anybody really believe that Iraq is going to be a wonderful democracy where people are going to run down to the voting box and gently put in their ballot and the winner is happily going to step up to lead the county? C'mon. Two minutes after we leave, there's going to be a revolution, and the meanest, toughest, smartest, most vicious guy will take over. And he'll have weapons of mass destruction, which Saddam didn't have. What was the purpose of this whole thing? Hundreds and hundreds of young people killed. And what about the people coming back with no arms and legs? Not to mention the other side. All those Iraqi kids who've been blown to pieces. And it turns out that all of the reasons for the war were blatantly wrong. All this for nothing!
  • Pregnancy is "a wonderful thing for the woman, it's a wonderful thing for the husband, it's certainly an inconvenience for a business."
    • About pregnancy (2004)
  • The concept of shaking hands is absolutely terrible, and statistically I’ve been proven right.
    • Playboy, 2004 [3]
  • In many cases, I probably identify more as Democrat. It just seems that the economy does better under the Democrats than the Republicans. Now, it shouldn't be that way. But if you go back, I mean it just seems that the economy does better under the Democrats. ...But certainly we had some very good economies under Democrats, as well as Republicans. But we've had some pretty bad disaster under the Republicans.

2005

  • I'll go backstage, before a show, and everyone's getting dressed and ready and everything else. And you know, no men are anywhere. And I'm allowed to go in because I'm the owner of the pageant and therefore I'm inspecting it. You know I'm inspecting, I want to make sure everything is good, the dresses, "Is everyone OK?", you know they're standing there with no clothes, "Is everybody OK?", and you see these incredible-looking women, and so I sort of get away with things like that.
  • I did try and fuck her. She was married. I moved on her like a bitch, but I couldn't get there. And she was married. Then all of a sudden I see her, she's now got the big phony tits and everything. She's totally changed her look. I've gotta use some Tic Tacs, just in case I start kissing her. You know, I'm automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It's like a magnet. Just kiss. I don't even wait. When you're a star, they let you do it. You can do anything... Grab 'em by the pussy. You can do anything.

2006

  • Jon Ward: There's a lot of talk, which you no doubt heard too, about a sort of real estate bubble. What's your take on that pessimism?
  • Donald Trump: Well, first of all, I sort of hope that happens because then people like me would go in and buy.

2007

  • Since I love what I do, I do it vigorously and I do it better. Because I inject it with enthusiasm and passion, it doesn't feel like work. My passion spills over to everyone around me and motivates them to do their very best.
  • Passion is absolutely necessary to achieve any kind of long-lasting success. I know this from experience. If you don't have passion, everything you do will ultimately fizzle out or, at best, be mediocre.
    • Trump 101 The Way to Success (2007), p. 2
  • The war is total disaster. It's a catastrophe, nothing less. It is such a shame that this took place. In fact, I gained a lot of respect for our current president's father by the fact that he had the sense not to go in to Iraq. He won the war and then said let's not go the rest of the way and he turned out to be right. And Saddam Hussein, whether they like him or didn't like him, he hated terrorists. He'd shoot and kill terrorists. When terrorists came in to his country, which he did control and he did dominate, he would kill terrorists. Now it's a breeding ground for terrorists. So, look, the war is a total catastrophe...and they have a civil war going on.
  • I make that --- twice now, on a Monday I let returning Iraqi injured soldiers come to the premises. The most beautiful people I've ever seen. But they're missing arms and legs, they're with their wives, sometimes they're with their girlfriends. And the tears are coming down the faces of these people. I mean, thousands and maybe hundreds of thousands, and the Iraqis that have been just maimed and killed. This war is a horrible thing. Now, President Bush says he's religious. And yet 400,000 people, the way I count it, have died, and probably millions have been badly maimed and injured. What's going on? What's going on? And the day we pull out it's going to explode. We're keeping the lid on a little bit. It's still a catastrophe, but the day we pull out, because they're in a civil war. Whether we want to admit it or not, they're in a civil war.
  • Hillary Clinton I think is a terrific woman. I am biased because I have known her for years. I live in New York. She lives in New York. I really like her and her husband both a lot. I think she really works hard. And I think, again, she's given an agenda, it is not all of her, but I think she really works hard and I think she does a good job. I like her.
  • Trump Steaks are the world's greatest steaks, and I mean that in every sense of the word. Treat yourself to the very, very best life has to offer you. And as a gift, Trump Steaks are the best you can give. One bite, and you'll know exactly what I'm talking about, and believe me. I understand steaks, it's my favorite food.
    • Lines marking the introduction of Trump Steaks by The Sharper Image (2007)
  • My net worth fluctuates, and it goes up and down with the markets and with attitudes and with feelings, even my own feelings, but I try.

2008

2009

  • If I'd started in business thinking I knew everything, I'd have been sunk before I started... Never think of learning as being a burden or studying as being boring. It may require some discipline, but it can be an adventure. It can also prepare you for a new beginning.
    • Think Like a Champion: An Informal Education In Business and Life (2009), pp. 16–17

2011

  • Donald Trump: Meredith, he spent two million dollars in legal fees trying to get away from this issue. And if he weren't lying, why wouldn't he just solve it? And I wish he would, because if he doesn't, it's one of the greatest scams in the history of politics, and in the history period. You are not allowed to be a president if you're not born in this country. He may not be born in this country. And I'll tell you what, three weeks ago I thought he was born in this country. Right now, I have some real doubts. I have people that actually have been studying it and they cannot believe what they're finding.
    Meredith Vieira: You have people now, down there searching—
    Trump: Absolutely.
    Vieira: I mean, in Hawaii?
    Trump: Absolutely. And they cannot believe what they're finding. I would like to have him show his birth certificate, and can I be honest with you, I hope he can. Because if he can't, if he can't, if he wasn't born in this country, which is a real possibility, I'm not saying it hap— I'm saying it's a real possibility, much greater than I thought two or three weeks ago, then he has pulled one of the great cons in the history of politics. And beyond politics.
    • Today, NBC, 7 April 2011 
    • regarding Barack Obama
    • Two million dollars is the sum of all the Obama presidential campaign's post-election legal expenses.[4]
  • David Brody: Radical Islam: to Evangelicals, this is a bread and butter issue. You said there's a Muslim problem in this country. What do you mean by that exactly?
    Donald Trump: Bill O'Reilly asked me is there a Muslim problem? And I said absolutely, yes. In fact I went a step further. I said I didn't see Swedish people knocking down the World Trade Center. It was very interesting. I thought that was going to be a controversial statement and somebody, I think it was Dennis Miller introduced me, he was doing like an analysis of me, he said, I love it. The guy said what the truth is. He didn't mince his words. He didn't say, 'Oh, gee, no there's not a Muslim problem, everybody's wonderful.' And by the way, many, many, most Muslims are wonderful people, but is there a Muslim problem? Look what's happening. Look what happened right here in my city with the World Trade Center and lots of other places. So I said it and I thought it was going to be very controversial but actually it was very well received. I think people want the truth. I think they're tired of politicians. They're tired of politically correct stuff. I mean I could have said, 'Oh absolutely not Bill, there's no Muslim problem, everything is wonderful, just forget about the World Trade Center.' But you have to speak the truth. We're so politically correct that this country is falling apart.
    Brody: With some evangelicals there are some problems with the teachings of the Koran. Do you have concerns about the Koran?
    Trump: Well, I'll tell you what. The Koran is very interesting. A lot of people say it teaches love and there is a very big group of people who really understand the Koran far better than I do. I'm certainly not an expert, to put it mildly. But there's something there that teaches some very negative vibe. I mean things are happening, when you look at people blowing up all over the streets that are in some of the countries over in the Middle East, just blowing up a super market with not even soldiers, just people, when 250 people die in a super market that are shopping, where people die in a store or in a street. There's a lot of hatred there that's some place. Now I don't know if that's from the Koran. I don't know if that's from some place else. But there's tremendous hatred out there that I've never seen anything like it. So, you have two views. You have the view that the Koran is all about love and then you have the view that the Koran is, that there's a lot of hate in the Koran.
  • I look very much forward to showing my financials. Because they are huge.
  • Today I'm very proud of myself, because I've accomplished something that nobody else has been able to accomplish. I was just informed, while on the helicopter, that our president has finally released a birth certificate. I want to look at it, but I hope it's true, so that we can get on to much more important matters, so the press can stop asking me questions. He should have done it a long time ago. Why he didn't do it when the Clintons asked for it, why he didn't do it when everyone else was asking for it, I don't know. But I am really honored, frankly, to have played such a big role in hopefully, hopefully getting rid of this issue. Now, we have to look at it, we have to see, is it real? Is it proper? What's on it? But I hope it checks out beautifully. I am really proud, I am really honored.
    • press conference, 2011-04-27
    • "Trump Questions Obama Birth Certificate", TMZ, 27 April 2011, retrieved on 2011-05-01 
    • Regarding the release of Barack Obama's full birth record from Hawaii that morning
  • The word is, according to what I've have read, is that he was a terrible student when he went to Occidental. He then gets to Columbia and then gets to Harvard. I heard at Columbia he was not a very good student, and then he then he gets into Harvard. How do you get into Harvard if you are not a good student? Maybe that's right, maybe that's wrong, but I don't know why he doesn't he release his records. Why doesn't he release his Occidental records?
    • press conference, New Hampshire, 2011-04-27
    • "Schieffer: Racism underlying Trump's assertions", CBS News, 27 April 2011, Archived from the original on 2013-06-28, retrieved on 2011-05-01 
    • About Barack Obama, who transferred to Columbia from Occidental College in 1981, graduated from Columbia in 1983, and graduated magna cum laude with a Juris doctorate from Harvard Law School in 1991
  • It's like in golf. A lot of people — I don't want this to sound trivial — but a lot of people are switching to these really long putters, very unattractive. It's weird. You see these great players with these really long putters, because they can't sink three-footers anymore. And, I hate it. I am a traditionalist. I have so many fabulous friends who happen to be gay, but I am a traditionalist.
  • I dealt with Gaddafi. I rented him a piece of land. He paid me more for one night than the land was worth for two years, and then I didn't let him use the land. That's what we should be doing. I don't want to use the word 'screwed,' but I screwed him. That's what we should be doing.
  • She's a slob, she talks like a truck driver.
  • If I were running my business, I'd fire Rosie, I mean, I'd look her right in that fat ugly face of hers and say, "Rosie, you're fired."

2012

  • Mitt is tough. He is smart. He is sharp. He is not going to allow bad things to continue to happen to this country that we all love. So Gov. Romney, go out and get em. You can do it.
  • No, I've never really changed. Nothing's changed my mind. And by the way, you know, you have a huge group of people — I walk down the street, and people are screaming, "Please don't give that up." A lot of people are questioning his birth certificate. They're questioning the authenticity of his birth certificate. I've been known as being a very smart guy for a long time. I don't consider myself birther or not birther, but there are some major questions here and the press doesn't wanna cover it. The press just refuses to cover it. Now if that were somebody else, they would be covering it, and they'd be throwing people out of office. But they don't want to cover it. So it's interesting.
  • Wolf Blitzer: Donald, you're beginning to sound a little ridiculous, I have to tell you.
    Donald Trump: No I think you are, Wolf. Now let me tell you something, I think you sound ridiculous, and if you'd ask me a question and let me answer it —
    Blitzer: Here's the question, did the conspiracy start in 1961 where the Honolulu Star-Bulletin and the Honolulu Advertiser contemporaneously published announcements that he was born in Hawaii?
    Trump: That's right. That's right. And many people put those announcements in because they wanted to get the benefit because of getting so-called born in this country. Many people did it. It was something that was done by many people even though they weren't born in the country. You know and so do I... And so do a lot of your viewers. Although you don't have too many viewers.
  • Donald Trump (clip): I have people that actually have been studying it and they cannot believe what they're finding.
    Meredith Vieira (clip): You have people now, down there searching—
    Trump (clip): Absolutely.
    Vieira (clip): I mean, in Hawaii?
    Trump (clip): Absolutely. And they cannot believe what they're finding.
    Wolf Blitzer: All right, tell us what your people who were investigating in Hawaii, what they found.
    Trump: Oh, we don't have to go into old news. That's old news.
    Blitzer: Well, what did they find?
    Trump: There's been plenty found. You can call many people. You can read many, many articles on the authenticity of the certificate. You can read many articles from just recently as to what the publisher printed in a brochure as to what Obama told him, as to where his place of birth is. And that's fine, Wolf.
    Now, it's appropriate, I think, that we get to the subject of hand, which is — at hand, which is jobs, which is the economy, which is how our country is not doing well at all under this leadership, which is how are we going to do something about energy, which is really that things that I wanted to talk to you about, but you like to keep going back to the place of birth.
  • @ariannahuff is unattractive both inside and out. I fully understand why her former husband left her for a man- he made a good decision.
  • He [Obama] lost the popular vote by a lot and won the election. We should have a revolution in this country!
  • The phoney [sic] electoral college made a laughing stock out of our nation. The loser one!
  • More votes equals a loss... revolution!
  • This election is a total sham and a travesty. We are not a democracy!
  • The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy.
  • Republicans didn't have anything going for them with respect to Latinos and with respect to Asians... The Democrats didn't have a policy for dealing with illegal immigrants, but what they did have going for them is they weren't mean-spirited about it... They didn't know what the policy was, but what they were is they were kind... He had a crazy policy of self deportation which was maniacal... It sounded as bad as it was, and he lost all of the Latino vote... He lost the Asian vote. He lost everybody who is inspired to come into this country... Take care of this incredible problem that we have with respect to immigration, with respect to people wanting to be wonderful productive citizens of this country.
  • [climate change was] "created by and for the Chinese in order to make US manufacturing non-competitive"
  • "It doesn't matter who you vote for--it matters who is counting the votes." Be careful of voter fraud!. Oct 10 2012 [6]

2013

  • Sorry losers and haters, but my I.Q. is one of the highest -and you all know it! Please don't feel so stupid or insecure,it's not your fault
  • I keep asking, how long will we go on defending South Korea from North Korea without payment? South Korea is a very very rich country. They're rich because of us. They sell us televisions, they sell us cars. They sell us everything. They are making a fortune. We have a huge deficit with South Korea. They're friends of mine. I do deals with them. I've been partners with them, no problem. But they think we're stupid. They can't believe it. We are defending them against North Korea, we're doing it for nothing. We're not in that position. When will they start to pay us for this defense? Isn't it really ridiculous when you think of it? They make a fortune on the United States and then they got some problems, and what happens? They call the United States to defend them, and we get nothing?
  • Leadership: whatever happens, you're responsible. If it doesn't happen, you're responsible.

2014

2015

May 2015

  • There is a way of beating ISIS so easily, so quickly, so effectively, and it would be so nice...I know a way that would absolutely give us guaranteed victory...the problem is then everybody will take the idea, run with it and then people will forget where it came from...I ran it past two or three people. [It's] so simple. It's like the paper clip.
    • On his plan to defeat ISIS (May 2015)

June 2015

  • So I said to myself, you know, nobody's ever going to know unless I run, because I'm really proud of my success.
  • I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will have Mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words.
    • Campaign launch rally, 15 June 2015
Presidential Bid Announcement (June 16, 2015)
Sadly, the American dream is dead. But if I get elected president, I will bring it back bigger and better and stronger than ever before, and we will make America great again.
At Trump Tower, 2015-06-16, speech announcing his candidacy for U.S. president — "Full text: Donald Trump announces a presidential bid", The Washington Post, 16 June 2015 
  • Our country is in serious trouble. We don't have victories anymore. We used to have victories, but we don't have them. When was the last time anybody saw us beating, let's say, China in a trade deal? They kill us. I beat China all the time. All the time. When did we beat Japan at anything? They send their cars over by the millions, and what do we do? When was the last time you saw a Chevrolet in Tokyo? It doesn't exist, folks. They beat us all the time. When do we beat Mexico at the border? They're laughing at us, at our stupidity. And now they are beating us economically. They are not our friend, believe me. But they're killing us economically. The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else's problems.
  • When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. They're not sending you. They're not sending you. They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people. But I speak to border guards and they tell us what we're getting. And it only makes common sense. It only makes common sense. They're sending us not the right people. It's coming from more than Mexico. It's coming from all over South and Latin America, and it's coming probably – probably – from the Middle East. But we don't know. Because we have no protection and we have no competence, we don't know what's happening. And it's got to stop and it's got to stop fast.
  • Islamic terrorism is eating up large portions of the Middle East. They've become rich. I'm in competition with them. They just built a hotel in Syria. Can you believe this? They built a hotel. When I have to build a hotel, I pay interest. They don't have to pay interest, because they took the oil that, when we left Iraq, I said we should've taken.
  • I love the military, and I want to have the strongest military that we've ever had, and we need it more now than ever. But I said, "Don't hit Iraq," because you're going to totally destabilize the Middle East. Iran is going to take over the Middle East, Iran and somebody else will get the oil, and it turned out that Iran is now taking over Iraq. Think of it. Iran is taking over Iraq, and they're taking it over big league.
  • We lost thousands of lives, thousands in Iraq. We have wounded soldiers, who I love, I love — they're great — all over the place, thousands and thousands of wounded soldiers. And we have nothing. We can't even go there. We have nothing. And every time we give Iraq equipment, the first time a bullet goes off in the air, they leave it.
  • Last quarter, it was just announced our gross domestic product — a sign of strength, right? But not for us. It was below zero. Whoever heard of this? It's never below zero.
  • A lot of people up there can't get jobs. They can't get jobs, because there are no jobs, because China has our jobs and Mexico has our jobs. They all have jobs.
  • Our enemies are getting stronger and stronger by the way, and we as a country are getting weaker. Even our nuclear arsenal doesn't work. It came out recently they have equipment that is 30 years old. They don't know if it worked. And I thought it was horrible when it was broadcast on television, because boy, does that send signals to Putin and all of the other people that look at us and they say, "That is a group of people, and that is a nation that truly has no clue. They don't know what they're doing. They don't know what they're doing."
  • We have a disaster called the big lie: Obamacare. ... We have to repeal Obamacare, and it can be — and — and it can be replaced with something much better for everybody. Let it be for everybody. But much better and much less expensive for people and for the government. And we can do it.
  • Remember the $5 billion Web site? $5 billion we spent on a Web site, and to this day it doesn't work. A $5 billion Web site. I have so many Web sites, I have them all over the place. I hire people, they do a Web site. It costs me $3.
  • I watch the speeches of these people, and they say the sun will rise, the moon will set, all sorts of wonderful things will happen. And people are saying, "What's going on? I just want a job. Just get me a job. I don't need the rhetoric. I want a job."
  • Obama is going to be out playing golf. He might be on one of my courses. I would invite him, I actually would say. I have the best courses in the world, so I'd say, you what, if he wants to — I have one right next to the White House, right on the Potomac. If he'd like to play, that's fine. In fact, I'd love him to leave early and play, that would be a very good thing.
  • I've watched the politicians. I've dealt with them all my life. If you can't make a good deal with a politician, then there's something wrong with you. You're certainly not very good. And that's what we have representing us. They will never make America great again. They don't even have a chance. They're controlled fully — they're controlled fully by the lobbyists, by the donors, and by the special interests, fully.
  • I have lobbyists. I have to tell you. I have lobbyists that can produce anything for me. They're great. But you know what? it won't happen. It won't happen. Because we have to stop doing things for some people, but for this country, it's destroying our country. We have to stop, and it has to stop now.
  • Our country needs a truly great leader, and we need a truly great leader now. We need a leader that wrote "The Art of the Deal." We need a leader that can bring back our jobs, can bring back our manufacturing, can bring back our military, can take care of our vets. Our vets have been abandoned. And we also need a cheerleader. ... We need somebody that can take the brand of the United States and make it great again. It's not great again.
  • He (Barack Obama) was vibrant. He was young. I really thought that he would be a great cheerleader. ... But he wasn't a cheerleader. He's actually a negative force. He's been a negative force. He wasn't a cheerleader; he was the opposite.
  • We need somebody that can take the brand of the United States and make it great again. It's not great again.
  • We need -- we need somebody -- we need somebody that literally will take this country and make it great again. We can do that.
  • You know, all of my life, I've heard that a truly successful person, a really, really successful person and even modestly successful cannot run for public office. Just can't happen. And yet that's the kind of mindset that you need to make this country great again.
  • So, ladies and gentlemen, I am officially running for president of the United States, and we are going to make our country great again!
  • We have people that aren't working. We have people that have no incentive to work. But they're going to have incentive to work, because the greatest social program is a job. And they'll be proud, and they'll love it, and they'll make much more than they would've ever made, and they'll be — they'll be doing so well, and we're going to be thriving as a country, thriving. It can happen. I will be the greatest jobs president that God ever created. I tell you that.
  • We owe China $1.3 trillion. We owe Japan more than that. So they come in, they take our jobs, they take our money, and then they loan us back the money, and we pay them in interest, and then the dollar goes up so their deal's even better. How stupid are our leaders? How stupid are these politicians to allow this to happen? How stupid are they?
  • I'm totally against the trade bill for a number of reasons. Number one, the people negotiating don't have a clue. Our president doesn't have a clue. He's a bad negotiator. He's the one that did Bergdahl. We get Bergdahl, they get five killer terrorists that everybody wanted over there. We get Bergdahl. We get a traitor. We get a no-good traitor, and they get the five people that they wanted for years, and those people are now back on the battlefield trying to kill us. That's the negotiator we have.
  • Israel maybe won't exist very long. It's a disaster, and we have to protect Israel.
  • I'm a free trader. But the problem with free trade is you need really talented people to negotiate for you. If you don't have talented people, if you don't have great leadership, if you don't have people that know business, not just a political hack that got the job because he made a contribution to a campaign, which is the way all jobs, just about, are gotten, free trade terrible. Free trade can be wonderful if you have smart people, but we have people that are stupid. We have people that aren't smart. And we have people that are controlled by special interests. And it's just not going to work.
  • I love China. The biggest bank in the world is from China. You know where their United States headquarters is located? In this building, in Trump Tower. I love China. People say, "Oh, you don't like China?" No, I love them. But their leaders are much smarter than our leaders, and we can't sustain ourself with that.
  • We have all the cards, but we don't know how to use them. We don't even know that we have the cards, because our leaders don't understand the game. We could turn off that spigot by charging them tax until they behave properly.
  • You have a problem with ISIS. You have a bigger problem with China. And, in my opinion, the new China, believe it or not, in terms of trade, is Mexico.
  • I know the smartest negotiators in the world. I know the good ones. I know the bad ones. I know the overrated ones.
  • I love the Saudis. Many are in this building. They make a billion dollars a day. Whenever they have problems, we send over the ships. We say "we're gonna protect." What are we doing? They've got nothing but money.
  • Saudi Arabia without us is gone. They're gone.
  • All of these politicians that I'm running against now, they're trying to disassociate. I mean, you looked at Bush, it took him five days to answer the question on Iraq. He couldn't answer the question. He didn't know. I said, "Is he intelligent?" Then I looked at Rubio. He was unable to answer the question, is Iraq a good thing or bad thing? He didn't know. He couldn't answer the question. How are these people gonna lead us? How are we gonna — how are we gonna go back and make it great again? We can't. They don't have a clue. They can't lead us. They can't. They can't even answer simple questions. It was terrible.
  • Saudi Arabia is in big, big trouble. Now, thanks to fracking and other things, the oil is all over the place. And I used to say it, there are ships at sea, and this was during the worst crisis, that were loaded up with oil, and the cartel kept the price up, because, again, they were smarter than our leaders. They were smarter than our leaders.
  • I think I am a nice person. People that know me, like me. Does my family like me? I think so, right. Look at my family. I'm proud of my family.
  • This is going to be an election that's based on competence, because people are tired of these nice people. And they're tired of being ripped off by everybody in the world. And they're tired of spending more money on education than any nation in the world per capita, than any nation in the world, and we are 26th in the world, 25 countries are better than us in education. And some of them are like third world countries. But we're becoming a third word country, because of our infrastructure, our airports, our roads, everything. So one of the things I did, and I said, you know what I'll do. I'll do it. Because a lot of people said, "He'll never run. Number one, he won't want to give up his lifestyle." They're right about that, but I'm doing it.
  • We have losers. We have people that don't have it. We have people that are morally corrupt. We have people that are selling this country down the drain.
  • I would build a great wall, and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me, and I'll build them very inexpensively, I will build a great, great wall on our southern border. And I will have Mexico pay for that wall.
  • I will stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons. And we won't be using a man like Secretary Kerry that has absolutely no concept of negotiation, who's making a horrible and laughable deal, who's just being tapped along as they make weapons right now, and then goes into a bicycle race at 72 years old, and falls and breaks his leg. I won't be doing that. And I promise I will never be in a bicycle race. That I can tell you.
  • Fully support and back up the Second Amendment.
  • Bush is totally in favor of Common Core. I don't see how he can possibly get the nomination. He's weak on immigration. He's in favor of Common Core. How the hell can you vote for this guy? You just can't do it. We have to end — education has to be local.
  • Rebuild the country's infrastructure. Nobody can do that like me. Believe me. It will be done on time, on budget, way below cost, way below what anyone ever thought. I look at the roads being built all over the country, and I say I can build those things for one-third. What they do is unbelievable, how bad.
  • Save Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security without cuts. Have to do it. Get rid of the fraud. Get rid of the waste and abuse, but save it. People have been paying it for years. And now many of these candidates want to cut it. You save it by making the United States, by making us rich again, by taking back all of the money that's being lost.
  • We're in a bubble. We have artificially low interest rates. We have a stock market that, frankly, has been good to me, but I still hate to see what's happening. We have a stock market that is so bloated. Be careful of a bubble because what you've seen in the past might be small potatoes compared to what happens. So be very, very careful.
  • Sadly, the American dream is dead. But if I get elected president, I will bring it back bigger and better and stronger than ever before, and we will make America great again.

July 2015

  • Donald Trump: Oh, well, if you look at the statistics, of people coming— I didn't say about Mexic— I say the illegal immigrants— if you look at the statistics on rape, on crime, on everything, coming in illegally into this country, they're mind-boggling. If you go to Fusion, you will see a story about 80% of the women coming in– I mean, you have to take a look at these stories. And you know who owns Fusion? Univision. It was in The Huffington Post. I said, let me get some of these articles because I've heard some horrible things. I deal a lot of talking with people on the border patrol. They're incredible people. They help our country.
    Don Lemon: But I want some clarification–
    Trump: No, but Don, all you have to do is go to Fusion and pick up the stories on rape, and it's unbelievable when you look at what's going on. So all I'm doing is telling the truth.
    Lemon: I've read The Washington Post, I read the Fusion, I read The Huffington Post. And that's about women being raped, it's not about criminals coming across the border entering the country.
    Trump: Somebody's doing the raping, Don, I mean, you know– I mean, somebody's doing it. You think it's women being raped, well who's doing the raping? Who's doing the raping? I mean how can you say such a thing. So, the problem is you have to stop illegal immigration coming across the border. You have to create a strong border. If you don't, we don't have a country.
I can't apologize for the truth.
  • I don't know. I really don't know. I don't know why he wouldn't release his records.
  • The Obama Administration's agreement with Iran is very dangerous. Iran developing a nuclear weapon, either through uranium or nuclear fuel, and defying the world is still a very real possibility. The inspections will not be followed, and Iran will no longer have any sanctions. Iran gets everything and loses nothing. Every promise the Obama Administration made in the beginning of negotiations, including the vow (made at the beginning of the negotiations) to get our great American prisoners returned to the U. S. has been broken. This is a bad deal that sets a dangerous precedent. This deal sets off a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, which is the most-unstable region in the world. It is a horrible and perhaps catastrophic event for Israel. Furthermore, we should have kept the billions of dollars we have agreed to pay them. Any great dealmaker would know this is a perfect example of "tapping along" and because they have been unchecked for so long throughout this extremely lengthy process, I guarantee they are much closer to producing a nuclear weapon than they were at the start of negotiations. The fact is, the US has incompetent leaders and even more incompetent negotiators. We must do better for America and the world. We have to Make America Great Again.
  • Donald Trump: 15,000 people showed up to hear me speak. Bigger than anybody and everybody knows it. A beautiful day with incredible people that were wonderful, great Americans, I will tell you. John McCain goes, "Oh, boy, Trump makes my job difficult. He had 15,000 crazies show up." Crazies. He called them all crazy. I said, they weren't crazy. They were great Americans. These people— if you would have seen these people— you— I know what a crazy is. I know all about crazies. These weren't crazy. So he insulted me and he insulted everybody in that room...
    Frank Luntz: He's a war hero.
    Donald Trump: He's not a war hero.
    Luntz: He's a war hero.
    Trump: He is a war hero—
    Luntz: Five and a half years in a POW camp.
    Trump: He's a war hero 'cause he was captured. I like people that weren't captured, OK? I hate to tell you.
    Luntz: Do you agree with that?
    Trump: He's a war hero. He's a war hero because he was captured, OK? You can have— and I believe— perhaps he's a war hero, but— but right now he said some very bad things about a lot of people.
  • I see Rick Perry the other day. ... He's doing very poorly in the polls. He put on glasses so people will think he's smart. And it just doesn't work! You know people can see through the glasses!
  • But you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers me—it would have been so easy, and it's not as important as these lives are (nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what's going to happen and he was right—who would have thought?), but when you look at what's going on with the four prisoners—now it used to be three, now it's four—but when it was three and even now, I would have said it's all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don't, they haven't figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it's gonna take them about another 150 years—but the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us.
  • I'm a Republican, I'm a conservative, I'm in first place, I want to run as a Republican and I think I'll get the nomination... [Hillary Clinton] is easily the worst Secretary of State in the history of the country. She's going to be beaten and I'm the one to beat her.
  • Jose Diaz-Balart: Mr. Trump, you know 53,000 Hispanics turn 18 years of age in this country every month, born in the country of voting age. 54 million plus Hispanics — many feel that what you said when you said that the people who cross the border are rapists and murderers—
    Donald Trump: No, no, no! We're talking about illegal immigration and everybody understands that. And you know what? That's a typical case. That's a typical case of the press with misinterpretation. They take a half a sentence, they take a half a sentence, then they take quarter of a sentence and put it all together. It's a typical thing...
    Diaz-Balart: I'm not finished with my question.
    Trump: No, no! You're finished!
  • I think that I would be a great uniter. I think that I would have great diplomatic skills. I think that I would be able to get along with people very well. I've had a great success in my life. I think the world would unite if I were the leader of the United States.

August 2015

I do whine because I want to win and I’m not happy about not winning and I am a whiner and I keep whining and whining until I win.
  • You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.
  • I will be phenomenal to the women. I mean, I want to help women.
    • Face the Nation, 9 August 2015
  • I think there has to be a trust. There actually has to be a trust. If you don't trust, you're not going to do very well.
  • We have to keep the families together, but they have to go. What if they have no place to go?
  • You know, when you put out policy, like a 14-point plan? A lot of times in the first hour of negotiation, that 14-point plan goes astray, but you may end up with a better deal. That's the way it works. That's the way really life works. When I do a deal, I don't say, "Oh, here's 14 points." I got out and do it. I don't sit down and talk about 14 points.
  • You've seen my statements, I do very well, I don't mind paying some taxes. The middle class is getting clobbered in this country. You know the middle class built this country, not the hedge fund guys, but I know people in hedge funds that pay almost nothing and it's ridiculous.

September 2015

  • This is a country where we speak English, not Spanish.
    • Criticizing Jeb Bush for speaking Spanish on the campaign trail during a Republican Presidential Debate on CNN (16 September 2015)
  • Audience member: We have a problem in this country, it's called Muslims. Our current President is one. We know he's not even an American. We have training camps growing where they want to kill us. That's my question, when can we get rid of them?
    Donald Trump: We're going to be looking at a lot of different things. A lot of people are saying that and a lot of people are saying that bad things are happening out there. We're going to be looking at that and a lot of different things.
  • Am I morally obligated to defend the president every time somebody says something bad or controversial about him? I don't think so!
  • This is the first time in my life that I have caused controversy by NOT saying something.
  • You can be politically correct if you want, but are you trying to say we don't have a problem? ... Most Muslims, like most everything, I mean, these are fabulous people... But we certainly do have a problem, I mean, you have a problem throughout the world. ... It wasn't people from Sweden that blew up the World Trade Center.
  • The first thing I'd do in my first day as president is close up our borders so that illegal immigrants cannot come into our country.
  • You ever see guys with nothing on their desk? They always fail. I don't know what it is. I've seen it for years.

October 2015

  • All my friends who work out all the time, they’re going for knee replacements, hip replacements — they’re a disaster
  • He was such a nice guy. And he said, Oh, I'm never going to attack. But then his poll numbers tanked. He's got -- that's why he's on the end -- and he got nasty. And he got nasty. So you know what? You can have him.

November 2015

  • Trump: I'm Donald Trump, and I'm running for president. Our country is in deep trouble because let's face it: politics are all talk and no action. My opponents have no experience in creating jobs or making deals. The fact is, I'm going to make the greatest trade deals we've ever made in our country. And I'm going to bring jobs and money back to the United States. I'll take care of our veterans and make our military so strong that nobody will ever mess with us. I'll secure our borders, and yes, we will have a wall. You can't have a country without borders. Obamacare is a great plan . It will be repealed and replaced with something much better. If the people of Iowa vote for me, you'll never be disappointed. I don't disappoint people, I produce. Together, we're going to Make America Great Again. I'm Donald Trump, candidate for president, and I hate this message.
    Female V/O: Paid for by Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.
    • Radio ad aired in Iowa (5 November 2015)
  • You're going to have a deportation force, and you're going to do it humanely and you're going to bring the country -- and, frankly, the people, because you have some excellent, wonderful people, some fantastic people hat have been here for a long period of time. Don't forget, Mika, that you have millions of people that are waiting in line to come into this country and they're waiting to come in legally. And I always say the wall, we're going to build the wall. It's going to be a real deal. It's going to be a real wall. There was a picture in one of the magazines where they had a wall this tall and they were taking drugs over the wall. They built a ramp over the wall and the truck was going up and down. They were using it like a highway; the wall is like a highway. It's not going to happen. It's going to be a Trump wall. It's going to be a real wall. And it's going to stop people and it's going to be good. But your friend Thomas Friedman called me and said, hah, there should be a big door. I said going to be a big door. I love the expression. There's going to be a big beautiful nice door. People are going to come in and they're going to come in legally. But we have no choice. Otherwise, we don't have a country. We don't even know how many people. We don't know if it's 8 million or if it's 20 million. We have no idea how many people are in our country. And then you see what happened with Kate in San Francisco. You see what happens with all of the things going on, all of the tremendous crime going on. It costs us $200 billion a year for illegal immigration right now. $200 billion a year, maybe $250, maybe $300. They don't even know. We're going to stop it. We're going to run it properly and we're going to stop it.
    • On his immigration plan (2015 November 11)
  • [When the government says] 'everybody gets equal pay,' you get away from the whole American Dream.
    • An unequal answer about equal pay (19 November 2015)
  • I watched when the World Trade Center came tumbling down. And I watched in Jersey City, N.J., where thousands and thousands of people were cheering as that building was coming down. Thousands of people were cheering.
    It was on television. I saw it. It was well covered at the time, George. Now, I know they don't like to talk about it, but it was well covered at the time. There were people over in New Jersey that were watching it, a heavy Arab population, that were cheering as the buildings came down. Not good.
Crippled America: How to Make America Great Again (November 2015)
published 3 November 2015
  • The enthusiasm was based on pure love and love of what we were doing.
    • Preface, p. xiv
  • The fact is I give people what they need and deserve to hear - exactly what they don't get from politicians - and that is The Truth. Our country is a mess right now and we don't have time to pretend otherwise. We don't have time to waste on being politically correct.
    • p. 8
  • I use the media the way the media uses me—to attract attention. Once I have that attention, it's up to me to use it to my advantage.
    • p. 10
  • I've seen these so-called journalists flat-out lie. I say that because incompetence doesn't begin to explain the inaccurate stories they have written.
    • p. 12
  • Our country, our people, and our laws have to be our top priority.
    • p. 30
  • Citizenship is not a gift we can afford to keep giving away.
    • p. 28
  • I want good people to come here from all over the world, but I want them to do so legally. We can expedite the process, we can reward achievement and excellence, but we have to respect the legal process. And those people who take advantage of the system and come here illegally should never enjoy the benefits of being a resident--or citizen--of this nation. So I am against any path to citizenship for undocumented workers or anyone else who is in this country illegaly. They should--and need to--go home and get in line.
    • p. 30
  • Depending on the price of oil, Saudi Arabia earns somewhere between half a billion and a billion dollars every day. They wouldn't exist, let alone have that wealth, without our protection. We get nothing from them. Nothing. We defend Germany. We defend Japan. We defend South Korea. These are powerful and wealthy countries. We get nothing from them. It's time to change all that. It's time to win again.
    • p. 34
  • When Kuwait was attacked by Saddam Hussein, all the wealthy Kuwaitis ran to Paris. They didn't just rent suites—they took up whole buildings, entire hotels. They lived like kings while their country was occupied. Who did they turn to for help? Who else? Uncle Sucker. That's us.
    • p. 34
  • We can't be afraid to use our military, but sending our sons and daughters should be the very last resort. I've seen what wars do to our kids. I've seen their broken bodies, know all about the horrors that live in their heads, and the enormous effects of trauma. We cannot commit American troops to battle without a real and tangible objective.
    • p. 35
  • To me, for politicians to claim that we have an answer to every problem is silly. When you listen to some politicians reeling off their prepared answers, you almost fall for it. They're all experts. But nothing ever happens.
    • p. 73
  • I manage to blast through the ridiculous liberal bias of the media and speak right to the hearts of the people - or at least I try.
    • p. 80
  • It's not just jobs that are being lost to other countries. We are seeing whole industries vanish overseas.
    • p. 85
  • A great leader has to be flexible, holding his ground on the major principles but finding room for compromises that can bring people together. A great leader has to be savvy at negotiations so we don't drown every bill in pork barrel bridges to nowhere. I know how to stand my ground — but I also know that Republicans and Democrats need to find common ground to stand on as well.
    • p. 96
  • We look at politicians and think: This one's owned by this millionaire. That one's owned by that millionaire, or lobbyist, or special interest group. Me? I speak for the people. So the establishment attacks me. They can't own me, they can't dictate to me, so they search for ways to dismiss me.
    • p. 97

December 2015

  • My policy has always been the same. We're fighting ISIS and Assad is fighting ISIS, but we're backing rebels to fight Assad. You can't fight everybody, you have to pick who you want to fight. And now you've got Turkey, who like ISIS more than they like others, no one really knows because we don't have people that know what they're doing. So in my opinion, you go along, and Russia does not like ISIS, and people are starting to find out. I mean in all fairness lost an airplane, got blew out of the air. So Russia is not a fan of ISIS. Russia is bombing the hell out of them, starting to bomb them. I say isis is our number one threat. We can't be fighting everybody at the same time. ISIS is our number one threat. I would bomb the hell out of them -- I like to do one thing at a time. I would knock the hell out of ISIS. I would hit them ... so hard like they've never been hit before.
  • They're using them as shields. It's a horrible thing. They're using them as shields. But we're fighting a very politically correct war. And the other thing is with the terrorists. You have to take out their families. When you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. They care about their lives. Don't kid yourself. But they say they don't care about their lives. You have to take out their families.
    • When asked how he would deal with civilian casualties. In an interview with Fox & Friends. [8] (December 2, 2015)
  • Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on... According to Pew Research, among others, there is great hatred towards Americans by large segments of the Muslim population. Most recently, a poll from the Center for Security Policy released data showing "25% of those polled agreed that violence against Americans here in the United States is justified as a part of the global jihad" and 51% of those polled, "agreed that Muslims in America should have the choice of being governed according to Shariah." Shariah authorizes such atrocities as murder against non-believers who won't convert, beheadings and more unthinkable acts that pose great harm to Americans, especially women.
  • These are people that are outside the country, so we're really not talking about the Constitution. And it's not about religion. This is about safety. This has nothing to do with religion. It's about safety.
  • We're doing really well with the evangelicals, and, by the way: And again, I do like Ted Cruz -- but not a lot of evangelicals come out of Cuba, in all fairness. It's true. Not a lot come out. But I like him nevertheless. But I think we're going to do great, and we are doing great with evangelicals.
    I'm with you. I'm with everybody. I'm with everybody, look, I'm self-funding. I have no oil company. I have no special interest. I have no lobbyists.
    Well look he's from Texas -- to the best of my knowledge, there's a lot of oil in Texas, right? So, he gets a lot of money from the oil companies, and he's against ethanol and everything you're else talking about. And I'm not I'm totally in favor. And you know it's a big industry here, it's a big industry. You know if that industry is upset Iowa's got problems.
    I really do, I like Ted Cruz a lot, I would say that we would certainly have things in mind for Ted, to be honest with you. I mean, he's somebody that I could certainly say that [about] because I like him.
  • We're rounding 'em up in a very humane way, in a very nice way. And they're going to be happy because they want to be legalized. And, by the way, I know it doesn't sound nice. But not everything is nice.
    • 27 December 2015 on 60 Minutes
  • I'm trying to figure out, let's see, I'm in my room, in New York city, and I want to put a little spray, so I can, you know [mimes spraying] right, right, but I hear they don't want me to use the hairspray, they want me to use the pump, because the other one, which I really like better than going [mimes pumping] bang, bang, bang, and then it comes out in big globs, right, and it's stuck in your hair and you say, "Oh my god I've got to take a shower again, my hair's all screwed up", right, I want to use hairspray, but they say "Don't use hairspray, it's bad for the ozone", so I'm sitting in this concealed [sic] apartment, this concealed unit (you know I do live in a very apartment, right) but it's sealed (it's beautiful) I don't think anything gets out, and I'm not supposed to be using hairspray!

2016

January 2016

I'm very angry. Because our country is being run horribly. I will gladly accept the mantle of anger. Our military is a disaster. Our healthcare is a horror show. Obamacare, we're going to repeal it and replace it.
We have no borders. Our vets are being treated horribly. Illegal immigration is beyond belief! Our country is being run by incompetent people and yes, I am angry. I'm angry because our country is a mess!
  • The entire world has been upset. The entire world, it's a different place. During Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton's term, she's done a horrible job.
    She has caused death. She has caused tremendous death with incompetent decisions. I was against the war in Iraq. I wasn't a politician, but I was against the war in Iraq. She voted for the war in Iraq.
    Look at Libya. That was her baby. Look. I mean, I'm not even talking about the ambassador and the people with the ambassador. Young, wonderful people. With messages coming in by the hundreds, and she's not even responding. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about all of the death that's been caused and not only our side.
    There was nothing saved. If we would have never done anything in the Middle East, we would have a much safer world right now. ... All of this has led to the migration. All of this has led to tremendous death and destruction. And she for the most part was in charge of it along with Obama.
    She's constantly playing the woman card. It's the only way she may get elected. I mean frankly... Personally, I'm not sure that anybody else other than me is going to beat her. And I think she's a flawed candidate. And you see what's happened recently. And it hasn't been a very pretty picture for her or for Bill. Because I'm the only one that's willing to talk about his problems. I mean, what he did and what he has gone through I think is frankly terrible, especially if she wants to play the woman card.
    I have more respect for women by far than Hillary Clinton has. And I will do more for women than Hillary Clinton will. I will do far more including the protection of our country. She caused a lot of the problems that we have right now.
  • They've created ISIS. Hillary Clinton created ISIS with Obama; created with Obama. But I love predicting because you know, ultimately, you need somebody with vision.
  • She [Clinton] has a terrible record as secretary of state. I mean, she's literally created ISIS. If you look at her, between her and Obama, they're the ones — we have this big ISIS problem they created with their bad policies and their bad thinking.
  • Mexico is going to be the new China because what they're doing to us is unbelievable, although they did catch El Chapo. Good? Good? They did catch El Chapo, that's good. I mean I don't know, he better not escape a third time, you know? Those tunnels, bing, boom, right under the toilet, bing boom, right up. It's pretty amazing when you think about it, right? But anyway. I have an idea: Put him on the fourth floor this time, right? No more, no more first floors.
  • I'm very angry because our country is being run horribly and I will gladly accept the mantle of anger. Our military is a disaster. Our healthcare is a horror show. Obamacare, we're going to repeal it and replace it. We have no borders. Our vets are being treated horribly. Illegal immigration is beyond belief. Our country is being run by incompetent people. And yes, I am angry. I'm angry because our country is a mess.
  • And just so — if I could, because he insulted a lot of people. I've had more calls on that statement that Ted made — New York is a great place. It's got great people, it's got loving people, wonderful people. When the World Trade Center came down, I saw something that no place on Earth could have handled more beautifully, more humanely than New York. You had two one hundred, you had two 110-story buildings come crashing down. I saw them come down. Thousands of people killed, and the cleanup started the next day, and it was the most horrific cleanup, probably in the history of doing this, and in construction. I was down there, and I've never seen anything like it. And the people in New York fought and fought and fought, and we saw more death, and even the smell of death — nobody understood it. And it was with us for months, the smell, the air. And we rebuilt downtown Manhattan, and everybody in the world watched and everybody in the world loved New York and loved New Yorkers. And I have to tell you, that was a very insulting statement that Ted made.
  • The truth is, he's a nasty guy. He was so nice to me. I mean, I knew it. I was watching. I kept saying, 'Come on Ted. Let's go, okay.' But he's a nasty guy. Nobody likes him. Nobody in Congress likes him. Nobody likes him anywhere once they get to know him. He's a very –- he's got an edge that's not good. You can't make deals with people like that and it's not a good thing. It's not a good thing for the country. Very nasty guy.
  • Tony Perkins wrote that out for me -- he actually wrote out 2, he wrote out the number 2 Corinthians, I took exactly what Tony said, and I said, 'Well Tony has to know better than anybody.
  • It's a very small deal, but a lot of people in different sections of the world say two, and I've had many, many people say that to me. My mother, as you know, was from Scotland, and they say two.
    • In an interview with CNN's Don Lemon, about saying "two Corinthians" instead of "Second Corinthians" during a speech at Liberty University. [10] (January 22, 2016)
  • Ted Cruz lies. He's a liar. And that's why nobody likes him, that's why his Senate people won't endorse him. That's why he stands on the middle of the Senate floor and can't make a deal with anybody. He looks like a jerk. He's standing all by himself. And you know, there's something to say about having a little bit of ability to get other people to do things. You can't be a lone wolf and stand there. That's sort of what we have right now as a president.
Speech at Liberty University (18 January 2016)
Presidential Candidate Donald Trump at Liberty University, C-SPAN (18 January 2016)
  • I have read a lot about it and I watched it and Liberty University, like a rocket ship, a really great rocket ship.
  • I'm in first place. I said when you're in first place, you discuss polls.
  • I love Iowa, and I'm going there right after this, going up to New Hampshire, I'm going to Iowa because I want to win Iowa. Everyone says don't say that. Just say you're going to do well. That's the closest, but I can't do that. The safe way is, I think I'll do well. I want to win Iowa.
  • We've done great with the evangelicals. The evangelicals have been amazing. The Tea Party has been amazing and we're doing really well.
  • We're going to protect Christianity, and I can say that. I don't have to be politically correct. We're going to protect it. I hear this is a major theme right here, but two Corinthians, 3:17, that's the whole ball game. "Where the Spirit of the Lord", right, "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty", and here there is Liberty College, but Liberty University, but it is so true. You know, when you think -- and that's really -- is that the one? Is that the one you like? I think that's the one you like because I loved it, and it's so representative of what's taken place. But we are going to protect Christianity. And if you look what's going on throughout the world, you look at Syria where if you're Christian, they're chopping off heads. You look at the different places, and Christianity, it's under siege.
  • I'm a protestant. I'm very proud of it, Presbyterian to be exact, but I'm proud of it, very, very proud. And we've got to protect because bad things are happening, very bad things are happening, and we don't -- I don't know what it is. We don't band together, maybe. Other religions, frankly, they're banding together.
  • This is a movement. It is a movement going on. We want to take our country back. Our country is disappearing. You look at the kind of deals we make. You look at what's happening, our country is going in the wrong direction, and so wrong, and it's got to be stopped and it's got to be stopped fast.
  • And my generals, by the way, they're not going on television, OK? So the enemy can learn all about it. Oh, well, then we attack.
  • They have totally destabilized the Middle East. It's a disaster.
  • When our sailors were captured last week, I said that's one of the saddest things that I have seen when those young people were on their hands and knees in a begging position with their hands up and thugs behind them with guns, and then we talk like it's OK. It's not OK. It's lack of respect. We can't let that happen to this country. It's lack of respect.
  • The Persians, very good negotiators. Great negotiators, legendary negotiators. They're known for it. They're sitting across the table.
  • I hate to tell this to the woman, they're behind the fact, they're a little behind the fact. They haven't figured out that women may be in certain ways much better than men. But I don't want to say that because I will get myself in trouble with men. But they haven't figured this out yet but that's OK.
  • We're a debtor nation. We owe $19 trillion. We're not going to give you any money, and you want to be nice. You don't want to put it in their face. Just say, look, we're a poor nation. We've been mismanaged, we've been misrun. We don't know what the hell we're doing, right?
  • If I'm president, you're going to see 'Merry Christmas' in department stores, believe me.
  • We spent 5 trillion dollars in the Middle East and our country is going to hell. We gotta bring it back. We gotta knock the hell out of ISIS.
  • I want to see a woman president soon, but not [Hillary Clinton]. She's a disaster. She's a disaster. She's a disaster. I mean, just think of the corruption and the scandal... We don't want to go through it. We want to see winning. We want to see win, win, win – constant winning. And you'll say – if I'm president... 'Please, Mr. President, we're winning too much. We can't stand it anymore. Can't we have a loss?' And I'll say no, we're going to keep winning, winning, winning... because we're going to make America great again. And you'll say, 'Okay, Mr. President. Okay.'
Speech at Dordt University (23 January 2016)
  • The people, my people, are so smart, and you know what they say about my people? The polls. They say I have the most loyal people — did you ever see that? Where I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters. It's like incredible. No, they say, "Trump we love you too." Trump's voters are by far, ya know, I'm at sixty-eight and sixty-nine percent, I'm at ninety percent, total, like, "Will you say absolutely?" I think it's sixty-eight and sixty-nine percent. "Will you most likely stay?" That gets into the nineties. Other guys like a ten. A guy like Jeb Bush, he has a nobody, but he's like, they don't have people. They have nothing. Rubio, soft. They're all soft. My people stay, by the way, Cruz, soft. When they heard about this thing with that he was bordering Canada, nobody knew them? He lost a lot of people! He's gone down big in the polls. Ted Cruz has gone down big in the polls. That doesn't mean he's giving us a fight in Iowa, that doesn't mean you can stay home, okay, see, you with the smile? It doesn't mean that. You gotta go out cause we can't take any chances.

February 2016

  • To have a crowd like this on our final day, can you believe it, this is the day. This is the day we take our country back. Remember that. This is the day we take our country back. So I got a little notice in case you see it. It's security guys. We have wonderful security guys. They said, "Mr. Trump, there may be somebody with tomatoes in the audience." So if you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of them, would you? Seriously... Okay? Just knock the hell... I promise you I will pay for the legal fees, I promise. I promise. There won't be so much cause the courts agree with us too. What's going on in this country.
  • This has been going if it's not going to happen anymore, folks. We're going to bring businesses back. We're going to have businesses that used to be in New Hampshire, that are now in Mexico, come back to New Hampshire and you can tell them to go f--- themselves...because they let you down, and they left. We want the businesses that stay. I know a lot of businesses up here and I knew a lot of businesses up here. These are great people, they could've left and they wanna stay. They willing to stay, they're fighting to stay. It's hard. With a highest tax nation in the entire world. It's hard for them to stay and they stay. Those are the people we have to cherish and love. These are the people that are great.
  • Trump: No, I didn't use the word. I never said the word, Bill. I don't know who told you -- I would never use the word. I didn't say the word. I said, "you can tell them to go [beat of silence] themselves."
    O'Reilly: But the lips kind of moved in the --
    Trump: Well, they might have. No, I didn't say the word. I wouldn't do that. Even I -- hey Bill, even I wouldn't do that, okay. No, I never said the word.
    • On an interview on The O'Reilly Factor (6 February 2016)
  • Torture works, okay folks? [...] Believe me, it works. [...] Waterboarding is your minor form. Some people say it's not actually torture. Let's assume it is. But they asked me the question. What do you think of waterboarding? Absolutely fine. But we should go much stronger than waterboarding. That's the way I feel.
  • They were having terrorism problems, just like we do, and he caught 50 terrorists who did tremendous damage and killed many people. And he took the 50 terrorists, and he took 50 men and he dipped 50 bullets in pigs' blood — you heard that, right? He took 50 bullets, and he dipped them in pigs' blood. And he had his men load his rifles, and he lined up the 50 people, and they shot 49 of those people. And the 50th person, he said: You go back to your people, and you tell them what happened. And for 25 years, there wasn't a problem. Okay? Twenty-five years, there wasn't a problem.
  • Bye bye. Look, see? He's smiling. See, he's having a good time. Oh, I love the old days, you know? You know what I hate? There's a guy, totally disruptive, throwing punches, we're not allowed to punch back anymore. I love the old days. You know what they used to do to guys like that when they were in a place like this? They'd be carried out on a stretcher, folks. You know, I love our police, and I really respect our police, and they're not getting enough. They're not. Honestly, I hate to see that. Here's a guy, throwing punches, nasty as hell, screaming at everything else when we're talking, and he's walking out, and we're not allowed -- you know, the guards are very gentle with him, he's walking out, like, big high fives, smiling, laughing -- I'd like to punch him in the face, I'll tell you.

March 2016

  • Look at those hands. Are they small hands? And he referred to my hands — if they're small, something else must be small. I guarantee you there's no problem, I guarantee.
  • Anderson Cooper: Is Islam at war with the West?
    Donald Trump: I think Islam hates us. There is something there, there is a tremendous hatred there, and we have to get to the bottom of it. There is an unbelievable hatred of us.
    Cooper: In Islam itself?
    Trump: You're going to have to figure that out, but there is a tremendous hatred and we have to be very vigilant, we have to be very careful and we can't allow people coming into this country who have this hatred of the United States and of people that are not Muslim.
    Cooper: The question is is there a war between the West and radical Islam or is it between the West and Islam itself?
    Trump: Well it's radical but it's very hard to define, it's very hard to separate because you don't know who's who.
  • Iran has already, since the deal is in place, test-fired ballistic missiles three times. Those ballistic missiles, with a range of 1,250 miles, were designed to intimidate not only Israel, which is only 600 miles away, but also intended to frighten Europe and someday maybe hit even the United States. And we're not going to let that happen. We're not letting it happen. And we're not letting it happen to Israel, believe me.
    Thank you. Thank you.
    Do you want to hear something really shocking? As many of the great people in this room know, painted on those missiles in both Hebrew and Farsi were the words "Israel must be wiped off the face of the earth." You can forget that.
    What kind of demented minds write that in Hebrew?
    • 21 March 2016 address to AIPAC (America-Israel Public Affairs Committee)
  • Obama: But you would rule in the possibility to fight against ISIS.
    Trump: Well, I'm never gonna rule anything out. And I wouldn't wanna say. Even if I felt -- it wasn't going -- I wouldn't wanna tell you that because, at a minimum, I want them to think maybe that we would use it.
    • As part of a conversation with Barack Obama about ruling out the use of nuclear weapons (March 23, 2016) reported 24 March 2016 by CBS
  • I was angry because they sued.
    • explaining why he withdrew the medical benefits to his nephew's infant son who had cerebral palsy, after his nephew claimed that the exclusion from Fred Trump's will was a result of Donald Trump and his siblings unduly influencing the older man
    • as quoted in Donald Trump's Cruel Streak, by Conor Friedersdorf, in The Atlantic; published September 26, 2016; retrieved October 24, 2016
  • Talking about success, most people think success is measured in the form of monetary success. It's not really. I mean to be a successful person is to have a great family, is who loves the family, loves the children and the children love him or her. To me that's a much more successful person than a person that has made a billion dollars or ten billion dollars, and is miserable and doesn't have a good family and nobody likes that person. I think I've seen every type of person there is that God created.

April 2016

  • I can be presidential, but if I was presidential I would only have - about 20% of you would be here because it would be boring as hell.
    • At a rally in Superior, Wisconsin (4 April 2016)
Foreign Policy Speech (27 April 2016)
No country has ever prospered that failed to put its own interests first.
Transcript: Donald Trump's Foreign Policy Speech, The New York Times (27 April 2016)
  • My foreign policy will always put the interests of the American people and American security above all else... That will be the foundation of every single decision that I will make. America First will be the major and overriding theme of my administration.
  • Our foreign policy is a complete and total disaster. No vision. No purpose. No direction. No strategy.
  • President Obama has weakened our military by weakening our economy. He's crippled us with wasteful spending, massive debt, low growth, a huge trade deficit and open borders.
  • Our allies are not paying their fair share... The countries we are defending must pay for the cost of this defense, and if not, the U.S. must be prepared to let these countries defend themselves. We have no choice.
  • Israel, our great friend and the one true democracy in the Middle East has been snubbed and criticized by an administration that lacks moral clarity... President Obama has not been a friend to Israel. He has treated Iran with tender love and care and made it a great power.
  • We've let our rivals and challengers think they can get away with anything, and they do... If President Obama's goal had been to weaken America, he could not have done a better job.
  • We've made the Middle East more unstable and chaotic than ever before. We left Christians subject to intense persecution and even genocide. We have done nothing to help the Christians, nothing, and we should always be ashamed for that lack of action.
  • Hillary Clinton refuses to say the words radical Islam, even as she pushes for a massive increase in refugees coming into our country. After Secretary Clinton's failed intervention in Libya, Islamic terrorists in Benghazi took down our consulate and killed our ambassador and three brave Americans. Then, instead of taking charge that night, Hillary Clinton decided to go home and sleep. Incredible. Clinton blames it all on a video, an excuse that was a total lie, proven to be absolutely a total lie. Our ambassador was murdered and our secretary of state misled the nation.
  • We're also going to have to change our trade, immigration and economic policies to make our economy strong again. And to put Americans first again. This will ensure that our own workers, right here in America, get the jobs and higher pay that will grow our tax revenues, increase our economic might as a nation.
  • I believe an easing of tensions, and improved relations with Russia from a position of strength only is possible.
  • Americans must know that we're putting the American people first again on trade, on immigration, on foreign policy. The jobs, incomes and security of the American worker will always be my first priority. No country has ever prospered that failed to put its own interests first. Both our friends and our enemies put their countries above ours and we, while being fair to them, must start doing the same. We will no longer surrender this country or its people to the false song of globalism. The nation-state remains the true foundation for happiness and harmony. I am skeptical of international unions that tie us up and bring America down, and will never enter America into any agreement that reduces our ability to control our own affairs.

May 2016

  • We have a 500 billion dollar deficit, trade deficit with China. We're going to turn it around and we have the cards, don't forget, we're like the piggy bank that's being robbed. We have the cards, we have a lot of power with China. When China doesn't want to fix the problem in North Korea we say "Sorry folks, you've got to fix the problem." Because we can't continue to allow China to rape our country, and that's what they're doing. It's the greatest theft in the history of the world.

June 2016

  • It's going to be like this. I'm not changing.
  • I'm truly honored by your support. Together, we accomplished what nobody thought was absolutely possible and you know what that is and we're only getting started and it's going to be beautiful, remember that. Tonight we close one chapter in history and we begin another. Our campaign received more primary votes than any GOP campaign in history, no matter who it is, no matter who they are, we received more votes. This is a great feeling. That's a great feeling. This is not a testament to me but a testament to all of the people who believed real change, not Obama change, but real change is possible. You've given me the honor to lead the Republican Party to victory this fall.
    • Victory speech after winning New Jersey and other states Tuesday night (7 June 2016) – Time transcript
  • To those who voted for someone else in either party, I will work hard to earn your support and I will work very hard to earn that support. To all of those Bernie Sanders voters who have been left out in the cold by a rigged system of super delegates, we welcome you with open arms. And by the way, the terrible trade deals that Bernie was so vehemently against and he's right on that will be taken care of far better than anyone ever thought possible and that's what I do. We are going to have fantastic trade deals. We're going to start making money and bringing in jobs.
    • Victory speech after winning New Jersey and other states Tuesday night (7 June 2016) – Time transcript
  • My goal is always again to bring people together. But if I'm forced to fight for something I really care about, I will never, ever back down and our country will never, ever back down. Thank you. I've fought for my family. I've fought for my business. I've fought for my employees. And now, I'm going to fight for you, the American people like nobody has ever fought before.
    • Victory speech after winning New Jersey and other states Tuesday night (7 June 2016) – Time transcript
  • We're led by a man that either is not tough, not smart, or he's got something else in mind. And the something else in mind, you know, people can't believe it, people cannot believe that President Obama is acting the way he acts and can't even mention the words 'radical Islamic terrorism. There's something going on — it's inconceivable. There's something going on. He doesn't get it, or he gets it better than anybody understands. It's one or the other, and either one is unacceptable.
  • Look, companies now are leaving the United States. Corporate inversion, they're leaving the United States, we have almost $5 trillion sitting out there, where they can't get the money back, they can't bring it in because there's no mechanism to bring it back in and the tax is so high. I'm going to bring tremendous amounts of money, tremendous amounts of jobs, tremendous numbers of companies, and yes the tax is going to be cut from the highest tax nation anywhere in the world to a fairly low tax. Not the lowest in the world, but to a fairly low tax.

  • Norah O'Donnell: Hillary Clinton called you the king of debt.

    Donald Trump: Well, no she didn't call me, I called myself the king of debt. I'm the king of debt. I'm great with debt, nobody knows debt better than me. I made a fortune by using debt. And if things don't work out I renegotiate the debt, I mean that's a smart thing not a stupid thing. And I made a fortune.

    O'Donnell: How do you renegotiate the debt?

    Trump: Because you go back and you say, hey, guess what, the economy just crashed, I'm going to give you back half. I like debt for me, I don't like debt for the country. I like debt for my company, but I don't like debt for the country. For the country we have $19 trillion in debt, it's going to be very soon $21 trillion, not billion, $21 trillion in debt. And I will tell you we are sitting on a time bomb and Hillary Clinton doesn't have a clue. And President Obama has pretty much doubled the debt since he's been in office and somebody's going to pay a big price. We have to start chopping that debt down.

    O'Donnell: Janet Yellen, who you know, the chairman of the Federal Reserve blasted you for saying that the U.S. could load up on debt and then make a deal with creditors if the economy has soured. She said there would be very severe consequences if an elected president tried to renegotiate the nation's debt.

    Trump: I wouldn't renegotiate the debt.

  • Our enemies probably know every single one [of Clinton's deleted emails]. So they probably now have a blackmail file. . . . We can't hand over our government to someone whose deepest, darkest secrets may be in the hands of our enemies. Can't do it."
Speech about the Orlando Shooting (June 13, 2016)
Speech after the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting (transcript)
  • So many people — it's just hard to believe, but just so many people dead, so many people gravely injured, so much carnage, such a disgrace. The horror is beyond description. The families of these wonderful people are totally devastated, and they will be forever. Likewise, our whole nation and indeed the whole world is devastated.
  • Our nation stands together in solidarity with the members of Orlando's LGBT community. They have been through something that nobody could ever experience. This is a very dark moment in America's history. A radical Islamic terrorist targeted the nightclub, not only because he wanted to kill Americans, but in order to execute gay and lesbian citizens, because of their sexual orientation.
  • It's a strike at the heart and soul of who we are as a nation. It's an assault on the ability of free people to live their lives, love who they want, and express their identity. It's an attack on the right of every single American to live in peace and safety in their own country.
  • We're not acting clearly, we're not talking clearly, we've got problems.
  • We have a dysfunctional immigration system, which does not permit us to know who we let into our country, and it does not permit us to protect our citizens properly. We have an incompetent administration.
  • The immigration laws of the United States give the president powers to suspend entry into the country of any class of persons. Now, any class — it really is determined and to be determined by the president for the interests of the United States. And it's as he or she deems appropriate. Hopefully it's he in this case.
  • When I'm elected I will suspend immigration from areas of the world where there's a proven history of terrorism against the United States, Europe or our allies until we fully understand how to end these threats. ... After a full and partial and long — really long overdue security assessment we will develop a responsible immigration policy that serves the interests and values of America.
  • We cannot continue to allow thousands upon thousands of people to pour into our country many of whom have the same thought process as this savage killer. Many of the principles of radical Islam are incompatible with Western values and institutions. Remember this, radical Islam is anti-woman, anti-gay and anti- American. I refuse to allow America to become a place where gay people, Christian people, Jewish people are targets of persecution and intimation by radical Islamic preachers of hate and violence. This is not just a national security issue. It's a quality of life issue. If we want to protect the quality of life for all Americans — women and children, gay and straight, Jews and Christians and all people then we need to tell the truth about radical Islam and we need to do it now. We need to tell the truth also about how radical Islam is coming to our shores. And it's coming.
  • We're importing radical Islamic terrorism into the West through a failed immigration system and through an intelligence community held back by our president.
  • They share these oppressive views and values. We want to remain a free and open society. Then, and if we do, then we have to control our borders. We have to control, and we have to control them now, not later. Right now.
  • Hillary Clinton, for months, and despite so many attacks, repeatedly refused to even say the words radical Islam until I challenged her yesterday. And, guess what, she will probably say them. She sort of has said them, but let's see what happens. She really has no choice, but she doesn't want to. However, she's really been forced, and she has been forced to say these words. She supports, and the reason is, she supports so much of what is wrong, and what is wrong with this country, and what's going wrong with our country and our borders. She has no clue, in my opinion, what radical Islam is and she won't speak honestly about it if she does, in fact, know. She's in total denial, and her continuing reluctance to ever name the enemy broadcasts weakness across the entire world — true weakness.
  • She says the solution is to ban guns. They tried that in France which has among the toughest gun laws anywhere in the world, and 130 people were brutally murdered by Islamic terrorists in cold blood. Her plan is to disarm law abiding Americans, abolishing the Second Amendment, and leaving only the bad guys and terrorists with guns. No good. Not going to happen, folks. ... She wants to take away American's guns and then admit the very people who want to slaughter us. Let them come into the country, we don't have guns. Let them come in, let them have all the fun they want.
  • Hillary Clinton's catastrophic immigration plan will bring vastly more radical Islamic immigration into this country, threatening not only our society but our entire way of life. When it comes to radical Islamic terrorism, ignorance is not bliss. It's deadly — totally deadly. ... Clinton's State Department was in charge of admissions and the admissions process for people applying to enter from overseas. Having learned nothing from these attacks, she now plans to massively increase admissions without a screening plan including a 500 percent increase in Syrian refugees coming into our country. Tell me, tell me – how stupid is that? This could be a better, bigger, more horrible version than the legendary Trojan Horse ever was. Altogether, under the Clinton plan, you'd be admitting hundreds of thousands of refugees from the Middle East with no system to vet them, or to prevent the radicalization of the children and their children. Not only their children, by the way, they're trying to take over our children and convince them how wonderful ISIS is and how wonderful Islam is and we don't know what's happening. The burden is on Hillary Clinton to tell us why she believes immigration from these dangerous countries should be increased without any effective system to really to screen. We're not screening people.
  • We have, just, no intelligence gathering information. We need this information so badly. ... We need an intelligence gathering system second to none. Second to none. That includes better cooperation between state, local and federal officials, and with our allies, very importantly. I will have an Attorney General, a Director of National Intelligence and a Secretary of Defense who'll know how to fight a war on radical Islamic terrorism.
  • They have put political correctness above common sense, above your safety, and above all else. I refuse to be politically correct.
  • The days of deadly ignorance will end, and they will end soon.
  • The media talks about home grown terrorism but Islamic radicalism and that's a very, very important term — a term that the president refuses to use and the networks that nurture it are imports from overseas whether you like it or whether you don't like it. Yes, there are many radicalized people already inside our country as a result of poor policies of the past.
  • Hillary Clinton can never claim to be a friend of the gay community as long as she continues to support immigration policies that bring Islamic extremists to our country and who suppress women, gays and anyone who doesn't share their views or values.
  • Clinton wants to allow radical Islamic terrorists to pour into our country. They enslave women, and they murder gays. I don't want them in our country.
  • Immigration is a privilege, and we should not let anyone into this country who doesn't support our communities. All of our communities, every single one of them.
  • I want every American to succeed including Muslims. But the Muslims have to work with us. They have to work with us. They know what's going on. They know that he was bad. They knew the people in San Bernardino were bad. But you know what? They didn't turn them in. And you know what? We had death, and destruction.
  • Hillary Clinton wants to empty out the Treasury to bring people into the country that include individuals who preach hate against our citizens. I want to protect our citizens, all of our citizens.
  • America must do more — much more — to protect its citizens, especially people who are potential victims of crimes based on their backgrounds or sexual orientation, as you just saw in Orlando.
  • The decision to overthrow the regime in Libya, then pushing for the overthrow of the regime in Syria, among other things, without plans for the day after, have created space for ISIS to expand and grow like nobody has ever seen before. These actions, along with our disastrous Iran deal, have also reduced our ability to work in partnership with our Muslim allies in the region. That is why our new goal must be to defeat Islamic terrorism not nation building. No more nation building. It's never going to work.
  • The last major NATO mission was Hillary Clinton's war in Libya. That mission helped to unleash ISIS on a new continent.
  • America must unite the whole civilized world in the fight against Islamic terrorism. Pretty much like we did with communism during the Cold War. We tried it President Obama's way, doesn't work. He gave the world his apology tour. We got ISIS and many other problems in return. That's what we got. Remember the famous apology tour. We're sorry for everything.

July 2016

  • Saddam Hussein was a bad guy. Right? He was a bad guy, really bad guy. But you know what he did well? He killed terrorists. He did that so good. They didn't read them the rights—they didn't talk, they were a terrorist, it was over. [...] Today, Iraq is Harvard for terrorism. You want to be a terrorist, you go to Iraq. It's like Harvard. Okay? So sad.
  • [Interviewer: You're not known to be a humble man. But I wonder—] I think I am actually humble. I think I'm much more humble than you would understand.
  • Look, having nuclear—my uncle was a great professor and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton School of Finance, very good, very smart—you know, if you're a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if, like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I'm one of the smartest people anywhere in the world—it's true!—but when you're a conservative Republican they try—oh, do they do a number—that's why I always start off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there, went there, did this, built a fortune—you know I have to give my like credentials all the time, because we're a little disadvantaged—but you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers me—it would have been so easy, and it's not as important as these lives are—nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what's going to happen and he was right, who would have thought?—but when you look at what's going on with the four prisoners—now it used to be three, now it's four—but when it was three and even now, I would have said it's all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don't, they haven't figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it's gonna take them about another 150 years—but the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us.
    • Speech in South Carolina (19 July 2016)
  • Though Bernie is exhausted and has given up on his revolution, many of his voters still want to keep up the fight. I expect that millions of Bernie voters will refuse to vote for Hillary because of her support for the War in Iraq, the invasion of Libya, NAFTA and TPP, and of course because she is totally bought and sold by special interests. She and her husband have been paid millions and millions by global corporations and powerful interests who will control her every decision. She is their puppet, and they pull the strings. We welcome with open arms all voters who want an honest government and to fix our rigged system so it works for the people. This includes fixing one of Bernie's biggest issues, our terrible trade deals that strip our country of its jobs and wealth.
  • A guy who didn't have the guts to run for president. Little Michael. He doesn't know anything about me. But he never had the guts to run. He probably wished he did but he didn't. He spent millions of dollars on polling but he was missing one thing: guts. Little Michael.
  • Obama gave a good speech but not nearly as good as the press would have you believe. Whether it's good or bad, the press will say it's fantastic. In many ways, I like Obama. It's hard to define. There's something about him I do like. I'm embarrassed to admit it. I give him a lot of credit. It's very unique and very hard to do and I give him tremendous credit. He became a two-term president of the United States. He's got some quality going.
  • Emails in general are terrible. There's no security. It happens so often. I'm old-fashioned. I put a letter in an envelope and have it hand delivered. My son is 10 years old, and he has grown up computer literate. They start using computers before they can walk. His computer was locked and he unlocked it. And I said, ‘Barron, how did you do that?' And he said, ‘I won't tell you, Dad.
  • Putin said I was a genius. I do say this: Wouldn't it be wonderful if we actually could get along with Russia and China and some other countries that we don't get along with, and then we go out and knock the hell out of ISIS? Wouldn't it be nice if we cleaned that mess up? Wouldn't it be smart?
  • Captain Humayun Khan was a hero to our country and we should honor all who have made the ultimate sacrifice to keep our country safe. The real problem here are the radical Islamic terrorists who killed him, and the efforts of these radicals to enter our country to do us further harm. Given the state of the world today, we have to know everything about those looking to enter our country, and given the state of chaos in some of these countries, that is impossible. While I feel deeply for the loss of his son, Mr. Khan who has never met me, has no right to stand in front of millions of people and claim I have never read the Constitution, (which is false) and say many other inaccurate things. If I become President, I will make America safe again.
  • Hillary Clinton should be held accountable for her central role in destabilizing the Middle East. She voted to send the United States to war against Iraq, helped lead the disastrous withdrawal of American troops years later that created the vacuum allowing the rise of ISIS, and has never met a regime change she didn't like (which have all been disasters) – not to mention her invasion of Libya and her abandonment of American personnel in Benghazi. The loss of these lives in Libya is directly traceable to Clinton, but their families' testimonials were rejected by the media.
  • Clinton's actions have been reckless and have directly led to the loss of American lives. And her extreme immigration policies, as also laid out by American victims in Cleveland, will cause the preventable deaths of countless more -- while putting all residents, from all places, at greater risk of terrorism. As Bernie Sanders said on numerous occasions, Hillary Clinton suffers from "bad judgement." She is not qualified to serve as Commander in Chief.
2016 Republican National Convention (21 July 2016)
I have joined the political arena so that the powerful can no longer beat up on people that cannot defend themselves.
Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it.
"Full transcript of Donald Trump’s acceptance speech at the RNC", Vox (22 July 2016) · "Donald Trump's entire Republican convention speech", CNN (21 July 2016) · Donald Trump 2016 RNC draft speech transcript, Politico (21 July 2016)
  • The attacks on our police, and the terrorism in our cities, threaten our very way of life. Any politician who does not grasp this danger is not fit to lead our country.
  • Americans watching this address tonight have seen the recent images of violence in our streets and the chaos in our communities. Many have witnessed this violence personally. Some have even been its victims.
    I have a message for all of you: The crime and violence that today afflicts our nation will soon — and I mean very soon come to an end. Beginning on January 20th 2017, safety will be restored.
    The most basic duty of government is to defend the lives of its citizens. Any government that fails to do so is a government unworthy to lead.
  • It is finally time for a straightforward assessment of the state of our nation. I will present the facts plainly and honestly. We cannot afford to be so politically correct anymore.
    So if you want to hear the corporate spin, the carefully-crafted lies, and the media myths — the Democrats are holding their convention next week. Go there.
    But here, at our convention, there will be no lies. We will honor the American people with the truth, and nothing else.
  • Decades of progress made in bringing down crime are now being reversed by this Administration's rollback of criminal enforcement.
  • America is far less safe – and the world is far less stable – than when Obama made the decision to put Hillary Clinton in charge of America's foreign policy. I am certain it is a decision he truly regrets. Her bad instincts and her bad judgment – something pointed out by Bernie Sanders – are what caused the disasters unfolding today.
  • This is the legacy of Hillary Clinton: death, destruction and weakness.
  • The problems we face now – poverty and violence at home, war and destruction abroad – will last only as long as we continue relying on the same politicians who created them. A change in leadership is required to change these outcomes.
  • There can be no prosperity without law and order
  • Our plan will put America First. Americanism, not globalism, will be our credo. As long as we are led by politicians who will not put America First, then we can be assured that other nations will not treat America with respect.
  • Big business, elite media and major donors are lining up behind the campaign of my opponent because they know she will keep our rigged system in place. They are throwing money at her because they have total control over everything she does. She is their puppet, and they pull the strings. That is why Hillary Clinton's message is that things will never change. My message is that things have to change – and they have to change right now.
  • Every day I wake up determined to deliver for the people I have met all across this nation that have been neglected, ignored, and abandoned. I have visited the laid-off factory workers, and the communities crushed by our horrible and unfair trade deals. These are the forgotten men and women of our country, and they are forgotten, but they're not going to be forgotten long. These are people who work hard but no longer have a voice. I AM YOUR VOICE.
  • I have no patience for injustice, no tolerance for government incompetence, no sympathy for leaders who fail their citizens.
  • When innocent people suffer, because our political system lacks the will, or the courage, or the basic decency to enforce our laws – or worse still, has sold out to some corporate lobbyist for cash – I am not able to look the other way.
  • When a Secretary of State illegally stores her emails on a private server, deletes 33,000 of them so the authorities can't see her crime, puts our country at risk, lies about it in every different form and faces no consequence – I know that corruption has reached a level like never before.
  • I have joined the political arena so that the powerful can no longer beat up on people that cannot defend themselves. Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it.
    I have seen firsthand how the system is rigged against our citizens, just like it was rigged against Bernie Sanders – he never had a chance.
  • He (Mike Pence) is a man of character and accomplishment. He is the right man for the job.
  • An attack on law enforcement is an attack on all Americans. I have a message to every last person threatening the peace on our streets and the safety of our police: when I take the oath of office next year, I will restore law and order our country.
  • In this race for the White House, I am the Law And Order candidate. ... I will work to ensure that all of our kids are treated equally, and protected equally.
  • Once again, France is the victim of brutal Islamic terrorism. Men, women and children viciously mowed down. Lives ruined. Families ripped apart. A nation in mourning.
  • I will do everything in my power to protect our LGBT citizens from the violence and oppression of a hateful foreign ideology.
  • We must work with all of our allies who share our goal of destroying ISIS and stamping out Islamic terror. This includes working with our greatest ally in the region, the State of Israel.
  • We must immediately suspend immigration from any nation that has been compromised by terrorism until such time as proven vetting mechanisms have been put in place.
  • I only want to admit individuals into our country who will support our values and love our people. Anyone who endorses violence, hatred or oppression is not welcome in our country and never will be.
  • Decades of record immigration have produced lower wages and higher unemployment for our citizens, especially for African-American and Latino workers. We are going to have an immigration system that works, but one that works for the American people.
  • Of all my travels in this country, nothing has affected me more deeply than the time I have spent with the mothers and fathers who have lost their children to violence spilling across our border.
  • We are going to build a great border wall to stop illegal immigration, to stop the gangs and the violence, and to stop the drugs from pouring into our communities.
  • Peace will be restored.
  • We are going to be considerate and compassionate to everyone. But my greatest compassion will be for our own struggling citizens.
  • Americans want relief from uncontrolled immigration. Communities want relief.
  • I'm going to make our country rich again. I am going to turn our bad trade agreements into great ones.
  • I pledge to never sign any trade agreement that hurts our workers, or that diminishes our freedom and independence. Instead, I will make individual deals with individual countries.
  • No longer will we enter into these massive deals, with many countries, that are thousands of pages long – and which no one from our country even reads or understands. We are going to enforce all trade violations, including through the use of taxes and tariffs, against any country that cheats.
  • We'll walk away if we don't get the deal that we want.
  • Reducing taxes will cause new companies and new jobs to come roaring back into our country.
  • My Dad, Fred Trump, was the smartest and hardest working man I ever knew.
  • I have loved my life in business.
  • We must break free from the petty politics of the past.
  • America is a nation of believers, dreamers, and strivers that is being led by a group of censors, critics, and cynics.
  • All of the people telling you that you can't have the country you want, are the same people telling you that I wouldn't be standing here tonight. No longer can we rely on those elites in media, and politics, who will say anything to keep a rigged system in place.
  • We must choose to Believe In America. History is watching us now.
  • My opponent asks her supporters to recite a three word loyalty pledge. It reads, "I'm with her." I choose to recite a different pledge. My pledge reads, "I'm with you – the American people." I am your voice. So to every parent who dreams for their child, and every child who dreams for a better future, I say these words to you tonight: I'm with you, and I will fight for you, and I will win for you. To all Americans tonight, in all of our cities and towns, I make this promise: We will make America proud again, we will make America strong again, we will make America safe again, and we will Make America Great Again! God bless you and good night! I love you!
This Week Interview (July 30, 2016)
Interview on ABC News' This Week with George Stephanopoulos. Transcript (31 July 2016)
  • She's (Hillary Clinton) a very dishonest person. I have one of the great temperaments. I have a winning temperament. She has a bad temperament. She's weak. We need a strong temperament and that's all it is, I have a strong temperament. ... I think I have a great temperament. I beat 16 very talented people in -- and I've never done this before. You don't do that with a bad temperament. ... I'm leading her in the polls, as you probably have noticed. And I think I have a great temperament. I have a temperament where I know how to win. She doesn't know how to win. She's not a winner. She doesn't know how to win. Honestly, she lies a lot and she really -- she should tell the truth. I honestly believe if she told the truth -- because she made some reference to my campaigning, I've had a beautiful -- I've had a -- had a flawless campaign. You'll be writing books about this campaign. And yet she's criticizing my campaign.
  • If you look at what's going on in terms of unity, the Bernie people are angry. They're angry. He was angry. What was amazing to me is when she was talking about Bernie last night, the camera was on him and he was angry. It almost looks like he has buyer's remorse, like he shouldn't have made the deal.
  • I have no relationship with Putin. I don't think I've ever met him. I never met him. I don't think I've ever met him. ... I have never spoken to him on the phone, no. I've speak -- I've spoken -- when we had the Miss Universe contest a number of years ago, we had Miss Universe in Moscow, in the Moscow area, he was invited. He wanted to come. He wasn't able to come. That would have been a time when I would have met him. ... I don't know what it means by having a relationship. I mean he was saying very good things about me, but I don't have a relationship with him. I didn't meet him. I haven't spent time with him. I didn't have dinner with him. I didn't go hiking with him. I don't know -- and I wouldn't know him from Adam except I see his picture and I would know what he looks like.
  • If our country got along with Russia, that would be a great thing. When Putin goes out and tells everybody -- and you talk about a relationship, but he says Donald Trump is going to win and Donald Trump is a genius, and then I have people saying you should disavow. I said, I'm going to disavow that? ... If we can have a good relationship with Russia and if Russia would help us get rid of ISIS, frankly, as far as I'm concerned, you're talking about tremendous amounts of money and lives and everything else, that would be a positive thing, not a negative thing.
  • NATO is going to be just fine. But NATO countries -- we have 28 countries -- many of them are taking advantage of us because they're not paying. So we're protecting these countries and they're not paying. ... I'm all in favor of NATO. I said NATO is obsolete. I was asked a question by one of your competitors and I said NATO is obsolete, because it's not taking care of terror.
  • The people of Crimea, from what I've heard, would rather be with Russia than where they were. And you have to look at that, also. Now, that was under -- just so you understand, that was done under Obama's administration. And as far as the Ukraine is concerned, it's a mess. And that's under the Obama's administration, with his strong ties to NATO. So with all of these strong ties to NATO, Ukraine is a mess. Crimea has been taken. Don't blame Donald Trump for that.
  • No debts. I have very little debt to anybody. I don't need debt. You know, it's very interesting, I'm so liquid, I don't need debt. And if I need debt, if I want debt, I can get it from banks in New York City very easily.
  • If you want to get a television today -- I buy thousands of television sets. If I want a television, I would love the buy American-made televisions like they used to have where they had GE and Sylvania and all of the different. Today, it's Samsung, it's LG, it's Sony. We don't make televisions anymore.
  • When I do ties, I bid them out. And I go all over the place. You have companies over in different countries where they devalue their currency and they make it impossible for American companies to compete. The hat, Make America Great Again. I fought like crazy to find a company in this country that could make the hats. And I found one. And they're American-made, but it's -- because I knew the first thing people would do is, where is the hat made. OK, Make America Great.
  • He (Khizr M. Khan) was, you know, very emotional and probably looked like a nice guy to me. His wife, if you look at his wife, she was standing there. She had nothing to say. She probably, maybe she wasn't allowed to have anything to say. You tell me. But plenty of people have written that. She was extremely quiet. And it looked like she had nothing to say. A lot of people have said that. And personally, I watched him. I wish him the best of luck.
  • I'd say we've had a lot of problems with radical Islamic terrorism. That's what I'd say. We have a lot of problems. ... I'd say you've got to take a look at that, because something is going on. And it's not good.
  • Well, that sounds - who wrote that? Did Hillary's scriptwriters write it? Because everybody that went out there, we also had John Allen who failed with ISIS. I mean, he was a general, Allen, General Allen. He went out. And he was ranting and raving. And then I read a report. He was in there for a number of months. And he failed with ISIS.
  • The generals aren't doing so well right now. Now, I have a feeling it may be Obama's fault. But if you look at ISIS… General MacArthur and General Patton, they're spinning in their graves. The generals certainly aren't doing very well right now.
  • I think I've made a lot of sacrifices. I work very, very hard. I've created thousands and thousands of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs, built great structures. I've done, I've had tremendous success. I think I've done a lot. ... I think they're sacrifices. I think when I can employ thousands and thousands of people, take care of their education, take care of so many things, even in military. I mean, I was very responsible, along with a group of people, for getting the Vietnam Memorial built in downtown Manhattan, which to this day people thank me for.
  • I raised, and I have raised, millions of dollars for the vets. I'm helping the vets a lot. I think my popularity with the vets is through the roof, far greater than hers. She's done nothing. All she's done is tell everybody that the vets are in good shape. They're fine. And they're not fine. People are waiting on line for seven days to see a doctor. She thinks it's fine.
  • Our country's a mess. And that's why when she makes the speech, she doesn't talk about radical Islam. She doesn't talk about the problems that we have in this country and throughout the world. Many of the problems, she caused. I mean, she created ISIS with her stupidity and her lack of knowledge with her bad judgment.

August 2016

In my administration, I'm going to enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information. No one will be above the law.
  • He’s not going into Ukraine, OK, just so you understand. He’s not going to go into Ukraine, all right? You can mark it down. You can put it down. You can take it anywhere you want.
  • Don't worry about that baby. I love babies. I hear that baby crying, I like it. What a baby. What a beautiful baby. Don't worry, don't worry. The mom's running around like—don't worry about it, you know. It's young and beautiful and healthy and that's what we want. [...] Actually, I was only kidding, you can get the baby out of here. That's all right. Don't worry. I, I think she really believed me that I love having a baby crying while I'm speaking. That's OK. People don't understand. That's OK.
  • No group in America has been more harmed by Hillary Clinton's policies than African-Americans. If Hillary Clinton's goal was to inflict pain on the African-American community, she could not have done a better job. It's a disgrace. Tonight, I'm asking for the vote of every single African-American citizen in this country who wants to see a better future. The inner cities of our country have been run by the Democratic party for more than fifty years. Their policies have reduced only poverty, joblessness, failing schools and broken homes. It's time to hold Democratic politicians accountable for what they have done to these communities. At what point do we say, "enough?" It's time to hold failed leaders accountable for their results not just their empty words over and over again. Look at what the Democratic party has done to the city as an example and there are many others of Detroit: forty percent of Detroit's residents live in poverty. Half of all Detroit residents do not work and cannot work and can't get a job. Detroit tops the list of most dangerous cities in terms of violent crime. This is the legacy of the Democratic politicians who have run this city. This is the result of the policy agenda embraced by Hillary Clinton: thirty-three thousand emails gone. The only way to change results is to change leadership. We can never fix our problems by relying on the same politicians who created our problems in the first place. A new future requires brand new leadership. Look how much African-American communities suffered under Democratic control. To those I say the following: What do you have to lose by trying something new like Trump. What do you have to lose? I say it again, what do you have to lose. Look, what do you have to lose? You're living your poverty, your schools are no good, you have no jobs. Fifty-eight percent of your youth is unemployed? What the hell do you have to lose? And at the end of four years, I guarantee you, that I will get over ninety-five percent of the African-American vote. I promise you.
  • Immigration security, we need to protect American jobs. We need to protect American safety. We're going to build a wall folks, don't worry, we're going to build a wall. That wall will go up so fast, your heads will spin. And you'll say, "you know, know he meant it!" And you know what else I mean? Mexico is going to pay for the wall.
    • On immigration at a rally in Akron, Ohio (22 August 2016)
  • The fundamental problem with the immigration system in our country is that it serves the needs of wealthy donors, political activists and powerful politicians. Let me tell you who it doesn’t serve: it doesn’t serve you, the American people.
  • When politicians talk about immigration reform, they usually mean the following: amnesty, open borders, and lower wages. Immigration reform should mean something else entirely: it should mean improvements to our laws and policies to make life better for American citizens. But if we are going to make our immigration system work, then we have to be prepared to talk honestly and without fear about these important and sensitive issues.
  • To all the politicians, donors and special interests, hear these words from me today: there is only one core issue in the immigration debate and it is this: the well-being of the American people. Nothing even comes a close second.
  • You’re stealing my money! You’re stealing my fucking money! What the fuck is this? Why are you letting him steal my fucking money?
    • When informed he was by law required to fund a transition.[18]
  • Fuck the law. I don’t give a fuck about the law. I want my fucking money.
    • When informed he was by law required to fund a transition.[19]
Speech at rally in Wilmington, North Carolina (August 9, 2016)
Speech at rally in Wilmington, North Carolina. Transcript (August 9, 2016)
  • I'm the messenger, but I'll tell you what, the message is the right message.
  • $400 million in all cash, anybody know what that looks like? That's a lot of cash. That's a lot of case. And honestly, it's so sad. Think of it, going to Iran, a terrorist state. Now I happen to think they have plenty of money, we've given then $150 billion, so the $400 million is just, you know – I happen to think it goes into their accounts in Switzerland personally. Now, a lot of people say, "no, no, it's used for terror," and they use it for terror because it's the number one terror funder – not even close. But I also think that when you have $400 million in cash, different denominations, do you see the size of this? I guess they did release the pictures after all. They released pictures. ... Obama said that he did it because we don't have a working account with Iran. Do you believe that? How long does it take to set up an account? Right? You don't have a working account, you set up an account, right?
  • What's going on in this country is insane. And we have people running our country that don't know what they're doing, they're grossly incompetent, and it's time. We have to make change, real change. Not Obama change, we have to make change.
  • We get Bergdahl who was a traitor, and they get five of the greatest killers that they've wanted for eight years. We get Bergdahl — I call it the five for one trade. For the Iran deal, where we get nothing, we get nothing. They get ultimately, they have the path, beautiful path, they'll get way, way earlier than that. They'll get nuclear weapons, so if you get Trump you're going to see a lot of changes to that deal. That'll happen fast.
  • Remember Obamacare, "you're going to keep your doctor, you're going to keep your plan, over and over again, you're going to keep your doctor." It was a lie. And in fact, if he didn't make the lie, he would have never gotten it approved because most Democrats, many of the Democrats didn't want to do it. It was only that, that got them to sign it and to approve it. And it was a lie.
  • America first. We get a little tired of these deals where they actually put, and you know why, because of lobbyists and special interests and people representing and people wanting it to happen. It's just not that they want other countries to benefit over us. There are reasons for it and you know, when I raise money, and I'm putting up a lot of money for my own campaign, I'm funding me. And I'm raising for the Republican party. And we're getting a lot of money from the small donors.
  • Those cameras are not going on the move unless we have a protester. If we had a protester that's the only time they move because they're showing something that in their mind is a bad thing, so then they move. But I like that, I've always liked my protesters because the cameras show these massive crowds and people say wow, was that a big crowd.
  • She (Hillary Clinton) lacks judgment, she lacks temperament and I'm the one that used unfit many, many months ago. And now they've turned it around, use it on me, unfit? I'm unfit? That's — that's a first. But she lacks the temperament and the moral character to lead this country, its very simple. She really does. She's a dangerous person who doesn't tell the truth which has been proven very loudly. I've never seen a — I don't think we've ever had greater proof of that, of anybody. And she has disregarded the lives of Americans — you see what's happening — with what she has done with her server? And you know why she did that. So, I just look at this, and I said that if she gets elected, she will cause the destruction of this country from within. Remember that. ... She is disdainful of the rules set for everyone else and she hasn't changed a bit. This is — that was the good thing. I couldn't say the bad things. It was too much. Nobody would even — nobody would even believe it. You've got to see this book. Nobody would believe because it's so terrible, so terrible. And she comes across like this woman — nice, easy — but she's not. And — and she's — listen — she's not a leader, not a leader. And she is a liar.
  • France isn't France anymore. We're not going. And so many people are saying that. Look at what's going on with Germany. Look at what's happening with Germany. Look at the crime; look at the problems. We have enough problems in our country right now. We don't need additional problems, folks. We don't need additional problems. And for all we know, this could be the great Trojan Horse. This could be. We don't know who these people are. ... We have to get smart, folks. We don't need the problems — and we've already got those problems, just so you understand. Because they're coming into the country, they're being put where nobody even knows where they are. It's like, if I were the enemy, I would say, I can't believe they're that stupid. They're taking my people and they're putting them all over the place, because you have great military right here.
  • Could you imagine if I said that "I short circuited"? They would be calling for my execution, — electric chair. They'd bring back the electric chair. It would be a whole different ball game if I said it, believe me.
  • Obama-Clinton economic policies have produced 1.2 percent economic growth, the weakest so-called recovery since the Great Depression. Now, this is, like, unbelievable — 1.2. Do you know China goes to 7 percent or 8 percent, it's like a national catastrophe. Now, what they do is they cut their currency. They devalue their currency, and big league, and then all of our businesses continue to be drained out of the United States. Our money, our jobs. They make our product, they sell our product to us. No tax, no nothing, you devalue — see devaluing is sort of cheating.
  • I see the carnage that NAFTA has caused, I see the carnage. It's been horrible. ... It's a suicidal pact for our country. And you know I've watched for years.
  • I like Mexico. And I respect the leaders of Mexico because they're much smarter, they're much street smarter, but they're much smarter and more cunning than our leaders. But you have to see what's going on.
  • I can't believe I'm saying I'm a politician.
  • The Bernie ones were — they had a lot more spirit. I think we're going to get a lot of Bernie voters, if you want to know the truth. Because they do understand that trade is killing us. Trade.
  • The national debt has doubled. And you know the bad part about that? You think if the national debt has doubled, our infrastructure would be great, our country would be in great shape. We'd have beautiful roads, beautiful highways. You see where like 50 percent of the bridges are in danger in this country. And the roadways are a mess.
  • We have great people. We have the most loyal people. We have the smartest people. You know, so many of my people, they're so smart. They like to say, well, Trump, I don't know if he's got this right — let me tell you, we have the smartest people. We have the people that are the smartest, and the strongest, and the best and the hardest working. We have the smartest people. We'll put I.Q.s among — some of us, we couldn't say all of us, right — against any I.Q.s that we — we have to deal with, that I can tell you. I would love to do that.
  • Today, homeownership is at its lowest rate in 51 years. ... Lowest that its been in so many years, 51 years. Nearly 12 million people and more Americans are dependent on food stamps and 2 million more Latino Americans live in poverty under Obama and Clinton — under Obama; because Clinton's just gonna carry on.
  • Hillary wants to raise taxes. It's a comparison. I want to lower them.
  • If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is. I don't know. But — but I'll tell you what. That will be a horrible day. If — if Hillary gets to put her judges — right now, we're tied. You see what's going on.
  • Hillary essentially wants to abolish the Second Amendment.
  • Hillary and President Obama refused to use the term radical Islamic terrorism. Big problem. Big problem. Hillary wants to release violent criminals and criminal offenders from prison, that's wonderful, enjoy yourselves. I want to work with our police. Our police are so incredible, they're not getting the respect they deserve.
  • We have to respect and cherish our police.
  • We're fighting a political correct war. It's a political correct war. I mean, you know what's going on. You know what's going on. These are people that chop off heads. These are people that, in steel cages, drop steel cages into the waters and drowned large numbers of people. These are people that buried people in the sand. We've got to knock them out. I was against the war in Iraq. We shouldn't have been to the war in Iraq. It destabilized the Middle East and I said that was going to happen. But we shouldn't have gotten out the way we got out. The way we got out was insane. And Obama gave a date, and he — and that's how ISIS happened, folks. Hence, the birth of ISIS.
  • If I'm ISIS, I call her (Hillary Clinton) up and I give her the most valuable player award. ... And I guarantee you with Libya, which was her baby, and all of the other mistakes she has made. Obama takes now, because obviously, for him, that's the better alternative, all right? But he has been an incompetent president. He has done a horrible job.
Speech in Jackson, Mississippi (August 24, 2016)

Speech in Jackson, Mississippi. As quoted by CBS and The Hindu [20][21] (August 24, 2016)

  • Hillary Clinton is a bigot who sees people of color only as votes, not as human beings worthy of a better future. She's going to do nothing for African-Americans. She's going to do nothing for the Hispanics. She's only going to take care of herself, her consultants, her donors, these are the people she cares about. She doesn't care what her policies have done to your communities. She doesn't care. Remember this, you've had her policies — Democrats running some of the inner cities for 50, 70, 80, even over 100 years. And look what you have right now: poverty, no education, crime, you can't walk down the street with your child. We're going to fix it. Hillary Clinton has no remorse. I will fight to create a better future for every American.
  • Eight years of Obama-Clinton policies have sacrificed our safety and undermined our freedom and independence. ... The Obama-Clinton foreign policy has unleashed ISIS, destabilised the Middle East and put the nation of Iran — which chants Death to America — in a dominant position of regional power and, in fact, aspiring to be a dominant world power.
  • Our jobs have moved overseas, Islamic terrorism has spread within our shores and an open border has crushed low-income workers and threatened our security. The issues we face here in America are similar to the issues faced in Britain during their referendum on membership in the EU. This is the movement known as Brexit
  • Hillary wants to surrender America to globalism. She wants a country without borders. She wants trade deals written for the benefit of foreign corporations. She wants a government that ignores the will of the people. She wants to sell out American security to the Clinton Foundation for a pile of cash. It is hard to tell where the Clinton Foundation ends and the State Department begins. ... Hillary Clinton has betrayed her duty to the people.
  • The job of a public official is to serve and protect the citizens of the United States. Not illegal immigrants, not foreign nationals seeking entry, but the people living here lawfully today — including millions of African-American and Hispanic citizens.
  • I will fight for their security, I will fight for their jobs, I will fight for their families. One American Nation.
  • It's time for America to recapture its destiny. Our government, our leaders, and our media have lost touch with the people. You need no better evidence of that than the fact that the media ignores the plight of Americans who have lost their children to illegal immigrants, but spends day after day pushing for amnesty for those here in violation of the law.
  • This is the legacy of Hillary Clinton: death, destruction, terrorism and weakness. But Hillary Clinton's legacy doesn't have to be America's legacy.
  • I have a message for the terrorists trying to kill our citizens: we will find you, we will destroy you, and we will win. This is not only a military fight, but we will also require cyberwarfare and financial warfare. It is also an ideological fight. We will confront directly the hateful ideology of Radical Islam — and promote American values, and American culture, and America's system of government.

September 2016

  • OK, what I do is, wash it with Head and Shoulders. I don't dry it, though. I let it dry by itself. It takes about an hour. Then I read papers and things…I also watch TV…OK, so I've done all that. I then comb my hair. Yes, I do use a comb…
    Do I comb it forward? No, I don't comb it forward…I actually don't have a bad hairline. When you think about it, it's not bad. I mean, I get a lot of credit for comb-overs. But it's not really a comb-over. It's sort of a little bit forward and back. I've combed it the same way for years. Same thing, every time.
  • People don't know how great you are. People don't know how smart you are. These are the smart people. These are the smart people. These are really the smart people. And they never like to say it, but I say it. And I'm a smart person. These are the smart. We have the smartest people. We have the smartest people. And they know it. Some say it, but they hate to say it. But we have the smartest people.
First presidential debate (September 26, 2016)

Transcript, Washington Post

  • Our jobs are fleeing the country. They're going to Mexico. They're going to many other countries. You look at what China is doing to our country in terms of making our product. They're devaluing their currency, and there's nobody in our government to fight them. And we have a very good fight. And we have a winning fight. Because they're using our country as a piggy bank to rebuild China, and many other countries are doing the same thing. ... We have to stop our jobs from being stolen from us. We have to stop our companies from leaving the United States and, with it, firing all of their people. ... We cannot let it happen. Under my plan, I'll be reducing taxes tremendously, from 35 percent to 15 percent for companies, small and big businesses. That's going to be a job creator like we haven't seen since Ronald Reagan. It's going to be a beautiful thing to watch. Companies will come. They will build. They will expand. New companies will start. And I look very, very much forward to doing it. We have to renegotiate our trade deals, and we have to stop these countries from stealing our companies and our jobs.
  • Our country's in deep trouble. We don't know what we're doing when it comes to devaluations and all of these countries all over the world, especially China. They're the best, the best ever at it. What they're doing to us is a very, very sad thing.
  • But in all fairness to Secretary Clinton, when she started talking about this, it was really very recently. She's been doing this for 30 years. And why hasn't she made the agreements better? The NAFTA agreement is defective. Just because of the tax and many other reasons, but just because of the fact Secretary Clinton and others, politicians, should have been doing this for years, not right now, because of the fact that we've created a movement.
  • The first thing you do is don't let the jobs leave. The companies are leaving. I could name, I mean, there are thousands of them. They're leaving, and they're leaving in bigger numbers than ever. And what you do is you say, fine, you want to go to Mexico or some other country, good luck. We wish you a lot of luck. But if you think you're going to make your air conditioners or your cars or your cookies or whatever you make and bring them into our country without a tax, you're wrong. And once you say you're going to have to tax them coming in, and our politicians never do this, because they have special interests and the special interests want those companies to leave, because in many cases, they own the companies. So what I'm saying is, we can stop them from leaving. We have to stop them from leaving. And that's a big, big factor.
  • CLINTON: Donald was one of the people who rooted for the housing crisis. He said, back in 2006, "Gee, I hope it does collapse, because then I can go in and buy some and make some money." Well, it did collapse.
TRUMP: That's called business, by the way.
  • We invested in a solar company, our country. That was a disaster. They lost plenty of money on that one. Now, look, I'm a great believer in all forms of energy, but we're putting a lot of people out of work. Our energy policies are a disaster. Our country is losing so much in terms of energy, in terms of paying off our debt. You can't do what you're looking to do with $20 trillion in debt. The Obama administration, from the time they've come in, is over 230 years' worth of debt, and he's topped it. He's doubled it in a course of almost eight years, seven-and-a-half years, to be semi- exact.
  • We have to do a much better job at giving companies incentives to build new companies or to expand, because they're not doing it.
  • NAFTA is the worst trade deal maybe ever signed anywhere, but certainly ever signed in this country. And now you [Hillary Clinton] want to approve Trans-Pacific Partnership. You were totally in favor of it. Then you heard what I was saying, how bad it is, and you said, I can't win that debate. But you know that if you did win, you would approve that, and that will be almost as bad as NAFTA. Nothing will ever top NAFTA.
  • You are going to approve one of the biggest tax cuts in history. You are going to approve one of the biggest tax increases in history. You are going to drive business out. Your regulations are a disaster, and you're going to increase regulations all over the place. And by the way, my tax cut is the biggest since Ronald Reagan. I'm very proud of it. It will create tremendous numbers of new jobs. But regulations, you are going to regulate these businesses out of existence. ... The things that business as in people like the most is the fact that I'm cutting regulation. You have regulations on top of regulations, and new companies cannot form and old companies are going out of business. And you want to increase the regulations and make them even worse. I'm going to cut regulations. I'm going to cut taxes big league, and you're going to raise taxes big league, end of story.
  • She's telling us how to fight ISIS. Just go to her website. She tells you how to fight ISIS on her website. I don't think General Douglas MacArthur would like that too much. ... See, you're telling the enemy everything you want to do. No wonder you've been fighting ISIS your entire adult life.
  • I'm really calling for major jobs, because the wealthy are going create tremendous jobs. They're going to expand their companies. They're going to do a tremendous job. I'm getting rid of the carried interest provision. And if you really look, it's not a tax -- it's really not a great thing for the wealthy. It's a great thing for the middle class. It's a great thing for companies to expand.
  • We have the worst revival of an economy since the Great Depression. And believe me: We're in a bubble right now. And the only thing that looks good is the stock market, but if you raise interest rates even a little bit, that's going to come crashing down.
  • I will release them as soon as the audit. Look, I've been under audit almost for 15 years. I know a lot of wealthy people that have never been audited. I said, do you get audited? I get audited almost every year. And in a way, I should be complaining. I'm not even complaining. I don't mind it. It's almost become a way of life. I get audited by the IRS. But other people don't. I will say this. We have a situation in this country that has to be taken care of. I will release my tax returns -- against my lawyer's wishes -- when she [Hillary Clinton] releases her 33,000 e-mails that have been deleted. As soon as she releases them, I will release.
    • About releasing his tax returns.
  • That was more than a mistake. That was done purposely. OK? That was not a mistake. That was done purposely. When you have your staff taking the Fifth Amendment, taking the Fifth so they're not prosecuted, when you have the man that set up the illegal server taking the Fifth, I think it's disgraceful.
  • As far as my tax returns, you don't learn that much from tax returns. That I can tell you. You learn a lot from financial disclosure. And you should go down and take a look at that.
  • I am very underleveraged. I have a great company. I have a tremendous income. And the reason I say that is not in a braggadocios way. It's because it's about time that this country had somebody running it that has an idea about money.
  • Maybe he didn't do a good job and I was unsatisfied with his work ... On occasion, four times, we used certain laws that are there. And when Secretary Clinton talks about people that didn't get paid, first of all, they did get paid a lot, but taken advantage of the laws of the nation. Now, if you want to change the laws, you've been there a long time, change the laws. But I take advantage of the laws of the nation because I'm running a company. My obligation right now is to do well for myself, my family, my employees, for my companies. And that's what I do. ... She [Hillary Clinton] doesn't say is that tens of thousands of people that are unbelievably happy and that love me.
    • About not having paid to some of his employees.
  • We need law and order. If we don't have it, we're not going to have a country. ... We need law and order in our country.
  • We have a situation where we have our inner cities, African- Americans, Hispanics are living in hell because it's so dangerous. You walk down the street, you get shot.
  • Our police, in many cases, are afraid to do anything. We have to protect our inner cities, because African-American communities are being decimated by crime, decimated.
  • HOLT: Stop-and-frisk was ruled unconstitutional in New York, because it largely singled out black and Hispanic young men.
TRUMP: No, you're wrong. It went before a judge, who was a very against-police judge. It was taken away from her. And our mayor, our new mayor, refused to go forward with the case. They would have won an appeal. If you look at it, throughout the country, there are many places where it's allowed.
HOLT: The argument is that it's a form of racial profiling.
TRUMP: No, the argument is that we have to take the guns away from these people that have them and they are bad people that shouldn't have them.
  • You need more police. You need a better community, you know, relation. ... You need better relationships between the communities and the police, because in some cases, it's not good.
  • So when you [Hillary Clinton] tried to act holier than thou, it really doesn't work. It really doesn't.
  • We should be better than anybody else, and perhaps we're not. I don't think anybody knows it was Russia that broke into the DNC. She's saying Russia, Russia, Russia, but I don't -- maybe it was. I mean, it could be Russia, but it could also be China. It could also be lots of other people. It also could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds, OK?
  • We have to get very, very tough on cyber and cyber warfare.
  • President Obama and Secretary Clinton created a vacuum the way they got out of Iraq, because they got out -- what, they shouldn't have been in, but once they got in, the way they got out was a disaster. And ISIS was formed.
  • I said it to you once, had we taken the oil -- and we should have taken the oil -- ISIS would not have been able to form either, because the oil was their primary source of income. And now they have the oil all over the place, including the oil -- a lot of the oil in Libya, which was another one of her disasters.
  • You [Hillary Clinton] look at the Middle East, you started the Iran deal, that's another beauty where you have a country that was ready to fall, I mean, they were doing so badly. They were choking on the sanctions. And now they're going to be actually probably a major power at some point pretty soon, the way they're going.
  • I think we have to get NATO to go into the Middle East with us, in addition to surrounding nations, and we have to knock the hell out of ISIS, and we have to do it fast, when ISIS formed in this vacuum created by Barack Obama and Secretary Clinton. And believe me, you were the ones that took out the troops. ... When they formed, this is something that never should have happened. It should have never happened. Now, you're talking about taking out ISIS. But you were there, and you were secretary of state when it was a little infant. Now it's in over 30 countries. And you're going to stop them? I don't think so.
  • I think the best person in her [Clinton's] campaign is mainstream media.
  • The single greatest problem the world has is nuclear armament, nuclear weapons, not global warming, like you think and your -- your president thinks.

October 2016

  • So important that you get out and vote. So important that you watch other communities, because we don't want this election stolen from us. We don't want this election stolen from us.
  • This event gives not only the candidates' chance to be with each other in very social setting it's also allowing the candidates the opportunity to meet the other candidate team, good team, I know Hillary met my campaign manager and I got chance meet people who are working so hard to get her elected, there they are...the head of NBC, CNN, CBS, ABC, there's the New York Times right over there and the Washington Post, they're working overtime, it's true...true... Oh this one gonna get me a trouble...
    • Speech at the Al Smith Charity Dinner, 2016
  • Hillary Clinton meets in secret with international banks to plot the destruction of U.S. sovereignty in order to enrich these global financial powers, her special interest friends and her donors.
  • Honestly, she should be locked up. She should be. Should be locked up.
  • Our movement is about replacing a failed and corrupt - and when I say corrupt, I'm talking about totally corrupt - political establishment [Obamacare] with a new government controlled by you, the American people. There is nothing the political establishment will not do. No lie that they won't tell to hold their prestige and power at your expense and that's what's been happening. The Washington establishment and the financial and media corporations that funded exist for only one reason: to protect and enrich itself. The establishment has trillions of dollars at stake in this election. As an example, just one single trade deal they'd like to pass involves trillions of dollars controlled by many countries, corporations, and lobbyists. For those who controlled the levels of power in Washington, and for the global special interests, they partner with these people that don't have your good in mind. Our campaign represents a true existential threat like they haven't seen before.
    • At a campaign rally in Florida (13 October 2016)
  • No, no, lot of things are going on folks, lot of things. I think she's actually getting pumped up, if you want to know the truth, she's getting pumped up, you understand? In fact we're going to be talking about that in a few minutes. She's getting pumped up for Wednesday night. Let's see. You know, I don't know, maybe, we're like athletes, right? Hey, look, I beat seventeen senators, governors, I beat all these people, we're like athletes. Hillary beat Bernie, although it looks like Bernie got a little bit of a bad deal based on Wikileaks, right? If you look at Wikileaks. But we're like athletes, right? So athletes, they're making them more and more, but athletes, they make them take a drug test, right? I think we should take a drug test prior to the debate, I do. I think we should, why don't we do that? We should take a drug test, prior, because I don't know what's going on with her. But at the beginning of her last debate, she was all pumped up at the beginning, and at the end it was like, "Uh, take me down." She could barely reach her car. So I think we should take a drug test, I'm, er, anyway I'm willing to do it.
  • I would like to promise and pledge to all of my voters and supporters and to all of the people of the United States that I will totally accept the results of this great and historic presidential election, if I win.
  • Hillary is so corrupt, she got kicked off the Watergate commission.
  • And I have to give the FBI credit, that was so bad, what happened, originally, and it took guts for Director Comey to make the move that he made, in light of the kind of opposition he had, with their trying to protect her from criminal prosecution, you know that. It took a lot of guts, I really disagreed with him, I was not his fan, but I'll tell you what, what he did, he brought back his reputation, he brought it back. He's got to hang tough, because there's a lot of, lotta people, want him to do the wrong thing, what he did was the right thing.
    • At a rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan shortly after Comey announced the FBI would investigate further emails relating to Hillary Clinton, but before his statement that no incriminating information was found within them (31 October 2016)
Second presidential debate (October 9, 2016)

Transcript, New York Times

  • Anderson Cooper: You bragged that you have sexually assaulted women. Do you understand that?
    Donald Trump: No, I didn't say that at all. I don't think you understood what was — this was locker room talk.
  • I have great respect for women. Nobody has more respect for women than I do.
  • ...if I win, I am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into your [Hilary Clinton's] situation, because there has never been so many lies, so much deception. There has never been anything like it, and we're going to have a special prosecutor.
  • Hillary Clinton: ...it's just awfully good that someone with the temperament of Donald Trump is not in charge of the law in our country.
    Donald Trump: Because you'd be in jail.
  • Cooper: Please allow her to respond. She didn't talk while you talked.
    Clinton: Yes, that's true, I didn't.
    Trump: Because you have nothing to say.
  • Martha Raddatz: ...you, Secretary Clinton, purportedly say you need both a public and private position on certain issues....
    Clinton: As I recall, that was something I said about Abraham Lincoln after having seen the wonderful Steven Spielberg movie ...
    Trump: Now she's blaming the lie on the late, great Abraham Lincoln. That's one that I haven't... OK, Honest Abe, Honest Abe never lied. That's the good thing. That's the big difference between Abraham Lincoln and you. That's a big, big difference. We're talking about some difference.
  • I know nothing about Russia. I know — I know about Russia, but I know nothing about the inner workings of Russia.
  • Cooper: Did you use that $916 million loss to avoid paying personal federal income taxes for years?
    Trump: Of course I do. Of course I do. And so do all of her donors, or most of her donors. ... I pay tremendous numbers of taxes. I absolutely used it. And so did Warren Buffett and so did George Soros and so did many of the other people that Hillary is getting money from.
  • ...NAFTA, signed by her husband, is perhaps the greatest disaster trade deal in the history of the world.

November 2016

  • Our movement is about replacing a failed and corrupt political establishment with a new government controlled by you, the American people. The establishment has trillions of dollars at stake in this election. For those who control the levers of power in Washington and for the global special interests, they partner with these people that don't have your good in mind. The political establishment that is trying to stop us is the same group responsible for our disastrous trade deals, massive illegal immigration and economic and foreign policies that have bled our country dry. The political establishment has brought about the destruction of our factories and our jobs as they flee to Mexico, China and other countries all around the world. It's a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities. The only thing that can stop this corrupt machine is you. The only force strong enough to save our country is us. The only people brave enough to vote out this corrupt establishment is you, the American people. I'm doing this for the people and the movement and we will take back this country for you and we will make America great again. I'm Donald Trump and I approve this message.
    • Closing argument for America (4 November 2016)
      • Lines recycled from Trump's campaign rally in West Palm Beach, FL (10/13/2016)
  • No dream is too big, no challenge is too great. Nothing we want for our future is beyond our reach. America will no longer settle for anything less than the best.
  • I think I'm a sober person. I think the press tries to make you into something a little bit different. In my case, a little bit of a wild man, I'm not, I'm actually not. I'm a very sober person.
    • During an interview on 60 Minutes (11 November 2016)
  • Today, I would like to provide the American people with an update on the White House transition and our policy plans for the first 100 days. Our transition team is working very smoothly, efficiently, and effectively. Truly great and talented men and women, patriots indeed are being brought in and many will soon be a part of our government, helping us to Make America Great Again. My agenda will be based on a simple core principle: putting America First. Whether it's producing steel, building cars, or curing disease, I want the next generation of production and innovation to happen right here, in our great homeland: America – creating wealth and jobs for American workers. As part of this plan, I've asked my transition team to develop a list of executive actions we can take on day one to restore our laws and bring back our jobs. It's about time. These include the following: On trade, I am going to issue our notification of intent to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a potential disaster for our country. Instead, we will negotiate fair, bilateral trade deals that bring jobs and industry back onto American shores. On energy, I will cancel job-killing restrictions on the production of American energy – including shale energy and clean coal – creating many millions of high-paying jobs. That's what we want, that's what we've been waiting for. On regulation, I will formulate a rule which says that for every one new regulation, two old regulations must be eliminated, it's so important. On national security, I will ask the Department of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to develop a comprehensive plan to protect America's vital infrastructure from cyber-attacks, and all other form of attacks. On immigration, I will direct the Department of Labor to investigate all abuses of visa programs that undercut the American worker. On ethics reform, as part of our plan to Drain the Swamp, we will impose a five-year ban on executive officials becoming lobbyists after they leave the Administration – and a lifetime ban on executive officials lobbying on behalf of a foreign government. These are just a few of the steps we will take to reform Washington and rebuild our middle class. I will provide more updates in the coming days, as we work together to Make America Great Again for everyone.
  • We are very blessed to call this nation our home. And that is what America is: it is our home. It's where we raise our families, care for our loved ones, look out for our neighbors, and live out our dreams. It is my prayer, that on this Thanksgiving, we begin to heal our divisions and move forward as one country, strengthened by a shared purpose and very, very common resolve. In declaring this national holiday, President Lincoln called upon Americans to speak with "one voice and one heart." That's just what we have to do. We have just finished a long and bruising political campaign. Emotions are raw and tensions just don't heal overnight. It doesn't go quickly, unfortunately, but we have before us the chance now to make history together to bring real change to Washington, real safety to our cities, and real prosperity to our communities, including our inner cities. So important to me, and so important to our country. But to succeed, we must enlist the effort of our entire nation. This historic political campaign is now over. Now begins a great national campaign to rebuild our country and to restore the full promise of America for all of our people. I am asking you to join me in this effort. It is time to restore the bonds of trust between citizens. Because when America is unified, there is nothing beyond our reach, and I mean absolutely nothing. Let us give thanks for all that we have, and let us boldly face the exciting new frontiers that lie ahead. Thank you. God Bless You and God Bless America.
New York Times Interview (November 23, 2016)
New York Times Interview, Transcript (November 23, 2016)
  • People are giving up tremendous careers in order to be subject to you folks and subject to a lot of other folks. But they're giving up a lot. I mean some are giving up tremendous businesses in order to sit for four or maybe eight or whatever the period of time is. But I think we're going to see some tremendous talent, tremendous talent coming in. We have many people for every job. I mean no matter what the job is, we have many incredible people. I think, Reince, you can sort of just confirm that. The quality of the people is very good. ... We're trying very hard to get the best people. Not necessarily people that will be the most politically correct people, because that hasn't been working. So we have really experts in the field. Some are known and some are not known, but they're known within their field as being the best. That's very important to me.
  • I think the popular vote would have been easier in a true sense because you'd go to a few places. I think that's the genius of the Electoral College. I was never a fan of the Electoral College until now.
  • What we do want to do is we want to bring the country together, because the country is very, very divided, and that's one thing I did see, big league. It's very, very divided, and I'm going to work very hard to bring the country together.
  • I want to move forward, I don't want to move back. And I don't want to hurt the Clintons. I really don't. She went through a lot. And suffered greatly in many different ways. And I am not looking to hurt them at all. The campaign was vicious. They say it was the most vicious primary and the most vicious campaign. I guess, added together, it was definitely the most vicious; probably, I assume you sold a lot of newspapers. ... It's just not something that I feel very strongly about. ... I'm not looking to look back and go through this. This was a very painful period. This was a very painful election with all of the email things and all of the foundation things and all of the everything that they went through and the whole country went through. This was a very painful period of time.
    • About not prosecuting Hillary Clinton.
  • Our country's really in bad, big trouble. We have a lot of trouble. A lot of problems. And one of the big problems, I talk about, divisiveness. I think that a lot of people will appreciate … I'm not doing it for that reason. I'm doing it because it's time to go in a different direction.
  • Clean air is vitally important. Clean water, crystal clean water is vitally important. Safety is vitally important.
  • Sometimes I'll say I'm actually an environmentalist and people will smile in some cases and other people that know me understand that's true. Open mind.
  • We're not a competitive nation with other nations anymore. We have to make ourselves competitive. We're not competitive for a lot of reasons. That's becoming more and more of the reason. Because a lot of these countries that we do business with, they make deals with our president, or whoever, and then they don't adhere to the deals, you know that. And it's much less expensive for their companies to produce products. So I'm going to be studying that very hard, and I think I have a very big voice in it. And I think my voice is listened to, especially by people that don't believe in it. And we'll let you know.
  • As far as the, you know, potential conflict of interests, though, I mean I know that from the standpoint, the law is totally on my side, meaning, the president can't have a conflict of interest. That's been reported very widely. Despite that, I don't want there to be a conflict of interest anyway. And the laws, the president can't. And I understand why the president can't have a conflict of interest now because everything a president does in some ways is like a conflict of interest.
  • I don't care about my company. ... Because it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters to me is running our country.
  • It's hard to explain. I don't care about anything having to do with anything having to do with anything other than the country.
  • In theory I could run my business perfectly, and then run the country perfectly. And there's never been a case like this where somebody's had, like, if you look at other people of wealth, they didn't have this kind of asset and this kind of wealth, frankly. It's just a different thing.
  • I've known Steve Bannon a long time. If I thought he was a racist, or alt-right, or any of the things that we can, you know, the terms we can use, I wouldn't even think about hiring him. First of all, I'm the one that makes the decision, not Steve Bannon or anybody else.
  • To me more important is taking care of the people that really have proven to be, to love Donald Trump, as opposed to the political people. And frankly if the political people don't take care of these people, they're not going to win and you're going to end up with maybe a total different kind of government than what you're looking at right now. These people are really angry. They're smart, they're workers, and they're angry. I call them the forgotten men and women. And I use that in speeches, I say they're the forgotten people — they were totally forgotten.
  • I would love to be able to be the one that made peace with Israel and the Palestinians. I would love that, that would be such a great achievement. Because nobody's been able to do it. ... I've had a lot of, actually, great Israeli businesspeople tell me, you can't do that, it's impossible. I disagree, I think you can make peace. I think people are tired now of being shot, killed. At some point, when do they come? I think we can do that. I have reason to believe I can do that.
  • The Times is, it's a great, great American jewel. A world jewel.

December 2016

  • Funny how that term caught on, isn't it? I tell everyone, I hated it. Somebody said 'drain the swamp' and I said, 'Oh, that is so hokey. That is so terrible.' I said, all right, I'll try it. So like a month ago I said 'drain the swamp' and the place went crazy. And I said 'Whoa, what's this?' Then I said it again. And then I start saying it like I meant it, right? And then I started to love it, and the place loved it. Drain the swamp. It's true. It's true. Drain the swamp.

2017

20 January 2017 - Donald Trump's presidency began

January 2017

  • Reporter: Would a reasonable observer say that you are potentially vulnerable to blackmail by Russia or by its intelligence agencies?
    Trump: Lemme just tell you what I do. When I leave our country, I'm a very high-profile person, would you say? I am extremely careful. I'm surrounded by bodyguards. I'm surrounded by people. And I always tell them—anywhere, but I always tell them if I'm leaving this country, "Be very careful, because in your hotel rooms and no matter where you go, you're gonna probably have cameras." I'm not referring just to Russia, but I would certainly put them in that category. And number one, "I hope you're gonna be good anyway. But in those rooms, you have cameras in the strangest places. Cameras that are so small with modern technology, you can't see them and you won't know. You better be careful, or you'll be watching yourself on nightly television." I tell this to people all the time. I was in Russia years ago, with the Miss Universe contest, which did very well—Moscow, the Moscow area did very, very well. And I told many people, "Be careful, because you don't wanna see yourself on television. Cameras all over the place."
    And again, not just Russia, all over. Does anyone really believe that story? I'm also very much of a germaphobe, by the way, believe me.
From this moment on, it's going to be America First.
I looked out, the field was, looked like million, million and a half people.
  • I looked out, the field was, looked like million, million and a half people. They showed a field where there was practically nobody standing there. And they said, "Donald Trump did not draw well." I said, "It was almost raining!" The rain should've scared them away but God looked down and said we're not going to let it rain on your speech.
  • [About David Becker] He's grovelling again. You know, I always talk about the reporters that grovel when they want to write something that you want to hear but not necessarily millions of people want to hear or have to hear.
  • I've always felt the need to pray...I would say that the office is so powerful that you need God even more.
Inaugural address, (January 20, 2017)

Transcript (January 20, 2017)

  • Chief Justice Roberts, President Carter, President Clinton, President Bush, President Obama, fellow Americans, and people of the world: Thank you. We, the citizens of America, are now joined in a great national effort to rebuild our country and restore its promise for all of our people. Together, we will determine the course of America and the world for many, many years to come. We will face challenges, we will confront hardships, but we will get the job done. Every 4 years, we gather on these steps to carry out the orderly and peaceful transfer of power, and we are grateful to President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama for their gracious aid throughout this transition. They have been magnificent. Thank you.
  • Today's ceremony, however, has very special meaning. Because today we are not merely transferring power from one administration to another or from one party to another, but we are transferring power from Washington, DC, and giving it back to you, the people. For too long, a small group in our Nation's Capital has reaped the rewards of Government while the people have borne the cost. Washington flourished, but the people did not share in its wealth. Politicians prospered, but the jobs left, and the factories closed. The establishment protected itself, but not the citizens of our country. Their victories have not been your victories; their triumphs have not been your triumphs; and while they celebrated in our Nation's Capital, there was little to celebrate for struggling families all across our land. That all changes, starting right here and right now, because this moment is your moment: It belongs to you. It belongs to everyone gathered here today and everyone watching all across America. This is your day. This is your celebration. And this, the United States of America, is your country. What truly matters is not which party controls our Government, but whether our Government is controlled by the people. January 20, 2017, will be remembered as the day the people became the rulers of this Nation again. The forgotten men and women of our country will be forgotten no longer. Everyone is listening to you now.
  • You came by the tens of millions to become part of a historic movement the likes of which the world has never seen before. At the center of this movement is a crucial conviction: that a nation exists to serve its citizens. Americans want great schools for their children, safe neighborhoods for their families, and good jobs for themselves. These are just and reasonable demands of righteous people and a righteous public. But for too many of our citizens, a different reality exists: Mothers and children trapped in poverty in our inner cities; rusted-out factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our Nation; an education system, flush with cash, but which leaves our young and beautiful students deprived of all knowledge; and the crime and the gangs and the drugs that have stolen too many lives and robbed our country of so much unrealized potential. This American carnage stops right here and stops right now. We are one Nation, and their pain is our pain, their dreams are our dreams, and their success will be our success. We share one heart, one home, and one glorious destiny. The oath of office I take today is an oath of allegiance to all Americans.
  • For many decades, we've enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry, subsidized the armies of other countries while allowing for the very sad depletion of our military. We've defended other nations' borders while refusing to defend our own and spent trillions and trillions of dollars overseas while America's infrastructure has fallen into disrepair and decay. We've made other countries rich while the wealth, strength, and confidence of our country has dissipated over the horizon. One by one, the factories shuttered and left our shores, with not even a thought about the millions and millions of American workers that were left behind. The wealth of our middle class has been ripped from their homes and then redistributed all across the world. But that is the past. And now we are looking only to the future. We, assembled here today, are issuing a new decree to be heard in every city, in every foreign capital, and in every hall of power. From this day forward, a new vision will govern our land. From this this day forward, it's going to be only America first. America first. Every decision on trade, on taxes, on immigration, on foreign affairs, will be made to benefit American workers and American families.
  • We must protect our borders from the ravages of other countries making our products, stealing our companies, and destroying our jobs. Protection will lead to great prosperity and strength. I will fight for you with every breath in my body, and I will never, ever let you down. America will start winning again, winning like never before. We will bring back our jobs. We will bring back our borders. We will bring back our wealth. And we will bring back our dreams. We will build new roads and highways and bridges and airports and tunnels and railways all across our wonderful Nation. We will get our people off of welfare and back to work, rebuilding our country with American hands and American labor. We will follow two simple rules: Buy American and hire American. We will seek friendship and good will with the nations of the world, but we do so with the understanding that it is the right of all nations to put their own interests first. We do not seek to impose our way of life on anyone, but rather to let it shine as an example—we will shine—for everyone to follow. We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones and unite the civilized world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth. At the bedrock of our politics will be a total allegiance to the United States of America, and through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other. When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice. The Bible tells us, "How good and pleasant it is when God's people live together in unity." We must speak our minds openly, debate our disagreements honestly, but always pursue solidarity. When America is united, America is totally unstoppable. There should be no fear: We are protected, and we will always be protected. We will be protected by the great men and women of our military and law enforcement, and most importantly, we will be protected by God.
  • Finally, we must think big and dream even bigger. In America, we understand that a nation is only living as long as it is striving. We will no longer accept politicians who are all talk and no action, constantly complaining, but never doing anything about it. The time for empty talk is over. Now arrives the hour of action. Do not allow anyone to tell you that it cannot be done. No challenge can match the heart and fight and spirit of America. We will not fail. Our country will thrive and prosper again. We stand at the birth of a new millennium, ready to unlock the mysteries of space, to free the Earth from the miseries of disease, and to harness the energies, industries, and technologies of tomorrow. A new national pride will stir our souls, lift our sights, and heal our divisions.
  • It's time to remember that old wisdom our soldiers will never forget: that whether we are Black or Brown or White, we all bleed the same red blood of patriots, we all enjoy the same glorious freedoms, and we all salute the same great American flag. And whether a child is born in the urban sprawl of Detroit or the windswept plains of Nebraska, they look up at the same night sky, they fill their heart with the same dreams, and they are infused with the breath of life by the same almighty Creator. So to all Americans in every city near and far, small and large, from mountain to mountain, from ocean to ocean, hear these words: You will never be ignored again. Your voice, your hopes, and your dreams will define our American destiny. And your courage and goodness and love will forever guide us along the way. Together, we will make America strong again. We will make America wealthy again. We will make America proud again. We will make America safe again. And, yes, together, we will make America great again. Thank you. God bless you, and God bless America. Thank you. God bless America.

February 2017

  • As we celebrate National African American History Month, we recognize the heritage and achievements of African Americans. The contributions African Americans have made and continue to make are an integral part of our society, and the history of African Americans exemplifies the resilience and innovative spirit that continue to make our Nation great
  • For us here in Washington, we must never ever stop asking God for the wisdom to serve the public according to His will. But we had tremendous success on The Apprentice and, when I ran for President, I had to leave the show, that's when I knew for sure I was doing it, and they hired a big, big movie star, Arnold Schwarzenegger, to take my place, and we know how that turned out. The ratings went right down the tubes, it's been a total disaster, and Mark [Burnett] will never, ever bet against Trump again, and I want to just pray for Arnold, if we can, for those rating, OK?
  • Who is the state senator? Do you want to give me his name? We'll destroy his career.
  • I listened to a panel of judges and I'll comment on that — I will not comment on the statements made by, um, certainly one judge — but I have to be honest that if these judges wanted to, in my opinion, help the court, in terms of respect for the court, they'd do what they should be doing. I mean it's so sad, they should be, you know, when you read something so simple, and so beautifully written, and so perfectly written — other than the one statement, of course, having to do with "he" or "she" — but when you read something so perfectly written, and so clear to anybody, and then you have lawyers and you watched, I watched last night in amazement, and I heard things that I couldn't believe, things that really had nothing to do with what I just read, and I don't ever want to call a court biased, so I won't call it biased, and we haven't had a decision yet, but courts seem to be so political, and it would be so great for our justice system if they would be able to read a statement and do what's right.
  • Every child in America should be able to play outside without fear, walk home without danger, and attend a school without being worried about drugs or gangs or violence.
  • Well I just want to say that we are, you know, very honored by the victory that we had, 306 electoral college votes, we were not supposed to crack 220, you [turning to the Israeli PM] know that right? There was no way to 221, but then they said there's no way to 270 [Netanyahu tries to respond, but Trump continues, so then mouths "I thought he was talking to me"] and there's tremendous enthusiasm out there. I will say that, um, we are going to have peace, in this country, we are going to stop crime, in this country, we are going to do everything within our power to stop long-simmering racism, and every other thing that's going on, because a lot of bad things have been taking place over a long period of time. I think one of the reasons I won the election is we have a very, very divided nation, very divided, and hopefully I'll be able to do something about that, and I, you know, it's something that was very important to me. As far as people, Jewish people, so many friends, a daughter who happens to be here right now, a son-in-law, and three beautiful grandchildren, I think that you're going to see a lot different United States of America over the next three, four, or eight years, er, I think a lot of good things are happening, and you're going to see a lot of love, you're going to see a lot of love.
  • The press has become so dishonest that if we don't talk about, we are doing a tremendous disservice to the American people. Tremendous disservice. We have to talk to find out what's going on, because the press honestly is out of control. The level of dishonesty is out of control.
  • I guess it was the biggest Electoral College win since Ronald Reagan.
  • This administration is running like a fine-tuned machine.
Mike Flynn is a fine person, and I asked for his resignation.
  • Mike Flynn is a fine person, and I asked for his resignation. He respectfully gave it. He is a man who there was a certain amount of information given to Vice President Pence, who is with us today. And I was not happy with the way that information was given. He didn't have to do that, because what he did wasn't wrong. What he did in terms of the information he saw. What was wrong was the way that other people, including yourselves in this room, were given that information, because that was classified information that was given illegally. That's the real problem.
  • Look, when I go to rallies, they turn around, they start screaming at CNN. They want to throw their placards at CNN. You know. I think you would do much better by being different.
  • Tomorrow, they will say, "Donald Trump rants and raves at the press." I'm not ranting and raving. I'm just telling you. You know, you're dishonest people. But, but I'm not ranting and raving. I love this. I'm having a good time doing it. But tomorrow, the headlines are going to be, "Donald Trump rants and raves." I'm not ranting and raving.
You know what uranium is, right? It's a thing called nuclear weapons and other things like lots of things are done with uranium including some bad things.
  • You know what uranium is, right? It's a thing called nuclear weapons and other things like lots of things are done with uranium including some bad things.
  • In the meantime, Mosul is very, very difficult. Do you know why? Because I don't talk about military, and I don't talk about certain other things, you're going to be surprised to hear that. And by the way, my whole campaign, I'd say that. So I don't have to tell you. I don't want to be one of these guys that say, "Yes, here's what we're going to do." I don't have to do that. I don't have to tell you what I'm going to do in North Korea. Wait a minute. I don't have to tell you what I'm going to do in North Korea. And I don't have to tell you what I'm going to do with Iran. You know why? Because they shouldn't know. And eventually, you guys are going to get tired of asking that question.
  • Where are you from? [The reporter responds that he is from the BBC] Here's another beauty.
  • Do you want to set up the meeting? Are they friends of yours? [Addressing an African-American reporter and referring to the Congressional Black Caucus]
  • I am the least anti-Semitic person that you’ve ever seen in your entire life
    • 17 February 2017 per CNBC
  • And I want you all to know that we are fighting the fake news. It's fake, phony, fake. A few days ago I called the fake news the enemy of the people, and they are, they are the enemy of the people.
  • They shouldn't be allowed to use sources unless they use somebody's name. Let their name be put out there. Let their name be put out.
  • I love Sweden, great country, great people, I love Sweden. But they understand, the people over there understand I'm right. Take a look at what's happening in Sweden.
  • I have a friend, he's a very, very substantial guy. He loves the city of lights, he loves Paris. For years, every year during the summer, he would go to Paris, was automatic with his wife and his family. Hadn't seen him in a while and I said, Jim, let me ask you a question, how's Paris doing? "Paris? I don't go there anymore, Paris is no longer Paris."
  • Nations around the world, like Canada, Australia and many others – have a merit-based immigration system. It is a basic principle that those seeking to enter a country ought to be able to support themselves financially,
    Yet, in America, we do not enforce this rule, straining the very public resources that our poorest citizens rely upon.
    ..
    With the help of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, we have formed a Council with our neighbors in Canada to help ensure that women entrepreneurs have access to the networks, markets and capital they need to start a business and live out their financial dreams
    ..
    America respects the right of all nations to chart their own path. My job is not to represent the world. My job is to represent the United States of America
    ..
    It is not compassionate, but reckless, to allow uncontrolled entry from places where proper vetting cannot occur,
    We cannot allow a beachhead of terrorism to form inside America -- we cannot allow our nation to become a sanctuary for extremists.

March 2017

  • As we stand together with our Irish friends, I'm reminded of that proverb – and this is a good one, this is one I like, I've heard it for many many years and I love it – "Always remember to forget the friends that proved untrue, but never forget to remember those that have stuck by you." We know that, politically speaking, a lot of us know that, we know it well, it's a great phrase.

April 2017

  • Let's fucking kill him! Let's go in. Let's kill the fucking lot of them.
  • Today's chemical attack in Syria against innocent people, including women and children, is reprehensible and cannot be ignored by the civilized world. These heinous actions by the Bashar al-Assad regime are a consequence of the past administration's weakness and irresolution. President Obama said in 2012 that he would establish a "red line" against the use of chemical weapons and then did nothing. The United States stands with our allies across the globe to condemn this intolerable attack.
  • We had finished dinner. We're now having dessert. And we had the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake that you've ever seen and President Xi was enjoying it.
  • So what happens is, I said we've just launched 59 missiles heading to Iraq. [Interviewer interrupts to correct him] Yes, heading toward Syria.
I thought it would be easier.

May 2017

I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job.

June 2017

  • History is written by the dreamers, not the doubters.
I love all people, rich or poor, but in those particular positions I just don't want a poor person.
  • I love all people, rich or poor, but in those particular positions I just don't want a poor person.
  • We're thinking about building the wall as a solar wall, so it creates energy, and pays for itself. And this way Mexico will have to pay much less money, and that's good, right, is that good? You're the first group I've told that to, a solar wall, makes sense, let's see, we're working it out, we'll see, solar wall, panels, beautiful. I mean actually think of it, the higher it goes the more valuable it is, it's like... pretty good imagination [points to his own head], right, good? My idea.
  • Well I didn't tape him — you never know what's happening, when you see that the Obama administration, and perhaps longer than that, was doing all of this unmasking and, er, surveillance, and you read all about it, and I've been reading about for the last couple of months about the seriousness of the, and horrible situation, with surveillance all over the place, and you've been hearing the word 'unmasking', a word you probably never heard before, so you never know what's out there — but I didn't tape, and I don't have any tape, and I didn't tape.
  • Well, er, it wasn't, er, it wasn't very stupid, I can tell you that. [In response to the interviewer suggesting that his tweeting that there were tapes was a smart tactic]
  • I heard poorly rated @Morning_Joe speaks badly of me (don't watch anymore). Then how come low I.Q. Crazy Mika, along with Psycho Joe, came to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year's Eve, and insisted on joining me. She was bleeding badly from a face-lift. I said no!
The human soul yearns for discovery. By unlocking the mysteries of the universe, we unlock truths within ourselves.
  • The human soul yearns for discovery. By unlocking the mysteries of the universe, we unlock truths within ourselves. That's true. Our journey into space will not only make us stronger and more prosperous, but will unite us behind grand ambitions and bring us all closer together. Wouldn't that be nice? Can you believe that space is going to do that? I thought politics would do that. (Laughter.) Well, we'll have to rely on space instead.
  • Every launch into the skies is another step forward toward a future where our differences seem small against the vast expanse of our common humanity. Sometimes you have to view things from a distance in order to see the real truth. It is America's destiny to be at the forefront of humanity's eternal quest for knowledge and to be the leader amongst nations on our adventure into the great unknown.
  • Space. A lotta room out there, right? [Buzz Aldrin interjects: To infinity and beyond!] This is infinity, it could be infinity, we don't really don't know, but it could be, there's gotta be something, but it could be infinity, right?

July 2017

  • The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive. Do we have the confidence in our values to defend them at any cost? Do we have enough respect for our citizens to protect our borders? Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it?
  • ...let Obamacare fail, it will be a lot easier. And I think we're probably in that position where we'll let Obamacare fail. We're not going to own it. I'm not going to own it. I can tell you the Republicans are not going to own it. We'll let Obamacare fail, and then the Democrats are going to come to us.
  • I am disappointed in the Attorney General, he should not have recused himself, almost immediately after he took office, and if he was going to recuse himself he should have told me prior to taking office, and I would have quite simply picked somebody else, so I think that's a bad thing, not for the President but for the presidency, I think it's unfair to the presidency, and that's the way I feel.
  • I said please don't be too nice. Like when you guys put somebody in the car, and you're protecting their head, you know, the way you put the hand over, like, don't hit their head, and they've just killed somebody, don't hit their head? I said, you can take the hand away, OK.
2017 National Scout Jamboree (July 24, 2017)

Trump inspiring young people at the 2017 National Scout Jamboree (24 July 2017)

  • I said, who the hell wants to speak about politics when I'm in front of the boy scouts, right?
  • You know, I go to Washington and I see all these politicians, and I see the swamp, and it's not a good place, in fact, today I said we ought to change it from the word 'swamp' to the word 'cesspool' or perhaps to the word 'sewer'. But it's not good, not good.
  • Secretary Tom Price is also here. Today Dr. Price still lives the scout oath, helping to keep millions of Americans strong and healthy as our Secretary of Health and Human Services, and he's doing a great job. And, hopefully, he's going to get the votes tomorrow to start our path toward killing this horrible thing known as Obamacare that's really hurting us, folks. By the way, you going to get the votes? He better get them. He better get them. Oh, he better, otherwise I'll say, "Tom, you're fired."
  • Turn those cameras back there, please, that is so incredible. By the way, what do you think the chances are that this incredible, massive crowd, record-setting is going to be shown on television tonight? 1% or zero? The fake media will say, "President Trump", and you know what this is, "President Trump spoke before a small crowd of boy scouts today."
  • By the way, just a question, did President Obama ever come to a jamboree?
  • And you know we have a tremendous disadvantage in the electoral college, popular vote is much easier.

August 2017

  • We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides, on many sides [repeat intentional]. This had been going on for a long time in our country. Not Donald Trump, not Barack Obama. A long, long time.
    • First statement regarding White Nationalist Rally terrorism in Charlottesville, VA. [24]. The Guardian. (12 August 2017)
  • Racism is evil -- and those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans. Those who spread violence in the name of bigotry strike at the very core of America. As a candidate I promised to restore law and order to our country and our federal law enforcement agencies are following through on that pledge. We will spare no resource in fighting so that every American child can grow up free from violence and fear. We will defend and protect the sacred rights of all Americans and we will work together so that every citizen in this blessed land is free to follow their dreams, in their hearts, and to express the love and joy in our souls.
  • I think there's blame on both sides, you look at, you look at both sides, I think there's blame on both sides, and I have no doubt about it, and you don't have any doubt about it either. If you reported it accurately, you would say that the neo-Nazis started this thing. They showed up in Charlottesville. Excuse me. They didn't put themselves down as neo-Nazis. You had some very bad people in that group. You also had some very fine people on both sides. You had people in that group — excuse me, excuse me — I saw the same pictures as you did. You had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down of, to them, a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name. [Reporters crosstalk] Well, George Washington was a slave owner. Was George Washington a slave owner? So will George Washington now lose his status? Are we going to take down — excuse me — are we going to take down statues to George Washington? How about Thomas Jefferson? What do you think of Thomas Jefferson? You like him. Good. Are we going to take down his statue? He was a major slave owner. Are we going to take down his statue? It is fine. You are changing history and culture. You had people — and I'm not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, they should be condemned totally — you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists. The press has treated them absolutely unfairly. Now, in the other group also, you had some fine people but you also had troublemakers and you see them come with the black outfits and with the helmets and with the baseball bats. You had a lot of bad people in the other group too.
  • The statement I made on Saturday, the first statement, was a fine statement.

September 2017

  • The only thing you could do better is if you see it, even if it's one player, leave the stadium, I guarantee things will stop. Things will stop. Just pick up and leave. Pick up and leave. Not the same game anymore anyway. Wouldn't you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, you'd say, 'Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out! He's fired. He's fired!

October 2017

November 2017

December 2017

  • He killed many people, ran them over. Chain migration. According to chain migration, he may have as many as 22 to 24 people that came in with him. His grandfather, his grandmother, his mother, his father, his brother, his sisters. We have to end chain migration. We have to end chain migration.

2018

January 2018

  • The United States has foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years, they have given us nothing but lies and deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools. They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan, with little help. No more!
    • CNN: Trump's first 2018 tweet: Pakistan has 'given us nothing but lies & deceit' [27], The Independent [28]
  • The libel laws are very weak in this country. If they were strong, it would be very helpful. You wouldn't have things like that happen where you can say whatever comes to your head.
    • Response to a question regarding Michael Wolff's Fire and Fury, Camp David speech (6 January 2018)
  • I get exercise. I mean I walk, I this, I that. I run over to a building next door. I get more exercise than people think.
    A lot of people go to the gym and they’ll work out for two hours and all. I’ve seen people ... then they get their new knees when they’re 55 years old and they get their new hips and they do all those things. I don’t have those problems.
    I guess they all realized they’re going to have to leave it to a president that scored the highest on tests. What can I tell you?
    I was on a treadmill for the first time actually in quite a while, and it was at a very steep angle, and I was there for a very long time.
    They were surprised. And they said, ‘Well you can stop now, that’s amazing.’ And I said, ‘I can go much longer than this if you want me to.
    I’ve always been more of a believer in diet ‘cause I’m strong, you know? I hit the ball far. I mean, I’m strong, physically.
    The people that do the food at the White House are extraordinary, but I think they can maybe make the portions a little bit smaller and maybe we’ll cut out some of the more fattening ingredients, and I’m okay with that.
  • Right now, in a number of states, the laws allow a baby to be born from his or her mother's womb in the ninth month. It is wrong, it has to change.
  • in recent weeks, two terrorist attacks in New York were made possible by the visa lottery and chain migration

February 2018

Can we call that treason, why not?
  • My administration has identified three major priorities for creating a safe, modern, and lawful immigration system: fully securing the border, ending chain migration, and canceling the visa lottery. Chain migration is a disaster, and very unfair to our country. The visa lottery is something that should have never been allowed in the first place. People enter a lottery to come into our country. What kind of a system is that? It is time for Congress to act and to protect Americans.
  • I never said "give teachers guns" like was stated on Fake News @CNN & @NBC. What I said was to look at the possibility of giving "concealed guns to gun adept teachers with military or special training experience - only the best. 20% of teachers, a lot, would now be able to...
  • ... immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions. Highly trained teachers would also serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this. Far more assets at much less cost than guards. A "gun free" school is a magnet for bad people. ATTACKS WOULD END!
  • Because in America people don't worship government. They worship God.
  • Or, Mike, take the firearms first and then go to court, because that’s another system. Because a lot of times, by the time you go to court, it takes so long to go to court, to get the due process procedures. I like taking the guns early. Like in this crazy man’s case that just took place in Florida, he had a lot of firearms – they saw everything – to go to court would have taken a long time, so you could do exactly what you’re saying, but take the guns first, go through due process second.

March 2018

April 2018

  • I want to thank the White House Historical Association and all of the people that work so hard with Melania, with everybody, to keep this incredible house or building, or whatever you want to call it — because there really is no name for it; it is special — and we keep it in tip-top shape. We call it sometimes tippy-top shape. And it's a great, great place.
    • Referring to the White House, during a speech given for Easter (April 2, 2018)
  • And chain migration -- think of that. So you come in, and now you can bring your family, and then you can bring your mother and your father. You can bring your grandmother. You can bring your this; you can bring -- we had somebody on the West Side Highway, which I know very well -- in Manhattan -- he ran over -- I think he killed about eight people

May 2018

We will not allow a regime that chants "Death to America" to gain access to the most deadly weapons on Earth.
  • America will not be held hostage to nuclear blackmail. We will not allow American cities to be threatened with destruction. And we will not allow a regime that chants "Death to America" to gain access to the most deadly weapons on Earth.

June 2018

  • In the meantime, people are suffering because of the Democrats. So we've created, and they've created, and they've let it happen — a massive child-smuggling industry. That's exactly what it's become. Traffickers — if you think about this — human traffickers are making a fortune. It's a disgrace. These loopholes force the release of alien families and minors into the country when they illegally cross the border.

July 2018

  • but we have to do it gently because we're in the #MeToo generation, so we have to be very gentle.
    we will very gently take that kit, and we will slowly toss it, hoping it doesn't hit her and injure her arm.
  • Allowing the immigration to take place in Europe is a shame. I think it changed the fabric of Europe and, unless you act very quickly, it's never going to be what it was and I don't mean that in a positive way. So I think allowing millions and millions of people to come into Europe is very, very sad. I think you are losing your culture.
  • The border with the Sahara can't be bigger than ours with Mexico.
  • We're ordering 147 new F-35 Lightning fighters. This is an incredible plane. It's stealth; you can't see it. So when I talk to even people from the other side, they're trying to order our plane. They like the fact that you can't see it. I said, 'How would it do in battle with your plane?' They say, 'Well, we have one problem: We can't see your plane.'

August 2018

  • You know, if you go out and you want to buy groceries, you need a picture on a card, you need ID. You go out and you want to buy anything, you need ID and you need your picture. The only time you don’t need it in many cases is when you want to vote for a president, when you want to vote for a senator, when you want to vote for a governor or a congressman. It’s crazy.
  • We have the worst laws! How about chain migration? One person comes in and you end up with 32 people. The person that ran down 18 people on the West Side Highway, he's allowed to have -- and I think eight died. He has 22 members of his family in the United States because of chain migration. So we have to change this stuff, Rush,
  • How about chain migration? How about that? Somebody comes in, he brings his mother, and his father, and his aunt and uncle, 15 times removed. He brings them all

September 2018

  • Reliance on a single foreign supplier can leave nations vulnerable to extortion and intimidation and that is why we congratulate European states such as Poland for leading construction of a Baltic pipeline so that nations are not dependent on Russia to meet their energy needs. Germany will become totally dependent on Russian energy if it does not immediately change course.

October 2018

  • You know they have a word, it sort of became old-fashioned, it's called a nationalist,
    And I say 'really, we're not supposed to use that word?' Do you know what I am? I'm a nationalist.
  • Now how ridiculous: we're the only country in the world where a person comes in, has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States for 85 years with all of those benefits
  • It was always told to me that you needed a constitutional amendment. Guess what? You don't,
    Number one, you don't need that. Number two, you can definitely do it with an act of Congress. But now they're saying I can do it just with an executive order.
    It's in the process,
    It'll happen, with an executive order.

November 2018

  • One of the problems that a lot of people like myself we have very high levels of intelligence, but we're not necessarily such believers. You look at our air and our water, and it's now at a record clean. But when you look at China and you look at parts of Asia and when you look at South America, and when you look at many other places in this world, including Russia, including just many other places, the air is incredibly dirty and when you're talking about an atmosphere, oceans are very small and it blows over and it sails over. I mean, we take thousands of tons of garbage off our beaches all the time that comes over from Asia. It just flows right down the Pacific, if flows, and we say where does this come from. And it takes many people to start off with.
    • 28th November, Washington Post interview, Donald Trump on whether he believes in global warming reports of the 13 of agencies of his administration. [33]

December 2018

  • I want to thank Vice President Mike Pence,
    A tremendous supporter, a tremendous supporter of yours. And Karen. And they go there and they love your country. They love your country. And they love this country. That's a good combination, right?
  • Well, I don't see it. I spoke with Bibi, I told Bibi.
    And, you know, we give Israel $4.5 billion a year.
    And they're doing very well defending themselves, if you take a look.
    So that's the way it is.
    The United States cannot continue to be the policeman of the world,
    We don't want to do that.

2019

January 2019

  • we're getting out and we're getting out smart and we're winning, we're winning. OK. But just to answer your question, Over a period of time. I never said I'm getting out tomorrow I said I'm pulling our soldiers out and they will be pulled back in Syria, that we're getting out of Syria. Yeah absolutely. But we're getting out very powerfully.
  • Iran is no longer the same country
    Iran is pulling people out of Syria.
    They can do what they want there, frankly, but they're pulling people out.
    They're pulling people out of Yemen.
    Iran wants to survive now.
  • I know more about drones than anybody. I know about every form of safety that you can have. (January 2019)
  • I think nobody knows more about campaign finance than I do, because I'm the biggest contributor. (1999)
  • I know more about people who get [TV] ratings than anyone. (October 2012)
  • I know more about ISIS than the generals do. (November 2015)
  • I understand social media. I understand the power of Twitter. I understand the power of Facebook maybe better than almost anybody, based on my results, right? (November 2015)
  • I know more about courts than any human being on Earth. (November 2015)
  • [W]ho knows more about lawsuits than I do? I'm the king. (January 2016)
  • I understand politicians better than anybody.
  • [N]obody knows the [visa] system better than me. I know the H1B. I know the H2B. ... Nobody else on this dais knows how to change it like I do, believe me. (March 2016)
  • Nobody knows more about trade than me. (March 2016)
  • [N]obody knows the [U.S. government] system better than I do. (April 2016)
  • I know more about renewables than any human being on Earth. (April 2016)
  • I think nobody knows more about taxes than I do, maybe in the history of the world. (May 2016)
  • I’m the king of debt. I’m great with debt. Nobody knows debt better than me. (June 2016)
  • I understand money better than anybody. (June 2016)
  • [L]ook, as a builder, nobody in the history of this country has ever known so much about infrastructure as Donald Trump. (July 2016)
  • I know more about [senator] Cory [Booker] than he knows about himself. (July 2016)
  • I think I know more about the other side [Democrats] than almost anybody. (November 2016)
  • [N]obody knows more about construction than I do. (May 2018)
  • I think I know about [the economy] better than [the Federal Reserve]. (October 2018)
  • Technology — nobody knows more about technology than me. (December 2018)
  • I know more about drones than anybody. I know about every form of safety that you can have." (January 2019)
  • Having a drone fly overhead — and I think nobody knows much more about technology, this type of technology certainly, than I do. (January 2019)
  • We have pizzas, we have three-hundred hamburgers, many, many French fries, all of our favourite foods.
    I want to see what's here when we leave, because I don't think it's going to be much.
    If it's American, I like it. It's all American stuff.
    • 14 January 2019 quote mentioned in article by BBC
  • Do we give you some little quick salads that the first lady will make, along with the second lady — they’ll make some salads.
    I said you guys aren’t into salads.
    Or do I go out and send out for about one-thousand hamburgers?
    Big Macs.
    So we actually did.
    We bought one-thousand Burger King.
    All American companies.
    Burger King, Wendy’s and McDonald’s.
    • 14 January 2019 quote mentioned in article by Rolling Stone

  • Great being with the National Champion Clemson Tigers lat night at the White House.
    Because of the Shutdown I served them massive amounts of Fast Food (I paid),
    over 1000 hamberders etc.
    Within one hour, it was all gone.
    Great guys and big eaters!

February 2019

  • They're starting to, as we gain the remainder, the final remainder of the caliphate of the area, they'll be going to our base in Iraq, and ultimately some will be coming home. But we're going to be there and we're going to be staying--
    We have to protect Israel. We have to protect other things that we have. But we're- yeah, they'll be coming back in a matter of time. Look, we're protecting the world. We're spending more money than anybody's ever spent in history, by a lot. We spent, over the last five years, close to 50 billion dollars a year in Afghanistan. That's more than most countries spend for everything including education, medical, and everything else, other than a few countries.
  • Since the founding of our nation, many of our greatest strides — from gaining our independence to abolition of civil rights to extending the vote for women — have been led by people of faith
  • In fact, I think I can say this, Prime Minister Abe of Japan gave me the most beautiful copy of a letter that he sent to the people who give out a thing called the Nobel Prize. He said: "I have nominated you, respectfully, on behalf of Japan. I am asking them to give you the Nobel Peace Prize." I said, 'Thank you.'
    We do a lot of good work. This administration does a tremendous job and we don't get credit for it. So Prime Minister Abe gave me — I mean it's the most beautiful five-page letter, Nobel Prize, he sent it to them. You know why? Because he had rocket ships and he had missiles flying over Japan, and they had alarms going off — you know that. Now all of the sudden they feel good, they feel safe. I did that.

Spring 2019

  • there will be some people in the room that don't like this. We're down to 3.7 percent unemployment — the lowest number in a long time. But think of this: I got all these companies moving in. They need workers. We have to bring people into our country to work these great plants that are opening up all over the place. This was not necessarily what I was saying during the campaign because I never knew we would be as successful as we've been. Companies are roaring back into our country, and now we want people to come in. We need workers to come in, but they've got to come in legally, and they've got to come in through merit, merit, merit.
  • Hello, everybody. The economic numbers just came out; they're very, very good. Our country is doing unbelievably well, economically. Most of you don't report that, because it doesn't sound good from your perspective. But the country is doing really, really well. We have a lot of very exciting things going on. A lot of companies will be announcing shortly they're moving back into the United States. They're all coming back. They want to be where the action is.
  • The Jews always flip.

June 2019

  • There is no basis whatsoever for impeachment. None. There was no collusion. There was no obstruction. There was no crime. The crime was by the Democrats. The crime was by the Democrats. There is no legal basis for impeachment. It's a big witch hunt. Everybody knows it, including the Democrats.
  • This week, we commemorate a mighty endeavor of righteous nations and one of the greatest undertakings in all of history. Seventy-five years ago, more than 150,000 Allied troops were preparing on this island to parachute into France, storm the beaches of Normandy, and win back our civilization. As Her Majesty remembers, the British people had hoped and prayed and fought for this day for nearly 5 years. When Britain stood alone during the Blitz of 1940 and 1941, the Nazi war machine dropped thousands of bombs on this country and right on this magnificent city. Buckingham Palace alone was bombed on 16 separate occasions. In that dark hour, the people of this nation showed the world what it means to be British. They cleared wreckage from the streets, displayed the Union Jack from their shattered homes, and kept fighting on to victory. They only wanted victory. The courage of the United Kingdom's sons and daughters ensured that your destiny would always remain in your own hands. Through it all, the royal family was the resolute face of the Commonwealth's unwavering solidarity.
  • This evening we thank God for the brave sons of the United Kingdom and the United States who defeated the Nazis and the Nazi regime and liberated millions from tyranny. The bond between our nations was forever sealed in that "Great Crusade." As we honor our shared victory and heritage, we affirm the common values that will unite us long into the future: freedom, sovereignty, self-determination, the rule of law, and reverence for the rights given to us by Almighty God. From the Second World War to today, Her Majesty has stood as a constant symbol of these priceless traditions. She has embodied the spirit of dignity, duty, and patriotism that beats proudly in every British heart. On behalf of all Americans, I offer a toast to the eternal friendship of our people, the vitality of our nations, and to the long, cherished, and truly remarkable reign of Her Majesty the Queen. Thank you.
  • I think a lot of progress was made yesterday, but we have to make a lot of progress. Mexico has been making, for many, many years, hundreds of billions of dollars. And then, they've been making an absolute fortune on the United States. They have to step up, and they have to step up to the plate, and perhaps they will. We're going to see. They can solve the problem. The Democrats—Congress has been a disaster. They won't change. They won't do anything. They want free immigration—immigration to pour into our country. They don't care who it is. They don't care what kind of a record they have. It doesn't make any difference. They're not going to be changing anything. We go to them, we say, "Let's fix the immigration laws." They just want it to do badly. The worse it does, the happier they are. So that's the way it is, and I guess that's the way it will be until after the election. It's just a disgrace. Because, frankly, we could solve this problem so easy if the Democrats in Congress were willing to make some changes, but they're not. And that's the way it is. They want to just ride it out. They want to have a real bad time. They don't care about crime. They don't care about drugs pouring into our country. They couldn't care less. It's all politics. It's a vicious business. So that's the way it is. But we're having a great talk with Mexico. We'll see what happens. But something pretty dramatic could happen. We've told Mexico the tariffs go on. And I mean it too. And I'm very happy with it. And lot of people, Senators included, they have no idea what they're talking about when it comes to tariffs. They have no—absolutely no idea. When you have the money, when you have the product, when you have the thing that everybody wants, you're in a position to do very well with tariffs, and that's where we are. We're the piggybank. The United States is the piggybank. It has all the money that others want to take from us, but they're not taking it so easy anymore. It's a lot different. Our talks with China—a lot of interesting things are happening. We'll see what happens.
  • For some reason we have a certain chemistry — or whatever. Let's see what happens. We have a long way to go. But I'm in no rush... So, I just want to say that we are going to be heading out to the DMZ and it's something I planned long ago but had the idea yesterday to maybe say hello, just shake hands quickly and say hello.
Remarks on the 75th Anniversary of D-Day in Colleville-sur-Mer, France

Transcript (June 6, 2016)

  • Here with you are over 60 veterans who landed on D-day. Our debt to you is everlasting. Today we express our undying gratitude. When you were young, these men enlisted their lives in a great crusade, one of the greatest of all times. Their mission is the story of an epic battle and the ferocious, eternal struggle between good and evil. On the 6th of June, 1944, they joined a liberation force of awesome power and breathtaking scale. After months of planning, the Allies had chosen this ancient coastline to mount their campaign to vanquish the wicked tyranny of the Nazi empire from the face of the Earth. The battle began in the skies above us. In those first tense midnight hours, 1,000 aircraft roared overhead, with 17,000 Allied airborne troops preparing to leap into the darkness beyond these trees. Then came dawn. The enemy who had occupied these heights saw the largest naval armada in the history of the world. Just a few miles offshore were 7,000 vessels bearing 130,000 warriors.
  • They were the citizens of free and independent nations, united by their duty to their compatriots and to millions yet unborn. There were the British, whose nobility and fortitude saw them through the worst of Dunkirk and the London Blitz. The full violence of Nazi fury was no match for the full grandeur of British pride. Thank you. There were the Canadians, whose robust sense of honor and loyalty compelled them to take up arms alongside Britain from the very, very beginning. There were the fighting Poles, the tough Norwegians, and the intrepid Aussies. There were the gallant French commandos, soon to be met by thousands of their brave countrymen ready to write a new chapter in the long history of French valor. And finally, there were the Americans. They came from the farms of a vast heartland, the streets of glowing cities and the forges of mighty industrial towns. Before the war, many had never ventured beyond their own community. Now they had come to offer their lives half a world from home.
  • This beach, codenamed Omaha, was defended by the Nazis with monstrous firepower, thousands and thousands of mines and spikes driven into the sand, so deeply. It was here that tens of thousands of the Americans came. The GIs who boarded the landing craft that morning knew that they carried on their shoulders not just the pack of a soldier, but the fate of the world. Colonel George Taylor, whose 16th Infantry Regiment would join in the first wave, was asked: What would happen if the Germans stopped right then and there, cold on the beach, just stopped them? What would happen? This great American replied: "Why, the 18th Infantry is coming in right behind us. The 26th Infantry will come on too. Then, there is the 2nd Infantry Division already afloat. And the 9th Division. And the 2d Armored. And the 3d Armored. And all the rest. Maybe the 16th won't make it, but someone will."
  • Nine thousand three hundred and eighty-eight young Americans rest beneath the white crosses and Stars of David arrayed on these beautiful grounds. Each one has been adopted by a French family that thinks of him as their own. They come from all over France to look after our boys. They kneel. They cry. They pray. They place flowers. And they never forget. Today America embraces the French people and thanks you for honoring our beloved dead. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
  • To all of our friends and partners: Our cherished alliance was forged in the heat of battle, tested in the trials of war, and proven in the blessings of peace. Our bond is unbreakable.
  • From across the Earth, Americans are drawn to this place as though it were a part of our very soul. We come not only because of what they did here, we come because of who they were. They were young men with their entire lives before them. They were husbands who said goodbye to their young brides and took their duty as their fate. They were fathers who would never meet their infant sons and daughters because they had a job to do. And with God as their witness, they were going to get it done. They came wave after wave, without question, without hesitation, and without complaint.
  • More powerful than the strength of American arms was the strength of American hearts. These men ran through the fires of hell moved by a force no weapon could destroy: the fierce patriotism of a free, proud, and sovereign people. They battled not for control and domination, but for liberty, democracy, and self-rule. They pressed on for love in home and country, the main streets, the schoolyards, the churches and neighbors, the families and communities that gave us men such as these. They were sustained by the confidence that America can do anything because we are a noble nation, with a virtuous people, praying to a righteous God. The exceptional might came from a truly exceptional spirit. The abundance of courage came from an abundance of faith. The great deeds of an Army came from the great depths of their love. As they confronted their fate, the Americans and the Allies placed themselves into the palm of God's hand.
  • The men behind me will tell you that they are just the lucky ones. As one of them recently put it, "All the heroes are buried here." But we know what these men did. We knew how brave they were. They came here and saved freedom, and then, they went home and showed us all what freedom is all about. The American sons and daughters who saw us to victory were no less extraordinary in peace. They built families. They built industries. They built a national culture that inspired the entire world. In the decades that followed, America defeated communism, secured civil rights, revolutionized science, launched a man to the Moon, and then kept on pushing to new frontiers. And today, America is stronger than ever before.
  • Seven decades ago, the warriors of D-day fought a sinister enemy who spoke of a thousand-year empire. In defeating that evil, they left a legacy that will last not only for a thousand years, but for all time—for as long as the soul knows of duty and honor; for as long as freedom keeps its hold on the human heart. To the men who sit behind me, and to the boys who rest in the field before me, your example will never, ever grow old. Your legend will never tire. Your spirit—brave, unyielding, and true—will never die. The blood that they spilled, the tears that they shed, the lives that they gave, the sacrifice that they made, did not just win a battle. It did not just win a war. Those who fought here won a future for our Nation. They won the survival of our civilization. And they showed us the way to love, cherish, and defend our way of life for many centuries to come. Today, as we stand together upon this sacred Earth, we pledge that our nations will forever be strong and united. We will forever be together. Our people will forever be bold. Our hearts will forever be loyal. And our children, and their children, will forever and always be free. May God bless our great veterans, may God bless our Allies, may God bless the heroes of D-day, and may God bless America. Thank you. Thank you very much.

July 2019

  • The kidney has a very special place in the heart.
  • "I said, you know, you don't like me and I don't like you. I never have liked you and you never liked me but you're going to support me because you're a rich guy. And if you don't support me, you're going to be so goddamn poor you're not going to believe it."
  • Boris Johnson, good man he is tough but he is smart. They call him Brittain Trump..They like me over there
    • [www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0wO89TT9vI Trump on Johnson: 'They call him Britain Trump' - BBC News] July 24, 2019
  • I am the least racist person there is anywhere in the world

August 2019

  • I am the chosen one. Somebody had to do it, so I'm taking on China... and you know what we're winning.

September 2019

  • The truth is plain to see — if you want freedom, take pride in your country; if you want democracy, hold onto your sovereignty, and if you want peace, love your nation. Wise leaders always put the good of their own people and their own country first. The future does not belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots. The future belongs to sovereign and independent nations who protect their citizens, respect their neighbours, and honor the differences that make each country special and unique.

October 2019

Statement on the Death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
Last night, the United States brought the world's number one terrorist leader to justice. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead. He was the founder and leader of ISIS, the most ruthless and violent terror organization in the World.
Offiical release at Whitehouse.gov (27 October 2019) · Transcript of delivered remarks at The New York Times (27 October 2019) · "President Trump's full announcement on the death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi", The Washington Post YouTube channel (27 October 2019)
  • Terrorists who oppress and murder innocent people should never sleep soundly, knowing that we will completely destroy them. These savage monsters will not escape their fate – and they will not escape the final judgement of God.
  • This raid was impeccable, and could only have taken place with the acknowledgement and help of certain other nations and people.
    I want to thank the nations of Russia, Turkey, Syria and Iraq, and I also want to thank the Syrian Kurds for certain support they were able to give us. Thank you as well to the great intelligence professionals who helped make this very successful journey possible.
  • Last night was a great night for the United States and for the World. A brutal killer, one who has caused so much hardship and death, was violently eliminated – he will never again harm another innocent man, woman or child. He died like a dog. He died like a coward. The world is now a much safer place.
  • I don't want to say how, but we had absolutely perfect -- as though you were watching a movie. It was -- that -- that in -- the technology there alone is -- is really great.

November 2019

December 2019

  • We have a situation where we're looking very strongly at sinks and showers, and other elements of bathrooms.
    You turn on the faucet and you don't get any water..
    People are flushing toilets 10 times, 15 times.
    They have so much water that it comes down. It's called rain.
  • So ridiculous. Greta must work on her Anger Management problem, then go to a good old fashioned movie with a friend! Chill Greta, Chill!
  • I never understood wind. I know windmills very much, I have studied it better than anybody. I know it is very expensive. They are made in China and Germany mostly, very few made here, almost none, but they are manufactured, tremendous—if you are into this—tremendous fumes and gases are spewing into the atmosphere. You know we have a world, right?
    So the world is tiny compared to the universe. So tremendous, tremendous amount of fumes and everything. You talk about the carbon footprint, fumes are spewing into the air, right spewing, whether it is China or Germany, is going into the air.
    You see all those [windmills]. They’re all different shades of color. They’re like sort of white, but one is like an orange-white. It’s my favorite color, orange.

2020

January 2020

  • Well, you have to give him credit. I spoke to him very recently, and he's also doing the rockets, he likes rockets, and he does good at rockets too, by the way. I never saw… where the engines come down with no wings, no anything, and they're landing. I've said I've never seen that before. And I was worried about him, because he's one of our great geniuses, and we have to protect our genius. We have to protect Thomas Edison, we have to protect all of these people that came up originally with the light bulb, and the wheel, and all of these things. And he's one of our very smart people, and we want to cherish those people, that's very important. But he's done a very good job. Shocking, how well, …how it's come so fast. You go back a year, and they were talking about the end of the company and all of a sudden they're talking about these great things. He's going to be building a very big plant in the United States. He has to. Because we help him, so he has to help us.
  • Joe Kernen: It was a couple of years ago. Before we get started-- with- we're going talk about the economy and a lot of other things--the CDC-- has identified a case of coronavirus-- in Washington state. The Wuhan strain of this. If you remember SARS, that affected GDP. Travel-related effects. Do you-- have you been briefed by the CDC? And--
Donald Trump: I have, and--
Joe Kernen: --are there worries about a pandemic at this point?
Donald Trump: No. Not at all. And-- we're-- we have it totally under control. It's one person coming in from China, and we have it under control. It's—going to be just fine.
Joe Kernen: Okay. And President Xi-- there's just some-- talk in China that maybe the transparency isn't everything that it's going to be. Do you trust that we're going to know everything we need to know from China?
Donald Trump: I do. I do. I have a great relationship with President Xi. We just signed probably the biggest deal ever made. It certainly has the potential to be the biggest deal ever made. And-- it was a very interesting period of time time [sic].
Joe Kernen: Yeah. Let’s get into that--
Donald Trump: But we got it done, and-- no, I do. I think-- the relationship is very, very good.

February 2020

  • And by the way, the virus. They're working hard. Looks like by April, you know, in theory, when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away. I hope that's true.
  • We know all the people. We know all the good people. It's a question I asked the doctors before. Some of the people we cut, they haven't been used for many, many years, and if we ever need them, we can get them very quickly. And rather than spending the money — I'm a businessperson, I don't like having thousands of people around when you don't need 'em, when we need 'em, we can get them back very quickly.
  • It's going to disappear. One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear. And from our shores, we — you know, it could get worse before it gets better. It could maybe go away. We'll see what happens. Nobody really knows.
Donald Trump Charleston, South Carolina Rally (February 28, 2020)
Donald Trump Charleston, South Carolina Rally (February 28, 2020), transcript online at Rev.
  • Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All I can say is that the fake news just doesn't get it, do they? They don't get it. [inaudible 00:02:54] They just don't get it. Hello Charleston, and I'm thrilled to be back in the great state of South Carolina with thousands of hardworking American Patriots who believe in faith, family, God, and country. Thank you. It's a phenomenal crowd, only topped by the number of people outside that didn't get in. If anybody would like to give up where you're standing or your seat, please raise your hand. All right. Then let's begin, right? Thank you all very much though. This is great. No, they don't get it. Down the road, they have a rally for one of the people that are going to be running tomorrow. They're trying to get to a hundred, but they're not going to make it. So I think they're going to set up a round table. Well, that's what they do. So people want to go to a rally, they end up sitting at a round table talking about their definition of impeachment. Crazy.
  • No, it's crazy. Crazy! It's a crazy deal. No, the fake news media, they've been trying to figure this out for years. They still don't get it though. They don't get it. Look at all of those cameras. Look at all of those cameras. That's a lot of cameras. That's a lot of cameras, Lindsey and Tim, that's a lot of... They heard you guys were here. They heard Tim was here and that Lindsey was here and that... And they said, "We're not going to attend that rally," but when we heard those two guys plus our great congressmen, they're here, great congressmen. But this is an incredible time for our nation. We're thrilled to be in the midst of what we call the Great American Comeback and that's what it is. Jobs are booming, incomes are soaring, factories are returning, poverty is plummeting, confidence is surging, and we have completely rebuilt the awesome power of the United States military. Our country is stronger than ever before.
  • We are stronger, we are better, but while we are building a great future, the radical left Democrats in Washington are trying to burn it all down. They have spent the last three years, and I can even go further than that, three years since the election, but we go before the election, working to erase your ballots and overthrow our democracy. But with your help, we have exposed the far left's corruption and defeated their sinister schemes and let's see what happens in the coming months. Let's watch. Let's just watch. Very dishonest people. Now the Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus, you know that right? Coronavirus, they're politicizing it. We did one of the great jobs. You say, "How's President Trump doing?" They go, "Oh, not good, not good." They have no clue. They don't have any clue. They can't even count their votes in Iowa. They can't even count. No, they can't. They can't count their votes.
  • One of my people came up to me and said, "Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia." That didn't work out too well. They couldn't do it. They tried the impeachment hoax. That was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything. They tried it over and over. They'd been doing it since you got in. It's all turning. They lost. It's all turning. Think of it. Think of it. And this is their new hoax. But we did something that's been pretty amazing. We have 15 people in this massive country and because of the fact that we went early. We went early, we could have had a lot more than that. We're doing great. Our country is doing so great. We are so unified. We are so unified. The Republican party has never ever been unified like it is now. There has never been a movement in the history of our country like we have now. Never been a movement. So a statistic that we want to talk about, go ahead. Say USA. It's okay. USA. So a number that nobody heard of, that I heard of recently and I was shocked to hear it, 35,000 people on average die each year from the flu. Did anyone know that? 35,000, that's a lot of people. It could go to 100,000, it could be 27,000. They say usually a minimum of 27, goes up to 100,000 people a year die. And so far we have lost nobody to coronavirus in the United States. Nobody. And it doesn't mean we won't and we are totally prepared. It doesn't mean we won't, but think of it. You hear 35 and 40,000 people and we've lost nobody and you wonder the press is in hysteria mode. CNN fake news and the camera just went off, the camera. The camera just went off. Turn it back on. Hey, by the way, hold it. Look at this, and honestly, all events are like this. It's about us. It's all about us. I wish they'd take the camera, show the arena please. They never do. They never do. They never do it. They never show the arena. You can hear it because when you hear it, that's not 200 people. That's not a hundred people. That's thousands and thousands of people including people outside. You can hear it. They always show my face. See that face? They show my face. I want them to show the arena, not my face, right? [...] While the extreme left has been wasting America's time with these vile hoaxes, we've been killing terrorists, creating jobs, raising wages, enacting fair trade deals, securing our border, and lifting up citizens of every race, religion, color, and creed. We added another 225,000 jobs last month alone. And that makes seven million jobs since our election, seven million. The unemployment rate in the great state of South Carolina. You ever hear of that place?
  • Practically every one. Can you believe it? I'm sure your husbands are thrilled, right? They're thrilled. Where are you going tonight? I'm going to another Trump rally. Cool. Number 114. What do your husbands say about that? This group up here. She said, "We don't care." Thank you. Thank you. Democrats will only say horrible things even though they know we're doing a great job. We're doing a great job with what we have to work with. It's incredible. The Democrats want us to fail so badly. Even if their actions, and you take a look, hurt the people of this country, they'll hurt the people themselves, their wealth, their everything. They're willing to hurt our country in order to say bad, even if they know it's not so. We made an unbelievable deal with Mexico, with Canada, with China, with South Korea, with Japan. And if you put a microphone with these people back there like the Academy Awards used to be, not anymore. Best movie of the year. It's made in South Korea. What's that all about? I'm waiting to see the best movie of the year-
  • And it's made... He said, "It's garbage." Only in South Carolina can you say that. Only in South Carolina. You're going to get us in trouble. No, I'm just repeating what he said for the fake news. No, but seriously the Academy Awards has gone way, way down in ratings. Do you know why? Because they started attacking us and we don't believe in it anymore. That's why. No, but they had the best movie of the year made in South Korea. They make enough stuff for us, right? And they're good. They're our friends. Take advantage of us, that's okay. Not so much anymore. We are really, you take a look, magnificently organized with the best professionals in the world. We're prepared for the absolute worst. You have to be prepared for the worst, but hopefully it will all amount to very little. That's why I tell you when we have the flu with 35,000 people and this one we have to take it very, very seriously. That's what we're doing. We are preparing for the worst.
  • My administration has taken the most aggressive action in modern history to prevent the spread of this illness in the United States. We are ready. We are ready. Totally ready. On January 31st, I ordered the suspension of foreign nationals who have recently been in China from entering the United States. An action which the Democrats loudly criticized and protested and now everybody's complimenting me saying, "Thank you very much. You were 100% correct." Could've been a whole different story. But I say, so let's get this right. A virus starts in China, bleeds its way into various countries all around the world, doesn't spread widely at all in the United States because of the early actions that myself and my administration took against a lot of other wishes, and the Democrats' single talking point, and you see it, is that it's Donald Trump's fault, right? It's Donald Trump's fault. No, just things that happened.
  • But you know what this does show you? Things happen. Whoever thought of this two weeks ago? Who would've thought this could be going on four weeks ago? You wouldn't. But things happen in life and you have to be prepared and you have to be flexible and you have to be able to go out and get it. And my guys that we have the best professionals in the world, the best in the world and we are so ready. At the same time that I initiated the first federally mandated quarantine in over 50 years. We had a quarantine some people. They weren't happy, they weren't happy about it. I want to tell you there are a lot of people that not so happy, but after two weeks they got happy. You know who got happy? The people around them got happy. That's who got happy.
  • I also created a White House virus task force. It's a big thing, a virus task force. I requested 2.5 billion dollars to ensure we have the resources we need. The Democrats said, "That's terrible. He's doing the wrong thing. He needs eight and a half billion, not two and a half." I've never had that before. I ask for two and a half, they want to give me eight and a half, so I said, "I'll take it." Does that make me a bad... I'll take it. I'll take it. I never had that before. I never had it. We want two and a half million. That's plenty. We demand you take eight and a half. He doesn't know what he's doing. We want eight and a half. These people are crazy. We must understand that border security is also health security. And you've all seen the wall has gone up like magic. It's gone up like magic. You think that was an easy one? That was not an easy one. It's going up great and we're up now 132 miles and this is the exact wall that border security, water, everything.
  • So I don't know what the record attendance is in this arena, but I was told that we broke it by a lot. And you got the people outside. Are we allowed to tell them who we would like them to vote for? Because you're allowed to skip. All right, so wait a minute, let's do a poll. We do this for the fake news back there. Ready? Who would be the best candidate for us? Not for them. We're ready. Ready? So let's go through them just quickly. We won't include Steyer because he's a loser. He's out, okay? We won't include him. Who would be the best? This is a real poll. This isn't one of those fake polls taken by ... In all fairness, I love you, Fox, taken by Fox, the worst pollster. This guy ... this pollster hates Trump's guts. I was losing the last election by a fortune. They said, "He did great with women." Everything was wrong. And they never replaced this guy. But watch this. You ready?
  • We had a great event yesterday, an event that was so beautiful, young African American leaders. One of the things I asked them, and I’ve been thinking about this for a long time… And great people, great people. Some of them are here tonight. Do you like the name African American or Black? And they said, “Black!” all at the same time. No, true. I tell you. Because you say, “African American or Black?” And they said almost immediately, “Black.” But we had an incredible group of people and what happened is NBC… It was such a love fest. It was so incredible. It went on for 45 minutes. It was a love fest. It was incredible. NBC turned down… There they are right there. They turned down… Comcast, which owns NBC… Actually NBC, I think, we call it MSDNC, right? MSDNC. But NBC I think is worse than CNN. I actually do. And Comcast, a company that spends millions and millions of dollars on their image… I’ll do everything possible to destroy their image because they are terrible. They are terrible. They’re a terrible group of people. And they paid me a fortune for years for the Apprentice. They paid me a fortune. And when I left the show, it was doing great. When I left the show, 14 seasons, think of that, they got a big movie star. I won’t tell you his name. Nobody would know. Actually nobody will know his name because he was on for such a short period of time. But the show went down the tubes very quickly after they had Trump. But the country in five years from now, of course you want to upset them, five years or nine years or 13 years. Or 18 years! 10 more years. Nah. Oh, they go crazy when you say it. When you say to them five more years, so it’s five, but you then say maybe nine, maybe 13, maybe 17, maybe 21, or not, maybe 21. Let’s do this. Let’s term limit ourselves at 25 years. No more than 25 years. No more. Okay. They’ll pass something in the Senate. Tim, pass it in the Senate with Lindsey, a 25 year term limit please.

March 2020

  • Well, I think the 3.4% is really a false number. Now, and this is just my hunch, and — but based on a lot of conversations with a lot of people that do this. Because a lot people will have this and it's very mild. They'll get better very rapidly. They don't even see a doctor. They don't even call a doctor. You never hear about those people. So you can't put them down in the category of the overall population in terms of this corona flu and/or virus. So you just can't do that. So, if, you know, we have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get better just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work. Some of them go to work, but they get better.
  • But as of right now and yesterday, anybody that needs a test — That's the important thing. And the tests are all perfect. Like, the letter was perfect. The transcription was perfect. Right? This was not as perfect as that but pretty good.
  • They would like to have the people come off. I'd rather have the people stay, but I'd go with them. I told them to make the final decision. I would rather — because I like the numbers being where they are. I don't need to have the numbers double because of one ship that wasn't our fault.
  • You know, my uncle was a great person. He was at MIT. He taught at MIT for, I think, like a record number of years. He was a great super genius. Dr. John Trump. I like this stuff. I really get it. People are surprised that I understand it. Every one of these doctors said, "How do you know so much about this?" Maybe I have a natural ability. Maybe I should have done that instead of running for President.
  • I've been briefed on every contingency you can possibly imagine. Many contingencies. A lot of—a lot of positive. Different numbers. All different numbers. Very large numbers. And some small numbers too, by the way.
    • Regarding coronavirus. Posed question: "Mr. President, have you been briefed that up to 100 million Americans would ultimately be exposed to the virus?"
    • Briefing at the White House (2020-03-10)
  • We have an invisible enemy. We have a problem a month ago nobody ever thought about. [...] This is a bad one, this is a very bad one. This is bad in the sense that it's so contagious. It's just so contagious. Sort of record-setting type contagion.
    • Coronavirus task force press briefing, 2020-03-16, quoted in Jarrett Stepman (17 March 2020), "The Last Great Pandemic", The Daily Signal 

  • Q: Very simple question; does the buck stop with you? And on a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your response to this crisis?

    Donald Trump: I'd rate it a 10. I think we've done a great job. And it started with the fact that we kept a very highly infected country, despite all of the—even the professionals saying no, it's too early to do that, we were very, very early with respect to China. And we would have a whole different situation in this country if we didn't do that. I would rate it a very, very—I would rate ourselves and—and the professionals—I think the professionals have done a fantastic job.

  • Q: Does the buck stop with you, Mr. President? Does the buck stop with you?

    Donald Trump: Yeah, normally. But I think when you hear the—you know, this has never been done before in this country.

  • Peter Alexander: How are non-symptomatic professional athletes getting tests while others are waiting in line and can't get them?

    Donald Trump: No, I wouldn’t say so, but perhaps that’s been the story of life. That does happen on occasion and I’ve noticed where some people have been tested fairly quickly.

  • Peter Alexander: What do you say to Americans who are scared though? I guess, nearly 200 dead, 14,000 who are sick, millions, as you witnessed, who are scared right now? What do you say to Americans who are watching you right now who are scared?

    Donald Trump: I say that you're a terrible reporter, that's what I say. I think that's a very nasty question.

  • We're opening up this incredible country. Because we have to do that. I'd love to have it open by Easter. I would love to have it opened by Easter. It's such an important day for other reasons, but I will make it an important day for this, too. I would love to have the country opened up and just rarin' to go by Easter.
    • Fox News town hall, 2020-03-24
  • Look, Easter's a very special day for me. And I see it's sort of in that timeline that I'm thinking about. And I say, "Wouldn't it be great to have all of the churches full?" – you know the churches aren't allowed, essentially, to have much of a congregation there. And most of 'em, I watched on Sunday, online. And it was terrific, by the way, but online is never going to be like being there. So I think Easter Sunday, and you'll have packed churches all over our country. I think it would be a beautiful time. And it's just about the timeline that I think is right.
  • I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they’re going to be, I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators. You go into major hospitals sometimes, and they’ll have two ventilators. And now all of a sudden they’re saying, 'Can we order 30,000 ventilators?'
  • Just finished a very good conversation with President Xi of China. Discussed in great detail the CoronaVirus that is ravaging large parts of our Planet. China has been through much & has developed a strong understanding of the Virus. We are working closely together. Much respect!
  • My administration has done a job on really working across government and with the private sector, and it’s been incredible. It’s a beautiful thing to watch, I have to say. Unfortunately, the end result of the group we’re fighting — which are hundreds of billions and trillions of germs, or whatever you want to call them — they are bad news. This virus is bad news and it moves quickly, and it spreads as easily as anything anyone has ever seen.
  • I just want to reiterate, because a lot of people have been asking, well, what would have happened if we did nothing? Did nothing, we just rode it out, and I’ve been asking that question to Tony and Deborah, and they’ve been talking to me about it for a long time, other people have been asking that question, and I think we got our most accurate study today, or certainly most comprehensive. Think of the number, potentially, 2.2 million people if we did nothing. If we didn’t do the distancing, if we didn’t do all of the things that we’re doing. When you hear those numbers, you start to realize that, with the kind of work we went through last week, with the $2.2 trillion, it no longer sounds like a lot, right? You’re talking about, when I heard the number today, first time I’ve heard that number, because I’ve been asking the same question that some people have been asking, I felt even better about what we did last week with the $2.2 trillion, because you’re talking about a potential of up to 2.2 million, and some people said it could even be higher than that. So you’re talking about 2.2 million deaths. 2.2 million people from this. If we can hold that down as we’re saying, to 100,000, it’s a horrible number. Maybe even less, but to 100,000, so we have between 100 and 200,000, we altogether have done a very good job. 2.2, up to 2.2 million deaths and maybe even beyond that? I’m feeling very good about what we did last week.

April 2020

  • We’re working to ensure that the supplies are delivered where and when they’re needed, and in some cases, we’re telling governors we can’t go there because we don’t think you need it and we think someplace else needs it. And pretty much, so far, we’ve been right about that. And we’ll continue to do it. As it really gets — this will be probably the toughest week between this week and next week. And there’ll be a lot of death, unfortunately, but a lot less death than if this wasn’t done. But there will be death.
  • So we’ve done 1,670,000 tests. Think of that 1,670,000 tests. And we have a great system. Now we’re working with the states in almost all instances, but we have a great system. And the other thing that we bought a tremendous amount of is the hydroxy chloroquine. Hydroxy chloroquine, which I think is, you know, it’s a great malaria drug. It’s worked unbelievably. It’s a powerful drug on malaria and there are signs that it works on this, some very strong signs and in the meantime it’s been around a long time. It also works very powerfully on lupus, so there are some very strong powerful signs and we’ll have to see because again, it’s tested.
  • Now this is a new thing that just happened to as the invisible enemy we call it. And if you can, if you have a no signs of heart problems, the azithromycin, which will kill certain things that you don’t want living within your body. It’s a powerful drug. If you don’t have a problem, a heart problem, we would say, let your doctor think about it, but as a combination, I think they’re going to be, I think there’s two things that should be looked at very strongly. Now, we have purchased and we have stockpiled 29 million pills of the hydroxy chloroquine, 29 million. A lot of drug stores have them by prescription and also, and they’re not expensive. Also, we’re sending them to various labs. Our military, we’re sending them to the hospitals, we’re sending them all over. I just think it’s something, you know the expression, I’ve used it for certain reasons.
  • What do you have to lose? What do you have to lose? And a lot of people are saying that when … and are taking it, if you’re a doctor, a nurse, a first responder, a medical person going into hospitals, they say taking it before the fact is good, but what do you have to lose? They say, take it, I’m not looking at it one way or the other, but we want to get out of this. If it does work, it would be a shame if we didn’t do it early. But we have some very good signs. So that’s hydroxy chloroquine and as azithromycin, and again, you have to go through your medical people get the approval. But I’ve seen things that I sort of like, so what do I know? I’m not a doctor, I’m not a doctor, but I have common sense.
  • The FDA feels good about it. They’ve, as you know, they’ve approved it. They gave it a rapid approved approval. And the reason because it’s been out there for a long time and they know the side effects and they also know the potential. So based on that, we have sent it throughout the country. We have it stockpiled about 29 million doses, 29 million doses. We have a lot of it. We hope it works. Driven by the goal of the brightest minds in science. We have the brightest minds in science, but we were driven by the goal of getting rid of this plague, getting rid of this scourge, getting rid of this virus. These brilliant minds are working on the most effective antiviral therapies and vaccines. We are working very, very hard. I have met many of the doctors that are doing it. These are doctors that are working so hard on vanquishing the virus.
    • Coronavirus Task Force Briefing, April 5. Transcript at Rev.
    • Note: Hydroxychloroquine use is not approved by the FDA for COVID-19 as of 7 April 2020.
  • I want them to try it. It may work, and it may not work. But if it doesn’t work, it’s nothing lost by doing it. Nothing. Because we know long-term what I want. I want to save lives, and I don’t want it to be in a lab for the next year-and-a-half as people are dying all over the place. In France, they had a very good test. They’re continuing. But we don’t have time to go and say, gee, let’s take a couple of years and test it out, and let’s go and test with the test tubes and the laboratories. We don’t have time. I’d love to do that, but we have people dying today. As we speak, there are people dying. If it works, that’d be great. If it doesn’t work, we know for many years malaria, it’s incredible what it’s done for malaria. It’s incredible what it’s done for lupus, but it doesn’t kill people.
  • Speaker to Anthony Fauci: And would you also weigh in on this issue of hydroxychloroquine? What do you think about this and what is the medical evidence?
Donald Trump: You know how many times he’s answered that question?
Speaker: I’d love to hear from the doctor.
Donald Trump: Maybe 15. 15 times. You don’t have to ask the question.
Speaker: He’s your medical expert, correct?
Donald Trump: He answered that question 15 times.
  • This is a very brilliant enemy. You know, it's a brilliant enemy. They develop drugs like the antibiotics, you see it. Antibiotics used to solve every problem. Now one of the biggest problems the world has is the germ has gotten so brilliant, that the antibiotic can't keep up with it. And they're constantly trying to come up with a new— People go to a hospital and they catch– They go for a heart operation, that's no problem, but they end up dying from, from... problems. You know the problems I'm talking about.
  • When someone is president of the United States the authority is total.
  • The delays the WHO experienced in declaring a public health emergency cost valuable time tremendous amounts of time; more time was lost in the delay it took to get a team of international experts and to examine the outbreak which we wanted to do which they should have done. The inability of the WHO to obtain virus samples to this date has deprived the scientific community of essential data. New data that emerges across the world on a daily basis points to the unreliability of the initial reports and the world received all sorts of false information about transmission and mortality. The silence of the WHO on the disappearance of scientific researchers and doctors and new restrictions on the sharing of research into the origins of COVID-19 in the country of origin is deeply concerning especially when we put up by far the largest amount of money, not even close. Had the WHO done its job to get medical experts into China to objectively assess the situation on the ground and to call out China's lack of transparency, the outbreak could have been contained as a source with very little death, very little death, and certainly very little death by comparison. This would have saved thousands of lives and avoided worldwide economic damage. Instead the WHO willingly took China's assurances to face value, and they took it just at face value and defended the actions of the Chinese government, even praising China for its so-called transparency. I don't think so. The WHO pushed China's misinformation about the virus, saying it was not communicable, and there was no need for travel bans. They told us when we put on our travel ban a very strong travel ban, there was no need to do it. Don't do it; they actually fought us. The WHO's reliance on China's disclosures likely caused a 20-fold increase in cases worldwide, and it may be much more than that.
  •  Look, I could tell you about — and I’m not going to do it, because I didn’t want to bring it up — but I could tell you about events that took place. And I said things like, “You’ll never do that again” or “You’ll never do this again” or — I don’t even want to mention the events. I don’t want to mention what you’re supposed to be doing because — and you know one of them was so horrible.  I said, “A certain industry will be out of business — never happen again.” Two weeks later, it was like nothing ever happened. Hopefully, we get rid of this. We have tremendous talent up here and all over, including governors, including local governments, state governments.
  • That’s why your ratings are so bad because you’re pathetic. Go ahead. Let’s go. Your ratings are terrible. You got to get back to real news. Go ahead.
  • And then I see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in a minute. One minute.
    And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning?
    Because, you see, it gets on the lungs, and it does a tremendous number on the lungs.
    So it'd be interesting to check that.
    So that you're going to have to use medical doctors, but it sounds — it sounds interesting to me.
  • And we’re — really, I’m very happy the governors have been — the governors, really, have been doing a really good job working with us, and it’s — it’s, really, pretty impressive to see. I’ve spoken to numerous leaders of countries over the last 48 hours, and they are saying we’re leading the way. We’re really leading the way in so many different ways.
  • I work from early in the morning until late at night, haven’t left the White House in many months (except to launch Hospital Ship Comfort) in order to take care of Trade Deals, Military Rebuilding etc., and then I read a phony story in the failing @nytimes about my work schedule and eating habits, written by a third rate reporter who knows nothing about me. I will often be in the Oval Office late into the night & read & see that I am angrily eating a hamberger & Diet Coke in my bedroom. People with me are always stunned. Anything to demean!
  • What is the purpose of having White House News Conferences when the Lamestream Media asks nothing but hostile questions, & then refuses to report the truth or facts accurately. They get record ratings, & the American people get nothing but Fake News. Not worth the time & effort!
  • Donald Trump: And you have to understand: When we took over, the cupboards were bare. And the thing that — frankly, it’s not as tough as the ventilator situation. We’re the king of ventilators. But what we have done is — on testing, we’re doing numbers the likes of which nobody has ever seen before. And I told you, the President of South Korea, President Moon, called me to congratulate me on testing. And we did more tests than any other country anywhere in the world. And I think they told me yesterday a number — if you add up the rest of the world, we’ve done more testing. And it’s a higher quality test. So I think we’ve done a — I think the whole team, federal government — we built hospitals for you and others.
Phil Murphy: You bet.
Donald Trump: We built medical centers. And I’m talking about thousands and thousands of beds. Many, many medical centers. We had — as you know, we had the governor of Florida and the governor of Louisiana over the last two days. They could not have been — and one was a Democrat, and this gentleman happens to be a proud Democrat. They could not have been more supportive of the effort of the federal government. And I’ll tell you, Jim —
James Acosta: But aren’t you seeing massive lines for food?
Donald Trump: Let me just tell you, we have — we started off with empty cupboards. The last administration left us nothing. We started off with bad, broken tests and obsolete tests. What we’ve come up with, between the Abbott Laboratories, where you have the five-minute test. Did they test you today?
Phil Murphy: They did test me.
Donald Trump: Good. Now I feel better. (Laughter.)
Phil Murphy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m negative.
Donald Trump: You did the five-minute — the Abbott test.
Phil Murphy: I did the quick turnaround.
Donald Trump: It’s so great.
Phil Murphy: I feel like a new man.
Donald Trump: That’s a brand — you know what? That’s a brand-new test. That didn’t exist eight weeks ago, and now it’s like the rage. Everybody wants that test. No, I think we’ve done — I think we’ve done a really great job.

May 2020

  • With all of that unity we have, in one sense, we have great unity, in another sense, I think they're going to come along, I mean, you know, I certainly hope so, but the main thing I have to do is bring our country back, and I want to get it back to where it was or maybe beyond where it was, you know, we have tremendous stimulus, all the money we've been talking about so far tonight.
  • We have to close the country. And I said, say it again. They said, sir, you have to close the country. Nobody ever heard of a thing like this but they were right because if I didn't we would have lost two million, two and a half million, maybe more than that people.
  • To me it's not an acceptable answer, especially when it comes to schools
  • A lot of doctors take it. I take it.
  • I would have told you that three or four days ago, but we never had a chance, because you never asked me the question.
  • And, you know, when you say “per capita,” there’s many per capitas. It’s, like, per capita relative to what? But you can look at just about any category, and we’re really at the top, meaning positive on a per capita basis, too. They’ve done a great job.
  • Yeah. I tested positively toward negative, right? So, no, I tested perfectly this morning, meaning—meaning I tested negative... But that’s a way of saying it: positively toward the negative.
  • There is NO WAY (ZERO!) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent. Mail boxes will be robbed, ballots will be forged & even illegally printed out & fraudulently signed. The Governor of California is sending Ballots to millions of people, anyone living in the state, no matter who they are or how they got there, will get one. That will be followed up with professionals telling all of these people, many of whom have never even thought of voting before, how, and for whom, to vote. This will be a Rigged Election. No way!

June 2020

You have to dominate or you'll look like a bunch of jerks, you have to arrest and try people.
  • You have to dominate or you'll look like a bunch of jerks, you have to arrest and try people.
  • You don't have to be too careful.
  • Buffalo protester shoved by Police could be an ANTIFA provocateur. 75 year old Martin Gugino was pushed away after appearing to scan police communications in order to black out the equipment. @OANN I watched, he fell harder than was pushed. Was aiming scanner. Could be a set up?
  • I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other President and let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln because he did good but although it’s always questionable, you know in other words the end result.
  • These are the people – the best, the smartest, the most brilliant anywhere, and they’ve come up with the AIDS vaccine. They’ve come up with ... various things.
  • Cases up only because of our big number testing. Mortality rate way down!!!
  • It’s fading away, it’s going to fade away.
  • We have got the greatest testing program anywhere in the world.
  • We’ve done too good a job.
  • You know testing is a double-edged sword. ... Here’s the bad part. When you test to that extent, you are going to find more people, find more cases. So I said to my people, ‘Slow the testing down please.’
  • I said to my people slow the testing down please
  • Well, one of the things that will be really great, you know the word experience is still good. I always say talent is more important than experience. I’ve always said that. But the word experience is a very important word. It’s an — a very important meaning. I never did this before. I never slept over in Washington. I was in Washington, I think, 17 times. All of a sudden, I’m president of the United States. You know the story. I’m riding down Pennsylvania Avenue with our First Lady and I say, ‘This is great. But I didn’t know very many people in Washington. It wasn’t my thing. I was from Manhattan, from New York. Now I know everybody, and I have great people in the administration. You make some mistakes. Like, you know, an idiot like Bolton. All he wanted to do was drop bombs on everybody. You don’t have to drop bombs on everybody. You don’t have to kill people.
  • Can't you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something?

July 2020

  • Against every law of society and nature, our children are taught in school to hate their own country and to believe that the men and women who built it were not heroes but that were villains. The radical view of American history is a web of lies, all perspective is removed, every virtue is obscured, every motive is twisted, every fact is distorted, and every flaw is magnified until the history is purged and the record is disfigured beyond all recognition.
  • We got hit by the virus that came from China. We’ve made a lot of progress. Our strategy is moving along well.
  • We’ve learned how to put out the flame.
  • Now we have tested almost 40m people. By so doing, we show cases, 99% of which are totally harmless.
  • Deaths in the U.S. are way down.
  • For the 1/100th time, the reason we show so many Cases, compared to other countries that haven’t done nearly as well as we have, is that our TESTING is much bigger and better. We have tested 40,000,000 people. If we did 20,000,000 instead, Cases would be half, etc. NOT REPORTED!
  • We have the lowest Mortality Rate in the World.
  • Job growth is biggest in history.
  • Economy and Jobs are growing MUCH faster than anyone (except me!) expected.
  • I’m not a big fan of Fox, I’ll be honest with you.
  • We’re signing a healthcare plan within two weeks, a full and complete healthcare plan that the supreme court decision on DACA gave me the right to do. So we’re going to solve – we’re going to sign an immigration plan, a healthcare plan, and various other plans. And nobody will have done what I’m doing in the next four weeks.
  • If it reached my desk I would have done something about it.
  • Anarchists, Agitators or Protestors who vandalize or damage our Federal Courthouse in Portland, or any Federal Buildings in any of our Cities or States, will be prosecuted under our recently re-enacted Statues & Monuments Act. MINIMUM TEN YEARS IN PRISON. Don’t do it!
  • I think she'd be a fine choice, Kamala Harris. She'd be a fine choice.
    • Trump commented on the possibility of Kamala Harris becoming vice president candidate, according to a White House transcript.

August 2020

  • You can take the number of cases and look we're last, meaning we're first.
  • In an illegal late night coup, Nevada’s clubhouse Governor made it impossible for Republicans to win the state. Post Office could never handle the Traffic of Mail-In Votes without preparation. Using Covid to steal the state. See you in Court!
  •  Whether you call it Vote by Mail or Absentee Voting, in Florida the election system is Safe and Secure, Tried and True. Florida's Voting system has been cleaned up (we defeated Democrats attempts at change), so in Florida I encourage all to request a Ballot & Vote by Mail! #MAGA,
  • I don't know. I really don't know. I don't know. I don't know John Lewis. He chose not to come to my inauguration. He chose -- I don't -- I never met John Lewis actually, I don't believe.
  • It would seem like it based on the explosion. I met with some of our great generals and they just seem to feel that it was. This was not a — some kind of a manufacturing explosion type of a event. … They seem to think it was a attack. It was a bomb of some kind, yes.
    • When asked why he called an explosion in Beirut an attack and not an accident, as quoted by Darlene Superville/AP (4 August 2020), "[time.com/5875784/trump-explosion-beirut-attack/ Trump Says Massive Explosion in Beirut Likely an 'Attack']", Time 
  • Q: (Inaudible) if 160,000 people had died on President Obama's watch, do you think you would have called for his resignation?
Trump: No, I wouldn’t have done that. I think it’s — I think it’s been amazing what we’ve been able to do. If we didn’t close up our country, we would have had one and a half or two million people already dead. We’ve called it right; now we don’t have to close it. We understand the disease. Nobody understood it because nobody has ever seen anything like this. The closest thing is, in 1917, they say — right? The great — the great pandemic certainly was a terrible thing, where they lost, anywhere from 50- to 100 million people. Probably ended the Second World War; all the soldiers were sick. That was a — that was a terrible situation. And this is highly contagious. This one is highly, highly contagious. No, if I would have listened to a lot of people, we would have kept it open. And, by the way, we keep it open now, all the way. We keep it open. But we would have kept it open and you could be up to a million and a half or two million people right now — one and a half to two million people. Our people have done a fantastic job — our consultants and our doctors. You know, and with disagreements and with a lot of things happening.
  • So showerheads — you take a shower, the water doesn’t come out. You want to wash your hands, the water doesn’t come out. So what do you do? You just stand there longer or you take a shower longer? Because my hair — I don’t know about you, but it has to be perfect. Perfect.
  • I see again the forest fires are starting. They’re starting again in California. I said, you gotta clean your floors, you gotta clean your forests — there are many, many years of leaves and broken trees and they’re like, like, so flammable, you touch them and it goes up. Maybe we’re just going to have to make them pay for it because they don’t listen to us.
  • The deep state, or whoever, over at the FDA is making it very difficult for drug companies to get people in order to test the vaccines and therapeutics. Obviously, they are hoping to delay the answer until after November 3rd. Must focus on speed, and saving lives

September 2020

  • The Dow Jones Industrial just closed above 29,000! You are so lucky to have me as your President. With Joe Hiden’ it would crash.
  • Did you ever see a man who likes a mask as much as him? He has it hanging down. Because it gives him a feeling of security. If I were a psychiatrist, right, you know I'd say: 'This guy's got some big issues. Hanging down. Hanging down'.
  • If it has not been counted, vote -- which is every citizen's right to do -- you go and vote. You press the lever and vote. So if it hasn't been counted, if it doesn't show up, go and vote, and then, if your mail-in ballot arrives after you vote, which it shouldn't but possibly it could perhaps, that ballot will not be used or counted in that your vote has already been cast and tabulated, so this way you're guaranteed to have your vote count.
  • Under Operation Warp Speed, we've pioneered groundbreaking therapies, reducing the fatality rate 85% since April.
  • We're way ahead on the nuclear front. We've upgraded our nuclear.
  • When reports come out that certain countries don't really like me too much, that's not because of my personality, although it could be that also, frankly.
  • We’re on track to deliver and distribute the vaccine in a very, very safe and effective manner. We think we can start sometime in October. So as soon as it is announced, we’ll be able to start. That’ll be from mid-October on. It may be a little bit later than that, but we’ll be all set.
  • You saw what happened in Pennsylvania. Some state Supreme Court justice just ruled that they can take as long as they want to count the ballots. That means I’ll be leading and winning Pennsylvania like we did last time. Yeah, yeah. We’ll be leading, we’ll be winning Pennsylvania. We’re going to win it easy.
  • Left-wing mobs have torn down statues of our founders, desecrated our memorials, and carried out a campaign of violence and anarchy. Far-left demonstrators have chanted the words “America was never great.” The left has launched a vicious and violent assault on law enforcement — the universal symbol of the rule of law in America. These radicals have been aided and abetted by liberal politicians, establishment media, and even large corporations. Whether it is the mob on the street, or the cancel culture in the boardroom, the goal is the same: to silence dissent, to scare you out of speaking the truth, and to bully Americans into abandoning their values, their heritage, and their very way of life.
  • The radicals burning American flags want to burn down the principles enshrined in our founding documents, including the bedrock principle of equal justice under law. In order to radically transform America, they must first cause Americans to lose confidence in who we are, where we came from, and what we believe. As I said at Mount Rushmore — which they would love to rip down and it rip it down fast, and that’s never going to happen — two months ago, the left-wing cultural revolution is designed to overthrow the American Revolution.
  • The left has warped, distorted, and defiled the American story with deceptions, falsehoods, and lies. There is no better example than the New York Times’ totally discredited 1619 Project. This project rewrites American history to teach our children that we were founded on the principle of oppression, not freedom. Nothing could be further from the truth. America’s founding set in motion the unstoppable chain of events that abolished slavery, secured civil rights, defeated communism and fascism, and built the most fair, equal, and prosperous nation in human history.
  • She just died? Wow. I didn't know that. You are telling me now for the first time. She led an amazing life. What else can you say? Whether you agreed or not, she was an amazing woman who led an amazing life. I am actually sad to hear that.
  • Can you believe it, in one week they nominated me, not for one, but for two Nobel prizes. But you know, you have a president, you love your president, and your president gets honored, because I’m not being honored, you’re being honored with the Nobel Peace Prize, for Israel, what we did with Israel.
  • I’m the only man that got nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize and I didn’t get any press. They wouldn’t. For two of them. Last week, I’m not bragging about it.
  • I said, ‘Shinzo, please do me a favor, we need more car companies. ... We want them built here, not in Japan, please.’ He said, ‘But we cannot do that, this is a free enterprise system.’ I said, ‘... Please, I need some car companies.’ ... I said, ‘Shinzo, you have to do it.’ Next day, it was the story: ‘Five car companies opened up in Michigan.‘
  • Now we know it. It [the coronavirus] affects elderly people, elderly people with heart problems and other problems. If they have other problems. That's what it really affects. That's it. You know, In some states, thousands of people—nobody young. Below the age of 18, like, nobody. They have a strong immune system, who knows? You look...Take your hat off to the young, because they have a hell of an immune system. But it affects virtually nobody. It's an amazing thing.
  • Totally fake news
    • responding to the NYT report on the alleged tax avoidance by Donald Trump
  • We’re leading in Pennsylvania. We’re leading in Florida. I think we’re leading everywhere.
    • Claimed as quoted in Lori Robertson, Robert Farley, Rem Rieder, Eugene Kiely, Jessica McDonald, D'Angelo Gore (28 September 2020), "FactChecking Trump’s Weekend Claims", FactCheck.org 
  • I read today where at least 1% of the ballots for 2016 were invalidated. They take 'em. 'We don't like 'em. We don't like 'em.' They throw them out, left and right
  • Take a look at West Virginia, mailmen selling the ballots. They're being sold.
  • Number two, they cheat. They cheat. Hey, they found ballots in a wastepaper basket three days ago, and they all had the name military ballots -- there were military -- they all had the name Trump on 'em.

October 2020

Feeling really good! Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge. I feel better than I did 20 years ago!
  • Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this TOGETHER!
  • OUR GREAT USA WANTS & NEEDS STIMULUS. WORK TOGETHER AND GET IT DONE. Thank you!
  • If you look at the therapeutics, which I’m taking right now, some of them, and others are coming out soon that are looking like, frankly, they’re miracles, if you want to know the truth, they’re miracles. People criticize me when I say that, but we have things happening that look like they’re miracles, coming down from God.
  • I learned a lot about COVID. I learned it by really going to school. This is the real school, this isn’t the let’s-read-a-book school. And I get it and I understand it and it’s a very interesting thing and I’m gonna be letting you know about it.
  • I will be leaving the great Walter Reed Medical Center today at 6:30 P.M. Feeling really good! Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge. I feel better than I did 20 years ago!
  • Flu season is coming up! Many people every year, sometimes over 100,000, and despite the Vaccine, die from the Flu. Are we going to close down our Country? No, we have learned to live with it, just like we are learning to live with Covid, in most populations far less lethal!!!
  • We should have the small remaining number of our BRAVE Men and Women serving in Afghanistan home by Christmas!
    • Via tweet October 7, 2020
  • We want to do a rally in Florida, probably in Florida on Saturday night, might come back and do one in Pennsylvania on the following night. I feel so good!
    Well, what we’re doing is probably, the test will be tomorrow, and the actual test, because there’s no reason to test all the time, but they found very little infection or virus, if any. I don’t know if they found any, I didn’t go into it greatly with the doctors.
  • I’m OK with masks. I tell people, wear a mask. But just the other day they came out with a statement that 85% of the people that wear masks catch it.
    • Claimed about the coronavirus, as quoted by Brooks Jackson, Lori Robertson, Robert Farley, Angelo Fichera, Jessica McDonald, Rem Rieder, Katie Busch, Eugene Kiely (16 October 2020), "FactChecking Trump’s Town Hall", FactCheck.org 
  • Did you see they found 50,000 ballots in like a river?
    Even without the vaccine, the pandemic's going to end. It's gonna run its course. It's gonna end. They'll go crazy. He said 'without the vaccine' -- watch, it'll be a headline tomorrow. These people are crazy. No, it's running its course. We're rounding the turn. You see the numbers, and we're rounding the turn.
    The United States shows more CASES than other countries, which the Lamestream Fake News Media pounces on daily, because it TESTS at such a high (and costly) level.
    Since the China virus, we have created --- a record in the history of our country -- 11.4 million jobs over just a short period of months.
    We're now setting records for employment, unemployment. We're setting all sorts of records economically
    I signed a bill that gives you 10 years in jail if you rip down any federal statue.
    Mexico is paying for the wall.
    We gave the greatest -- the biggest tax cut in history.
  • (About “phony fake ballots":) How about the ones that were printed without my name on it, right? They had everything on it. They had every race, they had everything. You had the Senate, you had everything, they forgot to put me down.
  • We're not entering a dark winter, we are entering the final turn and the light at the end of the tunnel
  • COVID COVID COVID.. we are rounding the turn all they want to talk about is COVID by the way on Nov 4 you won't be hearing much more about it..Cases are up because we TEST TEST TEST
    • During election campaign in Allentown Trump calls U.S. coronavirus case spike a media ‘conspiracy’ video
  • The only thing you can do in Pennsylvania is a protest. You can't go to church. You can't pray to your God. You can't be with your pastors, your priests, your rabbis. You can't be -- none of that. You can't do anything
  • He’ll bury you in regulations, dismantle your police departments, dissolve our borders, confiscate your guns, terminate religious liberty, destroy your suburbs.
  • If you vote for Biden, it means no kids in school, no graduations, no weddings, no Thanksgiving, no Christmas and no Fourth of July together
  • You know in Germany, if you have a bad heart and you’re ready to die, or if you have cancer and you’re going to be dying soon and you catch Covid, that happens: we mark it down to Covid.
    You know, our doctors get more money if somebody dies from Covid. You know that, right?
    I mean our doctors are very smart people. So what they do is, they say, "I’m sorry, but you know everybody dies of Covid."
    But in Germany and other places, if you have a heart attack, or if you have cancer, you’re terminally ill, you catch Covid, they say you died of cancer, you died of a heart attack.
    With us? When in doubt, choose Covid.
    Now, it’s true. Now, they’ll say ‘oh, it’s terrible what he said’, but that’s true. It’s like $2,000 more.
    • 30 October 2020
      • Trump's estimate is too high, as Ashish Ja states, the bump for documenting Covid ranges from $1600-$2200 which is an average of only $1900 more.

November 2020

  • We were getting ready to win this election. Frankly, we did win this election. This is a major fraud on our nation. We want the law to be used in a proper manner. So we’ll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court. We want all voting to stop.
  • REPORT: DOMINION DELETED 2.7 MILLION TRUMP VOTES NATIONWIDE. DATA ANALYSIS FINDS 221,000 PENNSYLVANIA VOTES SWITCHED FROM PRESIDENT TRUMP TO BIDEN. 941,000 TRUMP VOTES DELETED. STATES USING DOMINION VOTING SYSTEMS SWITCHED 435,000 VOTES FROM TRUMP TO BIDEN.
  • FoxNews and the Fake News Networks aren’t showing these massive gatherings. Instead they have their reporters standing in almost empty streets. We now have SUPPRESSION BY THE PRESS
  • The vaccine will be available to the entire general population with the exception of places like New York state where for political reasons the governor decided to say — and I don’t think it’s good politically, I think it’s very bad from a health standpoint — but he wants to take his time with a vaccine. We can’t be delivering it to a state that won’t be giving it to its people immediately.
  • Big victory moments ago in the State of Nevada. The all Democrat County Commissioner race, on same ballot as President, just thrown out because of large scale voter discrepancy. Clark County officials do not have confidence in their own election security. Major impact!
    • Tweet dated November 16, 2020
  • I won the Election!
    • Tweet November 16, 2020, with the warning by twitter: "Multiple sources called this election differently"
  • Specific allegations were made, and we have massive proof, in the Pennsylvania case. Some people just don’t want to see it. They want nothing to do with saving our Country. Sad!!!
    • Tweet posted November 28, 2020
  • We don't have freedom of the press in this country, we have suppression of the press

December 2020

  • I saved at least 8 Republican Senators, including Mitch, from losing in the last Rigged (for President) Election. Now they (almost all) sit back and watch me fight against a crooked and vicious foe, the Radical Left Democrats. I will NEVER FORGET!
    • Disputed Tweet, 25 December 2020.

  • Weak and tired Republican “leadership” will allow the bad Defense Bill to pass.

2021

20 January 2021 - End of presidency

January 2021

  • So dead people voted. And I think the number is close to 5,000 people [in Georgia] .. [There] were thousands and thousands of ballots in a box that was not an official or a sealed box.
    They ran out because of a water-main break. And there was no water main, there was nothing. There was no break.
    You had out-of-state voters - they voted in Georgia but they were from out of state - of 4,925
    They're shredding ballots. And you should look at that very carefully. Because that's so illegal.
    We have not gone through your Dominion [voting machines], so we can't give them blessing. I mean, in other states, we think we found tremendous corruption with Dominion machines...
  • Rudy, you did a great job. He's got guts. You know what? He's got guts, unlike a lot of people in the Republican Party. He's got guts. He fights, he fights.
    ..
    Our brightest days are before us, our greatest achievements still wait. I think one of our great achievements will be election security because nobody until I came along, had any idea how corrupt our elections were. And again, most people would stand there at 9:00 in the evening and say, “I want to thank you very much,” and they go off to some other life, but I said, “Something’s wrong here. Something’s really wrong. Can’t have happened.” And we fight. We fight like Hell and if you don’t fight like Hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.
    ..
    After this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down. We’re going to walk down any one you want, but I think right here. We’re going walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators, and congressmen and women. We’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength, and you have to be strong. We have come to demand that Congress do the right thing and only count the electors who have been lawfully slated, lawfully slated. I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard. Today we will see whether Republicans stand strong for integrity of our elections, but whether or not they stand strong for our country, our country. Our country has been under siege for a long time, far longer than this four-year period.
    we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, I love Pennsylvania Avenue, and we’re going to the Capitol and we’re going to try and give…
    our Republicans, the weak ones, because the strong ones don’t need any of our help,
    we’re going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.
    So let’s walk down Pennsylvania Avenue.
  • Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!
  • I am asking for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order – respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue. Thank you!
  • To all of my wonderful supporters, I know you are disappointed, but I also want you to know that our incredible journey is just beginning
  • I would like to begin by addressing the heinous attack on the United States Capitol. Like all Americans, I am outraged by the violence, lawlessness, and mayhem. I immediately deployed the National Guard and Federal law enforcement to secure the building and expel the intruders. America is and must always be a nation of law and order. The demonstrators who infiltrated the Capitol have defiled the seat of American democracy. To those who engage in the acts of violence and destruction, you do not represent our country. And to those who broke the law, you will pay.
    We have just been through an intense election, and emotions are high. But now tempers must be cooled and calm restored. We must get on with the business of America. My campaign vigorously pursued every legal avenue to contest the election results. My only goal was to ensure the integrity of the vote. In so doing, I was fighting to defend American democracy. I continue to strongly believe that we must reform our election laws to verify the identity and eligibility of all voters and to ensure faith and confidence in all future elections.
  • To all of those who have asked, I will not be going to the Inauguration on January 20th.

February 2021

  • The Republican Party can never again be respected or strong with political “leaders” like Sen. Mitch McConnell at its helm. McConnell’s dedication to business as usual, status quo policies, together with his lack of political insight, wisdom, skill, and personality, has rapidly driven him from Majority Leader to Minority Leader, and it will only get worse. The Democrats and Chuck Schumer play McConnell like a fiddle—they’ve never had it so good—and they want to keep it that way! We know our America First agenda is a winner, not McConnell’s Beltway First agenda or Biden’s America Last.
  • It was a complete election disaster in Georgia, and certain other swing states. McConnell did nothing, and will never do what needs to be done in order to secure a fair and just electoral system into the future. He doesn’t have what it takes, never did, and never will.
  • Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack, and if Republican Senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again. He will never do what needs to be done, or what is right for our Country.

March 2021

  • Do you miss me yet? Do you miss me?
  • Mr. McLaughlin just gave me numbers that nobody's ever heard of before, more popular than anybody. That's all of us. It's all of us.
  • We won the election twice. I mean, you know, think about it ...
  • But who knows? Who knows? I may even decide to beat them for a third time, OK? For a third time.
  • This election was rigged. And the Supreme Court and other courts didn't want to do anything about it.
  • And the only people that should be allowed to vote by mail are people that can be proven to be either very sick or out of the country or military where they can't do it. One day.
  • And then a Republican president will make a triumphant return to the White House. And I wonder who that will be. I wonder who that will be. Who, who, who will that be, I wonder?
  • Karl Rove has been losing for years, except for himself.
  • He's a RINO of the highest order, who came to the Oval Office lobbying for 5G for him and a group.
  • He's a pompous fool with bad advice and always has an agenda.
  • If the Republican Party is going to be successful, they're going to have to stop dealing with the likes of Karl Rove and just let him float away, or retire, like Liddle' Bob Corker, Jeff 'Flakey' Flake, and others like Toomey of Pennsylvania, who will soon follow.
  • 31 million people listened to my CPAC speech online, and it had among the largest television audience of the week, even though it was on cable at 4pm on Sunday afternoon.
  • I will not be endorsing, under any circumstances, the failed candidate from the great State of Alaska, Lisa Murkowski. She represents her state badly and her country even worse. I do not know where other people will be next year, but I know where I will be — in Alaska campaigning against a disloyal and very bad Senator.
  • I would recommend it, and I would recommend it to a lot of people that don't want to get it and a lot of those people voted for me, frankly. But again, we have our freedoms and we have to live by that and I agree with that also. But it is a great vaccine. It is a safe vaccine and it is something that works.
  • And China, the same thing, they never treated us that way, right? You saw what happened a few days ago, was terrible, and uh, the border is not good, the border is the worst anybody’s ever seen it, and what you see now, multiply it times 10, Jim — he’s the only one I know who would handle the border tougher than me. We have to, and the tough is…in the most humanitarian way, because that’s what it is. What’s happening to the kids, they’re living in squalor, they are living like nobody has ever seen anybody, there’s never been anything like what’s, and you’re gonna have hundreds, and you have it now, they have the airplane photos, the shocks, and they call ’em shocks, and these things are showing thousands and thousands of people coming up from South America and it’s gonna be, it’s just uh, look, it’s a disaster. It’s a humanitarian disaster from their standpoint, and it’s gonna destroy the country, and frankly, the country can’t afford it because you’re talking about massive, just incredibly massive amounts. Our school systems, our hospital systems, everything.
  • Based on their interviews, I felt it was time to speak up about Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx, two self-promoters trying to reinvent history to cover for their bad instincts and faulty recommendations, which I fortunately almost always overturned. They had bad policy decisions that would have left our country open to China and others, closed to reopening our economy, and years away from an approved vaccine — putting millions of lives at risk
  • Dr. Birx was a terrible medical advisor, which is why I seldom followed her advice.
  • I only kept Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx on because they worked for the U.S. government for so long — they are like a bad habit!
  • Dr. Birx is a proven liar with very little credibility left.

April 2021

May 2021

  • If a thief robs a jewelry store of all of its diamonds (the 2020 Presidential Election), the diamonds must be returned.
  • The entire Database of Maricopa County in Arizona has been DELETED! This is illegal and the Arizona State Senate, who is leading the Forensic Audit, is up in arms. Additionally, seals were broken on the boxes that hold the votes, ballots are missing, and worse. Mark Brnovich, the Attorney General of Arizona, will now be forced to look into this unbelievable Election crime.

June 2021

  • Congratulations to the country of Nigeria, who just banned Twitter because they banned their President. More COUNTRIES should ban Twitter and Facebook for not allowing free and open speech — all voices should be heard. Zuckerberg kept calling me and coming to the White House for dinner telling me how great I was.
  • They may allow me back in two years. We got to stop that. We can’t let it happen. So unfair. They are shutting down an entire group of people. Not just me. They are shutting down the voice of a much more powerful and a much larger group.
    • about Facebook banning him, in rally speech [38]

July 2021

August 2021

  • There is massive and unconditional evidence that the election was shattered with fraud and irregularities at a level that our Country has never seen before. Much of it is already public, and a great deal more is coming out in the very near future. Every time you read a statement that there is “no evidence of election fraud,” about the 2020 election scam, just attribute that statement to a crooked and collusive media (they work closely together with the Radical Left Democrats) that will do anything to hide the real facts of this election fiasco.
  • If I were President right now, with COVID raging back, people being shot and killed in record numbers all over our cities, and the Border totally open with criminals and heavily infected COVID people pouring through our Southern Border and into our communities, the Fake News Media would be having an absolute field day.
  • If our soccer team, headed by a radical group of Leftist Maniacs, wasn’t woke, they would have won the Gold Medal instead of the Bronze.
  • Woke means you lose, everything that is woke goes bad, and our soccer team certainly has.
  • They should replace the wokesters with Patriots and start winning again. The woman with the purple hair played terribly and spends too much time thinking about Radical Left politics and not doing her job!

September 2021

October 2021 “I wanted to have people be ready because we were put on alert that they were going to do fruit,” Trump said in the October 2021 deposition, according to a transcript of the proceedings.


October 2021

  • If we don't solve the Presidential Election Fraud of 2020 (which we have thoroughly and conclusively documented), Republicans will not be voting in '22 or '24. It is the single most important thing for Republicans to do.
  • Wonderful to see Colin Powell, who made big mistakes on Iraq and famously, so-called weapons of mass destruction, be treated in death so beautifully by the Fake News Media. Hope that happens to me someday. He was a classic RINO, if even that, always being the first to attack other Republicans. He made plenty of mistakes, but anyway, may he rest in peace!

November 2021

  • RINOs who supported infrastructure bill should be ashamed of themselves
    • on Sky News Australia Youtube channel video (November 7, 2021)

December 2021

  • He was very early. Like earlier than most. I haven’t spoken to him since. Fuck him,
  • I thought the Palestinians were impossible, and the Israelis would do anything to make peace and a deal. I found that not to be true.
  • Bibi did not want to make a deal. Even most recently, when we came up with the maps. Now I don’t know if he didn’t want to make it for political reasons, or for other reasons. I wish he would have said he didn’t want to make a deal, instead of…. Because a lot of people devoted a lot of work. But I don’t think Bibi would have ever made a deal. That’s my opinion. I think the general [Gantz] wanted to make a deal.
  • There’s people in this country that are Jewish that no longer love Israel.
    I’ll tell you the Evangelical Christians love Israel more than the Jews in this country.
    It used to be that Israel had absolute power over Congress and today I think it’s the exact opposite, and I think Obama and Biden did that.
    And yet in the election, they still get a lot of votes from Jewish people…which tells you that the Jewish people, and I’ve said this for a long time.
    The Jewish people in the United States either don’t like Israel or don’t care about Israel.
    I mean, you look at The New York Times, The New York Times hates Israel, hates them, and they’re Jewish people that run The New York Times, I mean the Sulzberger family.
  • I think the origins are so obvious. They came out of the Wuhan lab. And I think if anybody thinks anything differently, they’re just kidding themselves. So, you can ask — China has to pay. They have to do something. They have to pay reparations. And China doesn’t have the money to pay those reparations. I believe that worldwide — I’m not just talking United States — worldwide, $60 trillion of damage, $60 trillion. China doesn’t have $60 trillion. But they have to do something to make up for what they’ve done. What they’ve done to the world is so horrible. It’s been horrible, all over the world. And it doesn’t stop.

2022

January 2022

  • I ran twice and we won twice.
    This crowd is a massive symbol of what took place, because people are hungry for the truth. They want their country back.
  • If I run and if I win, we will treat those people from January sixth fairly. We will treat them fairly.
    And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons. Because they are being treated so unfairly.

February 2022

  • I went in yesterday and there was a television screen, and I said, 'This is genius.' Putin declares a big portion of the Ukraine, of Ukraine, Putin declares it as independent. Oh, that's wonderful. So Putin is now saying, 'It's independent,' a large section of Ukraine. I said, 'How smart is that?' And he's going to go in and be a peacekeeper. That's the strongest peace force. We could use that on our southern border. That's the strongest peace force I've ever seen. ... Here's a guy who's very savvy. ... I know him very well. Very, very well.
  • They say, 'Trump said Putin's smart.' I mean, he's taking over a country for two dollars' worth of sanctions. I'd say that's pretty smart. He's taking over a country — really a vast, vast location, a great piece of land with a lot of people, and just walking right in.

March 2022

April 2022

  • Happy Easter to all including the Radical Left Maniacs who are trying everything to destroy our country May they not succeed, but let them, nevertheless, be happy, healthy, wealthy and well!
  • He went out of his way to deceptively edit an interview and got caught. That is a big story, isn’t it?

April 2022 Dictor: Okay. And you said that, ‘If you see someone getting ready to throw a tomato, just knock the crap out of them would you.’ That was your statement?

Trump: Oh, yeah. It was very dangerous.

Dictor: What was very dangerous?

Trump: We were threatened.

Dictor: With what?

Trump: They were going to throw fruit. We were threatened. We had a threat.

Dictor: How did you become aware that there was a threat that people were going to throw fruit?

Trump: We were told. I thought Secret Service was involved in that, actually. And you get hit with fruit, it’s – no – it’s very violent stuff. We were on alert for that.Trump attorney Jeffrey Goldman: A tomato is a fruit after all, I guess. … It has seeds.

Trump: It’s worse than a tomato, it’s other things also. But tomato, when they start doing that stuff, it’s very dangerous. There was an alert out that day.

Dictor: Who were you speaking to when you said …

Trump: The audience.

Dictor: So you were speaking to the audience when you said if they saw someone getting ready to throw a tomato, just knock the crap out of them, would you?

Trump: That was to the audience. It was said sort of in jest. Buy maybe, you know, a little truth to it. It’s very dangerous stuff. You can get killed with those things. … I wanted to have people be ready because we were put on alert that they were going to do fruit. And some fruit is a lot worse than – tomatoes are bad by the way. But it’s very dangerous … they were going to hit – they were going to hit very hard.

“So I got a little notice, in case you’re seeing these security guys — we have wonderful security guys,” Trump said at the Iowa rally. “They said, ‘Mr. Trump, there may be somebody with tomatoes in the audience.’ So if you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of them, would you? Seriously. Okay?”

May 2022

  • With rampant and record setting crime, a 42.8% increase over last year was just announced, and every other unimaginable problem, no wonder everyone is leaving the New York State, including businesses left and right.
  • I am not currently in possession of any Trump Organization-issued phones, computers or similar devices.
I believe the last phone or device I was issued by the Trump Organization was a cellphone in 2015. I no longer have the cellphone in my possession and I am not aware of its current location.
Since January 1, 2010, I previously owned two flip phones and a Samsung mobile phone. I do not have the two flips [sic] phones in my possession and I do not know their current whereabouts.”
[Samsung] it was taken from me at some point while I was president. I do not have the Samsung in my possession and I do not know its current whereabouts.
  • Kathy Barnette will never be able to win the general election against the radical left democrats. She has many things in her past which have not been properly explained or vetted, but if she is able to do so, she will have a wonderful future in the Republican Party — and I will be behind her all the way
NRA convention speech (May 27, 2022)
  • The existence of evil in our world is not a reason to disarm law-abiding citizens. The existence of evil is one of the very best reasons to arm law-abiding citizens.
  • Every time a disturbed or demented person commits a hideous crime there is always a grotesque effort by some in our society to advance their own extreme political agenda.
  • We need a top-to-bottom security overhaul of schools [...] Every building should have a single entry point. No one should ever be able to get near a classroom until they have been checked, scanned and screened ... Above all, from this day forward, every school in America should have an armed police officer or an armed resources officer on duty at all times. [...] Clearly, we need to make it far easier to confine the violent and mentally deranged into mental institutions.

July 2022

  • Warmongering and despicable human being Liz Cheney, who is hated by the great people of Wyoming (down 35!), keeps saying, over and over again, that HER Fake Unselect Committee may recommend CRIMINAL CHARGES against a President of the United States who got more votes than any sitting President in history,

September 2022

  • If you're the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying it's declassified, even by thinking about it, because you're sending it to Mar-a-Lago or to wherever you're sending it. And there doesn't have to be a process. There can be a process, but it doesn't have to be.

October 2022

November 2022

  • We're winning big, big, big in the Republican Party for the nomination like nobody's ever seen before
There it is, Trump at 71 [percent]. Ron DeSanctimonious at 10 percent. Mike Pence at 7 — oh, Mike Pence doing better than I thought​.
  • Well, I think if they win, I should get all the credit. And if they lose, I should not be blamed at all, OK, but it’ll probably be just the opposite.
  • Ron DeSanctimonious is playing games! The Fake News asks him if he's going to run if President Trump runs, and he says, 'I'm only focused on the Governor's race, I'm not looking into the future.' Well, in terms of loyalty and class, that's really not the right answer.
  • He shows up with 3 people, two of which I didn’t know, the other a political person who I haven’t seen in years,” the former president wrote on Truth Social. “Fake News went CRAZY!”
    • 29 November 2022 on Truth Social (per this article by Charisma Madarang of Rolling Stone) after Kanye West showed up for dinner with Boeing employee Jamal and Nick Fuentes (the two unknowns) and Karen Giorno (an aide from Trump's 2016 campaign) in a meeting arranged by Milo Yiannopoulos (who did not attend) via Karen

December 2022

  • Do you throw the Presidential Election Results of 2020 OUT and declare the RIGHTFUL WINNER, or do you have a NEW ELECTION? A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.
  • Merry Christmas to EVERYONE, including the Radical Left Marxists that are trying to destroy our Country, the Federal Bureau of Investigation that is illegally coercing & paying Social and LameStream Media to push for a mentally disabled Democrat over the Brilliant, Clairvoyant, and USA LOVING Donald J. Trump, and, of course, the Department of Injustice, which appointed a Special "Prosecutor", who, together with his wife and family, HATES "Trump" more than any other person on Earth.
  • I had almost nothing to do with January 6th.

2023

January 2023

  • So an out-of-control wild man kills beautiful Ashli Babbitt, a true Patriot, who was the only one killed on January 6th.
    Her mother goes to protest her death and memory, and they arrest her mother.
    Something has to be done about these Communists and Marxists that are taking over and destroying our Country.
    Pray for Ashli, and her wonderful, brave mother!
    • 8 January 2023 gab

February 2023

March 2023

CPAC keynote speech (March 4, 2023)

CPAC keynote address in National Harbor, Maryland, on March 4, 2023, reported in Five Key Moments from Donald Trump's Crucial CPAC Speech. Newsweek (March 5, 2023).

  • I'm the only candidate who can make this promise: I will prevent, and very easily, World War III.
  • We are never going back to a party that wants to give unlimited money to fight foreign endless wars but demands we cut veteran benefits and retirement benefits at home.
  • We’re not going back to people that want to destroy our great Social Security system – even some in our own party; I wonder who that might be – who want to raise the minimum age of Social Security to 70, 75 or even 80 in some cases, and who are out to cut Medicare to a level that will be unrecognizable
  • In 2016, I declared: I am your voice. Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed: I am your retribution.
  • I will totally obliterate the deep state. I will fire the unelected bureaucrats and shadow forces who have weaponized our justice system like it has never been weaponized before. And I will put the people back in charge of this country again.
  • This is the final battle – they know it, I know it, you know it, everybody knows it. Either they win, or we win. And I promise you this: If you put me back in the White House, their reign will be over, and America will be a free nation once again.
  • Before I even arrive at the Oval Office, I will have the disastrous war between Russia and Ukraine settled.
    I will get the problem solved.
    And I will get it solved in rapid order and 'it will take me no longer than one day, I know exactly what to say to each of them, I got along very well with Putin.
    • the March 4th speech was referenced when this was quoted March 7th by Stephen Collinson in a CNN analysis
      • Trump later reuses the phrase "before I even arrive at the Oval Office" in #June 2024 in Philadelphia

April 2023

NRA convention speech (April 14, 2023)
  • Our country has been chock full of guns for centuries, and there was no talk of massacres of schoolchildren until around the year 2000. That's what it really started. They started talking about it. This is not a gun problem. This is a mental health problem. This is a social problem. This is a cultural problem. This is a spiritual problem.
  • I will ask Congress to repeal totally ineffective legislation that makes it harder to protect our schools and easier for criminals to face absolutely no opposition when they go in. I will also create a new tax credit to reimburse any teacher for the full costs of a concealed carry firearm and training from highly qualified experts. Who's better? Who's better? If even 5% of teachers, people that are skilled with arms, we want that. 5% were voluntarily armed and trained to stop active shooters. We would achieve effective deterrence and the problem would cease to exist.

May 2023

June 2023

I AM AN INNOCENT MAN!
  • This is the final battle. With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state. expel the warmongers from our government. We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the Communists, Marxists, and Fascists, and we will throw off the sick political class that hates our country. We will rout the fake news media, and we will defeat crooked Joe Biden. We will liberate America from these villains once and for all.
  • For three years, Biden and his radical left allies have waged war on American auto workers in his ridiculous crusade to force everyone into electric cars, ridiculous regulations kill more than half of US auto jobs and decimate the suppliers that they decimated already, decimate the suppliers and it’s going to decimate your jobs.

July 2023

  • “Is it Crooked Joe and his wonderful son, Hunter? Release the findings, release the tapes. We can’t have a crackhead in charge of our Nuclear Arsenal!!
  • … He’s totally compromised...I don’t like doing the same word for two people. We’re using the word crooked for Joe Biden because Joe Biden is the most crooked president in the history.
  • We have potential for a war outside of Ukraine - Russia. We should have kept Bagram because Bagram is one of the largest military bases in the world cost us billions of dollars to build forget about Afghanistan, it's one hour away from where China is building their nuclear weapons.
  • If China takes Taiwan they will turn the world off potentially.
  • Millions of illegal aliens have stormed across our borders. It is an invasion, like a military invasion. Our rights and liberties are being torn to shreds,Your country is being turned into a third-world hellhole, run by censors, perverts, criminals, and thugs.”
  • America is tired of being ruled by radical bureaucrats in Washington the Bidens, the Clintons, the Obamas, the Radical Left Democrats, the Marxists – guys like Paul Ryan and Karl Rove. Their reign will be over, and it will be over quickly, and America will be a free nation once again.
  • Think of this. We give them everything, including military protection and trade, and now we have to pay them to go there. As President I will not allow this, will end very quickly.
    • “U.S. CITIZENS WILL HAVE TO PAY FOR A VISA TO TRAVEL TO EUROPE STARTING IN 2024.” [47]
  • Gloves are off.Under crooked Joe Biden. I never called him that. I took the name away from Hillary Clinton. We call her beautiful Hillary now.Now it's crooked Joe, because it's a much more appropriate name right now for this man who's just destroying our country.
  • As part of my plan to obtain total independence from China, we will phase in tariffs and import restrictions to bring back production of all essential medicines to the United States of America where they belong. I signed an executive order to begin this process in 2020 but Biden has shamefully failed to follow through. He wants it ended. He wants to take care of China.
  • [49]
  • They don’t go after the people who cheated in the election, they only go after the people who report on, or question the cheating if you don't have strong borders you don't have a country, right now we don't have a country.
  • Trumpism or America first is very simple low taxes and regulations , the most powerful military , tariffs on countries taking advantage, protection of section amendment , great healthcare , low energy prices, parental power on school boards, life , strong borders.
  • I expect nothing from the meeting with my lawyers and the lunatics in the DOJ regarding January 6th. They just want to interfere with the Presidential Election on 2024. It is their new form of cheating, but we will win !!! How can deranged Jack Smith bring a case on January 6th., as ridiculous as it is anyway, when I have already won such a case, and been fully acquitted, in the U.S. Senate? In other words, I was Impeached on this, and won!!!

August 2023

  • These monsters, all controlled and coordinated by the DOJ and Radical Left Lunatics, are Criminalizing Political Speech, a total SHUTDOWN OF DEMOCRACY!
    • Truth Social Post 6:28 PM on August 15, 2023.[54]
  • CROOKED JOE BIDEN IS TOTALLY CONTROLLED BY CHINA, UKRAINE, & VARIOUS OTHER COUNTRIES. THEY KNOW EVERYTHING ABOUT HIM - ALL OF HIS MISDEEDS. HE IS A COMPROMISED PRESIDENT WHO IS LEADING OUR COUNTRY TO HELL. HE IS A MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE!
    • Truth Social Post 6:20 PM on August 15, 2023.[55]
  • I believe we have a compromised president. He was bribed, and now he’s being blackmailed. He’s a Manchurian Candidate. That’s why Crooked Joe is letting other countries walk all over the United States.
    • Truth Social Post on August 15, 2023.[56]
  • The “shocking and totally unexpected” loss by the U.S. Women’s Soccer Team to Sweden is fully emblematic of what is happening to the our once great Nation under Crooked Joe Biden. Many of our players were openly hostile to America - No other country behaved in such a manner, or even close. WOKE EQUALS FAILURE. Nice shot Megan, the USA is going to Hell!!
  • https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/110845290114601452
  • Let’s see! My political Opponent, Crooked Joe Biden, tells Merrick Garland and the DOJ to indict and arrest me on bogus charges and accusations, trying desperately to steal the Election. But that wasn’t enough! He now wants Thug Prosecutor, Deranged Jack Smith, to file for a Court Order taking away my first amendment rights, SPEECH. So, based on yet another Radical Left Hoax, I’ll be the only “Politician” in American history not allowed to SPEAK. THE NEVER ENDING WITCH HUNT CONTINUES.
  • They just found a letter from Crooked Joe Biden directly to Keven Archer. Oh well, so much for “Joe” not knowing anything about all of the money he extorted. At some point the LameStream Media will have to cover this story, perhaps the biggest scandal in U.S. history. When they do, our Country will start to heal!
  • HOW CAN MY CORRUPT POLITICAL OPPONENT PUT ME ON TRIAL(S) DURING A CAMPAIGN THAT I AM WINNING (BY A LOT!), BUT FORCING ME TO SPEND TIME AND MONEY AWAY FROM THE “CAMPAIGN TRAIL” IN ORDER TO FIGHT BOGUS ACCUSATIONS & CHARGES? IS THIS GOING TO BE THE FUTURE OF ELECTIONS IN AMERICA? CAN A PRESIDENT ORDER HIS DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE TO INDICT AN OPPONENT JUST PRIOR TO AN ELECTION?
  • Just found out that Crooked Joe Biden’s DOJ secretly attacked my Twitter account, making it a point not to let me know about this major “hit” on my civil rights. My Political Opponent is going CRAZY trying to infringe on my Campaign for President. Nothing like this has ever happened before. Does the First Amendment still exist? Did Deranged Jack Smith tell the Unselects to DESTROY & DELETE all evidence?
  • Whenever more Biden corruption is exposed his henchmen charge me with a crime.
  • I think that Crooked Joe Biden is not only dumb and incompetent, I believe he has gone MAD, a stark raving Lunatic, with his HORRIBLE AND COUNTRY THREATENING ENVIRONMENTAL, OPEN BORDERS, & DOJ/FBI WEAPONIZATION POLICIES. HE IS A MENTAL CATASTROPHE THAT IS LEADING OUR COUNTRY TO HELL!What Crooked Joe Biden, who can’t string two sentences together, has done to our once great Country through his Open Borders CATASTROPHE, may go down as the greatest and most damaging mistake ever made in USA HISTORY. It is not even believable that such incompetence and stupidity could have been allowed to happen. OUR COUNTRY IS BEING DESTROYED BY A MAN WITH THE MIND, IDEAS, AND I.Q. OF A FIRST GRADER. THIS INVASION OF OUR COUNTRY MUST STOP IMMEDIATELY. IT CANNOT BE ALLOWED TO CONTINUE!


  • The Fake Indictments against me didn’t come down from heaven, they came from the most corrupt President in the history of the United States, Crooked Joe Biden, in order to Rig & Steal another Election.
  • Why is “Phoney” (Like in PERFECT “PHONE” CALL, get it?) Fani Willis, the severely underperforming D.A. of Fulton County who is being accused of having an “affair” with a Gang Member of a group that she is prosecuting, leaking my name in regard to a Grand Jury pertaining to Election Fraud & Irregularities that I say took place in Georgia. I made a PERFECT PHONE CALL OF PROTEST. What does Phoney Fani have to do with me? She should instead focus on the record number of murders in Atlanta!
  • The only Election Interference that took place in Fulton County, Georgia, was done by those that Rigged and Stole the Election, not by me, who simply complained that the Election was Rigged and Stolen. We have Massive and Conclusive Proof, if the Grand Jury would like to see it. Unfortunately, the publicity seeking D.A. isn’t interested in Justice, or this evidence. Also, as in Manhattan, the corrupt DOJ is pushing hard trying to keep Biden in Office. The whole system is dishonest and broken!
  • To say no comment is oftentimes fine, but to be smiling when you say it, especially again such a tragedy as this, is absolutely horrible and unacceptable, Our government was not prepared. And very importantly, the aftermath is going very poorly with the governor of the island wanting to do nothing but blame it on global warming, and other things that just happen to pop into his head.


  • I easily won the Great State of Georgia in 2016, did a fantastic job, as President, for Georgia and the entire USA, received 10 Million more votes than I got, nationwide, in 2016, got by far the most votes in history for a sitting President, but shockingly, “LOST” Georgia. All this despite winning nearby Alabama and South Carolina in Record Setting Landslides. Why did Georgia officials agree to, and sign, the one sided Consent Decree? Does anybody really believe I lost Georgia? I DON’T!


September 2023

  • It is all a shadow of its former self. Ukraine, Inflation, Bad Economy, Woke Military, No World Standing, No Respect, and today, 6 Billion Dollars for hostages. Where is the call from Republicans for the 25th Amendment.
    • Truth social
  • Can you believe that Crooked Joe Biden is giving $6 Billion to the terrorist regime in Iran? That money be used for terrorism all over the Middle East, and, indeed, the World. This incompetent FOOL is absolutely destroying America He had the audacity to announce this terrible deal today, September 11th. To pay for hostages will lead to kidnapping, ransom, and blackmail against Americans across the globe So, lets get this straight! We did a hostage TRADE with Iran. We gave them 5 very tough, smart people that they desperately wanted. We likewise got back 5 people BUT, we also gave them 6 BILLION DOLLARS! How much of a kickback does Crooked Joe Biden get Does anyone realize how much money 6 Billion Dollars is? When I was President, I got back 58 hostages for ZERO money. Remember Pastor Brunson? It sets a TERRIBLE precedent. Republicans, call out the 25th Amendment, NOW! Biden is INCOMPETENT
  • Early in the administration Education department will be closing . we spend more money on education than any other country yet we are bottom of every list.
  • Biden’s job killing EV mandate has dictated that nearly seven percent of all cars sold in the US must be fully electric in less than 10 years. Crooked Joe Biden is back like a wretched old vulture.
  • Mark Milley, who led perhaps the most embarrassing moment in American history with his grossly incompetent implementation of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, costing many lives, leaving behind hundreds of American citizens, and handing over BILLIONS of dollars of the finest military equipment ever made, will be leaving the military next week. This will be a time for all citizens of the USA to celebrate! This guy turned out to be a Woke train wreck who, if the Fake News reporting is correct, was actually dealing with China to give them a heads up on the thinking of the President of the United States. This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH! A war between China and the United States could have been the result of this treasonous act. To be continued!!!
  • Nobody has any idea where these people are coming from. And we know they come from prisons. We know they come from mental institutions, insane asylums. We know they're terrorists. Nobody has seen anything like we're witnessing right now. It is a very sad thing for our country. It's poisoning the blood of our country. It's so bad.

October 2023

  • We will immediately stop all of the pillaging and theft. Very simply: If you rob a store, you can fully expect to be shot as you are leaving that store... Shot! The word that they shoot you will get out within minutes and our nation, in one day, will be an entirely different place. There must be retribution for theft and destruction and the ruination of our country
  • I had a wonderful life before all this stuff. I didn't know what a grand jury was, I didn't know what a subpoena, what is a subpoena? I had a wonderful life.
  • lowlife with a very small brain and a very big mouth
  • by far the dumbest of my military people
  • incapable of doing a good job
  • It was too much for him, and I couldn’t stand the guy, so I fired him like a ‘dog’

November 2023

  • We pledge to you that we will root out the Communists, Marxists, Fascists, and Radical Left Thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our Country, lie, steal, and cheat on Elections, and will do anything possible, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America, and the American Dream. The threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous, and grave, than the threat from within. Despite the hatred and anger of the Radical Left Lunatics who want to destroy our Country, we will MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!

December 2023

  • Sean Hannity: Under no circumstances, you are promising America tonight, you would never abuse power as retribution against anybody?
    Donald Trump: Except for day one.
    Sean Hannity: Except for—
    Donald Trump: [aside to audience, pointing at Sean] He's doing great. [to Sean] Except for day one. I want to close the border and I want to drill, drill, drill.
  • We love this guy. He says, "You’re not going to be a dictator, are ya?" I said: "No, no, no, other than day one. We're closing the border, and we're drilling, drilling, drilling. After that, I'm not a dictator."
  • They let — I think the real number is 15, 16 million people into our country. When they do that, we got a lot of work to do.
    They're poisoning the blood of our country, that's what they've done.
    They poison mental institutions and prisons all over the world, not just in South America, not just to three or four countries that we think about, but all over the world. They're coming into our country from Africa, from Asia, all over the world.

2024

January 2024

  • Even if you vote and then pass away, it's worth it.
  • “We’re going to place strong protections to stop banks and regulators from trying to debank you from your—our political beliefs what they do. They want to debank you. We’re going to debank—think of this. They want to take away your country. Electric cars... They wanna take away your rights. They wanna take away your country. The things they’re doing. All electric cars. Give me a break. If you want an electric car, great. But they don’t go far. They’re very expensive. They gotta be made in China. That’s why I think I’m gonna get the autoworkers to vote for Trump. You know, we’re having great, great talks. But think of what they wanna do. They wanna take away your rights.”
    • 17 January 2024 at a campaign rally in New Hampshire, reported by several sources.[1][2]

March 2024

April 2024

  • I called [Bill Bar] him ‘Weak, Slow Moving, Lethargic, Gutless, and Lazy,Based on the fact that I greatly appreciate his wholehearted Endorsement, I am removing the word ‘Lethargic’ from my statement.

May 2024

  • These people are running a Gestapo administration,And it’s the only thing they have. And it’s the only way they’re going to win in their opinion.Once I got indicted, I said well, now the gloves have to come off,If you care too much, you tend to choke. And in a way, I don’t care. It’s just you know, life is life.
    • 4 May 2024 per NBC writers Burns/Brooks/Sonnier/Gomez/Terkel
  • If he wins, our country is going to be destroyed.
  • He’s a demented tyrant.
  • Our cities are choking to death. Our states are dying. And frankly, our country is dying.
  • I have been indicted more than the great Al Capone, on bullshit.
  • Before I even arrive at the Oval Office, shortly after we win the presidency, I will have the horrible war between Russia and Ukraine settled, and we will restore, as we had just four years ago, peace through strength. They respected our country and they respected your President.
  • And if you vote for me, on Day One, I will commute the sentence of Ross Ulbricht
    • 20 May 2024 (Saturday night) at Libertarian National Convention, reported in 25 May 2024 article by Peter Shaefer of Politico
  • We have a country that’s in big trouble, but this was a rigged decision right from day one, with a conflicted judge who should have never been allowed to try this case, And we’ll keep fighting we’ll fight till the end and we’ll win because our country has gone to hell. We don’t have the same country anymore. We have a divided mess. We’re a nation in decline, serious decline, millions and millions of people pouring into our country right now, from prisons and from mental institutions terrorists, and they’re taking over our country, real verdict would come in November.

June 2024

  • Don’t forget, if it weren’t me, they’d be going after somebody else. And I know a lot of the competition, They wouldn’t be doing so well right now. They’d be saying, ‘Mommy, take me home, I want to go home.
  • Wouldn't it be terrible to throw the President's wife and the former Secretary of State into jail? Wouldn't that be a terrible thing? But they wanna do it! It's a terrible, terrible, path that they're leading us to & it's very possible that it's going to have to happen to them.
  • Those J6 warriors — they were warriors — but they were really, more than anything else, they’re victims of what happened... All they were doing is protesting a rigged election. That’s what they were doing.
  • So I said, ‘Let me ask you a question. Nobody ever asked this question. And it must be because of MIT. My relationship to MIT. Very smart. I say, What would happen if the boat sank from its weight? And you’re in the boat and you have this tremendously powerful battery, and the battery is now underwater, and there’s a shark that’s approximately 10 yards over there. By the way, a lot of shark attacks lately. You notice that? A lot of shark. I watch some guys justifying it today. ‘Well, they weren’t really that angry. They bit off the young lady’s leg because of the fact that they were — they were not hungry, but they misunderstood what - who she was.’ These people are crazy. ‘There’s no problem with sharks. They just didn’t really understand a young woman swimming. No really got decimated and other people too, a lot of shark attacks. So I said, ‘So there’s a shark 10 yards away from the boat, 10 yards or here. Do I get electrocuted? If the boat is sinking, water goes over the battery, the boat is sinking. Do I stay on top of the boat and get electrocuted? Or do I jump over by the shark and not get electrocuted? ‘You know, nobody’s ever asked me that question.’ I said, ‘I think it’s a good question. I think there’s a lot of electric current coming through that water.’ But you know what I’d do if there was a shark or you get electrocuted? I’ll take electrocution every single time. I’m not getting near the shark!
  • before I even arrive at the Oval Office, shortly after we win the presidency
    • 22 June 2024 rally in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, quoted in a 2 July 2024 Politico article by Michael Hirsh
      • Trump had previously used the phrase "before I even arrive at the Oval Office" in #March 2023, and also used it in a May 2024 speech to the NRA the previous month
  • Israel is the one. And you should let them go and let them go finish the job. He doesn’t want to do it. He’s become like a Palestinian, but hey, don’t like him because he’s a very bad Palestinian. He’s a weak one.
  • If we had a real president, a president that knew -- that was respected by Putin ... he would have never invaded Ukraine.
    • 27 June 2024 debate with Joe Biden, cited 1 July 2024 by Edith Lederer

July 2024

  • I know nothing about project 2025.
  • I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.
    • Claimed on July 5, 2024, quoted in:
  • It was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening...In this moment, it is more important than ever that we stand United, and show our True Character as Americans, remaining Strong and Determined, and not allowing Evil to Win
  • By luck or by God, many people are saying it’s by God I’m still here.
    The agents hit me so hard that my shoes fell off, and my shoes are tight.
    I had all prepared an extremely tough speech, really good, all about the corrupt, horrible administration. But I threw it away. I want to try to unite our country.
    • 14 July 2024 cited by NY Post writer Michael Goodwin and Politico writer Isabella Ramirez
  • We have a new victim now, Kamala. A brand new victim, and honestly she’s a radical left lunatic. When you find out about her, all I have to say is defund the police,Three months ago, she was thought of so badly, [the media] were just killing her. And now they’re trying to make her into a, let’s say, Margaret Thatcher. I don’t think so. It’s not going to happen. Margaret Thatcher didn’t laugh like that. Did she?
  • I pledge to the bitcoin community, that the day I take the oath of office, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’ anti-crypto crusade will be over.On day one, I will fire Gary Gensler.
  • You won't have to do it anymore. Four more years, you know what, it will be fixed, it will be fine, you won't have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians...I love you Christians. I'm a Christian. I love you, get out, you gotta get out and vote. In four years, you don't have to vote again, we'll have it fixed so good you're not going to have to vote.
  • So I've known her a long time - indirectly, not directly very much - and she was always of Indian heritage. And she was only promoting Indian heritage. I didn't know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black. And now she wants to be known as Black. So I don't know, is she Indian or is she Black?

August 2024

  • That’s a weird deal going on there. They’re the weird ones. Nobody’s ever called me weird. I’m a lot of things, but weird I’m not.
    You notice the evening news, every one of them, you know, they introduced the word ‘weird’, and all of a sudden they’re talking about ‘weird’. No, we’re not weird people. We’re actually just the opposite. We’re right down the middle.
    No, we're not weird. We're very solid people. We want to have strong borders. We want to have good elections. They’re the weird ones.
  • 24 HOURS UNTIL WE UNLEASH HELL. At this time tomorrow, Crooked Kamala’s worst nightmares come true.
    Tomorrow I step on stage and deliver Open Border Czar Kamala Harris the WORST defeat of her failed political career.
  • What are the chances that Crooked Joe Biden, the WORST President in the history of the U.S., whose Presidency was Unconstitutionally STOLEN from him by Kamabla, Barrack HUSSEIN Obama, Crazy Nancy Pelosi, Shifty Adam Schiff, Cryin' Chuck Schumer, and others on the Lunatic Left, CRASHES the Democrat National Convention and tries to take back the Nomination, beginning with challenging me to another DEBATE. He feels that he made a historically tragic mistake by handing over the U.S. Presidency, a COUP, to the people in the World he most hates, and he wants it back, NOW!!!
  • If you look at Caracas, it was known for being a very dangerous city and now it's very safe. In fact, the next interview we do, we'll do it in Caracas, Venezuela, because it's safer than many of our cities.
  • I’ve spoken to the biggest crowds. Nobody’s spoken to crowds bigger than me. If you look at Martin Luther King when he did his speech, his great speech, and you look at ours, same real estate, same everything, same number of people, if not we had more. And they said he had a million people, but I had 25,000 people.
    Nobody was killed on Jan. 6.
    The presidency was taken away from Joe Biden, and I’m no Biden fan, but I tell you what, from a constitutional standpoint, from any standpoint you look at, they took the presidency away.
    Twenty million people came over the border during the Biden-Harris administration — 20 million people — and it could be very much higher than that. Nobody really knows.
  • Christie, he’s eating right now. He can’t be bothered.
    Sir, please do not call him a fat pig, that’s very disrespect.
    See, I’m trying to be nice. Don’t call him a fat pig. You can’t do that.
    I was extremely respectful of Sloppy Chris Christie today in New Hampshire. During a speech in front of a large crowd of Patriots, somebody shouted out that "Chris Christie is a fat pig." Rather than acknowleding that, which many speakers would have done, I said "No, No, he is not a fat pig." I'm sure Chris would have been very happy with my defense of him!
  • Has anyone noticed that Kamala CHEATED at the airport? There was nobody at the plane, and she ‘A.I.’d’ it, and showed a massive ‘crowd’ of so-called followers, BUT THEY DIDN’T EXIST!
  • She’s a CHEATER. She had NOBODY waiting, and the ‘crowd’ looked like 10,000 people! Same thing is happening with her fake ‘crowds’ at her speeches. This is the way the Democrats win Elections, by CHEATING ‒ And they’re even worse at the Ballot Box. She should be disqualified because the creation of a fake image is ELECTION INTERFERENCE. Anyone who does that will cheat at ANYTHING!
    EVERYTHING ABOUT KAMALA IS FAKE!
  • The worst president in history. And one of the reasons he was so bad, first of all, the Israeli attack would have never happened. Russia would never have attacked Ukraine and we'd have no inflation. And we wouldn't have had the Afghanistan mess if you think of it.
    Now she's looking like she wants to be more Trump than Trump if that's possible.She wants to have open borders. And now she's going like she's tough on the border. It's such a lie.
  • "I said to Vladimir Putin, I said, 'Don't do it. You can't do it, Vladimir, you do it, it's going to be a bad day. You cannot do it.' And I told him things that what I do. And he said, 'No way.' And I said, 'way.' And, you know, it's the last time we ever had the conversation.
  • You’re the greatest cutter,...I need an Elon Musk — I need somebody that has a lot of strength and courage and smarts. I want to close up the Department of Education, move education back to the states.
  • Iran is no friend of mine, a lot of bad signals get sent.The reason is because I was strong on Iran and I was protecting people in the Middle East that maybe they aren’t so happy about that.
  • Kamala has declared that tackling inflation will be a Day One priority, but Day One for Kamala was 3½ years ago. Why hasn’t she done it? .‌‌.‌‌She's a critic. That's all she is.
  • Miriam, I watched (Sheldon Adelson, her late husband) sitting so proud in the White House when we gave Miriam the Presidential Medal of Freedom. That’s the highest award you can get as a civilian, it’s the equivalent of the Congressional Medal of Honor, but civilian version. It’s actually much better, because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor – that’s soldiers. They’re either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets, or they’re dead. She gets it and she’s a healthy, beautiful woman, and they’re rated equal.
  • We’re talking about a thing called the economy.
    We’re doing this as an intellectual speech.
    We literally are a third world nation, we literally are a third-world nation. We’re a banana republic in so many ways, and we’re not going to let that happen because we’re starting a free fall.
    For nearly four years Kamala has crackled as the American economy has burned.
    What happened to her laugh? I haven’t heard that laugh in about a week. That’s why they keep her off the stage, that’s why she has disappeared.
    That’s the laugh of a crazy person, I will tell you. She’s crazy.
    Incompetent socialist lunatic.
    Kamabla.
    Rape and murder, rape and beatings, rape and something else, and sometimes just immediate killing. These people are brutal. These are people that came out of the toughest jails anywhere in the world from all over the world, and we can’t take them.
  • She actually called me ‘weird. And she called JD and I ‘weird.’ He’s not weird, he was a great student at Yale.
    We have this guy that’s running a failed, really a very failed state who’s had a terrible career. I mean you have him saying, ‘They’re weird.’ No, he’s a weird guy, and she’s weird in her policy.
  • I watched Sheldon sitting so proud in the White House when we gave Miriam the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
    That's the highest award you can get as a civilian.
    It's the equivalent of the Congressional Medal of Honor, but civilian version.
    It's actually much better because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor, they're soldiers.
    They're either in very bad shape because they've been hit so many times by bullets or they are dead.
    She gets it and she's a healthy, beautiful woman.
    And they're rated equal, but she got the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
  • Kamala will implement SOVIET Style Price Controls. EVERY American will be taxed up to 80% of their income!
    If Kamala is elected and implements her Communist Price Caps, there will be famine, starvation, and poverty, the likes of which we have never seen. America will NEVER recover!
    Kamala Harris wants to raise your taxes and make you pay for free healthcare and free housing in luxury hotels for her millions of illegal aliens.
  • I am much better looking than her. I’m a better looking person than Kamala.
    I say that I’m much better looking than her. I had never heard that one. They said her biggest advantage was that she’s a beautiful-looking woman. Ha. I’d never thought of that.
    I said, who am I running against, Harris? I said, ‘Who the hell is Harris?'
    Joe Biden hates her.
    They will say he’s rambling. I don’t ramble. I’m a really smart guy,
  • You know, he said we’re weird. That J.D. and I are weird. I think we’re extremely normal people. We’re like you, we’re exactly like you.
    He [Tim Walz] is weird. Did you ever see him go on the stage and go, like, crazy? Between his movement and her laugh, there’s a lot of crazy. I’d say a step further than weird, weird is a nice word by comparison.
  • You can’t walk across the street to get a loaf of bread. You get shot, you get mugged, you get raped, you get whatever it may be.
  • I think that women living in the suburbs—I keep hearing about ‘the suburban woman doesn’t like Trump,’ well, I think it’s a fake poll because why wouldn’t they like me? I keep the suburbs safe.
  • My Administration will be great for women and their reproductive rights.
  • Kamala Harris is the weakest presidential candidate in history on crime.
    She’s allowed millions of people to pour through our borders, many from prisons, mental institutions and, indeed, terrorists, coming in at levels never seen before.
    What gives her the right to run for president?
    She got no votes to Biden’s fourteen million.
    She failed in her previous attempt, was the first one out of twenty-two people to quit, never made it to Iowa, and now she’s a presidential candidate?
    This is a threat to democracy!
  • The Harris/Biden administration has been caught fraudulently manipulating job statistics to hide the true extent of the economic ruin that they’ve inflicted on America, Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the administration padded the numbers with an extra, listen to this one, 818,000 jobs that don’t exist.
  • I think to a certain extent it’s Biden’s fault and Harris’s fault. And I’m the opponent. Look, they were weaponizing government against me, they brought in the whole DOJ to try and get me, they weren’t too interested in my health and safety,They’re saying I’m a threat to democracy,They would say that, that was standard line, just keep saying it, and you know that can get assassins or potential assassins going. That’s a terrible thing … Maybe that bullet is because of their rhetoric.
  • I’ll be voting ’no’ for that reason
    “’No’ on (Florida) Amendment 4?”
    For that reason because it‘s radical. You talk about radical. Doing an abortion in the ninth month is unacceptable to anybody…. There‘s something in between, but the six (weeks) is too short, it‘s just too short a period and the nine months is unacceptable…. But for that reason, for the radicalization on the Democrats side, we‘re voting ’no’.
    “…Would you veto a federal abortion ban?”
    I‘m not going to have to think about it because it‘s working out so well right now. The states are doing it. It‘s a states issue…. Well, what‘s happening is you‘re never going to have to do it because it‘s being done by the states. The states are voting. And the people are now getting a chance to vote and this is the way everybody wanted it.
  • It’s crazy. Our country is being poisoned, and your schools and your children are suffering greatly because they’re going into the classrooms, they’re taking the seats and they don’t even speak English.

September 2024

  • I think you believe [in God] more, because when you speak to experts, like my sons who are shooting experts. But when you speak to experts, they said there was no chance that he could have missed from that distance....
    I think you think like, if you believe in God, you believe in God more. And somebody said like, why? And I’d like to think that God thinks that I’m going to straighten out our country. Our country is so sick and it’s so broken. Our country is just broken. And maybe that was the reason, I don’t know. I don’t know, a lot of people have said that.
  • You know, I do the weave. You know what the weave is? I’ll talk about like nine different things, and they all come back brilliantly together and it’s like, and friends of mine that are, like, English professors, they say, ‘It’s the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen.’ But the fake news, you know what they say? ‘He rambled.’
  • [About Project 2025:] I know nothing about it, and they know that, too. Democrats know that, and I purposely haven't read it because I want to say to you I don't, I have no idea what it's all about.
    It's easier than saying I read it and you know, all of the things. No, I purposely haven't read it, and I've heard about it.
    I've heard about things that are in there that I don't like, and there's some things in there that everybody would like, but there are things that I don't like at all.
  • I am proud to represent our Failing Nation in fighting the GREATEST POLITICAL WITCH HUNT IN HISTORY. REMOVE THE GAG ORDER SO THAT I CAN SHOW HOW CORRUPT OUR COURT SYSTEM IS. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES ARE NOT TO BE GAGGED!
  • [Asked about what specific legislation Trump would advance to make child care affordable:] Well, I would do that, and we’re sitting down, and I was, somebody, we had Senator Marco Rubio, and my daughter Ivanka was so impactful on that issue. It’s a very important issue. But I think when you talk about the kind of numbers that I’m talking about, that, because, look, child care is child care is. It’s, couldn’t, you know, there’s something, you have to have it. In this country you have to have it. But when you talk about those numbers compared to the kind of numbers that I’m talking about by taxing foreign nations at levels that they’re not used to — but they’ll get used to it very quickly – and it’s not gonna stop them from doing business with us, but they’ll have a very substantial tax when they send product into our country. Those numbers are so much bigger than any numbers that we’re talking about, including child care, that it’s going to take care. We’re gonna have — I, I look forward to having no deficits within a fairly short period of time, coupled with the reductions that I told you about on waste and fraud and all of the other things that are going on in our country, because I have to stay with child care. I want to stay with child care, but those numbers are small relative to the kind of economic numbers that I’m talking about, including growth, but growth also headed up by what the plan is that I just, that I just told you about. We’re gonna be taking in trillions of dollars, and as much as child care is talked about as being expensive, it’s relatively speaking not very expensive compared to the kind of numbers we’ll be taking in. We’re going to make this into an incredible country that can afford to take care of its people, and then we’ll worry about the rest of the world. Let’s help other people. But we’re going to take care of our country first. This is about America first. It’s about Make America Great Again. We have to do it because right now we’re a failing nation, so we’ll take care of it.
  • But the transgender thing is incredible. Think of it. Your kid goes to school and comes home a few days later with an operation. The school decides what's going to happen with your child. And you know, many of these childs [sic] 15 years later say, 'What the hell happened? Who did this to me?' They say, 'Who did this to me?' It's incredible.
  • As the first order of business, this commission will develop an action plan to totally eliminate fraud and improper payments within six months, saving trillions of dollars
  • WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again.
    Please beware that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials. Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.
  • The moment we win, we will rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner unjustly victimized by the Harris regime, and I will sign their pardons on day one. With your vote this election, their lying, cheating, thieving, hoaxing, and plotting will come to an end. We got to stop the cheating. If we stop that cheating, if we don't let them cheat, I don't even have to campaign anymore. We're going to win by so much.
  • Nobody can draw crowds like me... I’m the greatest of all time. Maybe greater even than Elvis. Elvis had a guitar, I don’t have a guitar. I don’t have the privilege of a guitar.
  • She doesn’t like doing interviews. And she’s not knowledgeable about economy and various things, and I think it would be a problem. But you know what? [Biden] was pretty much gone. They said, ‘Joe, it’s over. You’re getting out.’ And they put her in, and she somehow — a woman — somehow she’s doing better than he did. But I can’t imagine it can last.

1st Debate with Kamala Harris (September 10, 2024)

  • in response to Kamala Harris bringing up Project 2025:
    …she knows better than anyone, I have nothing to do with Project 2025. That's out there. I haven't read it. I don't want to read it, purposely. I'm not going to read it. This was a group of people that got together, they came up with some ideas. I guess some good, some bad. But it makes no difference. I have nothing to do -- everybody knows I'm an open book. Everybody knows what I'm going to do. Cut taxes very substantially. And create a great economy like I did before.
  • regarding inflation during the Biden presidency:
    I had no inflation, virtually no inflation, they had the highest inflation, perhaps in the history of our country because I've never seen a worse period of time. People can't go out and buy cereal bacon or eggs or anything else. These the people of our country are absolutely dying with what they've done. They've destroyed the economy and all you have to do it look at a poll. The polls say 80 and 85 and even 90% that the Trump economy was great that their economy was terrible.
  • We hardly make chips anymore because of philosophies like they have and policies like they have. I don't say her because she has no policy. Everything that she believed three years ago and four years ago is out the window. She's going to my philosophy now. In fact, I was going to send her a MAGA hat. She's gone to my philosophy. But if she ever got elected, she'd change it. And it will be the end of our country. She's a Marxist. Everybody knows she's a Marxist.
  • But when you look at what she's done to our country and when you look at these millions and millions of people that are pouring into our country monthly where it's I believe 21 million people, not the 15 that people say, and I think it's a lot higher than the 21. That's bigger than New York state. Pouring in. And just look at what they're doing to our country. They're criminals. Many of these people coming in are criminals. And that's bad for our economy too.
  • LINSEY DAVIS: …Vice President Harris says that women shouldn't trust you on the issue of abortion because you've changed your position so many times. Therefore, why should they trust you?
    Well, the reason I'm doing that vote [voting “no” on the Florida abortion ban] is because the plan is, as you know, the vote is, they have abortion in the ninth month. They even have, and you can look at the governor of West Virginia, the previous governor of West Virginia, not the current governor, who's doing an excellent job, but the governor before. He said the baby will be born and we will decide what to do with the baby. In other words, we'll execute the baby.
  • But her vice presidential pick [Tim Walz] says abortion in the ninth month is absolutely fine. He also says execution after birth, it's execution, no longer abortion, because the baby is born, is okay. And that's not okay with me. Hence the vote. But what I did is something for 52 years they've been trying to get Roe v. Wade into the states.
  • And now states are voting on it. And for the first time you're going to see -- look, this is an issue that's torn our country apart for 52 years. Every legal scholar, every Democrat, every Republican, liberal, conservative, they all wanted this issue to be brought back to the states where the people could vote. And that's what happened, happened.
  • KAMALA HARRIS: …But understand, if Donald Trump were to be re-elected, he will sign a national abortion ban….
    I’m not signing a ban. And there's no reason to sign a ban. Because we've gotten what everybody wanted. Democrats, Republicans and everybody else and every legal scholar wanted it to be brought back into the states. And the states are voting. And it may take a little time, but for 52 years this issue has torn our country apart. And they've wanted it back in the states. And I did something that nobody thought was possible. The states are now voting. What she says is an absolute lie. And as far as the abortion ban, no, I'm not in favor of abortion ban. But it doesn't matter because this issue has now been taken over by the states.
  • KAMALA HARRIS: …You will see during the course of his rallies he talks about fictional characters like Hannibal Lecter. He will talk about windmills cause cancer. And what you will also notice is that people start leaving his rallies early out of exhaustion and boredom….
    First let me respond as to the rallies. She said people start leaving. People don't go to her rallies. There's no reason to go. And the people that do go, she's busing them in and paying them to be there. And then showing them in a different light. So, she can't talk about that. People don't leave my rallies. We have the biggest rallies, the most incredible rallies in the history of politics. That's because people want to take their country back. Our country is being lost. We're a failing nation. And it happened three and a half years ago. And what, what's going on here, you're going to end up in World War 3, just to go into another subject. What they have done to our country by allowing these millions and millions of people to come into our country. And look at what's happening to the towns all over the United States. And a lot of towns don't want to talk -- not going to be Aurora or Springfield. A lot of towns don't want to talk about it because they're so embarrassed by it. In Springfield, they're eating the dogs. The people that came in. They're eating the cats. They're eating -- they're eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what's happening in our country. And it's a shame….
    DAVID MUIR: I just want to clarify here, you bring up Springfield, Ohio. And ABC News did reach out to the city manager there. He told us there have been no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community --
    Well, I've seen people on television
    DAVID MUIR: Let me just say here this ...
    The people on television say my dog was taken and used for food. So maybe he said that and maybe that's a good thing to say for a city manager.
    DAVID MUIR: I'm not taking this from television. I'm taking it from the city manager.
    But the people on television say their dog was eaten by the people that went there.
    DAVID MUIR: Again, the Springfield city manager says there's no evidence of that.
    *We'll find out.
  • But just to finish, I got more votes than any Republican in history by far. In fact, I got more votes than any president, sitting president in history by far.
  • DAVID MUIR: You also said you would use local police. How would you deport 11 million undocumented immigrants? I know you believe that number is much higher….
    Yeah. It is much higher because of them. They allowed criminals. Many, many, millions of criminals. They allowed terrorists. They allowed common street criminals. They allowed people to come in, drug dealers, to come into our country, and they're now in the United States. And told by their countries like Venezuela don't ever come back or we're going to kill you. Do you know that crime in Venezuela and crime in countries all over the world is way down? You know why? Because they've taken their criminals off the street and they've given them to her to put into our country. And this will be one of the greatest mistakes in history for them to allow -- and I think they probably did it because they think they're going to get votes. But it's not worth it. Because they're destroying the fabric of our country by what they've done. There's never been anything done like this at all. They've destroyed the fabric of our country. Millions of people let in. And all over the world crime is down. All over the world except here. Crime here is up and through the roof. Despite their fraudulent statements that they made. Crime in this country is through the roof. And we have a new form of crime. It's called migrant crime. And it's happening at levels that nobody thought possible.
    DAVID MUIR: President Trump, as you know, the FBI says overall violent crime is actually coming down in this country, but Vice President the...
    Excuse me, the FBI -- they were defrauding statements. They didn't include the worst cities. They didn't include the cities with the worst crime. It was a fraud. Just like their number of 818,000 jobs that they said they created turned out to be a fraud.
  • Responding to Harris listing the criminal cases against Trump:
    Excuse me. Every one of those cases was started by them against their political opponent. And I'm winning most of them and I'll win the rest on appeal. And you saw that with the decision that came down just recently from the Supreme Court. I'm winning most of them. But those are cases, it's called weaponization. Never happened in this country. They weaponized the justice department. Every one of those cases was involved with the DOJ, from Atlanta and Fani Willis -- to the attorney general of New York and the D.A. In New York. Every one of those cases. And then they say oh, he was -- he's a criminal. They're the ones that made them go after me. By the way, Joe Biden was found essentially guilty on the documents case. And what happened in my documents case? They said oh, that's the toughest of them all. A complete and total victory. Two months ago it was thrown out. It's weaponization. And they used it. And it's never happened in this country. They used it to try and win an election. They're fake cases….
    …This is the one that weaponized. Not me. She weaponized. I probably took a bullet to the head because of the things that they say about me. They talk about democracy. I'm a threat to democracy. They're the threat to democracy – With the fake Russia Russia Russia investigation that went nowhere.
  • Responding to Harris‘ statement that he inherited $400 million:
    Well, first of all, I wasn't given $400 million. I wish I was. My father was a Brooklyn builder. Brooklyn, Queens. And a great father and I learned a lot from him. But I was given a fraction of that, a tiny fraction, and I built it into many, many billions of dollars. Many, many billions. And when people see it, they are even surprised. So, we don't have to talk about that.
  • She went out -- she went out in Minnesota and wanted to let criminals that killed people, that burned down Minneapolis, she went out and raised money to get them out of jail. She did things that nobody would ever think of. Now she wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison. This is a radical left liberal that would do this. She wants to confiscate your guns and she will never allow fracking in Pennsylvania. If she won the election, fracking in Pennsylvania will end on day one.
  • Because the prices of energy were quadrupling and doubling. You saw what happened to gasoline. So, they said let’s go back to Trump. But if she won the election, the day after that election, they’ll go back to destroying our country and oil will be dead, fossil fuel will be dead. We’ll go back to windmills and we’ll go back to solar, where they need a whole desert to get some energy to come out. You ever see a solar plant? By the way, I’m a big fan of solar. But they take 400, 500 acres of desert soil— These are not good things for the environment that she understands.
  • DAVID MUIR: You were the president. You were watching [the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol] unfold on television. It’s a very simple question as we move forward toward another election. Is there anything you regret about what you did on that day? Yes or no.
    I had nothing to do with that other than they asked me to make a speech. I showed up for a speech. I said, I think it’s going to be big. I went to Nancy Pelosi and the mayor of Washington, D.C. And the mayor put it back in writing, as you know. I said, you know, this is going to be a very big rally or whatever you want to call it. And again, it wasn’t done by me. It was done by others. I said I’d like to give you 10,000 National Guard or soldiers. They rejected me. Nancy Pelosi rejected me. It was just two weeks ago, her daughter has a tape of her saying she is fully responsible for what happened. They want to get rid of that tape. It would have never happened if Nancy Pelosi and the mayor of Washington did their jobs. I wasn’t responsible for security. Nancy Pelosi was responsible. She didn’t do her job.
  • DAVID MUIR: Are you now acknowledging that you lost in 2020?
    No, I don’t acknowledge that at all.
    DAVID MUIR: But you did say that.
    I said that sarcastically. You know that. It was said, oh we lost by a whisker. That was said sarcastically. Look, there’s so much proof. All you have to do is look at it. And they should have sent it back to the legislatures for approval. I got almost 75 million votes. The most votes any sitting president has ever gotten. I was told if I got 63, which was what I got in 2016, you can’t be beaten. The election, people should never be thinking about an election as fraudulent. We need two things. We need walls. We need — and we have to have it. We have to have borders. And we have to have good elections.
    Our elections are bad. And a lot of these illegal immigrants coming in, they’re trying to get them to vote. They can’t even speak English. They don’t even know what country they’re in practically. And these people are trying to get them to vote. And that’s why they’re allowing them to come into our country.
  • DAVID MUIR: And [many judges] said there was no widespread [election] fraud.
    No judge looked at it. They said we didn’t have standing. That’s the other thing. They said we didn’t have standing. A technicality. Can you imagine a system where a person in an election doesn’t have standing, the President of the United States doesn’t have standing? That’s how we lost. If you look at the facts, and I’d love to have you — you’ll do a special on it. I’ll show you Georgia and I’ll show you Wisconsin and I’ll show you Pennsylvania and I’ll show you — we have so many facts and statistics. But you know what? That doesn’t matter. Because we have to solve the problem that we have right now. That’s old news. And the problem that we have right now is we have a nation in decline and they have put it into decline. We have a nation that is dying, David
  • KAMALA HARRIS: …And world leaders are laughing at Donald Trump. I have talked with military leaders, some of whom worked with you. And they say you’re a disgrace….
    DAVID MUIR: I’ll give you one minute to respond, Mr. President.
    Let me just tell you about world leaders. Viktor Orban, one of the most respected men — they call him a strong man. He’s a tough person. Smart. Prime Minister of Hungary. They said why is the whole world blowing up? Three years ago it wasn’t. Why is it blowing up? He said because you need Trump back as president. They were afraid of him. China was afraid. And I don’t like to use the word afraid but I’m just quoting him. China was afraid of him. North Korea was afraid of him. Look at what’s going on with North Korea, by the way. He said Russia was afraid of him….
    Look, Viktor Orban said it. He said the most respected, most feared person is Donald Trump. We had no problems when Trump was president. But when this weak pathetic man that you saw at a debate just a few months ago that if he weren’t in that debate he’d be running instead of her, she got no votes, he got 14 million votes, what you did, you talk about a threat to democracy. He got 14 million votes [in the primaries] and they threw him out of office. And you know what? I’ll give you a little secret. He hates her. He can’t stand her…. But he had 14 million votes. They threw them out. She got zero votes. And when she ran, she was the first one to leave because she failed. And now she’s running. I don’t understand it but I’m okay with it – because I think we’re going to do pretty well.
  • LINSEY DAVIS: President Trump, how would you negotiate with Netanyahu and also Hamas in order to get the hostages out and prevent the killing of more innocent civilians in Gaza?
    If I were president it would have never started. If I were president Russia would have never, ever -- I know Putin very well. He would have never -- and there was no threat of it either, by the way, for four years. Have gone into Ukraine and killed millions of people when you add it up.
  • She hates Israel. If she's president, I believe that Israel will not exist within two years from now. And I've been pretty good at predictions. And I hope I'm wrong about that one. She hates Israel. At the same time in her own way she hates the Arab population because the whole place is going to get blown up, Arabs, Jewish people, Israel. Israel will be gone. It would have never happened. Iran was broke under Donald Trump. Now Iran has $300 billion because they took off all the sanctions that I had. Iran had no money for Hamas or Hezbollah or any of the 28 different spheres of terror.
  • KAMALA HARRIS: …It is well known that he said of Putin that he can do whatever the hell he wants and go into Ukraine. It is well known when that he said when Russia went into Ukraine it was brilliant….
    They're the ones -- and she's the one that caused it, that's weak on national security by allowing every nation last month for the year, 168 different countries sending people into our country. Their crime rates are way down. Putin endorsed her last week. Said I hope she wins. And I think he meant it. Because what he's gotten away with is absolutely incredible. It wouldn't have happened with me.
  • DAVID MUIR: …You have said you would solve this war [in Ukraine] in 24 hours. How exactly would you do that? And I want to ask you a very simple question tonight. Do you want Ukraine to win this war?
    I want to get the war settled. I know Zelenskyy very well and I know Putin very well. I have a good relationship. And they respect your president. Okay? They respect me. They don't respect Biden….
    If I win, when I'm President-Elect, and what I'll do is I'll speak to one, I'll speak to the other, I'll get them together. That war would have never happened. And in fact when I saw Putin after I left, unfortunately left because our country has gone to hell, but after I left when I saw him building up soldiers, he did it after I left, I said oh, he must be negotiating. It must be a good strong point of negotiation. Well, it wasn't because Biden had no idea how to talk to him. He had no idea how to stop it. And now you have millions of people dead and it's only getting worse and it could lead to World War 3. Don't kid yourself, David. We're playing with World War 3.
  • And we have a president that we don't even know if he's -- where is our president? We don't even know if he's a president.
    DAVID MUIR: And just to clarify here.
    They threw him out of a campaign like a dog. We don't even know, is he our president? But we have a president…
    DAVID MUIR: Mr. President,--
    …that doesn't know he's alive.
  • KAMALA HARRIS: …If Donald Trump were president, Putin would be sitting in Kyiv right now….
    Putin would be sitting in Moscow and he wouldn't have lost 300,000 men and women. But he would have been sitting in Moscow… But eventually, you know, he's got a thing that other people don't have. He's got nuclear weapons. They don't ever talk about that. He's got nuclear weapons. Nobody ever thinks about that. And eventually uh maybe he'll use them. Maybe he hasn't been that threatening. But he does have that. Something we don't even like to talk about.
  • And that's the kind of talent we have with her. She's worse than Biden. In my opinion, I think he's the worst president in the history of our country. She goes down as the worst vice president in the history of our country. But let me tell you something. She is a horrible negotiator. They sent her in to negotiate. As soon as they left Putin did the invasion.
  • KAMALA HARRIS: [Regarding a peace deal Trump negotiated to end the Afghan War:] He bypassed the Afghan government. He negotiated directly with a terrorist organization called the Taliban. The negotiation involved the Taliban getting 5,000 terrorists, Taliban terrorists released.
    So if you take a look at that period of time, the Taliban was killing our soldiers, a lot of them, with snipers. And I got involved with the Taliban because the Taliban was doing the killing. That's the fighting force within Afghanistan. They don't bother doing that because you know, they deal with the wrong people all the time. But I got involved. And Abdul is the head of the Taliban. He is still the head of the Taliban. And I told Abdul don't do it anymore, you do it anymore you're going to have problems. And he said why do you send me a picture of my house? I said you're going to have to figure that out, Abdul. And for 18 months we had nobody killed. We did have an agreement negotiated by Mike Pompeo. It was a very good agreement. The reason it was good, it was -- we were getting out. We would have been out faster than them, but we wouldn't have lost the soldiers. We wouldn't have left many Americans behind. And we wouldn't have left -- we wouldn't have left $85 billion worth of brand new beautiful military equipment behind. And just to finish, they blew it. The agreement said you have to do this, this, this, this, this, and they didn't do it. They didn't do it. The agreement was, was terminated by us because they didn't do what they were supposed to do.
  • DAVID MUIR: …Why do you believe it's appropriate to weigh in on the racial identity of your opponent?
    I don't. And I don't care. I don't care what she is. I don't care. You make a big deal out of something. I couldn't care less. Whatever she wants to be is okay with me.
    DAVID MUIR: But those were your words. So, I'm asking --
    I don't know. I don't know. All I can say is I read where she was not Black, that she put out. And, I'll say that. And then I read that she was black. And that's okay. Either one was okay with me. That's up to her. That's up to her.
  • KAMALA HARRIS: …Let's remember, this is the same individual who took out a full-page ad in The New York Times calling for the execution of five young Black and Latino boys who were innocent, the Central Park Five. Took out a full-page ad calling for their execution….
    This is the most divisive presidency in the history of our country. There's never been anything like it. They're destroying our country. And they come up with things like what she just said going back many, many years when a lot of people including Mayor Bloomberg agreed with me on the Central Park Five. They admitted -- they said, they pled guilty. And I said, well, if they pled guilty they badly hurt a person, killed a person ultimately. And if they pled guilty -- then they pled we're not guilty.
  • I built one of the greatest economies in the history of the world and I'm going to build it again. It's going to be bigger, better and stronger. But they're destroying our economy. They have no idea what a good economy is. Their oil policies -- every single policy -- and remember this. She is Biden. She's trying to get away from Biden. I don't know the gentleman, she says. She is Biden. The worst inflation we've ever had. A horrible economy because inflation has made it so bad and she can't get away with that.
  • She is destroying our country. She has a plan to defund the police. She has a plan to confiscate everybody's gun. She has a plan to not allow fracking in Pennsylvania or anywhere else. That's what her plan is until just recently.
  • LINSEY DAVIS: …So tonight, nine years after you first started running, do you have a [healthcare] plan and can you tell us what it is?
    Obamacare was lousy health care. Always was. It's not very good today. And what I said, that if we come up with something, we are working on things, we're going to do it and we're going to replace it…. And what we will do is we're looking at different plans. If we can come up with a plan that's going to cost our people, our population less money and be better health care than Obamacare, then I would absolutely do it. But until then I'd run it as good as it can be run.
    LINSEY DAVIS: So just a yes or no, you still do not have a plan?
    I have concepts of a plan. I'm not president right now. But if we come up with something I would only change it if we come up with something better and less expensive. And there are concepts and options we have to do that. And you'll be hearing about it in the not-too-distant future.
  • Closing Statement:
    …We're a failing nation. We're a nation that's in serious decline. We're being laughed at all over the world. All over the world, they laugh, I know the leaders very well. They're coming to see me. They call me. We're laughed at all over the world. They don't understand what happened to us as a nation. We're not a leader. We don't have any idea what's going on. We have wars going on in the Middle East. We have wars going on with Russia and Ukraine. We're going to end up in a third World War. And it will be a war like no other because of nuclear weapons, the power of weaponry. I rebuilt our entire military. She gave a lot of it away to the Taliban. She gave it to Afghanistan. What these people have done to our country, and maybe toughest of all is allowing millions of people to come into our country, many of them are criminals, and they're destroying our country. The worst president, the worst vice president in the history of our country.
  • It was 3 on 1, but they were mentally challenged people, against one person of extraordinary genius.
  • They didn't correct her [Harris] once and they corrected me. Everything I said, practically, I think 9 times or 11 times. And the audience was absolutely, they went crazy. And the real, I thought, I walked off and I said, 'that was a great debate, I loved it.'


Disputed

  • Do you still like having sex with your wife? How often? You must have had a better fuck than your wife? Tell me about it. I have girls coming in from Los Angeles at three o'clock. We can go upstairs and have a great time. I promise.
  • I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.
    • Reported as being the words of President Trump recorded in a memo that James Comey, FBI Director at the time, wrote shortly after a meeting held in the Oval Office on 14 February 2017, referring to the federal investigation into links to the Russian government of national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, who had resigned the day before. In a statement, the White House has denied the version of events in the memo. — New York Times (16 May 2017)
    • Comey confirmed under oath his account of Trump's words while appearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee (8 June 2017)
    • When asked about Comey's testimony during a press conference on 9 June 2017, Trump said, "I didn't say that. I will tell you I didn't say that. And there'd be nothing wrong if I did say it according to everybody that I've read today, but I did not say that."
  • Why do we need more Haitians? Take them out.
    • Reportedly said in a meeting with lawmakers on immigration, as quoted in "'Sh*thole countries' respond to Trump's rhetoric", CBS News. Trump denied making this comment.
    • "Never said anything derogatory about Haitians other than Haiti is, obviously, a very poor and troubled country. Never said "take them out." Made up by Dems. I have a wonderful relationship with Haitians. Probably should record future meetings - unfortunately, no trust!" Tweet by @realDonaldTrump (12 January 2018)
  • Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers .. suckers .. Who were the good guys in this war?
    • Saturday 10 November 2018 two hours before a scheduled 30-minute helicopter ride from Paris to the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery, the visit was cancelled with White House stating a rainy forecast made it too dangerous
    • 3 September 2020 TheAtlantic.com writer Jeffrey Goldberg stated that "four people with firsthand knowledge of the discussion that day" (Goldberg did not provide any names) that "Trump rejected the idea of the visit because he feared his hair would become disheveled in the rain, and because he did not believe it important to honor American war dead", and described the two-sentence quote above as part of "a conversation with senior staff members on the morning of the scheduled visit".
      • Goldberg also stated that during the trip (in a separate conversation) that Trump used the term "suckers" to collectively describe the 1800+ marines who died at Belleau Wood, but did not provide any surrounding words (the purported quote was the only word in quotation marks)
      • the sentence about "good guys" Goldberg says was stated towards aides (not senior staff members)
        • Goldberg did state a number regarding witness count of the other two statements, only for the "losers" one
    • 4 September 2020 Trump responded to Goldberg's piece "It’s a total lie. It’s fake news".
    • Trump also tweeted that day: "The Atlantic Magazine is dying, like most magazines, so they make up a fake story in order to gain some relevance. Story already refuted, but this is what we are up against."
    • press secretary Kayleigh McEnany also on September 4th stated "The story in the Atlantic has been categorically debunked by eyewitnesses and contemporaneous documents", quoting two service members:
      • ""I was with the president the morning after the scheduled visit. He was extremely disappointed that arrangements could not be made to get him to the site and that the trip had been cancelled. I have worked with the president for his entire administration .. I have never heard him utter a disparaging remark of any kind about our troops." - Derek Lyons
      • "there was a bad weather called in France and that the helicopters were unable to safely make the flight. Overall, the president's support and respect for our American troops past and present is unquestionable" - Dan Walsh
    • following Goldberg's piece that same day, James LaPorta wrote on AP "A senior Defense Department official with firsthand knowledge of events and a senior U.S. Marine Corps officer who was told about Trump’s comments confirmed some of the remarks to The Associated Press, including the 2018 cemetery comments."



Misattributed

  • I have a really high IQ, Phil. I mean, c'mon. It's impossible for me to not be atheist.
    • Attributed by photo meme to an appearance on The Phil Donahue Show in 1989. According to Snopes.com, there is no evidence he ever said this, nor that he even appeared on The Phil Donahue Show in 1989.
  • If I were to run, I'd run as a Republican. They're the dumbest group of voters in the country. They believe anything on Fox News. I could lie and they'd still eat it up. I bet my numbers would be terrific.
    • There is no record of Trump ever saying this; sometimes "People magazine, 1998" is incorrectly given as the "source" of this quotation — snopes.com; truthorfiction.com
  • The harder I work, the luckier I get.
    • Originated with Samuel Goldwyn as a paraphrase of a proverb from a collection by Coleman Cox, but similar proverbs have existed since the 16th century. [62]
  • Life is what you do while you're waiting to die.
  • People are dying today that have never died before.
  • My blood IS the vaccine!!!!!
    • Originates from a fabricated screenshot of a tweet allegedly posted on October 5, 2020, the same day Trump was released from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center after his diagnosis of COVID-19. [64] The fictitious quote likely refers to the donation of the blood plasma of COVID-19 survivors as a treatment method against catching the disease, a treatment of which Trump has been a vocal supporter. Trump has, however, suggested that he would consider donating his own plasma for this purpose. [65]

Quotes about Trump

Alphabetized by surname.
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Donald Trump's voice is resonating with average Americans who feel their voice has been lost by their party. I believe this will become a new Republican Party, one that we should embrace. We should be the party of working men and women, the party of America first. ~ Lou Barletta
Donald Trump, I really truly believe is a very dangerous man. If you listen to the things he said... He has joked about killing reporters. ~ Glenn Beck
The neutrality of this article is disputed.
Please see the relevant discussion on the talk page.

A

I don't know him, when I sit with him face-to-face, I can judge him. But I only look at the person on the TV. ~ Bashar al-Assad
  • We have a commander-in-chief who has never failed to signal his xenophobia, his racism, his bigotry and his hatred. And that will absolutely filter down to the youngest and most impressionable members of our communities.
  • The meta-impact of President Trump routinely doing the "impossible" is that it changes how all of us view our world. If Trump can keep doing the impossible, time and time again, why can't we? [...] [D]on't be surprised if 2018 is the year when people all over the world shed their mental prisons and take on the "impossibles" in ways we have never seen. Thanks to President Trump, people everywhere are beginning to recognize the difference between real impossibilities and simple failures of imagination.
  • Trump gives about four months for Syria troop pull-out: NYT
    • Aljazeera, 1 January 2019 in response to 31 December 2019 article by Eric Schmitt and Maggie Haberman of New York Times titled "Trump to Allow Months for Troop Withdrawal in Syria, Officials Say" that says "Trump has agreed to give the military about four months to withdraw the 2,000 United States troops in Syria, administration officials said on Monday"
  • I think it's funny because Donald Trump is kind of in the spirit of old Greek tyrants where they used to vote in a guy that had no encumbrances. So the smartest thing about him, which is probably most overlooked, to me, is that he doesn't owe anybody anything and if he would just stick to fixing the bridges, roads and infrastructures that's what he knows how to do...just keep him doing that.
  • I think Trump failed to pull off his coup because of three enduring weaknesses in his character. First, many high school students know more about how the American government works than he does. He particularly does not understand the way the Constitution’s division of powers, even after all the growth in executive power over the decades, still can check an overreaching president. Thus he seems to have assumed that Republican judges would agree the election had been rigged simply because they were Republicans, when actually they were foremost judges in an independent judiciary bound by precedent, by a duty to see that justice is done, and by a demand for evidence. Similarly, Congress has many ties to executive agencies such as the FBI and the Department of Defense, especially the ties that bind with purse strings, that give it considerable influence in these agencies.
    Second, organizing something as complicated as a coup d’etat takes some serious cognitive chops, and by 2020 Donald Trump had trouble “staying on topic” for even a minute. If he were huddling with a conspirator over, say, control of the U.S. Marshalls during a takeover, he would soon be talking about how windmills kill eagles or the steam catapults on aircraft carriers. His thinking processes were too chaotic to orchestrate a coup.
    Third, even though Donald Trump convinced millions that he was a self-assured, super-confident, take-charge individualist, he has long lacked resolve. He always had the courage of his convictions, which meant he had almost none. He frequently changed positions on important issues, notoriously being swayed by whoever spoke to him last, and his decision-making could be fairly characterized as “Charge ahead impulsively, then quickly retreat.” For example, two days after the networks declared Joe Biden had won the election, Trump signed an executive order commanding the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan and elsewhere by inauguration day. This surprised everyone at the Pentagon, whose officials immediately pointed out the dangers of precipitate withdrawals. Trump almost never went toe-to-toe with advisors who stood up to him. Instead he just sulked and complained about having “too many lawyers.” Like the executive order Trump signed curtailing military aid to South Korea that an aide simply took off his desk and deep-sixed, the order about Afghanistan was ignored.
    Harry Truman famously said, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,” and he had a sign on his desk that read, “The buck stops here.” Trump can’t stand the heat, and accordingly he always makes sure the buck stops somewhere else. Like most bullies, he usually gets another person to do his dirty work and face all the danger. The mob who attacked the Capitol on January 6th were the latest version of the throngs who bought Trump’s junk bonds in earlier days, taking all the risks, for his benefit, while he watched.
  • What's more appalling is that huge numbers of those left behind in the wealth transfer genuflected to the new plutocratic class, celebrating the most vicious of the uber- CEOs. This craven CEO-worshipping is still going on today- middle Americans drag themselves home after work in order to gather around the television and watch billionaire assholes like Donald Trump deliver his "You're fired!" line to some desperate, stressed-out Smithers-abee.
    • Mark Ames, Going Postal: Rage, Murder and Rebellion: From Reagan's Workplaces to Clinton's Columbine and Beyond (2005), p. 87-88
  • He really does remind you of the original Narcissus, the frigid pretty boy of Greek myth who was mortally smitten by his own reflection. Narcissus is autoerotic; he is self-aroused.
  • Yes, Trump is worse than imperfect. So what? We can lament until we choke the lack of a great statesman to address the fundamental issues of our time—or, more importantly, to connect them. Since Pat Buchanan's three failures, occasionally a candidate arose who saw one piece: Dick Gephardt on trade, Ron Paul on war, Tom Tancredo on immigration. Yet, among recent political figures—great statesmen, dangerous demagogues, and mewling gnats alike—only Trump-the-alleged-buffoon not merely saw all three and their essential connectivity, but was able to win on them. The alleged buffoon is thus more prudent—more practically wise—than all of our wise-and-good who so bitterly oppose him. This should embarrass them. That their failures instead embolden them is only further proof of their foolishness and hubris.
  • Trump is not the only president in the modern era to have switched sides. Ronald Reagan famously changed from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party, but the change was driven by principle, and the change stuck. He didn't sway back and forth, again and again. It would be tough for anyone to claim Donald Trump flipped parties on "principle" like Reagan. Some have sought to dig into Trump's ideological evolution, figuring out what changed or who inspired him to become a Republican. I'll spare them the needless waste of effort. Donald Trump became a conservative when it became politically convenient for him. I have no doubt he would have become the raucous rising star of the Democratic Party, too, if that looked like a shorter path to the Oval Office. Either way, he did with his belief system what he did with any Trump product. He outsourced it for low-cost manufacturing to someone else, then slapped his name on it. A handful of hired minions gave him the bare-bones requirements of a "conservative" platform. And he covered it with gaudy gold plating to make it his own.
    • Anonymous, A Warning (2019), p. 97
  • Donald Trump has America back on the road to bankruptcy, an area where he has unparalleled expertise for a president of the United States. The small band of fiscal conservatives who remain in the Trump administration warned the president about the eventual dangers of his out-of-control spending addiction. In one such meeting, Trump reportedly said, "Yeah, but I won't be here." I never heard him say those words, but it doesn't come as a surprise. That's how he thinks. What does he care if the federal government goes belly-up? By then it won't be his problem.
    • Anonymous, A Warning (2019), p. 101
  • The president's denial-turned-apathy to Moscow's actions is why America responded with the diplomatic equivalent of a whimper to one of the biggest foreign affronts to our democracy. Of all the failures of Trump's foreign policy, letting Russia off the hook is perhaps the most frustrating. The outgoing Obama administration imposed modest sanctions on Moscow, including expelling several dozen alleged Russian agents from the United States, but it left the rest to the incoming White House. Trump was reluctant to take further action that might offend Putin, with whom he hoped to develop a close working relationship. He hesitated to even raise the subject in conversations with the Russian leader, dumbfounding people on the inside. I remember when Congress sanctioned Russia in summer 2017. Representatives vented their anger over how little the administration had done to hold Russia accountable, so they took matters into their own hands and passed legislation punishing the country. Though he would later take credit for the sanctions in order to claim our administration had been unusually tough on Moscow, Trump in fact was furious. He felt Congress was getting in the way of his goal of a warm friendship with the Kremlin. Russia responded to the sanctions by kicking out hundreds of US embassy staff from their country and seizing US diplomatic compounds. President Trump's response was startling. "I want to thank him because we're trying to cut down on payroll," Trump told reporters about Putin's move, without a hint of irony. "And as far as I'm concerned, I'm very thankful that he let go a large number of people, because now we have a smaller payroll. There's no real reason for them to go back. So I greatly appreciate the fact that we've been able to cut our payroll of the United States. We'll save a lot of money."
    • Anonymous, A Warning (2019), p. 164-165
  • Trump's cavalier attitude toward the Russian security threat has had a predictable yet devastating consequence. Moscow has not been deterred from attacking American interests. It has been emboldened. They continue to take advantage of the United States, around the world and on our own soil. Former director of National Intelligence Dan Coats testified in January 2019 that Russia was still sowing social, racial, and political discord in the United States through influence operations, and several months later, Robert Mueller said the same. "It wasn't a single attempt," he testified to Congress. "They're doing it as we sit here. And they expect to do it during the next campaign." This should be a national scandal, a cause for outrage and action against the Russian government. Instead, it's being ignored where it should matter most- in the Oval Office. Reporters asked Trump about Mueller's assessment days later and quizzed him again on whether he'd pressed Putin on the topic. "You don't really believe this," he shot back. "Do you believe this? Okay, fine. We didn't talk about it." Then he boarded Marine One.
    • Anonymous, A Warning (2019), p. 167
  • As we tried to make sense of Donald Trump's positions or when one of us tried to argue against them, we first had to ask: Why is the president so attracted to autocrats? After a contentious meeting about the president's engagement with a foreign dictator, a top national security aide offered me his take. "The president sees in these guys what he wishes he had: total power, no term limits, enforced popularity, and the ability to silence critics for good." He was spot on. It was the simplest explanation.
    • Anonymous, A Warning (2019), p. 171
  • Mr. Trump is a wild card, but he is likely to sign pro-life measures, and he is seeking advice now from the right people to appoint a plausible successor to Justice Scalia. In this Guide for the Perplexed, we may find reason to bite our lips and take the Wild Card over the brutal Sure Thing on the other side.
  • My analysis is that Trump would not be permitted to win. Why do I say that? Because he has had every establishment off his side. Trump does not have one establishment, maybe with the exception of the Evangelicals, if you can call them an establishment. Banks, intelligence, arms companies, foreign money, etc. are all united behind Hillary Clinton. And the media as well. Media owners, and the journalists themselves.
  • There is no greater sacrifice than to lay down one's life for their country, and that's the sacrifice that Captain Humayum Khan made fighting to defend our freedom and our constitutional rights. He was a true American hero. The Khan family deserves nothing less than our deepest support, respect, and gratitude, and they have every right to express themselves in any way they choose. I am appalled that Donald Trump would disparage them and that he had the gall to compare his own sacrifices to those of a Gold Star family.
    • Kelly Ayotte, statement regarding Donald Trump's comments about Khizr and Ghazala Khan [66] (July 31, 2016)

B

  • Attached hereto is a copy of Mr. Trump's birth certificate, demonstrating that he is the son of Fred Trump, not an orangutan.
    • Scott Balber, Donald Trump's lawyer, to comedian Bill Maher (2013), in response to Maher's facetious assertion that he'd pay Trump $5 million dollars upon release of Trump's birth certificate to prove he was not sired by an orangutan. [67] [68]
  • Interesting nugget here as well. @tparsi had been informed by a Hill staffer in touch with the Pentagon that military strikes were imminent. Apparently everyone thought these strikes were really happening right up until the last moment. @esaagar ... @tparsi also warns that any military strike could easily lead to full blown conflict. "The Idea that there's such a thing as a limited strike on Iran is frankly preposterous." ... Interview with Head of the National Iranian American Council @tparsi . He told us it would be "political suicide" for any Iranian politician to meet with Trump as long as Bolton/Pompeo are around. @esaagar ... #rising #sanctions #Iran #iranwar
  • Wait... you only thought to ask about how many people would die 10 minutes before the strike??? That's a rather important piece of info to nearly overlook.
  • Viewed through any conventional lens, President-elect Donald Trump's candidacy was improbable from start to finish. Today, two things about his victory seem to be in sharper focus: one, that Trump's victory might best be understood as the success of the country's first independent president, and second, that the Trump coalition may be even more uniquely his than President Obama's has turned out to be.
    Trump owes his success in part to the fact that he ran for president in an environment that favored change over the status quo. But his luck or genius goes beyond that. It has long been noted that the conditions have existed for an independent candidate to run a serious campaign for president.
    Trump took the elements of an independent candidacy — the lack of clear ideology, the name recognition of a national celebrity and the personal fortune needed to fund a presidential campaign — and then did what no one seemed to have thought of before. He staged a hostile takeover of an existing major party. He had the best of both worlds, an outsider candidacy with crosscutting ideological appeal and the platform of a major party to wage the general election. By the time he had finished, he had taken down two political dynasties: the Bush dynasty in the primaries and the Clinton dynasty in the general election.
  • It should not have taken a pandemic to raise these resources. In June 2019, we presented a Poor People’s Moral Budget to the House Budget Committee, showing that we can meet these needs for this entire country. If you had taken up this Moral Budget, we would have already moved towards infusing more than $1.2 trillion into the economy to invest in health care, good jobs, living wages, housing, water and sanitation services and more.
    This is not the time for trickle-down solutions. We know that when you lift from the bottom, everybody rises. There are concrete solutions to this immediate crisis and the longer term illnesses we have been battling for months, years and decades before. We will continue to organize and build power until you meet these demands. Many millions of us have been hurting for far too long. We will not be silent anymore.
    With its broad sweep, the COVID-19 pandemic has forced us into an unprecedented national emergency. This emergency, however, results from a deeper and much longer term crisis — that of poverty and inequality, and of a society that ignores the needs of 140 million people who are poor or a $400 emergency away from being poor.
Trump and Pence need to let the people go. They’ve been holding poor and low-wealth people hostage, essential workers hostage. It’s time for a change in this country. ~ Rev. William Barber II
  • On the issue of the economy, I think there couldn’t be a more fundamental difference between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Joe Biden believes you measure the health and the strength of America’s economy based on the health and the strength of the American worker and the American family. On the other hand, you have Donald Trump, who measures the strength of the economy based on how rich people are doing, which is why he passed a tax bill benefiting the top 1% and the biggest corporations of America, leading to a $2 trillion deficit that the American people are going to have to pay for
    Not only will Pence and Trump not acknowledge racism when it comes to police violence, they are not even acknowledging the disparate racism in economics and in healthcare, and... wanting to only secure the wealthy and the greedy...
    The Trump-Pence plan is talking about giving more money to the wealthy. In fact, the Trump-Pence-McConnell plan, they refuse to pass a stimulus because they want another $200 billion in tax cuts, they want money for a fighter jet, and they want to protect corporations from liability when those corporations didn’t protect their people from coronavirus.
  • What I saw in North Carolina, what we defeated in North Carolina, what we filed suit against in North Carolina, is now what Trump and Pence are talking about doing on the national level: surgical racism with surgical precision... Pence and Trump don’t believe in the Voting Rights Act... They know they cannot win if everybody votes. They are terribly afraid of poor and low-wealth Black and Brown people voting.
    And then stop saying Trump won the last time. He was elected by the Electoral College because of 80,000 votes. We have to end this mythology that he had some kind of superpower. The fact of the matter is, 100 million people did not vote. .. I couldn’t help but go to the Book of Exodus, where it talked about where God said, “If you don’t let my people go, I’m going to cause flies to come as a sign of what’s wrong. But I won’t let the flies be on the people, but the fly will be a symbol that you’re just wrong. You’re lying. Let my people go.” And Trump and Pence need to let the people go. They’ve been holding poor and low-wealth people hostage, essential workers hostage. It’s time for a change in this country.
  • Donald Trump's voice is resonating with average Americans who feel their voice has been lost by their party. I believe this will become a new Republican Party, one that we should embrace. We should be the party of working men and women, the party of America first.
  • Iran's actions can hardly be said to have occurred in a vacuum... it has been the recent policy of "maximum pressure" on Tehran under the incoherent foreign policy of the Trump administration that has exacerbated the current tensions... the Trump administration has withdrawn unilaterally from the internationally agreed – and successful – Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) of 2015... It is not hard, then, to see how these moves might be viewed in Tehran: as part of an escalating offensive from multiple sources threatening its own home front in a campaign of economic warfare designed to weaken the regime....The depth of the US stake in this increasingly dangerous game is far harder to judge, given the usual confusion of Trump's flip-flopping and the machinations of Bolton... All of which leaves us to contemplate the most frightening element of all in a complex crisis: that the current occupant of the White House lacks any of the skills required to successfully defuse it.
  • When conservatives desperately needed allies in the fight against big government, Donald Trump didn't stand on the sidelines. He consistently advocated that your money be spent, that your government grow, and that your Constitution be ignored... Trump's potential primary victory would provide Hillary Clinton with the easiest imaginable path to the White House. But it's far worse than that. If Donald Trump wins the Republican nomination, there will once again be no opposition to an ever-expanding government. This is a crisis for conservatism. And, once again, this crisis will not go to waste.
  • Donald Trump, I really truly believe is a very dangerous man. If you listen to the things he said this weekend... 'I could go onto Fifth Avenue and shoot people and I wouldn't lose a vote'. He has joked about killing reporters — and 'not' killing reporters like Putin does... We don't change with the mood of the country. That is the problem with our country right now. The Constitution is to anchor us in principles that help temper the mood of the country... The mood of the country is very angry, but you never make a good decision when you are angry... The worst thing we can do is to now start looking at, who is going to get revenge? One of the things that Donald Trump does, when you have a guy who is angry and then has an enemies list and starts to just take people down over and over and over again — if you disagree with him, he destroys you. If that is the mood of the country, we are in more trouble than I thought.
  • Trump may be vulgar, Trump may be abrasive, but in terms of racism, corruption, and destruction, he is MrReagan's true heir. Trump's Republican Party is what it has been at least since the 1980s, only more so.
  • "The words from his mouths begin in foolishness, and his talk ends in wicked madness, yet Trump talks on and on."
  • The evidence shows: Donald Trump cannot retain an ally, keep a promise, uphold a principle, maintain a story, change a mind or show a heart.
  • When it comes to COVID-19, after months of doing nothing, other than predicting the virus would disappear or maybe, if you drank bleach, you may be okay, Trump has simply given up.
    • Joe Biden on 9 July 2020 regarding Trump's April 2020 citation of William Bryan's research regarding disinfectants: Trump never specified using bleach or ingesting it
  • Donald Trump was a joke until nominated, unelectable until elected, incompetent until he succeeded on most fronts, and about to be impeached until he debunked the collusion nonsense; he has had a very successful year. His enemies have been weighed in the balance and they have been found wanting. They shall have their reward.
  • ...it is merely Marxist drivel to think that employers have more power than employees (tell that to Michael Jordan and Jerry Reinsdorf) or landlords than tenants (tell that to the landlord of Bill Gates or Donald Trump).
    • Walter E. Block, The Case for Discrimination (2010, Ludwig von Mises Institute) p. 404
  • Americans think it would be better to have a businessman than a politician as president, and I sympathize with them. Alas, the only businessmen crazy enough to run for president seem to be, well, crazy. At least Ross Perot kept his craziness confined mostly to private matters, such as the looming disruption of his daughter's wedding. Donald Trump puts it front and center. From a libertarian point of view, and I think serious conservatives and liberals would share this view, Trump's greatest offenses against American tradition and our founding principles are his nativism and his promise of one-man rule. Not since George Wallace has there been a presidential candidate who made racial and religious scapegoating so central to his campaign. Trump launched his campaign talking about Mexican rapists and has gone on to rant about mass deportation, bans on Muslim immigration, shutting down mosques, and building a wall around America. America is an exceptional nation in large part because we've aspired to rise above such prejudices and guarantee life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to everyone.
  • Trump spoke with Xi Jinping by phone on June 18, ahead of 2019's Osaka G20 summit, when they would next meet. Trump began by telling Xi he missed him and then said that the most popular thing he had ever been involved with was making a trade deal with China, which would be a big plus politically. They agreed their economic teams could continue meeting. The G20 bilateral arrived, and during the usual media mayhem at the start, Trump said, "we've become friends. My trip to Beijing with my family was one of the most incredible of my life." With the press gone, Xi said this is the most important bilateral relationship in the world. He said that some (unnamed) political figures in the United States were making erroneous judgments by calling for a new cold war, this time between China and the United States. Whether Xi meant to finger the Democrats, or some of us sitting on the US side of the table, I don't know, but Trump immediately assumed Xi meant the Democrats. Trump said approvingly that there was great hostility among the Democrats. He then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming US presidential election, alluding to China's economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he'd win. He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome. I would print Trump's exact words, but the government's prepublication review process has decided otherwise.
  • Trump... though representing the most reactionary US government in recent memory, paradoxically has also led to an opening to challenge US power. The first reason is that he and his administration are much less disciplined about obscuring their true intentions behind insincere proclamations of benevolent motives. Whereas the George W. Bush administration in the run up to the Iraq War successfully manufactured consent amongst a large swath of the US public by scaring them over false claims about "weapons of mass destruction," the Trump administration doesn't even hide the fact that its foreign policy is motivated by advancing the US economic interests.
  • Trump is a fascist. And that's not a term I use loosely or often. But he's earned it.
  • Republican Party is dead. ... It has been killed by Donald Trump.
  • Trump is an ignorant demagogue who traffics in racist and misogynistic slurs and crazy conspiracy theories. He champions protectionism and isolationism — the policies that brought us the Great Depression and World War II. He wants to undertake a police-state roundup of undocumented immigrants and to bar Muslims from coming to this country. He encourages his followers to assault protesters and threatens to sue or smear critics. He would abandon Japan and South Korea and break up the most successful alliance in history — NATO. But he has kind words for tyrants such as Vladimir Putin. There has never been a major party nominee in U.S. history as unqualified for the presidency. The risk of Trump winning, however remote, represents the biggest national security threat that the United States faces today.
  • I only know one thing for sure: I won't vote for Trump. My hope is that he will lose by a landslide, and the Republican Party will come to its senses, rejecting both his ugly, nativist populism and the extreme, holier-than-thou conservatism represented by Ted Cruz.
  • If an unapologetic ignoramus wins the presidency, the consequences will be no laughing matter.
  • Donald J. Trump, a presidential candidate who truly is the know-nothing his Republican predecessors only pretended to be ... It is genuinely terrifying that someone who advances such offensive and ridiculous proposals could win the nomination of a party once led by Teddy Roosevelt, who wrote more books than Mr. Trump has probably read. It's one thing to appeal to voters by pretending to be an average guy. It's another to be an average guy who doesn't know the first thing about governing or public policy. The Trump acolytes claim it doesn't matter; he can hire experts to advise him. But experts always disagree with one another and it is the president alone who must make the most difficult decisions in the world. That's not something he can do since he lacks the most basic grounding in the issues and is prey to fundamental misconceptions.
  • The GOP base is clearly disgusted and looking for new leadership. Enter Donald Trump, not just with policy prescriptions that challenge the cynical GOP leadership but with an attitude of disdain for that leadership—precisely in line with the sentiment of the base. Many conservatives are relishing this, but ah, the rub. Trump might be the greatest charlatan of them all.
  • It was spring, four years ago. Donald and Ivana Trump were seated at opposite ends of their long Sheraton table in Mrs. Marjorie Merriweather Post's former dining room. They were posed in imperial style, as if they were a king and queen. They were at the height of their ride, and it was plenty glorious. Trump was seen on the news shows offering his services to negotiate with the Russians. There was talk that he might make a run for president. Ivana had had so much publicity that she now offered interviewers a press kit of flattering clips. Anything seemed possible, the Trumps had grown to such stature in the golden city of New York.
  • The religious Right is the latest version of an old model of American politics, variously incarnated by Puritans, abolitionists, and William Jennings Bryan. It, like its predecessors, has argued that America and individual Americans need to have a godly or at least moral character to thrive. Now the religious Right adores a thrice-married cad and casual liar. But it is not alone. Historians and psychologists of the martial virtues salute the bone-spurred draft-dodger whose Khe Sanh was not catching the clap. Cultural critics who deplored academic fads and slipshod aesthetics explicate a man who has never read a book, not even the ones he has signed. Followers of Harry Jaffa, the most important Lincoln scholar of the last 60 years, rally round a Republican who does not know why the Civil War happened. Straussians, after leaving the cave, find themselves in Mar-a-Lago. Econocons put their money on a serial bankrupt.
  • Donald Trump betrays. It can start with Trump University, where Trump betrayed schoolteachers and others who dreamed of building a better life for themselves.
  • Donald Trump just has more courage. Whatever you might think of him, and I don't think much of him, but he has more courage than his opponents... He's a marketing genius who offers no substance. And people either got pushed into subprime loans by Trump Mortgage, or they got suckered into racking up huge credit card debt to buy courses on Trump University, and they were left high and dry when those things went belly up. And so that's a story that I think can be told. In a country which is feeling betrayed, he is a mass and serial betrayer... Given the numbers now, it's very hard to see he could win, given the huge numbers of Americans, the vast majority of Americans who say they could not support the guy. And I still find it hard to believe that somebody as policy-thin and as knowledge-thin would very well — he might be able to wear well with the electorate that we have.
  • Are we really here? Is this really happening? Is this America? Are we a great country talking about trying to straddle the world and create opportunity in this country? It's just mind-boggling. And we have sort of become acculturated, because this campaign has been so ugly. We have become acculturated to sleaze and unhappiness that you just want to shower from every 15 minutes. The Trump comparison of the looks of the wives, he does have, over the course of his life, a consistent misogynistic view of women as arm candy, as pieces of meat. It's a consistent attitude toward women which is the stuff of a diseased adolescent. And so we have seen a bit of that show up again. But if you go back over his past, calling into radio shows bragging about his affairs, talking about his sex life in public, he is childish in his immaturity. And his — even his misogyny is a childish misogyny. And that's why I do not think Republicans, standard Republicans, can say, yes, I'm going to vote for this guy because he's our nominee. He's of a different order than your normal candidate. And this whole week is just another reminder of that... The odd thing about his whole career and his whole language, his whole world view is there is no room for love in it. You get a sense of a man who received no love, can give no love, so his relationship with women, it has no love in it. It's trophy. And his relationship toward the world is one of competition and beating, and as if he's going to win by competition what other people get by love. And so you really are seeing someone who just has an odd psychology unleavened by kindness and charity, but where it's all winners and losers, beating and being beat. And that's part of the authoritarian personality, but it comes out in his attitude towards women.
  • a wartime president, with blue states, rather than any foreign nation, as the enemy.
  • When he looks at a glass, he is mesmerized by its reflection. If Donald Trump were shaped a little differently, he would compete for Miss America.
  • I do not support Trump, and believe he would be a disastrous president and commander in chief.
    Trump has no coherent organizing economic philosophy, spent decades acting like and supporting traditional liberal Democrats, has repeatedly shifted his positions on major issues and has little more trust from economists than he has earned among the general electorate.
    Trump is that he is a crony capitalist, who now states that he supported the Clintons and other liberals with donations for so long because he wanted to obtain influence with them while they were in power. He has led several businesses to bankruptcy. He has called himself the "king of debt," a description that Johnson or Paul and other leading libertarians would never use to describe themselves. ... The viewpoints offered by Trump seem to change like the leaves that change their colors when summer gives way to fall. ... Can anyone suggest we know what Trump will believe tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow?
  • The President bears responsibility for today’s events by promoting the unfounded conspiracy theories that have led to this point. It is past time to accept the will of American voters and to allow our nation to move forward.
  • two years into the Trump administration it was obvious to people why we needed unapologetic progressives in the House. The vile, white supremacist, sexist, bigoted Trump administration spewed lies, targeted Black and brown women elected officials, made a mockery of our democracy, and emboldened fascists.
    • Cori Bush The Forerunner: A Story of Pain and Perseverance in America (2022) p 227
  • Whatever his views are this morning, they might change this afternoon, and they were different than they were last night, and they'll be different tomorrow. ... They seem to be ever, ever-changing, depending on what crowd he's in front of. Sounds like a typical politician, by the way, where you get in front of one crowd and say one thing, and then say something else to another crowd that may want to hear a different view. All the things that Donald Trump railed against, he seems to be morphing into — it's kind of disturbing. ... He doesn't believe in things, this is all a game.
  • Donald Trump destroyed the Reagan Republican paradigm in 2016, but he didn’t exactly elucidate a new set of ideas, policies, and alliances. Trump’s devastation of the old order produced a grand struggle on the right to build a new one on Trumpian populist lines.
    The NatCons are wrong to think there is a unified thing called “the left” that hates America. This is just the apocalyptic menace many of them had to invent in order to justify their decision to vote for Donald Trump.
    They are wrong, too, to think there is a wokeist Anschluss taking over all the institutions of American life. For people who spend so much time railing about the evils of social media, they sure seem to spend an awful lot of their lives on Twitter. Ninety percent of their discourse is about the discourse. Anecdotalism was also rampant at the conference—generalizing from three anecdotes about people who got canceled to conclude that all of American life is a woke hellscape. They need to get out more. ** David Brooks, as quoted in The Terrifying Future of the American Right (18 November 2021), The Atlantic
  • In 1995, when he offered this company, if a monkey had thrown a dart, at the stock page, the monkey on average would've made 150 percent. But the people that believed in him, who listened to his siren song, ended up losing well over 90 cents in the dollar. They got back less than a dime.

C

They love him in spite of everything they've heard. They love him, often, in spite of himself. They're not deluded. They know exactly who Trump is. They love him anyway. They love Donald Trump because no one else loves them. ~ Tucker Carlson
  • If this guy pretends that closing the borders to anywhere either for trade (or) for people is going to provide prosperity to the United States, he is completely crazy... He is not very well informed.
  • Millions of Americans sincerely love Donald Trump. They love him in spite of everything they've heard. They love him, often, in spite of himself. They're not deluded. They know exactly who Trump is. They love him anyway. They love Donald Trump because no one else loves them. The country they built, the country their ancestors fought for over hundreds of years, has left them to die in unfashionable little towns, mocked and despised by the sneering halfwits with finance degrees -- but no actual skills -- who seem to run everything all of a sudden. Whatever Donald Trump's faults, he is better than the rest of the people in charge. At least he doesn't hate them for their weakness. Donald Trump, in other words, is and has always been a living indictment of the people who run this country. That was true four years ago when he came out of nowhere to win the presidency. And it's every bit as true right now, maybe even more true than it's ever been. It will remain true regardless of whether Donald Trump wins reelection.
  • Trump hit the established world of American politics like a rogue wave, obliterating almost all political precedent. He'd begun his campaign by suggesting that most undocumented Mexican immigrants were rapists and murderers, then later accused an American-born federal judge who was presiding over fraud claims against Trump University of being unable to do his job because of his Mexican heritage.
    • Julian Castro An Unlikely Journey: Waking Up from My American Dream (2018)
  • what I think is important for folks to realize out there — and now I’m speaking, you know, directly to the Latinx community — is that it’s night and day with Joe Biden versus Donald Trump. Donald Trump has been the cruelest, most ill-intentioned president when it comes to not only immigrants, migrants, but the broader Latino community, scapegoated the community, otherized the community, uses it as a political piñata. And Joe Biden is somebody who brings compassion, who brings understanding, and, most importantly — because what you want to judge politicians on is, OK, what are you going to do, and what is your track record — has a track record of expanding opportunity, with Barack Obama. The Affordable Care Act expanded healthcare to 4 million — more than 4 million Latinx folks in this country. On educational opportunity, on violence against women, on housing opportunity. I remember going to Delaware with him — I think it was Veterans Day of 2016 — and marking the effective end of veteran homelessness there in Wilmington, and seeing how much that meant to him. So, this is somebody that is going to work to make life better for everybody in this country, in a way that Donald Trump — as Michelle Obama pointed out, Donald Trump just isn’t up to it and doesn’t want to do it.
  • Okay, look, this is weird. Because a lot of people on both sides are saying there's nothing funny about Trump being hospitalized with coronavirus. And those people are obviously wrong. There's a lot funny about this. Maybe not from a moral standpoint. But mathematically, if you were constructing a joke, this has all the ingredients you need. The problem is, it’s almost too funny. Like, it’s so on the nose. It would be like if I were making fun of people who wear belts and my pants just immediately fell down.
  • The myriad vulgarities of Donald Trump—examples of which are retailed daily on Web sites and front pages these days—are not news to those of us who have been living downwind of him for any period of time. I first encountered Trump more than 30 years ago. Back then he was a flashy go-getter from an outer borough eager to make his name in Manhattan real estate. Which he succeeded in doing in the only way he knew how: by putting his name in oversize type on anything he was associated with—buildings, yes, but also vodka, golf courses, starchy ties, and even a sham of a real-estate school... Just to drive him a little bit crazy, I took to referring to him as a "short-fingered vulgarian" in the pages of Spy magazine. That was more than a quarter of a century ago. To this day, I receive the occasional envelope from Trump. There is always a photo of him—generally a tear sheet from a magazine. On all of them he has circled his hand in gold Sharpie in a valiant effort to highlight the length of his fingers.
  • At times he is extremely abrasive. I know that's kind of his campaign, but I think time will tell, he's already locked up in some controversial business and it certainly doesn't speak proudly for America that the person who sits in the Oval Office is involved in controversy, so that's never a good thing, but time will tell, a man's legacy is defined by time.
  • We're all tying ourselves in knots about what Donald Trump said about Mexicans... Just as Dylann Roof doesn't represent white people, Mexican rapists don't represent anyone other than themselves either... While I like a good brawl as much as the next person, it seems that Trump is the answer only if the question is: Why can't we get more oafish egomaniacs into politics? Just when the Republican Party needs finesse and sensitivity when discussing immigration; just when it needs to focus on issues that unite all sectors of the electorate, including Hispanic and Asian voters; it gets a blowhard with all the nuance of a grenade... Trump's smear about Mexican immigrants was about as far away as you can get from Ronald Reagan... He tarred most Mexican immigrants as drug dealers, criminals, and rapists, allowing only as an afterthought that some may be good people. He claimed to have discussed the matter with border guards. Would those officers please step forward? In any case, crude and vulgar people always preen that they are brave truth tellers.
  • Put aside for a moment Trump's countless past departures from conservative principle on defense, racial quotas, abortion, taxes, single-payer health care, and immigration. That's right. In 2012, he derided Mitt Romney for being too aggressive on the question, and he's made extensive use of illegal-immigrant labor in his serially bankrupt businesses. The man has demonstrated an emotional immaturity bordering on personality disorder, and it ought to disqualify him from being a mayor, to say nothing of a commander-in-chief. Trump has made a career out of egotism, while conservatism implies a certain modesty about government. The two cannot mix... When a con man swindles you, you can sue—as many embittered former Trump associates who thought themselves ill used have done. When you elect a con man, there's no recourse.
  • In our nation’s 248-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump. He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him. He can never be trusted with power again.
    As citizens, we each have a duty to put country above partisanship to defend our Constitution. That is why I will be casting my vote for Vice President Kamala Harris.
  • President Trump has built the most powerful and most professional team in political history and, under his leadership, has overcome every single obstacle in his way. From the illegal witch-hunts to the weaponization of the justice system to an assassination attempt to the political coup of replacing Biden, the enemies of America will stop at nothing to prevent President Trump from returning to the White House.
  • It's pretty easy to tell if a picture of Donald Trump is AI-Generated, okay? Here's the trick: If Donald Trump is in a picture and looks completely insane, then it's a real picture.
  • Trump was not silent, however. He issued a stream of confident pronouncements informing the public that it was just a cough; he has everything under control; he gets a 10 out of 10 for his handling of the crisis; it’s very serious but he knew it was a pandemic before anyone else; and the rest of the sorry performance. The technique is well-designed, much like the practice of reeling out lies so fast that the very concept of truth vanishes. Whatever happens, Trump is sure to be vindicated among his loyal followers.
  • Donald is a leader. He is a successful person that, like me, isn't afraid to tell it like it is. Our system is broken and it won't be fixed from the inside. I am proud to offer my endorsement of his candidacy for President.
    • Chris Christie, endorsing Donald Trump for President, at a campaign rally in Fort Worth, TX [69] (2016)
  • Please stop it with voting for Trump. It was funny for a little while. But the guy is Hitler. And by that I mean that we are being Germany in the 30s. Do you think they saw the shit coming? Hitler was just some hilarious and refreshing dude with a weird comb over.
  • Trump is not your best. He's the worst of all of us. He's a symptom to a problem that is very real. But don't vote for your own cancer. You're better than that.
  • Using Aiden as a political tool is, to say the least, reprehensible for any political purpose. They make it seem as though our wonderful Aiden appreciates your hate that we should follow their hate. Morally bankrupt politicians – Bernie Moreno, Chip Roy, J.D. Vance and Donald Trump – they have spoken my son’s name and used his death for political gain.
    They can vomit all the hate they want about illegal immigrants, the Border crisis and even untrue claims about fluffy pets being ravaged and eaten by community members. However they are not allowed nor have they ever been allowed to mention Aiden Clark from Springfield Ohio.
    Please stop the hate.
    • Nathan Clark, father of Aiden Clark, boy killed in a car accident involving a Haitian driver in Springfield, Ohio, speaking on the night of the first debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, quoted in Haitian families in Ohio under attack as racist claims spread, The Haitian Times (September 10, 2024)
  • Despite what you hear, we don't need to make America great again. America has never stopped being great. But we do need to make America whole again. Instead of building walls, we need to be tearing down barriers.
  • We cannot let him roll the dice with America.
  • It is insufficient to state the obvious of Donald Trump: that he is a white man who would not be president were it not for this fact. With one immediate exception, Trump's predecessors made their way to high office through the passive power of whiteness—that bloody heirloom which cannot ensure mastery of all events but can conjure a tailwind for most of them. Land theft and human plunder cleared the grounds for Trump's forefathers and barred others from it. Once upon the field, these men became soldiers, statesmen, and scholars; held court in Paris; presided at Princeton; advanced into the Wilderness and then into the White House. Their individual triumphs made this exclusive party seem above America's founding sins, and it was forgotten that the former was in fact bound to the latter, that all their victories had transpired on cleared grounds. No such elegant detachment can be attributed to Donald Trump—a president who, more than any other, has made the awful inheritance explicit.
  • Any empirical evaluation of the relationship between Trump and the white working class would reveal that one adjective in that phrase is doing more work than the other. In 2016, Trump enjoyed majority or plurality support among every economic branch of whites. It is true that his strongest support among whites came from those making $50,000 to $99,999. This would be something more than working-class in many nonwhite neighborhoods, but even if one accepts that branch as the working class, the difference between how various groups in this income bracket voted is revealing. Sixty-one percent of whites in this "working class" supported Trump. Only 24 percent of Hispanics and 11 percent of blacks did. Indeed, the plurality of all voters making less than $100,000 and the majority making less than $50,000 voted for the Democratic candidate. So when [George] Packer laments [in the New Yorker] the fact that "Democrats can no longer really claim to be the party of working people—not white ones, anyway," he commits a kind of category error. The real problem is that Democrats aren't the party of white people—working or otherwise. White workers are not divided by the fact of labor from other white demographics; they are divided from all other laborers by the fact of their whiteness.
  • Obama himself, underestimating Trump and thus underestimating the power of whiteness, believed the Republican nominee too objectionable to actually win. In this Obama was, tragically, wrong. And so the most powerful country in the world has handed over all its affairs—the prosperity of its entire economy; the security of its 300 million citizens; the purity of its water, the viability of its air, the safety of its food; the future of its vast system of education; the soundness of its national highways, airways, and railways; the apocalyptic potential of its nuclear arsenal—to a carnival barker who introduced the phrase "grab 'em by the pussy" into the national lexicon. It is as if the white tribe united in demonstration to say, "If a black man can be president, then any white man—no matter how fallen—can be president."
  • Donald Trump never thought he was going to win this election, he actually did not want to win this election, this was supposed to be the greatest infomercial in the history of politics. If you take that line, and you add the to it the Trump a la Moscow project, you'll understand that this was a branding deal, that's all the presidential campaign started out as.. there only one problem, one problem, he won.
  • Apart from his wife and children, I knew Trump better than anyone else did. In some ways, I knew him better than even his family did because I bore witness to the real man, in strip clubs, shady business meetings, and in the unguarded moments when he revealed who he really was: a cheat, a liar, a fraud, a bully, a racist, a predator, a con man... He has no one he trusts to keep his secrets. For ten years, he certainly had me, and I was always there for him, and look what happened to me. I urge you to really consider that fact: Trump has no true friends. He has lived his entire life avoiding and evading taking responsibility for his actions. He crushed or cheated all who stood in his way, but I know where the skeletons are buried because I was the one who buried them
  • A warning label should be affixed to Trump's forehead.
  • There's a populism to Trump that I found very appealing. The party elders would like him to go away, but the people have decided that he is not going to... [T]here is something really hopeful about the fact that, well, 36 percent of the likely voters want him to win, so the people in the machine don't get to say otherwise.
  • John Dickerson has way too much dignity to trade insults with the President of the United States to his face. But I, sir, am no John Dickerson. Let me introduce you to something we call the Tiffany Way. When you insult one member of the CBS family, you insult us all. Bazinga. All right. Here we go. All right. Mr. Trump, your presidency, I love your presidency, I call it "Disgrace the Nation". You're not the POTUS, you're the BLOATUS. You're the glutton with the button. You're a regular Gorge Washington. You're the presi-dunce, but you're turning into a real prick-tator. Sir, you attract more skinheads than free Rogaine. You have more people marching against you than cancer. You talk like a sign-language gorilla who got hit in the head. In fact the only thing your mouth is good for is being Vladimir Putin's cock holster. Your presidential library is going to be a kids' menu and a couple of Juggs magazines. The only thing smaller than your hands is your "tax returns" [holds up little finger] and you can take that any way you want.
  • Trump denied knowing that Serge (Kovaleski) was disabled, and demanded an apology, saying that anyone could see his imitation was of a flustered, frightened reporter, not a disabled person. It's true that Trump was not mimicking any mannerisms that Serge has. He doesn't jerk around or flail his arms. He's not retarded. He sits calmly, but if you look at his wrists, you'll see they are curved in. That's not the imitation Trump was doing—he was doing a standard retard, waving his arms and sounding stupid: "'Ahhh, I don't know what I said—ahhh, I don't remember!' He's going, ‘Ahhh, I don't remember, maybe that's what I said!'"
  • There's nothing Trump can do that won't be forgiven, except change his immigration policies.
  • Trump is an unreflective beneficiary of every sort of white privilege on offer, from his inherited fortune to his mass-media celebrity to his ability to lie with utter impunity about his career, his finances, and his easily documented record of public statements. If Barack Obama had committed but one of the transgressions Trump reveled in during his 2016 presidential run—deriding John McCain's war record, to take a comparatively minor instance—he would have suffered a torrent of righteous white moralizing that would have been unprecedented even in a country renowned for its righteous white moralizing. And if he'd been caught on tape bragging about a celebrity-enabled history of sexual assault—well, suffice it to say that it would have been a high-tech lynching on a scale that Clarence Thomas could scarcely begin to imagine.
  • Standing alongside two top public health officials who have declined to endorse his call for widely administering the drug, Mr. Trump suggested that he was speaking on gut instinct and acknowledged that he had no expertise on the subject. Saying that the drug is “being tested now,” Mr. Trump said that “there are some very strong, powerful signs” of its potential, although health experts say that the data is extremely limited and that more study of the drug’s effectiveness against the coronavirus is needed. [...] Mr. Trump, who once predicted that the virus might “miraculously” disappear by April because of warm weather, and who has rejected scientific consensus on issues like climate change, was undaunted by skeptical questioning. “What do you have to lose?” Mr. Trump asked, for the second day in a row, saying that terminally ill patients should be willing to try any treatment that has shown some promise.
  • Hydroxychloroquine has not been proved to work against Covid-19 in any significant clinical trials. A small trial by Chinese researchers made public last week found that it helped speed the recovery in moderately ill patients, but the study was not peer-reviewed and had significant limitations. Earlier reports from France and China have drawn criticism because they did not include control groups to compare treated patients with untreated ones, and researchers have called the reports anecdotal. Without controls, they said, it is impossible to determine whether the drugs worked. But Mr. Trump on Sunday dismissed the notion that doctors should wait for further study.
  • I have been pointing out, and I have been screaming to the rooftops, that Donald Trump is the Charlie Sheen of politics. [...] I have to tell you, I love Charlie Sheen, I loved working with him when he was sober, but he was, he's full of shit. He has been full of shit, you know, he has serious addiction. You know, his addiction is obviously serious, drugs, and, but, Trump is just addicted to feeling important. You know, and I think if anybody is under the delusion that he cares about, uh, uh, anybody in America besides himself, they are, they are stoned and need to rethink their priorities, 'cause he's, you know, 'cause it's just ridiculous that's he's gotten as far as he has.
    • Jon Cryer on the May 5, 2016, episode of the podcast Never Not Funny.
  • When the voters examine Donald, they'll discover he actually embodies Washington corruption, the Washington deal-making that they're so angry about.
  • People are asking themselves, 'How would we feel if our children came in repeating the words of the president of the United States if that president was Donald Trump?' And if it would embarrass you to have your children repeat the words of the president, that's not a good thing... A president should unify us, should appeal to our better angels, should appeal to our shared values that make America who we are.

Hillary Clinton, speech in Warren, Michigan (August 11, 2016)

Speech in Warren, Michigan. Transcript by Newsweek [72] (August 11, 2016)
  • He's made a career out of stiffing small businesses from Atlantic City to Las Vegas. There are companies that were left hanging because he refused to pay their bills. A lot of those companies scraped together what the could [sic] to pay their employees, and many of them put their businesses at risk and some of them ended up taking bankruptcy. It wasn't because Trump couldn't pay them, it was because he wouldn't pay them.
  • It's just not right that Donald Trump can ignore his debts, but students and families can't refinance their debt.
  • Mr. Trump may talk a big game on trade, but his approach is based on fear, not strength. Fear that we can't compete with the rest of the world even when the rules are fair. Fear that our country has no choice but to hide behind walls.
  • Let's remember where Trump makes many of his own products. Because it sure is not America. ... One positive thing Trump could do to make America great again is actually make great things in America again.
  • Trump would roll back the tough rules that we have imposed on the Financial Industry. I'll do the opposite – I think we should strengthen those rules so that Wall Street can never wreck Main Street again.
  • He called for a new tax loophole – let's call it the Trump Loophole – because it would allow him to pay less than half the current tax rate on income from many of his companies. He'd pay a lower rate than millions of middle class families.
  • He's making a big promise. But his advisors have said, his own advisors have said, he may not stand by them. ... One of the differences between Donald Trump and me is I'm telling you what I will do, I'm laying out my plans, and I will stand by them, and I want you to hold me accountable for delivering results. This all reminds me of that old saying, ‘if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.'
  • Guaranteeing equal pay won't just increase paychecks for women – it will boost family budgets and get incomes rising across the board. And I don't understand why Trump's against that. Paid family leave won't only make life easier for Moms and Dads – it will also keep skilled, talented Americans in the workforce and grow our economy. That's why every other advanced country already has it. Again, he's against it. Raising the federal minimum wage won't just put more money in the pockets of low-income families – it also means they will spend more at the businesses in their neighborhoods. Trump's against that as well.
  • Based on what we know from the Trump campaign, he wants America to work for him and his friends, at the expense of everyone else.

Hillary Clinton, speech in Reno, Nevada (August 25, 2016)

Speech in Reno, Nevada. Transcript by Vox [73] (August 25, 2016)

  • Donald Trump has built his campaign on prejudice and paranoia. He's taking hate groups mainstream and helping a radical fringe take over one of America's two major political parties. His disregard for the values that make our country great is profoundly dangerous. In just the past week, under the guise of "outreach" to African Americans, Trump has stood up in front of largely white audiences and described black communities in insulting and ignorant terms.
  • Donald Trump misses so much. He doesn't see the success of black leaders in every field… The vibrancy of black-owned businesses…Or the strength of the black church… He doesn't see the excellence of historically black colleges and universities or the pride of black parents watching their children thrive… And he certainly doesn't have any solutions to take on the reality of systemic racism and create more equity and opportunity in communities of color. It takes a lot of nerve to ask people he's ignored and mistreated for decades, "What do you have to lose?" The answer is everything!
  • Trump's lack of knowledge or experience or solutions would be bad enough. But what he's doing here is more sinister. Trump is reinforcing harmful stereotypes and offering a dog whistle to his most hateful supporters. It's a disturbing preview of what kind of President he'd be.
  • A man with a long history of racial discrimination, who traffics in dark conspiracy theories drawn from the pages of supermarket tabloids and the far reaches of the internet, should never run our government or command our military. If he doesn't respect respect all Americans, he can't serve all Americans! ... There's no other Donald Trump. This is it.
  • Well, throughout his career and this campaign, Donald Trump has shown us exactly who he is. We should believe him. When Trump was getting his start in business, he was sued by the Justice Department for refusing to rent apartments to black and Latino tenants. Three years later, the Justice Department took Trump back to court because he hadn't changed. The pattern continued through the decades.
  • Someone detached from reality should never be in charge of making decisions that are as real as they come.
  • He'd abolish the bedrock constitutional principle that says if you're born in the United States, you're an American citizen. He says that children born in America to undocumented parents are, quote, "anchor babies" and should be deported. Millions of them.
  • He'd ban Muslims around the world – 1.5 billion men, women, and children –from entering our country just because of their religion.
  • Ever since the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock, America has distinguished itself as a haven for people fleeing religious persecution. Under Donald Trump, America would distinguish itself as the only country in the world to impose a religious test at the border.
  • Trump likes to say he only hires the "best people." But he's had to fire so many campaign managers it's like an episode of the Apprentice.

D

  • he’s spewing white supremacist views that have real consequences in the lives of ordinary people...I think he needs to realize that what he’s saying, from the biggest bully pulpit in the whole world, is affecting individual people. I don’t know that he cares, because I think he’s just spewing these things, and I think, in part, this was also—you know, this is what he believes.
  • Donald Trump...is the last hope for America. I don't want nuance, I want bold colors: red, white, and blue... When I saw those guys on the boats on their knees, I mean, that sends a picture about America that I haven't seen ever before. And I think we need Donald Trump right now. The country needs him.
  • Let's say five years ago, someone wanted to tell an end-of-the-world story. Governments have broken down, diplomacy has gone out the window, and lunatic nutbags are running things. If the storyteller wanted to provide a shorthand to establish how things could have possibly gone so wrong, all he would have to do is have a newscaster talking about "President Trump." Because five years ago, the audience would have snorted and said, "Well, sure, I totally believe that if this country was stupid enough to put Trump into office, then it makes sense that the entire world is falling apart."
  • Trump has been said to have extended his initial 30-day deadline to four months
  • The case for constitutional limited government is the case against Donald Trump. To the degree we take him at his word — understanding that Trump is a negotiator whose positions are often purposefully deceptive — what he advocates is a rejection of our Madisonian inheritance and an embrace of Barack Obama's authoritarianism. Trump assures voters that he will use authoritarian power for good, to help those who feel — with good reason — ignored by both parties. But the American experiment in self-government was the work of a generation that risked all to defeat a tyrannical monarch and establish a government of laws, not men. A government of the people, by the people, and for the people is precisely what the Constitution offers, and what is most threatened by "great men" impatient to impose their will on the nation. Conservatives should reject Trump's hollow, Euro-style identity politics.
  • If your claim to fame is that you’ve taken money from other people and haven’t delivered what you promised, that doesn’t make you a genius businessman, that makes you a thief.

E

  • I'd have to go for Trump ... you know, [because] she's declared that she's gonna follow in [President] Obama's footsteps. I mean, it's a tough voice to listen to for four years. It could be a tough one. If she's just gonna follow what we've been doing, then I wouldn't be for her. She's made a lot of dough out of a being a politician. I gave up dough to be a politician. I'm sure that [former President] Ronald Reagan gave up dough to be a politician. ... [Trump]'s onto something, because secretly everybody's getting tired of political correctness, kissing up. That's the kiss-ass generation we're in right now. We're really in a p-ssy generation.
  • The only thing that I can say about President Trump is that he is the only person who, in 2009 when I served a lot of subpoenas on a lot of people, or at least gave notice to some pretty connected people, that I want to talk to them, is the only person who picked up the phone and said, let's just talk. I'll give you as much time as you want. I'll tell you what you need to know, and was very helpful, in the information that he gave, and gave no indication whatsoever that he was involved in anything untoward whatsoever, but had good information. That checked out and that helped us and we didn't have to take a deposition of him in 2009.
  • I will not be voting for Donald Trump in the primary. I take my conservatism seriously, and I also take Saint Paul seriously. In setting out the qualifications for overseers, or bishops, Saint Paul admonished Timothy... We should not put a new conservative in charge of conservatism or the country, so that he does not become puffed up with conceit and fall into condemnation. Republicans have wandered in the wilderness already by letting leaders define conservatism in their own image. Donald Trump needs more time and more testing of his new conservative convictions.
  • Hitler is not Hillary Clinton either. The neo-nazis and white supremacists backing Donald Trump fetishize Hitler too. Trump dog whistles to them.

F

  • I was trying to let science guide our policy, but he was putting as much stock in anecdotal things that turned out not to be true as he was in what scientists like myself were saying. That caused unnecessary and uncomfortable conflict where I had to essentially correct what he was saying, and put me at great odds with his people.
  • In the United States, Trump’s diversionary theatrics and early failures in Congress kept off the front pages a bonfire of social and environmental regulations as well as a purge of liberal judges from the federal bench that continued in the background with little resistance and that promised to play out for decades. When thwarted by Congress, Trump resorted to executive orders and emergency powers, as had presidents before him, though with a radical, institution-shaking appeal in justification “to the people” rarely heard since the New Deal. Internationally, the unconservative revisionism of the hard right was evident in Trump’s questioning or pulling back from previous American commitments— the Iran nuclear deal, world climate accords, the Western alliance itself. Rather than standing up for liberal democracy and universal values, he praised authoritarians: China’s Xi, Russia’s Putin, Saudi princes, the Philippines’ Duterte. Rather than follow every administration, Democrat or Republic, since 1945 and align Americanism, Westernism, and universalism in an avowedly virtuous trinity, the Trump right detached Americanism as justified and defendable on its own.
    • Edmund Fawcett, Conservatism: The Fight for a Tradition (2020), p. 348
  • Trump is Hillary Clinton's Christmas gift wrapped up under a tree.
  • Most amateur diagnosticians have mislabeled President Trump with the diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder. I wrote the criteria that define this disorder, and Mr. Trump doesn't meet them. He may be a world-class narcissist, but this doesn't make him mentally ill, because he does not suffer from the distress and impairment required to diagnose mental disorder.
Mr. Trump causes severe distress rather than experiencing it and has been richly rewarded, rather than punished, for his grandiosity, self-absorption and lack of empathy. It is a stigmatizing insult to the mentally ill (who are mostly well behaved and well meaning) to be lumped with Mr. Trump (who is neither).
  • A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not of building bridges, is not Christian. This is not the gospel... I say only that this man is not Christian if he has said things like that. We must see if he said things in that way and I will give him the benefit of the doubt.
  • I was wrong. Weeks ago I said on a number of radio interviews that while I opposed Trump in the primary, I'd back him if he won the GOP nomination. I hadn't yet seen, or had been unwilling to believe, the full extent of his contempt for the truth, his fondness for far-left conspiracy theories, and his sheer malice. When I saw Trump in full, my decision was easy. Never Trump... I cannot abide the notion of voting for a man whose 'war strategy' is a child-killing war crime.
  • There is an Ivy League grad who has spent most of his life in Manhattan, where he is chauffeured around in limousines. He frequently brags to strangers about his massive personal wealth. In public statements, he has advocated government healthcare, a woman's right to an abortion, an assault weapons ban, and paying off the national debt by forcing rich people to forfeit 14.25 percent of their total wealth. When the man married his third wife, he invited Bill and Hillary Clinton to the wedding, and he has given many thousands to their political campaigns and their foundation. He's donated many thousands more that helped elect Democrats to the Senate and the House. And George W. Bush was "maybe the worst president in the history of this country," the man said in 2008. "He was so incompetent, so bad, so evil." On paper, this is not someone you'd expect to excel in the 2016 Republican Party primary. But Donald Trump is excelling. Thanks to his celebrity, a few epic flip-flops, and his willingness to pander to the most xenophobic element of the GOP's base, the real-estate developer and reality-TV star is polling near the top of the field.
  • Trump has made it clear that he would rule as a dictator. His plans include destroying government as we know it, while acting on his desires without guardrails or accountability. He has vowed to use the power of the state to punish political opponents. In short, another Trump presidency would end American democracy as we know it.

G

  • We thought about it when we made the movie! Are you kidding? You watch Part II again and there's a scene where Marty confronts Biff in his office and there's a huge portrait of Biff on the wall behind Biff, and there's one moment where Biff kind of stands up and he takes exactly the same pose as the portrait? Yeah.
  • I remain a skeptic about Donald Trump. Trump fans look at us skeptics with incredulity that we could possibly object to their man... Yet I see people comparing Trump to Reagan. Donald Trump has been a conservative for about ten minutes.
  • [W]e have to learn something from history here. Fascism begins with the rhetoric of dehumanization, humiliation, and reification, right? It starts with the language of brutality, which it normalizes. It legitimates hatred and racism and violence. It views certain groups through rhetoric as enemies of the American people. It operates off of the rhetoric of war, anti-intellectualism, and white supremacy. It operates off of the language of disposability. That language doesn’t just simply normalize increasingly the notions of white nationalism, white supremacy, racism, and xenophobia; it also enacts policies and it creates a culture of utter stupidity, a culture of ignorance. And, unfortunately, it functions so as to enable violence against groups labeled as dangerous, other, excess, and a threat to the whitewashed notion of citizenship.
    With respect to the latter, when people can’t tell the difference between fact and fiction, they can’t tell the difference between good and evil. They can’t recognize a crime when they see one or what lawlessness looks like. All standards of truth go out the window. It’s a very dangerous moment because it means that people become more susceptible to demagogues, to people like Trump, and I think that the media has played an enormous role in creating a formative culture that at its worst legitimates and at its best enables what we see happening in the United States today.
  • As a party, we are better to risk losing without Donald Trump than trying to win with him. Enough already with Mister Trump.
  • Last week, the New York Times reported that the FBI, in 2017, launched an investigation of President Trump "to consider whether the president's own actions constituted a possible threat to national security" and specifically "whether he had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests." ...As usual – this melodrama was accomplished by steadfastly ignoring the now-standard, always-buried paragraph pointing out the boring fact that no actual evidence of guilt has yet emerged.
  • The FBI's counterintelligence investigation of Trump is far from the first time that the FBI has monitored, surveilled and investigated U.S. elected officials.... It is not difficult to understand what is so ominous and even tyrannical about the FBI investigating domestic political figures whose loyalties they regard as "suspicious," and whose political career they regard as a "national security threat," simply because those politicians express policy positions about U.S. adversaries that the FBI dislikes... If a politician adopts policy views... which is unduly accommodating to America's adversaries or "enemies," that's not a crime and the FBI thus has no business using its vast investigative powers against...[them]...the FBI investigation... clearly based, at least in part, on the FBI's disagreements with Trump's foreign policy views and the agency's assessment that such policies fail to safeguard "U.S. interests" as the FBI defines them.
As you can imagine, [Pat] is an expert on politics and she predicts whenever you decide to run for office you will be a winner! ~ Richard Nixon
I think the media have been harder on Trump than any other president certainly that I’ve known about, I think they feel free to claim that Trump is mentally deranged and everything else without hesitation. ~ Jimmy Carter
He's an ass. ~ George H. W. Bush
He's a master brander, and he's the most interesting character out there. And...he says something that overrides the ideological differences. There is a macho appeal to saying, 'I'm just sick of nothing happening. I'll make things – vote for me.' ~ Bill Clinton
We've seen nationalism distorted into nativism – forgotten the dynamism that immigration has always brought to America. We see a fading confidence in the value of free markets and international trade – forgetting that conflict, instability, and poverty follow in the wake of protectionism. ~ George W. Bush
We're shocked that somebody would be saying these things. We're shocked that somebody is fanning anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-Muslim sentiment. We're shocked! We're shocked that somebody could be loose with the facts. Or distort someone's record -- shocked... This is the guy, remember, who was sure that I was born in Kenya. Who just wouldn't let it go. And all this same Republican establishment, they weren't saying nothing. As long as it was directed at me, they were fine with it. They thought it was a hoot. Wanted to get his endorsement... What is happening in this primary is just a distillation of what's been happening inside their party for more than a decade. ~ Barack Obama

H

  • The conservative president we desperately need requires a paradoxical combination of boldness and restraint. The president will need to be bold in challenging the runaway power and reach of his own branch, against the fury of the bureaucracy itself, its client groups, and the media. This boldness is necessary to restore the restraint that a republican executive should have in our constitutional order. Trump exhibits no awareness of this supreme constitutional task.
  • Donald Trump is the result of a long process of political, cultural and social decay. He is a product of our failed democracy. The longer we perpetuate the fiction that we live in a functioning democracy, that Trump and the political mutations around him are somehow an aberrant deviation that can be vanquished in the next election, the more we will hurtle toward tyranny. The problem is not Trump. It is a political system, dominated by corporate power and the mandarins of the two major political parties, in which we don’t count. We will wrest back political control by dismantling the corporate state, and this means massive and sustained civil disobedience, like that demonstrated by teachers around the country this year...
    As a foreign correspondent I covered collapsed societies... It is impossible for any doomed population to grasp how fragile the decayed financial, social and political system is on the eve of implosion. All the harbingers of collapse are visible... We suffer the usual pathologies of impending death. I would be happy to be wrong. But I have seen this before. I know the warning signs. All I can say is get ready.
  • He doesn't know the Constitution, history, law, political philosophy, nuclear strategy, diplomacy, defense, economics beyond real estate, or even, despite his low-level-mafioso comportment, how ordinary people live. But trumping all this is a greater flaw presented as his chief strength. Governing a great nation in parlous times is far more than making "deals." Compared with the weight of the office he seeks, his deals are microscopic in scale, and as he faced far deeper complexities he would lead the country into continual Russian roulette. If despite his poor judgment he could engage talented advisers, as they presented him with contending and fateful options the buck would stop with a man who simply grasps anything that floats by. Following Obama's, a Trump presidency would be yet more adventure tourism for a formerly serious republic.

  • Trump undermines the free press because he wants to be the only legitimate source of information in society. He lies all the time to break down the processes by which we discern the truth about the world around us, and compile the observations and facts which make up the tapestry of reality. He has exposed the paper-thin vulnerability of our democratic society, which depends mightily on observing social norms—like yielding to shame—and a shared acceptance of some common set of truths.

    The American president is determined to bulldoze this architecture of social structures, and usher in an era where force, not deliberation and cooperation, determines the path our society will take. If he never acknowledges any truth besides his own, he never has to do anything outside his own direct interests. He does not have to actually respond to any kind of criticism, or ever reconsider his course of action. Relentless lying, after all, is a form of coercion, in which you bend others to your will by forcing them to accept the infrastructure of your false reality—or to give up caring whether anything is true or false in the first place. Don't believe your eyes and ears. Everybody was cheering for me.

  • White tears, as Damon Young explains in The Root, are why defeated Southerners refused to accept the freedom of black slaves and formed the Ku Klux Klan. And white tears are why 63 percent of white men and 53 percent of white women elected a malignant man-child as their leader.
  • Casting the Trump administration's credibility gap into sharp relief, allies like Japan and Germany have demanded more "credible" evidence to support the U.S. claim. While President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have been unequivocal in their assertion that Iran was responsible for the attacks on two oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman last week, some of America's closest allies are demanding more proof.
    Both Japan and Germany have requested more concrete evidence... Jeremy Corbyn, Britain's opposition leader, said more "credible evidence" was needed to support Trump's allegation.... According to The New York Times, other European leaders have also been hesitant to lay the blame on Iran ― a doubt fueled in part by their "distrust of the Trump administration and its hawkish policy toward Tehran," the paper said.

I

  • Donald Trump is a clear and present danger to the republic. He’s disqualified based on character and rationality, so I’ll be voting for Kamala Harris.
  • I feel sorry for him. He’s really quite a sick puppy. He needs some help.
  • He’s been unfaithful to three wives. Why would we, at the altar with him as the fourth, think that he’s going to be faithful to us? Talk about irrationality.
  • If Donald Trump loses, that would be a good thing for the Republican Party. Because then we could have a Republican rethink and get a correction.

J

  • It was an honor to visit with President Donald Trump. He was friendly, remarkably kind, and incredibly generous with his time.
  • Mr. Trump has crossed the line. More than one line. Captain Khan died in battle trying valiantly to save others. There is no place for criticism, stated or implied, of this brave soldier. He served our country. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery along with those of many ethnic backgrounds and religious denominations. They served our country. Mr. Trump did not. Criticizing Mrs. Khan for not speaking on stage is vile beyond words. No Gold Star Mother should ever be treated like that. Mr. Trump, you owe Mrs. Khan and all Gold Star families a huge apology.
  • The problem is, I know Trump, so my optimism has been squashed like a baby bird ... Everything bad I had to say about him, I said to his face. ... I think he's very good, very compelling on that show [Celebrity Apprentice] ... I really like him because of his absence of filters. I really like the glimpse we get into the human heart we get when someone loses their filters ... "A genius is the one most like himself." In a really weird way, Donald Trump has achieved that. If he weren't running for president, you'd be seeing essays from me about how much I learned from Donald Trump and how much I loved being on the show ... I'm feeling so, so, so guilty, because I feel like, along with millions of other people, I played right into this. The cynicism of the Clintons, the careful, tightrope walk of all politicians, forced me, as an atheist, to get down on my knees and pray that someone would come along with some kind of authenticity. Well, someone called my bluff, goddamn it. ... The stuff [Trump] is saying on immigration, the stuff he saying on torture, the stuff he is saying on war, is absolutely unforgivable ... He is coming out directly against the Statue of Liberty. I'm a pure and utter peacenik. I want a president who sings the praises of people, sings the praises of peace and sings the praises of working together for a great country ... Abraham Lincoln wouldn't have laughed about waterboarding ... I want a president that is kinder, smarter and more measured than me. ... I disagree with Hillary Clinton on just about everything there is to disagree with a person about. If it comes down to Trump and Hillary, I will put a Hillary Clinton sticker on my fucking car. ... Someone who is paying attention can do the same thing that Trump is doing with hate, and do it with love, and become president ... That's kind of beautiful. There's nothing more optimistic than that. ... Donald Trump does, when it comes right down to it, fuck up everything ... He fucks up his casinos. He fucks up his buildings.... Maybe he'll fuck up his campaign before he fucks up the country.
  • I did two tours of duty on Celebrity Apprentice and I referred to someone who I knew was a dipshit, who I knew was a loser and a liar, as "Mr. Trump." And I didn't laugh out loud when they said he was a billionaire. And I didn’t laugh out loud when they said he was a good businessman. I knew he was a terrible businessman. I knew he wasn't really rich. I knew he was a liar. I knew all of that. And I sat there in a suit. What harm does it do to be on a TV show? To pretend that someone is a successful businessman? Turns out it matters a lot.

K

  • The Trump phenomenon is better understood as an amalgam of three different, largely pathological strains in American history and culture... The first and perhaps most obvious strain is hostility toward immigrants... In the 1850s, the American Party, labeled the 'Know-Nothings' by its opponents, accused Irish and German Catholics of being agents of the pope and a threat... Later in the century, white workers on the Pacific coast led a mass campaign against Chinese newcomers, whom they blamed for undercutting wages... Federal lawmakers affirmed their bigotry by excluding any Chinese laborers... In the 1920s, fears of Slavs, Jews, Italians, and others suspected of being hostile to America's white 'Nordic' heritage persuaded Congress to impose quotas that all but banned immigrants... Trump's attacks on 'rapists and murderers' crossing the southern border and on potential Muslim terrorists jetting across the Atlantic belong to this long and ignominious tradition.
  • His vow to 'Make America Great Again' lacks any explanation of what or who made it so wonderful before. Searching his website for clues turns up no proposals that might credibly bring about a national revival, unless one believes that a simplified tax code and a stern crackdown on illegal immigration amount to a sufficient blueprint for major change.
  • The allure of Trump's candidacy and the dread it provokes at home and abroad stem from the same impulses, which run deep in U.S. political culture. A rich man whose name is familiar to everyone bashes people whom many citizens either fear or mistrust and makes vague promises to fix whatever ails the nation. And he does all this with a smirk, a threat, and yet also with a yearning for respect, even from those he routinely assaults in speeches. Trump probably will not be elected president, and it would be a disaster if he was. But his act is hardly as novel as he, and many of his fans and his critics, believe. After he leaves the stage, another wealthy performer with a talent for bombast and no political record to defend may well take his place.
  • Trump is no true conservative. He's not even a reactionary in the best sense of the word. He's a self-aggrandizing opportunist. His policies go no further than his catchphrase, 'you're fired'. Listening to his first television ad is like a preview for a bad movie; an empty supercut of the highlights, or lowlights, without the plot being revealed because it's so thin. Trump is no everyman. He built his empire with $100 million from his wealthy father. Far from born into working or middle class, Trump never struggled a day in his life except by his own failings in business and the resulting repeated bankruptcies. His privileged background enabled him to make money off money; not exactly high on the hierarchy of middle-class values. As for being incorruptible, Trump gave big to politicians. He admitted that was meant to buy favors. His policy positions are similarly ephemeral; he supported the Big Government policies of Democrats and slippery values of the Clintons when it suited him. Steadfast, he is not.
  • Donald Trump is convincingly playing the role of a pandering demagogue. He seeks to stir up a passionate reaction that serves the purposes of his ambition. America's founders repeatedly warned against such demagoguery, because it sets people up for tyranny. Given his background, it's advisable to assume Donald Trump is being used by the enemies of rightful liberty to lead otherwise sincerely conservative people down a blind canyon into the withering fire of their elitist foes... Given this track record, before following Trump's lead, shouldn't people sincerely anxious to restore America's constitutional liberty carefully examine the nature of his purported advocacy? With much fanfare, Trump is being attacked by his erstwhile elitist faction buddies. But has he attacked them for treacherous betrayal of the security and sovereignty of the American people?
  • Every president lies at some point, for diplomatic or national security reasons or to sell a policy. But Trump is not known for one big lie — just a constant stream of exaggerated, invented, inconsistent, dubious and false claims. In the nine years I have run The Fact Checker, I have never encountered a politician so cavalier about the facts, so unconcerned with accuracy, so willing to attack people for made-up reasons and so determined to falsely depict his achievements.
  • Donald Trump has asked why I did not speak at the Democratic convention. He said he would like to hear from me. Here is my answer to Donald Trump: Because without saying a thing, all the world, all America, felt my pain. I am a Gold Star mother. Whoever saw me felt me in their heart.
  • Donald Trump said I had nothing to say. I do. My son Humayun Khan, an Army captain, died 12 years ago in Iraq. He loved America, where we moved when he was 2 years old. He had volunteered to help his country, signing up for the ROTC at the University of Virginia. This was before the attack of Sept. 11, 2001. He didn't have to do this, but he wanted to.
  • I cannot walk into a room with pictures of Humayun. For all these years, I haven't been able to clean the closet where his things are — I had to ask my daughter-in-law to do it. Walking onto the convention stage, with a huge picture of my son behind me, I could hardly control myself. What mother could? Donald Trump has children whom he loves. Does he really need to wonder why I did not speak?
  • Donald Trump said that maybe I wasn't allowed to say anything. That is not true. My husband asked me if I wanted to speak, but I told him I could not. My religion teaches me that all human beings are equal in God's eyes. Husband and wife are part of each other; you should love and respect each other so you can take care of the family. When Donald Trump is talking about Islam, he is ignorant. If he studied the real Islam and Koran, all the ideas he gets from terrorists would change, because terrorism is a different religion. Donald Trump said he has made a lot of sacrifices. He doesn't know what the word sacrifice means.
  • Muslims are American, Muslims are citizens, Muslims participate in the well-being of this country as American citizens. We are proud American citizens. It's the values of this country that brought us here, not our religion. Trump's position on these issues do not represent those values.
    • Khizr M. Khan in an interview with Vocativ. [74] (December 08, 2015)
  • If it was up to Donald Trump, he never would have been in America. Donald Trump consistently smears the character of Muslims. He disrespects other minorities, women, judges, even his own party leadership. He vows to build walls and ban us from this country. Donald Trump, you are asking Americans to trust you with our future. Let me ask you: Have you even read the U.S. Constitution? I will gladly lend you my copy. In this document, look for the words "liberty" and "equal protection of law." Have you ever been to Arlington Cemetery? Go look at the graves of the brave patriots who died defending America — you will see all faiths, genders, and ethnicities. You have sacrificed nothing and no one. We can't solve our problems by building walls and sowing division. We are Stronger Together.
  • His policies, his practices, do not reflect that he has any understanding of the basic, fundamental constitutional principles of this country, what makes this country exceptional, what makes this country exceptional in the history of the mankind. There are principles of equal dignity, principle of liberty. He talks about excluding people, disrespecting judges, the entire judicial system, immigrants, Muslim immigrants. These are divisive rhetoric that is totally against the basic constitutional principle. If you read the Constitution, you will either deliberately would be violating those principles or you have not read. That is why I have watched whole ear and rest of the world has watched, and the love and affection and support that we have received after my statement, at every corner of the street, at every place. The affection, the support, the love that I have received, that we continue to receive is a testament that he is talking about ignorance. He is not fully aware of these principles.
  • Two things are absolutely necessary in any leader or any person that aspires, wishes, to be a leader. That is moral compass and second is empathy. This candidate is void of both traits that are necessary for the stewardship of this country.
  • I do not believe his whole year-long rhetoric, division, excluding people, talking about them derogatorily, has prepared him. He promised to the Republican leadership that he will change his manner, he will not be as ignorant as he had been. But he had continued. Those two traits of moral compass and empathy are absolutely necessary for the leader of a free world leader of nation like United States.
  • This candidate for presidency to not be aware of the respect of a gold star mother standing there, and he had to take that shot at her, this is height of ignorance. This is why I showed him that Constitution. Had he read that, he would know what status a gold star mother holds in that nation. This country holds such a person in the highest regard. And he has no knowledge, no awareness. That is height of his ignorance. She is ill. She had high blood pressure. People that know her, looked at her face, and she said, "I may fall off the stage." And I told her that, you have to assemble yourself and stand for the beauty of this tribute that is being paid. This person is total incapable of empathy. I want his family to counsel him, teach him some empathy. He will be a better person if he could become -- but he is a black soul. And this is totally unfit for the leadership of this beautiful country, the love and affection that we have received affirms that our beliefs, our experience in this country had been correct and positive. The world is receiving us like we have never seen. They have seen the blackness of his character, of his soul, that he is void of recognizing, empathizing with people.
    • Khizr M. Khan, on an interview with CNN about Donald Trump saying that Khan's wife didn't speak because she was forbidden. [76] (July 31, 2016)
  • I have exactly the same rights as he does. He had been abusing, disrespecting women, judges, all decent Americans. He had been so abusive of them. I exercise exactly the same rights. That, again, proves his ignorance. He wants to have one set of rights for himself, and he wants to have another set of rights for others. No, somebody should tell him that there is equal dignity, equal protection of law in this country. That is why that Constitution came to play. I keep that in my pocket, because I cherish this document. I wish somebody would read it to him. Certain fundamental values that enshrine in this document.
  • Donald Trump needs to sit with his advisers and portray to this world that he is empathetic. You solve the problems with empathy, putting people together. There are bad people among us, but there are good people among us, as well. You gather good people to get rid of bad people, but you do not malign the whole religion -- the whole culture.
  • We are the solution to the dealing with the terrorism in the United States. Join hands with good Muslims. Only war is not the solution. It is one of the solutions. Communities coming together is the solution. We are as concerned as Donald Trump is about the safety of this country. We are testament to the goodness of this country. We need to stop fighting with one another, but we need a leader that will unite us, not disrespect, not by derogatory remarks. I feel bad about the discourse that this campaign -- this election campaign has taken. We need to join hands. We have a very serious problem of this for the safety of the citizens of this country. We are solution. Look, the treatment of Muslims in France and other places, there is much worse security issues than United States does.
  • When a person becomes Commander-in- Chief, president, you are president and Commander-in-Chief of everybody that has supported you and that has not supported you.
  • But, far from making remarks of any persuasive power that can be viewed to be helpful to defusing tension, he made unprecedented rude nonsense one has never heard from any of his predecessors. A frightened dog barks louder. [...] He is unfit to hold the prerogative of supreme command of a country, and he is surely a rogue and a gangster fond of playing with fire, rather than a politician. [...] Action is the best option in treating the dotard who, hard of hearing, is uttering only what he wants to say. [...] I will surely and definitely tame the mentally deranged U.S. dotard with fire.
  • If instead of having ten fingers, I had ten combs for fingers, I'd love to meet Donald Trump, just so I could run my fingers through his hair.
    • Jarod Kintz (18 May 2011), This Book is Not For Sale 
  • We want every vote counted, yes every legal vote (of course). But, if you have legit concerns about fraud present EVIDENCE and take it to court. STOP Spreading debunked misinformation... This is getting insane.
    • Adam Kinzinger, Republican Congress member (2020-11-06) to Donald Trump about the 2020 election, Tweet
  • Yesterday, it became evident that not only has the president abdicated his duty to protect the people and the people’s house, he invoked and inflamed passions that only gave fuel to the insurrection that we saw here. When pressed to move and denounce the violence, he barely did so while of course victimizing himself and seeming to give a wink and a nod to those doing it. All indications are that the president has become unmoored, not just from his duty or even his oath but reality, itself. It is for this reason that I call on the vice president and members of the Cabinet to ensure the next few weeks are safe for the American people and that we have a sane captain of the ship.
  • I have spent my life building bridges and tearing down barriers — not building walls. That’s why I find Donald Trump’s belief that an American-born judge of Mexican descent is incapable of fairly presiding over his case is not only dead wrong, it is un-American. As the Presidential campaign progressed, I was hoping the rhetoric would tone down and reflect a campaign that was inclusive, thoughtful and principled. While I oppose the Democratic nominee, Donald Trump’s latest statements, in context with past attacks on Hispanics, women and the disabled like me, make it certain that I cannot and will not support my party’s nominee for President regardless of the political impact on my candidacy or the Republican Party. It is absolutely essential that we are guided by a commander-in-chief with a responsible and proper temperament, discretion and judgment. Our President must be fit to command the most powerful military the world has ever seen, including an arsenal of thousands of nuclear weapons. After much consideration, I have concluded that Donald Trump has not demonstrated the temperament necessary to assume the greatest office in the world.
  • Donald Trump — a political neophyte, a New York loudmouth who plays fast and loose with the truth, a massive egotist and a not altogether pleasant human being — has delivered conservatives one of the greatest years in living memory and has made our government more moral in the process. The left and many on the right didn't see it coming because they hate the man. And because they didn't see it coming, they won't see that it's come.
  • these children are ready to deliver their moral verdict on the people and institutions who knew all about the dangerous, depleted world they would inherit and yet chose not to act. They know what they think of Donald Trump in the United States and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil and Scott Morrison in Australia and all the other leaders who torch the planet with defiant glee while denying science so basic that these kids could grasp it easily at age eight.
    • Naomi Klein On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal (2019)
  • Isn't Donald Trump the very epitome of vulgarity? In sum... Isn't Trumpism a two-bit Caesarism of a kind that American conservatives have always disdained? Isn't the task of conservatives today to stand athwart Trumpism, yelling Stop?

L

  • There is nothing like a common adversary to make people recognize what they have in common. Once there was consensus that civility, compassion, immigration, equal opportunity and foreign allies were good; that racism, misogyny, discrimination, voter suppression and foreign autocrats were bad; that respect for the U.S. military, intelligence community, political leaders, science, the Constitution and the rule of law was a given; that the American promise was based on good faith, compromise and checks and balances; and that presidents should be role models.
  • On January 20, 2017, Donald John Trump became president, unskilled in the machinery of government and unmoved morally by the calling of the position, but aglow in his unmatched power. The first three years of Trump's term revealed a presidency of one, in which the universal value was loyalty- not to the country, but to the president himself. Scandal, bluster, and uninhibited chaos reigned. Decisions were driven by a reflexive logic of self-preservation and self-aggrandizement. Delusions born of narcissism and insecurity overtook reality.
    • Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year (2021), p. 1
  • The year 2020 will be remembered in the American epoch as one of anguish and abject failure. The coronavirus pandemic killed more than half a million people in the United States and infected tens of millions more, the deadliest health crisis in a century. Through the administration's Operation Warp Speed helped produce vaccines in record time, its overall coronavirus response was mismanaged by the president and marred by ineptitude and backbiting. The virus was only one of the crises Trump confronted in 2020. The pandemic paralyzed the economy, plunging the nation into a recession during which low-wage workers, many of them minorities, suffered the most. The May 25 killing of George Floyd, a Black man, under the knee of a white police officer ignited protests for racial justice and an end to police discrimination and brutality. Yet Trump sought to exploit the simmering divisions for personal political gain, quickly declared himself "your president of law and order" and relentlessly pressured Pentagon leaders to deploy active-duty troops against Black Lives Matter protestors. The worsening climate crisis, meanwhile, was almost entirely ignored Trump, who earlier in his term had rolled back environmental regulations and withdrawn the United States from the Paris Agreement. The president was instead preoccupied with stoking doubts about the legitimacy of the election. After he lost to Joe Biden, Trump fanned the flames of conspiracies and howled about fraud that did not exist. His false claims of a "rigged election" inspired thousands of people to storm the Capitol in a violent and ultimately failed insurrection on January 6, 2021.
    • Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year (2021), p. 2
  • Most of Trump's failings can be explained by a simple truth: He cared more about himself than the country. Whether managing the coronavirus or reacting to his election defeat, Trump prioritized what he thought to be his political and personal interests over the common good.
    • Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year (2021), p. 4
  • ...shrewdness, coupled with shamelessness and unnatural political stamina, allowed Trump to deliver on many of his political promises. He pleased his conservative base by remaking the federal judiciary, including with three nominations to the Supreme Court; cutting taxes on corporations and the wealthy; expanding the military; toughening border enforcement; and weakening the regulatory state. Trump also forged new bilateral trade agreements, negotiated peace accords in the Middle East, and won concessions from European allies he had argued were taking advantage of the United States. Trump nearly won a second term. More than 74 million people voted to reelect him- the second-highest total ever recorded, the highest being Biden's 81 million. Were it not for Biden's victories in a handful of swing states, Trump would have won the electoral college and secured four more years in office. It would be foolhardy then to dismiss his presidency as a failure and to turn the page on this period. Rather, we must try to understand what made him so appealing to so many, and what that reveals about the country.
    • Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year (2021), p. 6-7
  • Deserate people do desperate things in desperate times, unfortunately the American people are facing desperate times of COVID-19, but this president is in desperate times... as he speaks ill about senator Harris he speaks ill about women, and we hear it and it is a loud siren across this nation
  • Sadism has even found a prominent position in popular culture. Many prime-time television series now owe their staying power to the sadistic impulses they exploit on the tube. Audience members find tremendous enjoyment in viewing horrified contestants who devour worms and insects on NBC's Fear Factor; Donald Trump who exclaims without nuance, "You're fired" on his wildly popular series, The Apprentice...
    • Jack Levin and James Alan Fox, "Normalcy in Behavioral Characteristics of the Sadistic Serial Killer", Chapter 1 in Serial Murder and the Psychology of Violent Crimes, edited by Richard N. Kocsis, 2008 Humana Press; p. 12-13
  • Donald Trump is no conservative. That's not a crime, it's just a reason to vote against him. Many fine people are not conservatives. But the reason Trump's candidacy should worry the Right runs much deeper than that. He poses a direct challenge to conservatism, because he embodies the empty promise of managerial leadership outside of politics.
  • We have now arrived at a point where what is being spouted by Donald Trump, and others, amounts to a shallow, vulgar, uncompassionate conservatism. Sadly, to many Republicans, Bush is now a punchline, and Trump is the fad of the moment.
  • Trump's time in the White House is finally over. His presidency can be summarized as chaos, division, threats and hate. It's a wake up call for what can happen when hate and extremism are let in.
  • While Trump's appeal to various groups may be understandable, he makes a terrible champion for Republicans, and especially for conservatives. By the standards we typically use to evaluate candidates — their records, their views, their popularity with the general public, their experience, their temperament, their character — Trump should be dismissed out of hand. No candidate is perfect, but large numbers of conservatives have never before supported any candidate so obviously deficient in all of these respects. That Trump has a long history of liberal positions that extends even into the fairly recent past should not by itself be disqualifying. Conservatism has always welcomed converts. But conservatives have also expected some demonstrated commitment to their principles, some action that advanced their causes, before seeking to elevate a convert to high office. When Mitt Romney ran for the Senate in 1994, for example, he tried to distance himself from Reagan-era conservatism. He later moved right. But even on his least conservative day, Romney was arguing for a smaller government and lower taxes (and for an end to Ted Kennedy's career). Trump, by contrast, has done essentially nothing for any conservative cause prior to deciding to run for the Republican presidential nomination.
  • Trump obviously never meant to impose a wealth test on his administration, or he would have failed it himself. He is proof that a fortune isn't necessarily an obstacle to being a champion of an agenda of populist reform.
  • No participant in an administration that caged children, performed involuntary surgeries on captive women, and scoffed at science as millions were infected with a deadly virus should be enriched by the almost rote largesse of a big book deal. And no one who incited, suborned, instigated, or otherwise supported the January 6, 2021 coup attempt should have their philosophies remunerated and disseminated through our beloved publishing houses.

M

  • [Trump ... alpha male] they’re overcompensating for how insecure they feel — a man who is secure with himself, a human who is secure with themselves, doesn’t have to go around bullying people all the time.
    • Madonna stating it was not true that she had ever asked Donald Trump for a date according to Madonna at Sixty published June 5, 2019
  • Donald Trump, for all of his bluster, is at least authentically stupid... All these other guys are clown posers. Trump is the genuine article. And, God help me, I think I'd rather have him sitting in the Oval Office, getting stupidly out-maneuvered by the politicians under him, than bringing in a guy like Carson who is willing to shred every last bit of his intellectual credibility in order to lord over a citizenry he doesn't seem to have much respect for.
  • New Rule: Whenever you think the Tea Party can't get any dumber, they get dumber. Now they're in love with Donald Trump. Because nothing says "We're serious about fiscal responsibility" quite like a billionaire whose corporations have filed for bankruptcy three times.
    • Bill Maher (2011), The New New Rules: A Funny Look At How Everybody But Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass, New York: Blue Rider Press, ISBN 978-0399158414 
  • Here's the thing about Donald Trump: He never apologizes. He's never wrong, no matter what crazy thing he says. He's totally— he's the white Kanye. And they are gonna love him. For a party whose base adores belligerence, this is the guy.
  • Did you know that of the 14 states with the highest number of painkiller prescriptions per person, they all went for Trump?
    • Bill Maher Real Time with Bill Maher, January 20th 2017
  • His behavior defies the traditional definition of what it means to be "manly." He wears bronzer, loves gold and gossip, is obsessed with his physical appearance, whines constantly, can't control his emotions, watches daytime television, enjoys parades and interior decorating, and used to sell perfume.
  • He set us back like 10 years. We have worked so hard to promote our values, values that made him president when he hawked them, and now he does this, leaving everything in shambles? Nah, destroy him. Let it be a lesson to every other 'populist'.
  • I think even during the campaign I said that Trump reminded me most of Joffrey. They have the same level of emotional maturity. And Joffrey likes to remind everyone that he's king. And he thinks that gives him the ability to do anything. And we're not an absolute monarchy, like Westeros is. We're a constitutional republic. And yet, Trump doesn't seem to know what that means. He thinks the presidency gives him the power to do anything. And so, yeah, Joffrey is Trump.
  • Today's violent assault on our Capitol, an effort to subjugate American democracy by mob rule, was fomented by Mr. Trump. His use of the Presidency to destroy trust in our election and to poison our respect for fellow citizens has been enabled by pseudo political leaders whose names will live in infamy as profiles in cowardice. Our Constitution and our Republic will overcome this stain and We the People will come together again in our never-ending effort to form a more perfect Union, while Mr. Trump will deservedly be left a man without a country.
  • In recent days, Donald Trump disparaged a fallen soldier's parents. He has suggested that the likes of their son should not be allowed in the United States — to say nothing of entering its service. I cannot emphasize enough how deeply I disagree with Mr. Trump's statement. I hope Americans understand that the remarks do not represent the views of our Republican Party, its officers, or candidates.
  • I claim no moral superiority over Donald Trump. I have a long and well-known public and private record for which I will have to answer at the Final Judgment, and I repose my hope in the promise of mercy and the moderation of age. I challenge the nominee to set the example for what our country can and should represent.
  • Arizona is watching. It is time for Donald Trump to set the example for our country and the future of the Republican Party. While our Party has bestowed upon him the nomination, it is not accompanied by unfettered license to defame those who are the best among us.
  • The presidency's most crucial duty is the protection of American national security. Yet, interviewed by Hugh Hewitt months into his campaign, Donald Trump did not know the key leaders of the global jihad. The man who would be commander-in-chief was unfamiliar with Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader who has been murdering Americans for over 30 years; Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's longtime deputy who has quite notoriously commanded al-Qaeda since the network's leader was killed by U.S. forces in 2011; and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, self-proclaimed caliph of the Islamic State (ISIS) and a jihadist so globally notorious that many teenagers are aware of him. Of course a man who wants to be president should make it his business to know such things.

About the attack on US Capitol:

About the attack on US Capitol:

  • Former President Trump's actions that preceded the riot were a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty. Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.
  • Impeachment was never meant to be the final forum for American justice
  • We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. And former Presidents are not immune from being held accountable by either one.
  • He did not do his job. He didn't take steps so federal law could be faithfully executed and order restored. No. Instead, according to public reports, he watched television happily -- happily -- as the chaos unfolded.
  • Trump had been calling for better relations with Russia during his presidential campaign... Stooping to a new low, Friday's (New York) Times headline screamed: "F.B.I. Opened Inquiry Into Whether Trump Was Secretly Working on Behalf of Russia." For those interested in evidence — or the lack of it— regarding collusion between Russia and the presidential campaign of Donald Trump, we can thank the usual Russia-gate promoters at The New York Times and CNN for inadvertently filling in some gaps in recent days... NYT readers had to get down to paragraph 9 to read: "No evidence has emerged..."
  • Donald Trump is no conservative. He's a populist whose theme is: Our government is broken, and I'll fix it. He's right on point one: Both parties have failed to lead. Obama and congressional Democrats manipulate the levers of power to push America farther toward European socialism; Republicans promise free-market alternatives but end up caving in to pressure or carrying water for the GOP's own big-government special interests. The American people have signaled in recent elections that they've had enough of business as usual, and now they want to clean house. Yet Trump is no better than what we already have. He'll say anything to get a vote but give us more of the same if he gets into office. Trump beguiles us, defies the politically correct media, and bullies anyone who points out that the emperor has no clothes. None of that makes him a conservative who cherishes liberty... For decades, Trump has argued for big government.
  • Trump is unexpectedly increasing my enthusiasm for Hillary. What he is saying is not based on facts: it's based on immaturity, bad judgment and ignorance, and I think it's going to be hard for people in uniform who are thoughtful about this, to vote for him.
  • Trump's brawling, blustery, mean-spirited public persona serves to associate conservatives with all the negative stereotypes that liberals have for decades attached to their opponents on the right. According to conventional caricature, conservatives are selfish, greedy, materialistic, bullying, misogynistic, angry, and intolerant. They are, we're told, privileged and pampered elitists who revel in the advantages of inherited wealth while displaying only cruel contempt for the less fortunate and the less powerful. The Left tried to smear Ronald Reagan in such terms but failed miserably because he displayed none of the stereotypical traits... Trump is the living, breathing, bellowing personification of all the nasty characteristics Democrats routinely ascribe to Republicans.
  • There are two tactical approaches for candidates seeking their party's nomination in election campaigns. One is to strongly debate the issues and firmly advocate your positions, but to avoid personal attacks on your opponents or needless divisiveness. The other is to vigorously attack your fellow candidates, disparaging them personally and seeking to raise yourself up by dragging them down. Ronald Reagan was famous for epitomizing the former path. Donald Trump, unfortunately, has chosen to follow the latter course... At a time when the nation is suffering under one of the most divisive and incompetent presidents in history, our people need positive, unifying leadership, not negative, destructive political rhetoric.
  • Trump owes less to Willkie's tradition than to Benito Mussolini's, and not only because of the superficial: Trump's chin-out toughness, sweeping right-hand gestures and talk of his "huge" successes and his "stupid" opponents all evoke the Italian dictator's style. Monday's breathtaking announcement that he would block all Muslims from entering the United States has many pointing out the obvious fascist overtones... Trump uses many of the fascist's tools: a contempt for facts, spreading a pervasive sense of fear and overwhelming crisis, portraying his backers as victims, assigning blame to foreign or alien actors and suggesting only his powerful personality can transcend the crisis. He endorsed the violence done to a dissenter at one of his rallies, and he now floats the idea of making entry to the United States contingent on religion.
  • For all the promises Trump is breaking, there is one he has kept without wavering: his vow to be unpredictable. ... Some suggest that there is a method to Trump's madness, that he is trying to make would-be adversaries think he is irrational and capricious, thereby making foes and rivals wary of pushing him too far. ... But in Trump's application of the Madman Theory there seems to be less theory than madman. There may be advantages to keeping foes and opponents off guard, but Trump is baffling friends and allies, too. In foreign affairs, unpredictability spooks allies and spreads instability. And unpredictable policy at home has long been seen as toxic for business. ... The widespread chaos suggests Trump isn't signaling new policies as much as he's winging it. His unpredictability is not a theory. It's the absence of one.
  • He needs no introduction. His name is familiar to every person on the planet Earth. His name comes up in almost every conversation in the world on global politics. His every word is followed by tens of millions. He has left a deep and lasting impact everywhere.
President Trump should win the Nobel Peace Prize. ~ Moon Jae-in
  • The three primary goals of religious conservatives: to protect all human life, including that of the unborn; to reinforce the sanctity of marriage and the family; and to conserve the religious freedom of all persons. All three goals would be in jeopardy under a Trump presidency. Yes, Trump says that he is pro-life now, despite having supported partial-birth abortion in the past. The problem is not whether he can check a box. Pro-life voters expect leaders to have a coherent vision of human dignity and to be able to defend against assaults on human life in the future—some of which may be unimaginable today and will present themselves only as new technologies develop.
  • Trump's proposal would assure the enmity of all Muslims, including those whose support we need if we are to prevail. Even assuming an infallible way to identify who is Muslim, the proposal is both under- and over-inclusive. It is under-inclusive because it does not address potential terrorists who have U.S. passports or residence permits, or are already here, or may threaten us abroad; it is over-inclusive because it bars the huge majority of Muslims who are not potential terrorists. Trump says he would order the military to kill the families of terrorists. That would be a direct violation of the most basic laws of armed conflict, which require that deadly force be used only when required by military necessity, under circumstances that allow distinction between military and civilian targets, and when incidental damage to non-military targets is proportional to the military advantage gained. A military that adhered to the laws of armed conflict would necessarily disobey such an order; if it followed the order, both the person who gave it and those who followed it would be subject to prosecution for war crimes.
  • Trump has gotten six or seven stories in his presidency so far, that if they happened in 1981, there would have been serious talk about the president needing to resign. And that's gone now, that ray gun of, "We don't do this. You can't get away with that" is pretty much gone... Everything is a racial stereotype with him half the time. We've got to admit that about Trump.

N

  • I love Donald, and he would make a great president. Number one, he tells the truth. Number two, he's been where most of these guys want to be, in terms of riding on his own plane. He doesn't have to worry about what hotels he stays in, he doesn't have to worry about how his family gets to Hawaii, so on and so forth. I could give you so many reasons. But most of all, most important I think for Mr. Trump, is he tells it like it is. Look, we can talk about these radicals all we want, but it's my opinion, and I heard [Trump] say this too: They're only going to be as radical as we let them be.
  • Donald Trump is the most willfully ignorant man ever to hold the presidency. He does not understand even basic concepts of … well, almost anything. (Yesterday, he explained to a woman in Michigan that he would lower food prices by limiting food imports—in other words, by reducing the supply of food. Trump went to the Wharton School, where I assume “supply and demand” was part of the first-year curriculum.) He is insensate to anything that conflicts with his needs or beliefs, and briefing him on any topic is virtually impossible.
  • Have you ever argued with a toddler? Because if you have, you probably lost that argument, or you killed the toddler. Either way, you didn't win the argument, because you can't win an argument against a toddler. Toddlers will say the most outlandish shit. [...] Over the course of this election season, we've come to realize that president-elect Donald Trump might have the mind of a toddler. And if you think about it, it makes sense. He loves the same things that toddlers do. They like building things. They love attention, always grabbing things they're not supposed to. [...] You don't argue with a child if you want to win. Don't amplify the toddler's voice, because you'll just get trapped in the toddler's world. Rather, just keep asking the toddler to elaborate. Because logic is the downfall of every toddler. The point is to gently demoralize the toddler and smother his tantrums. And, as a bonus, stop him from delegitimizing the press.
  • I'd like to take Donald Trump to Palestine,/set him free in the streets of Ramallah or Nablus/amidst all the winners who never gave up in sixty-/nine years./They'd like to make their country great again too,/if only their hands weren't tied by the weapons/our country donates.

O

  • [Americans have] a continuing normative commitment to the ideals of individual freedom and mobility, values that extend far beyond the issue of race in the American mind. The depth of this commitment may be summarily dismissed as the unfounded optimism of the average American—I may not be Donald Trump now, but just you wait; if I don't make it, my children will.
  • We've got a debate inside the other party that is fantasy and schoolyard taunts and selling stuff like it's the Home Shopping Network. And then you've got the Republican establishment -- they're very exercised: We're shocked that somebody would be saying these things. We're shocked that somebody is fanning anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-Muslim sentiment. We're shocked! We're shocked that somebody could be loose with the facts. Or distort someone's record -- shocked... This is the guy, remember, who was sure that I was born in Kenya. Who just wouldn't let it go. And all this same Republican establishment, they weren't saying nothing. As long as it was directed at me, they were fine with it. They thought it was a hoot. Wanted to get his endorsement... What is happening in this primary is just a distillation of what's been happening inside their party for more than a decade. I mean, the reason that many of their voters are responding is because this is what's been fed through the messages they've been sending for a long time -- that you just make flat assertions that don't comport with the facts. That you just deny the evidence of science. That compromise is a betrayal. That the other side isn't simply wrong, or we just disagree, we want to take a different approach, but the other side is destroying the country, or treasonous. I mean, that's - look it up. That's what they've been saying. So they can't be surprised when somebody suddenly looks and says, you know what, I can do that even better. I can make stuff up better than that. I can be more outrageous than that. I can insult people even better than that. I can be even more uncivil.
  • I did hope, for the sake of our country, that Donald Trump might show some interest in taking the job seriously … But he never did. For close to four years now, he’s shown no interest in putting in the work; no interest in finding common ground; no interest in using the awesome power of his office to help anyone but himself and his friends; no interest in treating the presidency as anything but one more reality show that he can use to get the attention he craves. … Trump hasn’t grown into the job because he can’t.
  • Let's take a page from Donald Trump's book and ignore political correctness for a moment. If you support Trump, you support his sexist, bigoted and racist views. There are no ifs, ands or buts about it, and this is especially true for GOP party leaders, elected officials and even community leaders. Some have said things such as, 'I don't like Trump's history of demeaning women, but I think he will be good for the economy'. Sorry, you don't get a pass because you like one of his policy proposals. It's akin to saying, 'I supported Hitler for his tax plan'. And no, I'm absolutely not comparing Trump to Hitler. But Anne Frank's 86-year-old stepsister, Eva Schloss, who survived Auschwitz, did just that a few weeks ago, telling Newsweek that Trump 'is acting like another Hitler by inciting racism'.

  • This young girl, Tara Conner, how old is she? 20? 21. She went out and she was partying. She's from Kentucky. She went to New York and she was hanging out at all the parties, and doing what Paris and Lindsay do — you know, dancing, whatever. And so he held a press conference to announce whether or not she was going to retain her crown. And then she started to cry, going, "I just want to thank Donald for giving me a second chance." And there he is, hair looping, going [flipping hair over top of her head, imitating Trump] "Everyone deserves a second chance. I'm going to give her a second chance."

    He annoys me on a multitude of levels. He's the moral authority? Left the first wife, had an affair. Left the second wife, had an affair. Had kids both times, but he's the moral compass for 20-year-olds in America. Donald, sit and spin, my friend! I don't enjoy him. No. No, no, no.

  • He inherited a lot of money — wait a minute — and he's been bankrupt so many times where he didn't have to pay. But the people beneath him who he owed money to got shorted out of the money, but he got to again, try again and again. And you know what saved him the second time? After his father died, with that money, he paid off all his bankruptcy. This is not a self-made man.
  • I just think that this man is sort of like one of those, you know, snake oil salesmen in Little House on the Prairie.
  • This man just can't be president. They've got this button — this briefcase. He's going to find it.
  • The Founding Fathers created a system of checks and balances to limit the power of the President, but it only works if someone fucking checks or balances. And if you don't, it's no longer on Trump, it's on you. Because when you've got the presidential equivalent of a five-year-old shitting on the salad bar of a Ruby Tuesdays, at some point you stop blaming the five-year-old, and you start blaming the people who are not stopping him. Stop that boy, that's what I am saying. Stop that boy, now.
  • in 2019, President Trump repeated the baseless conspiracy theory that I had committed immigration fraud, nearly three years after I thought I had answered it once and for all.
  • to me, Trump is more like [former Italian prime minister [Silvio] Berlusconi than like Hitler. Trump is many things. He is pampered, he is an immature man, he is a teenager craving unconditional, endless love from everybody. I don’t think he is fanatic. I’m not sure I would say about his vice president that he is not a fanatic, he probably is, but I don’t think Donald Trump strikes me as a fanatic.

P

  • Had Hillary won, everyone would have expected disappointed Trump voters to show a modicum of respect for the electoral results as well as for the historic ceremony of the inauguration, during which former combatants momentarily unite to pay homage to the peaceful transition of power in our democracy. But that was not the reaction of a vast cadre of Democrats shocked by Trump's win. In an abject failure of leadership that may be one of the most disgraceful episodes in the history of the modern Democratic party, Chuck Schumer, who had risen to become the Senate Democratic leader after the retirement of Harry Reid, asserted absolutely no moral authority as the party spun out of control in a nationwide orgy of rage and spite. Nor were there statesmanlike words of caution and restraint from two seasoned politicians whom I have admired for decades and believe should have run for president long ago—Senator Dianne Feinstein and Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi. How do Democrats imagine they can ever expand their electoral support if they go on and on in this self-destructive way, impugning half the nation as vile racists and homophobes?
    All of which brings us to the issue of Trump's performance to date. The initial conundrum was: could he shift from being the slashing, caustic ex-reality show star of the campaign to a more measured, presidential persona? Perhaps to the dismay of his diehard critics, Trump did indeed make that transition at the Capitol on inauguration morning, when he appeared grave and focused, palpably conveying a sense of the awesome burdens of the highest office. As for his particular actions as president, I am no fan of executive orders, which usurp congressional prerogatives and which I was already denouncing when Obama was constantly signing them (with very little protest, one might add, from the mainstream media).
  • With Donald Trump as the presumptive presidential nominee, we are witnessing a populist hijacking of one of the United States' great political parties... [R]ooted in ignorance, prejudice, fear and isolationism... This troubles me deeply as a Republican, but it troubles me even more as an American... Enough is enough... It's time to put country before party and say it together: Never Trump.
  • Trump has made a living out of preying on and bullying society's most vulnerable, with the help of government. He isn't an outsider, but rather an unelected politician of the worst kind. He admits that he's bought off elected officials in order get his way and to openly abuse the system. The rabid defense he gets from some quarters is astonishing. Trump's liberal positions aren't in the distant past—he has openly promoted them on the campaign trail. Trump isn't fighting for anyone but himself, which has been his pattern for decades. Conservatives have a serious decision. Do we truly believe in our long-held principles and insist that politicians have records demonstrating fealty to them? Or are we willing to throw these principles away because an entertainer who has been a liberal Democrat for decades simply says some of the right things?
  • Observing his behavior, I have concluded that he is like the man who refuses to ask for directions.
  • All of the answers are there. And yet the president continues to go down the wrong path and refuses to ask for directions from scientists who know better than any of us.
  • We might get somebody of his ilk who's sane, and that would really be dangerous, because it could be who's smart, who's strategic, and the rest. This is a slob. He doesn't believe in science. He's a snake-oil salesman. And he's shrewd. Give him credit for his shrewdness.
    • Nancy Pelosi, as quoted by Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year (2021), p. 6
  • Donald Trump and I believe that Captain Humayun Khan is an American hero and his family, like all Gold Star families, should be cherished by every American. Captain Khan gave his life to defend our country in the global war on terror. Due to the disastrous decisions of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, a once stable Middle East has now been overrun by ISIS. This must not stand. By suspending immigration from countries that have been compromised by terrorism, rebuilding our military, defeating ISIS at its source and projecting strength on the global stage, we will reduce the likelihood that other American families will face the enduring heartbreak of the Khan family.
  • The president has made it clear that we want the governors to implement testing and deploy testing where they deem it's most appropriate in their state, we're going to continue to fully partner with states around the country to increase the supply, to make sure that they have the reagents and the test kits necessary to perform those tests. But I want to say again, it is truly -- it's a tribute to the president's leadership that early on in this process he brought in the top commercial labs in the country. They formed an alliance. And we went from one month ago to 80,000 tests being done to four million tests being completed as of yesterday. We'll continue to increase that. We'll continue to make governors aware of that.
  • I've seen that report in the papers this morning. And I know that HHS is making inquiries. But we believe those issues were resolved on that particular test by early February. But it's important for your viewers to know that that test, the slow lab-based test that is typical for CDC and public health labs would never have been able to meet the needs of testing in this coronavirus epidemic. That's why President Trump was so right when he brought together these commercial labs and formed a consortium. And literally took us from -- at that time in February we had done some 20,000 tests total across the country. Now we've done more than four million and we believe we'll have done more than five million tests before the end of this month. None of that would have been possible without the president's leadership, without the innovation, without the incredible efforts of companies like Roche and Avid Laboratories.
  • I wrote the scripture reference, which is 2 Corinthians 3:17, which is how it's written, I'm guilty as charged. That's exactly what I did. I sent him a couple of suggestions of some things he could talk about as a connection point.
    It shows that he's not familiar with Bible, Donald Trump's a very interesting guy. There are some things about him that I find fascinating, that I like about him, as well as other evangelicals.
    • Tony Perkins, in an interview with CNN's Erin Burnett on OutFront, about Trump saying "two Corinthians" instead of "Second Corinthians" during a speech at Liberty University. [78] (January 22, 2016)
  • He offers a barking carnival act that can be best described as Trumpism: a toxic mix of demagoguery, mean-spiritedness and nonsense that will lead the Republican Party to perdition if pursued... Let no one be mistaken: Donald Trump's candidacy is a cancer on conservatism, and it must be clearly diagnosed, excised and discarded. ... Donald Trump is the modern-day incarnation of the Know Nothing movement.
  • To most of us, the American presidential campaign is a media freak show, in which Donald Trump is the arch villain. But Trump is loathed by those with power in the United States for reasons that have little to do with his obnoxious behaviour and opinions. To the invisible government in Washington, the unpredictable Trump is an obstacle to America’s design for the 21st century...To the militarists in Washington, the real problem with Trump is that, in his lucid moments, he seems not to want a war with Russia; he wants to talk with the Russian president, not fight him; he says he wants to talk with the president of China. In the first debate with Hillary Clinton, Trump promised not to be the first to introduce nuclear weapons into a conflict. He said, “I would certainly not do first strike. Once the nuclear alternative happens, it’s over.” That was not news... what is clear is that Trump is considered a serious threat to the status quo maintained by the vast national security machine that runs the United States, regardless of who is in the White House. The CIA wants him beaten. The Pentagon wants him beaten. The media wants him beaten. Even his own party wants him beaten. He is a threat to the rulers of the world – unlike Clinton who has left no doubt she is prepared to go to war with nuclear-armed Russia and China... Without a shred of evidence, she has accused Russia of supporting Trump and hacking her emails.
  • The coming war on China is likely to happen by mistake or accident as a result of deliberate provocations by the US and its echoes. Under cover of the pandemic, the Trump regime is sending strategic bombers and spy drones within sight of China itself. Our silence is our peril.
  • Trump is an unbalanced force. He is the politicized American id. Should his election results match his polls, he would be, unquestionably, the worst thing to happen to the American common culture in my lifetime.
  • Donald Trump was so awful, so horrible, so disgusting... His lies, his distortions, his deceits, and his libels thicker and fouler than they've yet been... Since he began running he has demonstrated he knows things we don't know about the emotions roiling in the American underbelly. Maybe he knows this too... He interrupts, he yells over them, he insults them, he goes over his allotted time, and the whirlwind he creates turns into a vacuum that sucks all the air out of the place and right into his attention-whore lungs.
  • It’s not surprising that a criminal like Trump pardons other criminals. But apparently to get a pardon, one has to be either a Republican, a convicted child murderer or a turkey.
  • Trump and McConnell know these states are reopening too soon, but they don’t care, because they need to make the money happy. [...] The utter cruelty of these tactics, the nihilistic self-destruction of it in the face of more than 55,000 dead and thousands more to follow, has scarce precedent in the annals of U.S. politics. Instead of helping the entire country in this time of grievous crisis, Trump and McConnell are putting their boots to the neck of every state they deem ideologically unfit. It will be a damn miracle if the nation survives this, and them.
  • People imnitate Autistic hand flapping when they want to imply a disabled person is stupid, annoying, or out of control. Donald Trump famously did a cruel imitation of hand flapping during his 2016 campaign, while criticizing a physically disabled reporter.
He's a really brilliant and talented person, without any doubt. It's not our job to judge his qualities, that's a job for American voters, but he's the absolute leader in the presidential race. ~ Vladimir Putin

R

  • Your reminder that America's richest 1 percent now own half the value of the U.S. stock market. The richest 10 percent own 92 percent. So when Trump says the stock market is the economy, know who he's really talking about.
  • As the pandemic surges back, Trump and his lackeys have:
—Tried to dismantle the Affordable Care Act
—Rallied to pass a $740,000,000,000 defense spending bill
—Declined extending additional unemployment benefits to out-of-work Americans
Their priorities are crystal clear.
  • You may not agree with his authenticity but he's authentic. People like that. He speaks his mind, which reminds me of me once in a while. I think that's something that's refreshing.
  • He presents himself as a Strong Man who promises to knock heads and make things right again. In this, he has a lot more in common with South American populist demagogues than with our tradition of political leaders... The middle-class consensus in America has collapsed. This is the most important political and social earthquake since World War II. The conservative movement's leadership isn't up to the challenge, and a good number of voters are willing to gamble on Trump's bluster. Bad bet. Our nation's solidarity is being tested. It will only make things worse if we go Trumpster diving.
  • He is a successful man for a reason. He's actually created a dialogue [and] forced conversations. He has gotten more people engaged in the political process and current events and what's going on in the world than anyone else has for a long time. More people are engaged than ever before. I think whether you agree with Donald or you don't agree with Donald, he starts conversations. That's what democracy is — you've got to get people engaged to make this country run.
  • It's impossible to ignore the conspicuous regularity with which Donald Trump issues intentionally provocative, news-cycle-dominating comments. It's equally difficult to look past their timing, which tends to often coincide with scandalous revelations that reflect poorly on Democratic politicians... This is far from an isolated event; it's a pattern. First, a Democrat becomes embroiled in a controversy or an external event reflects negatively on the party. Donald Trump then makes an outrageous comment calculated for maximum political impact. Like clockwork, the press abandons their critical examination of Democratic policies, and Republicans are back at each other's throats. This is a measurable phenomenon. In just the last six months, there are almost too many examples to count.
  • Donald Trump, champion and avatar of the shallow state, has won power because his supporters are threatened by what they don't understand, and what they don't understand is almost everything. Indeed, from evolution to data about our economy to the science of vaccines to the threats we face in the world, they reject vast subjects rooted in fact in order to have reality conform to their worldviews. They don't dig for truth; they skim the media for anything that makes them feel better about themselves. To many of them, knowledge is not a useful tool but a cunning barrier elites have created to keep power from the average man and woman. The same is true for experience, skills, and know-how. These things require time and work and study and often challenge our systems of belief. Truth is hard; shallowness is easy.
  • I think it's time for a war president. Republicans, conservatives and Christians, and capitalist, any who love capitalism, any who loves America, patriots, I think we need a war president and I think God sent us someone named Donald Trump, I think he's perfect for this election. We needed someone who is a bit coarse and foul-mouthed and vicious and fights with a gun in a gunfight, not with a knife in a gun fight.
  • Dishonesty is Trump's hallmark: He claimed that he had spoken clearly and boldly against going into Iraq. Wrong, he spoke in favor of invading Iraq. He said he saw thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating 9/11. Wrong, he saw no such thing. He imagined it. His is not the temperament of a stable, thoughtful leader. His imagination must not be married to real power.
  • We have long referred to him as "The Donald." He is the only person in America to whom we have added an article before his name. It wasn't because he had attributes we admired.

S

Donald Trump...his entire political strategy is to divide the American people...So you have a president who gives tax breaks to billionaires...who tried to throw 32 million people off health care...who gave 83 percent of the tax benefits to the top one percent...So how do you win an election? What do you say — You see those undocumented people, they all your enemy. 'Stand with me. Hate them. Let's divide this country up.' ~ Bernie Sanders
  • What [Donald Trump] is doing and this is his entire political strategy is to divide the American people up based on where we came...So you have a president who gives tax breaks to billionaires and wants to cut Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. That's not what he's going to run on. You've got a president who tried to throw 32 million people off health care. He ain't gonna run on that one. You got a president who gave 83 percent of the tax benefits to the top one percent, not going to run on that one. So how do you win an election? What do you say — You see those undocumented people, they all your enemy. 'Stand with me. Hate them. Let's divide this country up.' I think that is an incredibly ugly and dangerous thing to be done. And I will do everything I can to stop that."
  • Attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman are unacceptable and must be fully investigated... but this incident must not be used as a pretext for a war with Iran, a war which would be an unmitigated disaster for the United States, Iran, the region, and the world... The time is now for the United States to exert international leadership,... and bring the countries in the region together to forge a diplomatic solution to the growing tensions...I would also remind President Trump that there is no congressional authorization for a war with Iran... A unilateral U.S. attack on Iran would be illegal and unconstitutional.
  • I think that the American people are never going to elect a president who insults Mexicans, who insults Muslims, who insults women, who insults African-Americans. And let us not forget that several years ago, Trump was in the middle of the so- called birther movement, trying to delegitimize the president of the United States of America. You know, I find it very interesting, Karen, my dad was born in Poland. I know a little bit about the immigrant experience. Nobody has ever asked me for my birth certificate. Maybe it has something to do with the color of my skin.
    In this country, immigration reform is a very hot debate. It's divided the country. But I would hope very much, that as we have that debate, we do not, as Donald Trump and others have done, resort to racism and xenophobia and bigotry. This idea of suddenly, one day or maybe a night, rounding up 11 million people and taking them outside of this country is a vulgar, absurd idea that I would hope very few people in America support.
    When you have Republican candidates for president and in Congress telling you that climate change is a hoax, which is Donald Trump and other candidates' position, what they are really saying is, we don't have the guts to take on the fossil fuel industry. ... You know what happens to that Republican who listens to the scientists? On that day, that Republican loses his campaign funding from the Koch brothers and the fossil fuel industry.
  • America you were never great./Are you fake news?/America this is the impression I get after feeding from Trump's/Twitter trough.
  • Yes, we must donate and volunteer and protest and vote, all while reminding ourselves daily that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote. And we must commit to defending our friends, neighbors, and coworkers who are immigrants (documented or not), Muslims (American born, immigrants, or refugees), people of color, women seeking reproductive health care, trans men and women seeking safety, lesbian and gay men seeking to protect their families, and everyone and everything else Trump has threatened to harm, up to and including the planet we all live on.
But we must make time for joy and pleasure and laughter and friends and food and art and music and sex. During the darkest days of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, when Republicans and religious conservatives controlled the federal government and were doing everything in their power to harm the sick and dying, queers organized and protested and volunteered and mourned. We also made music and theater and art. We took care of each other, and we danced and loved and fucked. Embracing joy and art and sex in the face of fear and uncertainty made us feel better—it kept us sane—and it had the added benefit of driving our enemies crazy. They couldn't understand how we could be anything but miserable, given the challenges we faced—their greed, their indifference, their bigotry—but we created and experienced joy despite their hatred and despite this awful disease. We turned to each other—we turned to our lovers and friends and sometimes strangers—and said, "Fuck them. Now fuck me."
[...] We may never eradicate racism and sexism and hatred. But fight it we will. And don't listen to anyone who tells you that music and dance and art and sex and joy are a distraction from the fight. They are a part of the fight.
  • I found that when I was briefing him, I had to put pictures of him in the briefing. When I put the pictures in, it was a good sign, and when I didn’t put the pictures in, you couldn’t get him to focus on it.
  • Here’s the bad news, though. Even if you got him to focus on it, he wouldn’t listen to you anyway because he’s so maniacally narcissistic.
  • He does look like he's the last hope [for America]. We don't hear anybody saying what he's saying. In fact, most of the people who ought to be lining up with him are attacking him. They're probably jealous of the amount of press coverage he gets. But the reason he gets so much press coverage is the grassroots are fed up with people who are running things, and they do want a change. They do want people to stand up for America. It really resonates when he says he wants to 'Make America Great Again.'
  • If Donald Trump becomes the next president of the U.S. it would be a complete disaster... I think he is acting like another Hitler by inciting racism... I remember how upset the world was when the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961 and now everybody is building walls again to keep people out. It's absurd.
  • There are two Trumps. The one he presents to the world is all bluster, bullying and certainty. The other, which I have long felt haunts his inner world, is the frightened child of a relentlessly critical and bullying father and a distant and disengaged mother who couldn't or wouldn't protect him.
    Trump's temperament and his habits have hardened with age. He was always cartoonish, but compared with the man for whom I wrote The Art of the Deal 30 years ago, he is significantly angrier today: more reactive, deceitful, distracted, vindictive, impulsive and, above all, self-absorbed – assuming the last is possible.
    Fear is the hidden through-line in Trump's life – fear of weakness, of inadequacy, of failure, of criticism and of insignificance. He has spent his life trying to outrun these fears by "winning" – as he puts it – and by redefining reality whenever the facts don't serve the narrative he seeks to create. It hasn't worked, but not for lack of effort.
    Whatever happens, may the worst of Trump inspire the best in us.
  • He is neither a strategist, nor is he schooled in the operational art, nor is he a tactician, nor is he a general, nor is he a soldier. Other than that, he's a great military man.
  • Trump wants to institute a ban that will keep all Muslims out of America... Of course such a ban will not come to pass. The Constitution forbids it. Republicans and Democrats oppose it. Even Israeli politicians, who have a far longer history of confronting terrorism, have chided him for equating Islam with terrorism... Republicans support Trump because he appears to be authentic, isn't afraid to tell it like it is and is not worried about being politically correct. I see the opposite. He isn't authentic, he is cynically opportunistic.
  • Their cruelty made them feel good, it made them feel proud, it made them feel happy. And it made them feel closer to one another…Their shared laughter at the suffering of others is an adhesive that binds them to one another, and to Trump.
    Donald Trump, whose uncritical support for Israel and belief that America is fundamentally a nation for white Christians exacerbates a divide between the two largest Jewish populations in the world.
    • Adam Serwer, The Cruelty Is the Point: The Past, Present, and Future of Trump's America (2021)
  • Trump and Barr let the biggest drug dealers in America off with a slap on the wrist. Law and Order indeed.
    • Adam Serwer 11/18/2020 on Twitter, responding to story about "the $8.3 billion settlement between the Justice Dept. and Purdue Pharma over its marketing of Oxycontin and other addictive opioids. Under the deal, the Sackler family will admit no wrongdoing and face no criminal charges."
  • And [then] you end up in idiocies like Donald Trump on stage waiving around a Bible, pretending he gives a damn what's in it. Right, after two marriages, and several adulterous affairs, and all that and bragging about having his experiences with married women; standing up there with a Bible and going 'this is an even better book than the odd of the deals'."
  • We know Hillary will be a terrible, hard-core ideological leftist; there is probably a 75 percent chance that Trump would govern less badly than Hillary. There is also a 25 percent chance that Trump would do something so catastrophically awful that he seriously harmed the country in ways Hillary wouldn't dream of. His trade policy alone could cast America back into recession; his foreign policy is a shambles. Any talk of him listening to advisers must be based on conjecture — so far, Trump hasn't just been a bull in a china shop, he's been a tank in a glass factory.
  • We have predicted nine of his last eight stumbles, and they have yet to all materialize... I think it's more than childish and juvenile and adolescent. There is something creepy about this, his attitude toward women. Take Megyn Kelly of FOX News, who he just has an absolute obsession about, and he's constantly writing about, you know, how awful she is and no talent and this and that. It's an obsession. And I don't know if he's just never had women — strong, independent women in his life who have spoken to him. It doesn't seem that way. His daughter... But there is something really creepy about this that's beyond locker room. It's almost like a stalker, and I just — I thought this was — it actually did the impossible. It made Ted Cruz look like an honorable, tough guy on the right side of an issue.
  • The 2017 World Environment Day was dominated by US President Donald Trump walking out of the Paris agreement. What does Trump's arrogance imply for international obligations to protect the earth, for a future based on ecological justice, for sowing the seeds of earth democracy?
    • Vandana Shiva Oneness vs. the 1%: Shattering Illusions, Seeding Freedom (2018)
  • I've known Donald for a few decades, and what you can say without argument is that he's a good father. His kids have turned out really well. There's nothing bad you can say about that.
  • Before the 2016 election I dreaded a return to the Jim Crow era signaled by the slogan “Make America Great Again”, which obviously meant white. Tragically that is exactly what happened. Four more years is unthinkable. That is why I am working to elect President Bernie Sanders.
  • For the first time in our Nation’s history, a grand jury has charged a former President with committing crimes while in office to overturn an election that he lost. In response, the defendant claims that to protect the institution of the Presidency, he must be cloaked with absolute immunity from criminal prosecution unless the House impeached and the Senate convicted him for the same conduct. He is wrong.
    • Jack Smith, filing with United States Court of Appeals quoted in RawStory December 30, 2023
  • A great leader treats people with respect even when they present different opinions. Without a variety of views and opinions, we would have no innovation or creativity in our nation. Being a bully and being strong are not the same thing. Being strong is standing up for your convictions. Being a bully is trying to intimidate those who are perceived to be weaker or a threat. As a proud nerd, I had to deal with bullies over many years; it is tragedy watching our world suffer from one. In addition, President Trump lacks a moral compass. He ignores the truth.
  • Let me put this in language Donald Trump understands... You're a loser. You're a third-rate politician, who clearly doesn't understand issues, and is so scared of Megyn Kelly exposing it, that you're looking to use veterans to protect you from facing her questions.
  • Trump (and Bannon and other right-wing authoritarian leaders around the world) is often referred to as a "populist" because he displays faux concern for the working class and a resentment of science and education, but his policies are in fact grotesquely elitist. If by "populist" we mean whipping up resentment against immigrants and people of color, then we should say that. Otherwise, "populism" is just a lazy euphemism for racism.
  • Donald Trump is the son of a rich father, who was raised on money since he was a child. I grew up in wealth too. My father would jokingly warn me when I was a child, "Don’t be like Trump."
  • In a country with more than 300 million people, it is remarkable how obsessed the media have become with just one—Donald Trump. What is even more remarkable is that, after seven years of repeated disasters, both domestically and internationally, under a glib egomaniac in the White House, so many potential voters are turning to another glib egomaniac to be his successor.
  • I had some friends over for dinner and we were of course talking about Trump. People are saying, we don't think Trump's going to be the nominee. I said, I'll tell you what: I think he is. I'll tell you why I think he's going to be the nominee: he's proven that no matter what he says, people dig him. ... I think more or less, people are super tired of politicians, meaning that they like the idea of a successful businessman running the country who might actually be able to get shit done.
  • His stance on Muslim immigration, which he would cease until the terror threat is brought under control, is racist. Trump does not care about the things that regular conservatives have dedicated their lives to fighting for: controls on abortion, protection of marriage, reform of the healthcare market. His inclination towards expanding the government and putting it on the side of his people isn't terribly constitutional. And his claim in a debate that the purpose of conservatism is to conserve wealth is spiritually impoverished. The Republican Party needs to stop him; and sooner rather than later.
  • In the past few months, a Republican front-runner has emerged who has praised Planned Parenthood, pushed elements of a big spending agenda and questioned the neoconservative agenda. There's a case for saying that some or all of these were in need of analysis and revision. But Trump has taken a wrecking ball to the American conservative movement that threatens to leave it in pieces. It's a revolutionary moment and, unless I'm very much mistaken, conservatives are not supposed to be the revolutionaries. They exist to bring order to chaos, rationality over passion. Trump seems to exist to "mix things up." He is "nasty" and "fun" - although more the former than the latter. His enthusiasm for torture is unpleasant to say the least.
  • In January 2018, the experts at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the hands of the Doomsday Clock to two minutes before midnight, where it had stood during the darkest days of the Cold War, from 1953 to 1960. The latest move of the hands was precipitated by the recklessness in Trump's nuclear thinking... Trump wondered aloud about the point of having nuclear weapons if he couldn't use them.
    His answer was to make them more usable, which he did with his new Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), the first since Obama's 2010 NPR, which had reduced the role of nuclear weapons in the US defense posture. The 2018 NPR significantly elevated their role, permitting use in response to vaguely defined "extreme circumstances," such as cyberattacks or attacks on the infrastructure of both the United States and its "allies and partners." The review doubled down on Obama's unconscionable 30-year trillion-dollar modernization of all parts of the nuclear arsenal. The actual cost looks to be closer to $1.7 trillion and climbing. To make matters worse, all eight other nuclear powers are undertaking their own modernizations, though on a far more modest scale. Russia, it should be noted, actually cut its defense spending this past year.
  • On top of this, we have the rapid and accelerating drift toward planetary disaster exacerbated by the climate change–denying troglodytes in the Trump administration.
  • No one claimed fraud. No one derided the lopsided unfairness of the parliamentary results, where Labour got 34 percent of the vote and a whopping 63 percent of the seats, and where the new rightist Reform Party won 14 percent of the vote and got only 5 seats. Those were the rules ahead of the game, and they were the rules everyone had agreed to.
    There is one reason and one reason only why this kind of conciliatory exchange cannot happen any time soon in America, and that is Donald J. Trump. With a mind warped by pathological and malignant narcissism, incapable of generosity or grace or fairness, Trump has dominated this country’s politics for almost a decade now. He has systematically corroded every democratic norm and institution: the rule of law, the process of elections, the integrity of the Supreme Court, the independence of the Justice Department, the peaceful nature of the transfer of power, and the reliability of our alliances around the world. And none of this damage has been done to advance any broad policy or meaningful agenda, but merely and solely to advance the narcissism and corruption of the president himself.
  • But we do know for a fact that Trump is criminally inclined, driven by vengeance and rage, and has now been granted vague and unprecedented immunity powers by SCOTUS whose limits he will doubtless exploit. We know he will delegitimize any institution that gets in his way; and we know that electing a convicted felon who has already once tried to stop the peaceful transfer of power will be a watershed for a purported republic.
  • Like many of you, I watched the [September 9, 2024 presidential candidate] debate tonight. If you haven’t already, now is a great time to do your research on the issues at hand and the stances these candidates take on the topics that matter to you the most. As a voter, I make sure to watch and read everything I can about their proposed policies and plans for this country.
    Recently I was made aware that AI of ‘me’ falsely endorsing Donald Trump’s presidential run was posted to his site. It really conjured up my fears around AI, and the dangers of spreading misinformation. It brought me to the conclusion that I need to be very transparent about my actual plans for this election as a voter. The simplest way to combat misinformation is with the truth.
    I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in the 2024 Presidential Election. I’m voting for @kamalaharris because she fights for the rights and causes I believe need a warrior to champion them. I think she is a steady-handed, gifted leader and I believe we can accomplish so much more in this country if we are led by calm and not chaos. I was so heartened and impressed by her selection of running mate @timwalz, who has been standing up for LGBTQ+ rights, IVF, and a woman’s right to her own body for decades.
    I’ve done my research, and I’ve made my choice. Your research is all yours to do, and the choice is yours to make. I also want to say, especially to first time voters: Remember that in order to vote, you have to be registered! I also find it’s much easier to vote early. I’ll link where to register and find early voting dates and info in my story.
    With love and hope,
    Taylor Swiftz
    Childless Cat Lady
  • But at some point—if you understand, and this is not just ideological, it's not just the fact that he's abandoned one position after another or that he has the penchant for internet hoaxes or conspiracy theories. I mean a week ago tonight, remember, he was peddling the notion that Ted Cruz's dad had something do with the JFK assassination. So there are people who say that just because of party loyalty we're supposed to forget all of that. I just don't buy that. Because I've cautioned my fellow conservatives, you embrace Donald Trump, you embrace it all. You embrace every slur, every insult, every outrage, every falsehood. You're going to spend the next six months defending, rationalizing, evading all that. And afterwards, you come back to women, to minorities, to young people and say, that wasn't us. That's not what we're about. The reality is, if you support him to be president of the United States, that is who you are, and you own it.

T

  • All of Trump's constant bragging about his money and his poll numbers and his virility speak directly to this surprisingly vibrant middle American fantasy about a castrated white America struggling to re-grow its mojo... as basketball star turned pundit Kareem Abdul-Jabbar pointed out earlier this week, PC isn’t a new thing, or even a thing at all. It’s just an “emotional challenge every generation has had to go through.” We get older, our kids correct our bad habits, it happens. Not to Trump’s supporters. They’ve turned some minor cultural changes into a vast conspiracy of white victimhood. They're eating up Trump's Make America Great Again theme, which one supporter hilariously explained must be his true goal, because 'it's on his hat', because it's a fantasy tale of a once-great culture ruined by an invasion of mongrel criminals.
  • The Biden team is trying to go on with business as usual, but at some point, barring Trump getting a personality transplant, this is going to come to a head. The President is refusing to concede, he is refusing to allow the transition process to begin...
  • What we saw week in and week out, for me, after two and a half years in that administration, was terrifying. We would go in to try to talk to him about a pressing national security issue -- cyberattack, terrorism threat -- he wasn't interested in those things. To him, they weren't priorities.
  • Given what I have experienced in the administration, I have to support Joe Biden for president and even though I am not a Democrat, even though I disagree on key issues, I'm confident that Joe Biden will protect the country and I'm confident that he won't make the same mistakes as this President.
  • I saw firsthand how dangerous Trump is for America.
  • What we saw week in and week out and for me after two and a half years in that administration was terrifying
  • [T]he media always is taking Trump literally. It never takes him seriously, but it always takes him literally. I think a lot of the voters who vote for Trump take Trump seriously, but not literally.
  • Trump has given more than $100,000 to the Democratic House and Senate campaign committees. In 2006, the year Democrats took back Congress, he gave $25,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee... Trump wanted Nancy Pelosi to be speaker of the House and Harry Reid the Senate majority leader. Which is not surprising. At the time he made those contributions, from August 2001 to September 2009, Trump was a registered Democrat... Trump continued to support Reid as majority leader in the election immediately after the passage of Obamacare... With all his past support for Democrats, Trump ought to be asked: Will he commit to supporting whoever is the eventual Republican nominee? After all, why should he be welcomed into the Republican fold if he is going to end up throwing his support to Clinton? The fact is, Trump isn't a Democrat or a Republican; he is an opportunist... He's less a candidate than a brand. And running for president is great for the Trump brand, an opportunity for Donald Trump to take the national stage and tell us all how great he is. He pretty much admitted as much during his announcement speech, when he pointed out that some questioned whether he was really as successful as he claimed.
  • I wanted to like Donald Trump, much as I wanted to like Richard Nixon's vice president, Spiro Agnew. Both men have said many things with which I agree. Agnew attacked media bias, and Trump attacks the establishment's failure to "make America great," as he nonspecifically puts it. But a proper diagnosis does not equal competence in administering a cure. If I developed a brain tumor, I would want Ben Carson to operate on me, but do I want Donald Trump "operating" on America? Everyone has a temperament. The dictionary defines it as "the combination of mental, physical, and emotional traits of a person." Would Trump's "combination" make him a good president? I think not.
  • He's got to condemn this sh*t ASAP.
  • We need an Oval office address. He has to lead now. It has gone too far and gotten out of hand.
    • Donald Trump Jr. writing text messages to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows on January 6 2021, urging Meadows to make Donald Trump stop the attack on the Congress Building.
  • I think he would be a great president... He is one of the most dynamic people in the world. He looks presidential, and he talks presidential, and he would make the changes he promises.
  • Donald's pathologies are so complex and his behaviors so often inexplicable that coming up with an accurate and comprehensive diagnosis would require a full battery of psychological and neurophysical tests that he'll never sit for
  • In order to understand what brought Donald- and all of us- to this point, we need to start with my grandfather and his own need for recognition, a need that propelled him to encourage Donald's reckless hyperbole and unearned confidence that hid Donald's pathological weaknesses and insecurities. As Donald grew up, he was forced to become his own cheerleader, first, because he needed his father to believe he was a better and more confident son than Freddy was; then because Fred required it of him; and finally because he began to believe his own hype, even as he paradoxically suspected on a very deep level that nobody else did. By the time of the election, Donald met any challenges to his sense of superiority with anger, his fear and vulnerabilities so effectively buried that he didn't even have to acknowledge they existed. And he never would.
    • Mary L. Trump, Too Much And Never Enough: How My Family Created The World's Most Dangerous Man (2020), p. 11
  • In the 1970s, after my grandfather had already been preferring and promoting Donald for years, the New York media picked up the baton and began disseminating Donald's unsubstantiated hype. In the 1980s, the banks joined in when they began to fund his ventures. Their willingness (and then their need) to foster his increasingly unfounded claims to success hung on the hopes of recouping their losses. After a decade during which Donald floundered, dragged down by bankruptcies and reduced to fronting for a series of failed products from steaks to vodka, the television producer Mark Burnett gave him yet another chance. The Apprentice traded on Donald's image as the brash, self-made dealmaker, a myth that had been the creation of my grandfather five decades earlier and astonishingly, considering the vast trove of evidence disproving it, had survived into the new millennium almost entirely unaltered. By the time Donald announced his run for the Republican Party nomination in 2015, a significant percentage of the American population had been primed to believe that myth.
    • Mary L. Trump, Too Much And Never Enough: How My Family Created The World's Most Dangerous Man (2020), p. 11
  • To this day, the lies, misrepresentations, and fabrications that are the sum total of who my uncle is are perpetuated by the Republican Party and white evangelical Christians. People who know better, such as Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell; true believers, such as Representative Kevin McCarthy, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and Attorney General William Barr; and others too numerous to name, have become, unwittingly or not, complicit in their perpetuation.
    • Mary L. Trump, Too Much And Never Enough: How My Family Created The World's Most Dangerous Man (2020), p. 11-12
  • The fact is, Donald's pathologies are so complex and his behaviors so often inexplicable that coming up with an accurate and comprehensive diagnosis would require a full battery of psychological and neuropsychological tests that he'll never sit for. At this point, we can't evaluate his day-to-day functioning because he is, in the West Wing, essentially institutionalized. Donald has been institutionalized for most of his adult life, so there is no way to know how he would thrive, or even survive, on his own in the real world. At the end of my aunt's birthday party in 2017, as we lined up for our pictures, I could see that Donald was already under a kind of stress he'd never experienced before. As the pressures upon him have continued to mount over the course of the last three years, the disparity between the level of competence required for running a country and his incompetence has widened, revealing his delusions more starkly than ever before. Many, but by no means all of us, have been shielded until now from the worst effects of his pathologies by a stable economy and a lack of serious crises. But the out-of-control COVID-19 pandemic, the possibility of an economic depression, deepening social divides along political lines thanks to Donald's penchant for division, and devastating uncertainty about our country's future have created a perfect storm of catastrophes that no one is less equipped than my uncle to manage. Doing so would require courage, strength of character, deference to experts, and the confidence to take responsibility and to course correct after admitting mistakes. His ability to control unfavorable situations by lying, spinning, and obfuscating has diminished to the point of impotence in the midst of the tragedies we are currently facing. His egregious and arguably intentional mishandling of the current catastrophe has led to a level of scrutiny and pushback that he's never experienced before, increasing his belligerence and need for petty revenge as he withholds vital funding, personal protective equipment, and ventilators that your tax dollars have paid for from states whose governors don't kiss his ass sufficiently.
    • Mary L. Trump, Too Much And Never Enough: How My Family Created The World's Most Dangerous Man (2020), p. 13-14
  • After the election, Donald called his big sister, ostensibly to find out how he was doing. Of course, he thought he already knew the answer; otherwise he wouldn't have made the call in the first place. He merely wanted her to confirm very strongly that he was doing a fantastic job. When she said, "Not that good," Donald immediately went on offense. "That's nasty," he said. She could see the sneer on his face. Then, seemingly apropos of nothing, he asked her, "Maryanne, where would you be without me?" It was a smug reference to the fact that Maryanne owed her first federal judgeship to Donald because Roy Cohn had done him (and her) a favor all those years ago. My aunt has always insisted that she earned her position on the bench entirely on her own merits, and she shot back at him, "If you say that one more time, I will level you." But it was an empty threat. Although Maryanne had prided herself on being the only person on the planet Donald ever listened to, those days were long past, which was illustrated not long after, in June 2018. On the eve of Donald's first summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, Maryanne called the White House and left a message with his secretary: "Tell him his older sister called with a little sisterly advice. Prepare. Learn from those who know what they are doing. Stay away from Dennis Rodman. And leave his Twitter alone." He ignored all of it. The Politico headline the following day read "Trump Says Kim Meeting Will Be About 'Attitude,' Not Prep Work." If Maryanne had ever had any sway over her little brother, it was gone now. Aside from the requisite birthday call, they didn't speak much after that.
    • Mary L. Trump, Too Much And Never Enough: How My Family Created The World's Most Dangerous Man (2020), p. 188-189
  • Donald was to my grandfather what the border wall as been for Donald: a vanity project funded at the expense of more worthy pursuits.
    • Mary L. Trump, Too Much And Never Enough: How My Family Created The World's Most Dangerous Man (2020), p. 194
  • Trump's entire personal and professional history is Obama-esque. When it serves his interests, Trump lies. He has lied to business associates, employees, friends, spouses, and now to millions of prospective voters. Anyone who thinks that Trump will not lie to them, or that he will at least tell the truth about 'important things', immigration or ISIS or whatever, is deluding himself. When it becomes expedient for Trump to lie, he will.
  • After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence.
  • We're really good friends, we go back to '86, '87. Most of my successful and best fights were at Trump's hotels. He didn't manage me, though. He was just helping me with my court case. We're the same guy, a thrust for power, a drive for power. Whatever field we're in, we need power in that field. That's just who we are. Balls of energy. We're not even who we think we are. We're fire. We're made of this crap—water, motion, dirt, diamonds, emeralds. We're made out of that stuff, can you believe it?
  • That shit is the real deal. Listen: I'm a black motherfucker from the poorest town in the country. I've been through a lot in life. And I know him. When I see him, he shakes my hand and respects my family. None of them—Barack, whoever—nobody else does that. They're gonna be who they are and disregard me, my family. So I'm voting for him. If I can get 20,000 people or more to vote for him, I'm gonna do it.

U

President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of Government. He threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, and imperiled a coequal branch of Government.

V

  • you have to remember that Trump has no shame. There’s nothing that we can say to him, or nothing that he can say, that will make him blush. However, he’s only in power because of all these seemingly normal people supporting him. If we can make all of them radioactive, beyond radioactive, then we can take some steps towards hopefully neutralizing this larger threat.
  • I wrote about him as a buffoon, a dangerous buffoon, someone who wouldn’t actually become president. And so I spoke about him in terms of what it revealed about Jewish leaders who were supporting him despite his being a hero of American naziism — this was clear long before Charlottesville...I call Trump Netanyahu with smaller hands in the introduction. Netanyahu shares a lot in common with Trump. Including demagoguery, bigotry, attacks on the press, attacks on institutions of democracy, attacks on human rights organizations. I don’t know if Trump has gone that far yet, but he will. It’s a similar method of autocrats.
  • People no longer trust the career politicians, no longer trust the status-quo because they screwed it up so bad. I loved listening to you talk to those other talking heads about 'Donald Trump could be the destruction of the whole Republican party.' I throw my hands up in the air and cheer. I hope it happens! And I hope Bernie Sanders is the destruction of the Democratic Party. It's time to break up the two party dictatorship.
  • We believe your final decision yesterday was the right one — given the so-called "fog of war" and against the background of a long list of intelligence mistakes, not to mention "cooking" shenanigans. We... think Tucker Carlson had it right yesterday evening: "The very people — in some cases, literally the same people who lured us into the Iraq quagmire 16 years ago — are demanding a new war — this one with Iran. Carlson described you as "skeptical." We believe ample skepticism is warranted.
  • After the close call yesterday when you called off the planned military strike on Iran, we remain concerned that you are about to be mousetrapped into war with Iran. You have said you do not want such a war (no sane person would), and our comments below are based on that premise. There are troubling signs that Secretary Pompeo is not likely to jettison his more warlike approach, More importantly, we know from personal experience with Pompeo's dismissive attitude to instructions from you that his agenda can deviate from yours on issues of major consequence... Pompeo's behavior betrays a strong desire to resort to military action — perhaps even without your approval — to Iranian provocations (real or imagined), with no discernible strategic goal other than to advance the interests of Israel, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
  • If Pompeo failed to report back to you on the conversation you instructed him to have with Binney, you might ask him about it now (even though the flimsy evidence of Russia hacking the DNC has now evaporated, with Binney vindicated). There were two note-takers present at the October 24, 2017 meeting at CIA headquarters. There is also a good chance the session was also recorded. You might ask Pompeo about that... Binney had the impression Pompeo was simply going through the motions — and disingenuously, at that. If he "really wanted to know about Russian hacking," he would have acquainted himself with the conclusions that VIPS, with Binney in the lead, had reached in mid-2017, and which apparently caught your eye.... Had he pursued the matter seriously with Binney, we might not have had to wait until the Justice Department itself put nails in the coffin of Russiagate, CrowdStrike, and Comey. In sum, Pompeo could have prevented two additional years of "everyone knows that the Russians hacked into the DNC." Why did he not?
  • We are all Gold Star Families, who have lost those we love the most in war. Ours is a sacrifice you will never know. Ours is a sacrifice we would never want you to know.
  • Your recent comments regarding the Khan family were repugnant, and personally offensive to us. When you question a mother's pain, by implying that her religion, not her grief, kept her from addressing an arena of people, you are attacking us. When you say your job building buildings is akin to our sacrifice, you are attacking our sacrifice. You are not just attacking us, you are cheapening the sacrifice made by those we lost. You are minimizing the risk our service members make for all of us. This goes beyond politics. It is about a sense of decency. That kind decency you mock as "political correctness."
    • VoteVets' Gold Star Family Members, open letter to Trump [84] (August 1, 2016)

W

  • The political triumph of Donald Trump is a symbol and symptom—not cause or origin—of our imperial meltdown. Trump is neither alien nor extraneous to American culture and history. In fact, he is as American as apple pie. Yet he is a sign of our spiritual bankruptcy—all spectacle and no substance, all narcissism and no empathy, all appetite and greed and no wisdom and maturity.
  • Trump actually faces unique obstacles as he courts black voters. The mogul has a long history of using racially charged rhetoric and his real estate company was sued for allegedly discriminating against black renters in the 1970s. His stance on Muslims, which has drawn praise from white supremacists, could also prove problematic, since over 25 percent of American Muslims are black.
  • America has lost more than 12 million jobs in the last six months. An estimated 12 million people have lost their employer-sponsored health insurance during the worst pandemic in a century. Tens of millions report not having enough to eat. But one month ago, tens of millions of unemployed Americans lost... a $600 weekly federal unemployment insurance benefit that Congress failed to renew... How can this happen in a democracy? This is a question that everyone who works for a living... might want to consider on this Labor Day... If the facts of this political disaster were more widely known and understood, Republicans could lose not only the presidency but also the Senate in November. After all, millions of unemployed Republicans lost most of their income as a result of what their political party...did... Who would want to be forcing layoffs — potentially totaling millions at the state and local level — during a depression and pandemic? Ask Sen. McConnell and Donald Trump.
  • I'd vote for a bowling ball covered in dog shit and pubic hair before I vote for Trump.
  • The cost of appearing with a bloviating ignoramus is obvious, it seems to me. Donald Trump is redundant evidence that if your net worth is high enough, your IQ can be very low and you can still intrude into American politics.
  • It has come to this. The GOP, formerly the party of Lincoln and ostensibly the party of liberty and limited government, is being defined by clamors for a mass roundup and deportation of millions of human beings. To will an end is to will the means for the end, so the Republican clamors are also for the requisite expansion of government's size and coercive powers... Trump evidently plans to deport almost 10 percent of California's workers, and 13 percent of that state's K–12 students. He is, however, at his most Republican when he honors family values: He proposes to deport intact families, including children who are citizens... Trump proposes seizing money that illegal immigrants from Mexico try to send home. This might involve sacrificing mail privacy, but desperate times require desperate measures. He would vastly enlarge the federal government's enforcement apparatus, but he who praises single-payer health care systems and favors vast eminent domain powers has never made a fetish of small government.
  • If Donald Trump were a Democratic mole placed in the Republican Party to disrupt things, how would his behavior be any different? I don't think it would be.
  • Shortly after 8pm on Election Night, when the unexpected trend - Trump might actually win - seemed confirmed, Don Jr told a friend that his father, or DJT, as he calls him, looked as if he had seen a ghost. Melania was in tears - and not of joy. There was, in the space of little more than an hour, in Steve Bannon's not unamused observation, a befuddled Trump morphing into a disbelieving Trump and then into a horrified Trump. But still to come was the final transformation: Suddenly, Donald Trump became a man who believed that he deserved to be, and was wholly capable of being, the president of the United States.
    • p. 18
  • Trump did not enjoy his own inauguration. He was angry that A-level stars had snubbed the event, disgruntled with the accommodations at Blair House, and visibly fighting with his wife, who seemed on the verge of tears. Throughout the day, he wore what some around him had taken to calling his golf face: angry and pissed off, shoulders hunched, arms swinging, brow furled, lips pursed.
  • In pursuing a friend's wife, he would try to persuade the wife that her husband was perhaps not what she thought.
    • p. 23
  • Trump, in fact, found the White House to be vexing and even a little scary. He retreated to his own bedroom - the first time since the Kennedy White House that a presidential couple had maintained separate rooms. In the first days, he ordered two television screens in addition to the one already there, and a lock on the door, precipitating a brief standoff with the Secret Service, who insisted they have access to the room.
  • She [Ivanka Trump] treated her father with a degree of detachment, even irony, going so far as to make fun of his comb-over to others. She often described the mechanics behind it to friends: an absolutely clean pate - a contained island after scalp-reduction -surgery - surrounded by a furry circle of hair around the sides and front, from which all ends are drawn up to meet in the center and then swept back and secured by a stiffening spray. The color, she would point out to comical effect, was from a product called Just for Men - the longer it was left on, the darker it got. Impatience resulted in Trump's orange-blond hair color.
  • Rupert Murdoch, heretofore doubtlessly certain Trump was a charlatan and a fool, said he and his new wife, Jerry Hall, would pay a call on the president-elect. But Murdoch was late- quite late. Trump kept assuring his guests that Rupert was on his way, coming soon. When some of the guests made a move to leave, Trump cajoled them to stay a little longer. You'll want to stay to see Rupert. (Or, one of the guests interpreted, you'll want to stay to see Trump with Rupert.) It was a matched set of odd reversals- an ironic symmetry. Trump, perhaps not yet appreciating the difference between becoming president and elevating his social standing, was trying mightily to curry favor with the previously disdainful media mogul. And Murdoch, finally arriving at the party he was in more than one way sorely late to, was as subdued and thrown as everyone else, and struggling to adjust his view of a man who, for more than a generation, had been at best a clown prince among the rich and famous.
    • p. 20
  • Murdoch suggested that taking a liberal approach to H-1B visas, which open America's doors to select immigrants, might be hard to square with his promises to build a wall and close the borders. But Trump seemed unconcerned, assuring Murdoch, 'We'll figure it out.' "What a fucking idiot," said Murdoch, shrugging, as he got off the phone.
    • p. 36
  • The unique problem here was partly how to get information to someone who did not (or could not or would not) read, and who at best listened only selectively. But the other part of the problem was how best to qualify the information that he liked to get... The information he did not get was formal information. The data. The details. The options. The analysis. He didn't do PowerPoint. For anything that smacked of a classroom or of being lectured to- "professor" was one of his bad words, and he was proud of never going to class, never buying a textbook, never taking a note- he got up and left the room.
    • p. 188
  • The president liked generals. The more fruit salad they wore, the better. The president was very pleased with the compliments he got for appointing generals who commanded the respect that Mattis and Kelly and McMaster were accorded (pay no attention to Michael Flynn). What the president did not like was listening to generals, who, for the most part, were skilled in the new Army jargon of PowerPoint, data dumps, McKinsey-like presentations. One of the things that endeared Flynn to the president was the fact that Flynn, quite the conspiracist and drama queen, had good storytelling sense.
    • p. 188
    • Michael Wolff, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House (2018)
  • Let's begin with [Trump's] the simplest assertion: we are doing "great" economically... over the last 20 years the United States has had a hard time achieving economic growth. The last year or two are slightly better... because the government gave an enormous boost... not private capitalist corporations, the government gave... The 2017 tax cut... gave corporations... hundreds of billions of dollars in taxes they don't have to pay anymore... and they mostly used it to increase salaries of executives... very good for the top one percent, but not for the rest of the American people.
  • Chinese workers, the average amount of money they get adjusted for inflation, has quadrupled in the last 12, 15 years. What happened to the average wage in America, adjusted for inflation? It hardly budged... Excluding that from the conversation - prancing around as if the economy here is the envy of the world - that's not just nonsense.
  • ...he spent more time... demonizing immigrants than on any other topic.... the United States is an economy of three hundred and twenty five million people; the number of undocumented immigrants in the United States is estimated between 10 and 12 million [~3.4]% ...Focusing on immigrants is pure scapegoating; it's focusing people on something that doesn't matter because you don't want them to focus on what does matter.
  • I still call myself a conservative, but only in full knowledge that there is a blot on the escutcheon, and many a writer who claims that title is an open traitor to all I in truth uphold and he in word only. Because, honestly, a conservative who opposes Trump on the grounds of ideals, despite what this administration has already done in deregulating and defanging the bureaucracy, reversing foreign policy mistakes, and appointing originalist judges, falls into the same error of being a cultist and not a political thinker.

Y

  • He's the classic demagogue described well in the Federalist Papers that our system is designed to stop.
  • Donald Trump is also a coward. For all of his tough talk and bluster, the president of the United States is a punk ass bitch. And this has also been apparent for as long as we've known who he is.
  • He slipped out of draft duty because of ... bone spurs. Bone spurs don't even get you on the NFL injury report, but he used it to stay the fuck away from actually having to fight. We know his history of bullying and insulting women. And, since he's been in office, we've seen him cower to Kim Jong Un and literally get Deeboed by Vladimir Putin — two men who, for all of their faults, would definitely whoop Trump's ass.
  • We've had racist presidents before. We've had malignant misogynists in office before. But never has our president been such a fucking wimp.

Z

  • Donald Trump would be an awesome GOP nominee if he was remotely conservative, suited to beat Hillary, or had the temperament of a good POTUS.
  • His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the US and around the world. We removed these statements yesterday because we judged that their effect — and likely their intent — would be to provoke further violence.
  • We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great. Therefore, we are extending the block we have placed on his Facebook and Instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete.
  • Could Donald Trump be a secret double-agent, sent by Democrats to destroy their party from within? Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, who has borne the brunt of more than a few Trump barbs, seems to think there's a possibility... He's belittling his Republican colleagues. He's pulling the party to the nativist right in direct conflict with the goal set by strategists in 2013 to appeal to a more ethnically diverse nation. And he's generally sucking up all the political oxygen, making it harder for other candidates to get their message out. All in all, many experts say he's making it much more difficult for a Republican to win the general election next fall. Maybe he's doing it on purpose... But as the saying goes, even paranoids have enemies. And, at least for the moment, there are some Republicans who see Donald Trump much more of an enemy than a friend.

See also

Donald Trump at Wikiquote's sister projects:
Article at Wikipedia
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  1. ↑ We Need an Interpreter to Work Out Trump’s ‘Debanking’ Rant. The Daily Beast (2024-01-21). Retrieved on 2024-01-21.
  2. ↑ Luciano, Michael (2024-01-18). Huh? Trump Declares, ‘They Wanna De-Bank You and We’re Going to De-Bank’. Mediaite. Retrieved on 2024-01-21.
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