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Intellectuals of petty-bourgeois origin always stubbornly try in all sorts of ways, including literary and artistic ways, to project themselves and spread their views, and they want the Party and the world to be remoulded in their own image. In the circumstances it is our duty to jolt these "comrades" and tell them sharply, "That won't work! The proletariat cannot accommodate itself to you. . . The past epoch is gone, never to return. . . China is moving forward, not back, and it is the revolutionary base areas, not any of the backward, retrogressive areas, that are leading China forward. This is a fundamental issue that, above all, comrades must come to understand in the rectification movement. . . . I believe that in the course of the rectification movement and in the long period of study and work to come, you will surely be able to bring about a transformation in yourselves and in your works, to create many fine works which will be warmly welcomed by the masses of the people, and to advance the literature and art movement in the revolutionary base areas and throughout China to a glorious new stage. (Mao Zedong, "Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art" (2 and 23 May 1942); see also nice discussion in Bonnie McDougall, Mao Zedong's "Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art": A Translation of the 1943 Translation With Commentary (Universoty of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies, 1980)).
Rectification [整风 (Zhěngfēng)] or better put from its original longer form--to correct a working style--has always been around the intersticies of societal relations. In a world in which religion no longer fashions the bars within which it is possible to judge the need and character of rectification, other ideological frameworks have come into their own. Especially in the context of the ordering of political/social relations 整风 (Zhěngfēng; rectification) has moved from its classical Marxist-Leninist roots to insinuate itself as a critical element of the work style of all of the great ideological cages within which express the current tastes of humanity for their self-organization and the objectification of their hopes, manners, customs, dreams, and behaviors.
In whatever form one finds it, in whatever era of historical development of a collective, in whatever form the cognitive cages of societal rationalizations appear, 整风 (Zhěngfēng; rectification) is also there. I insist on using the term as it has come to be known in the aftermath of the template setting Yan'an rectification of the late 1940s which shaped both the disciplinary working style of vanguards (where Leninist, intellectual, techno-expert, aristocratic or what not).
Once again President Trump has come to Davos to deliver a speech to the assembled high level cadres of the global order(ing) and make deals (for what else would the self-aware incarnation of a transactional cognitive archetype do other than make deals?). Last year, when he returned at the start of his 2nd Presidency I noted:
Mr. Trump has been no stranger to Davos--and Davos will have him even as they might fear and loathe him and what he may be thought to bring to the table. He may be a "bad" boy but in the end he is more one of them than not--just in need of socialization and disciplining. At least that was the idea in 2018 when Mr. Trump last addressed this collection of vanguard elements ("America First" Explained at the Davos World Economic Forum: Text of President Trump's Address And White House Background Briefing). Still, the fundamental wariness and the sentiments fashionable in 2018 do linger (In quotes: How leaders at Davos 2025 view Trump's comeback). It is just that this time it is clearer that Mr. Trump could care less, perhaps because he no longer needs to care, and Davos movers and shakers are far more cautious, especially when they are being quoted. . . This is a Mr. Trump who might still be mocked, and resisted, but now also a Mr. Trump who might have to be taken more seriously --a disruptive force that either benefits or threatens the vanguard ordering represented in this body. (Davos Discourse 1--Mr. Trump's Address to the World Economic Forum 2025 and the Evolving Characteristics of America First as an Alternative to European and Chinese Models)
Last year President Trump loomed over the assembly briefly and on screen--a virtual presence that signified both a projection into the meeting and a distance from it, and a reminder that in modernity, virtual projections and the simulacra of the material might convey as much power as the physical--perhaps more.
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This year the President attended in person and delivered an address (Transcript: President Donald Trump Remarks @WEF Davos 2026). But this time, President Trump had 整风 (Zhěngfēng; rectification) on his mind. That was what appeared to be on his mind in the words of his own propaganda team:
President Donald J. Trump commanded the stage this morning at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, delivering a bold address that reaffirmed America’s leadership on the global stage and charted a decisive path forward for Western nations. Highlighting the imperatives of national sovereignty, cultural preservation, and proactive security, President Trump articulated a robust strategy to promote mutual prosperity and fortify alliances against global challenges. (In Davos, President Trump Outlines Bold Vision for American Prosperity, Transatlantic Strength )
While one might argue that the discursive style of President Trump's remarks might be distinguishable from that of Mao Zedong when, in addressing the intelligentsia in Yan'an in 1942 ("Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art"), it is hard (at least for me) to note much a a difference beyond discursive style and the primary (or at least initial) targets of a discourse in the form of a warning and ultimately sketching the boundaries of a new disciplinary framework.
It is from the perspective of rectification, then, that one might usefully approach the President's remarks.
1. Defeat the forces of reaction both at home and abroad! The President understood, and indeed, appeared to relish, his role as a measuring stick of rectification at the gathering if intellectuals and cadres at the global Yan'an. "It’s great to be back in beautiful Davos, Switzerland, and to address so many respected business leaders, so many friends, a few enemies." (Trump Remarks). That stick was fashioned from out of the discursive construction of the dialectic between the old regime and his. "Under the Biden administration, America was plagued by the nightmare of stagflation, meaning low growth and high inflation, a recipe for misery, failure, and decline. But now, after just one year of my policies, we are witnessing the exact opposite " (Ibid.). At the root of the decline were "radical-left Democrats" now taking up the role that in Yan'an had been occupied by right wing reactionaries, landlords and bourgeoisie elements. Within the liberated area that is the United States a new reality emerges and a need to appropriately lead the masses arises. The foundation of the authority for this political work is grounded in the victory of the current leadership against the reactionaries. "The USA is the economic engine on the planet. And when America booms, the entire world booms. It’s been the history. When it goes bad, it goes bad. And I hope we all — you all follow us down and you follow us up."
2. Adopting a correct working style is essential for unity around the core of leadership. President Trump here gets to the operational heart of the matter, the proper working style of ought to be American liberal democratic praxis! "This afternoon, I want to discuss how we have achieved this economic miracle, how we intend to raise living standards for our citizens to levels never seen before, and perhaps how you too and the places where you come from could do much better by following what we’re doing because certain places in Europe are not even recognizable, frankly, anymore." (Trump Remarks). The President, echoing the thrust of the National Security Strategy 2025 and the State Department elaboration of America First, starts with the failed praxis of the ancien regime:
In recent decades, it became conventional wisdom in Washington and European capitals that the only way to grow a modern Western economy was through ever-increasing government spending, unchecked mass migration, and endless foreign imports. The consensus was that so-called dirty jobs and heavy industries should be sent elsewhere, that affordable energy should be replaced by the “Green New Scam,” and that countries could be propped up by importing new and entirely different populations from faraway lands.
This was the path that sleepy Joe Biden administration and many other Western governments very foolishly followed, turning their backs on everything that makes nations rich and powerful and strong. And there’s so much potential in so many nations. The result was record budget and trade deficits and a growing sovereign deficit, driven by the largest wave of mass migration in human history. We’ve never seen anything like it.
Quite frankly, many parts of our world are being destroyed before our very eyes, and the leaders don’t even understand what’s happening. And the ones that do understand aren’t doing anything about it. Virtually all of the so-called experts predicted my plans to end this failed model would trigger a global recession and runaway inflation. But we have proven them wrong. It’s actually just the opposite. (Trump Remarks).
It doesn't really matter whether one believes this or not, or whether, in the blue collar style of oppositional trope one fact checks these assertions (against one's pne value measure). That is not the point here. The point is the trope, and the oppositional categories that are used to define the "defects among our comrades, such as idealism, dogmatism, empty illusions, empty talk, contempt for practice and aloofness from the masses, all of which call for an effective and serious campaign of rectification" (Mao Zedong "Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art" Section 5). The failures are magnified when set up against the dialectical successes of the current ruling ideology. These are described in a long passage of the Remarks that use as its markers (1) the rejection of "nation-wrecking energy policies", (2) the operationalization of an anti-bureaucratism campaign to reduce the size of the American nomenklatura and its regulatory footprint, (3) tax reduction, (4) tariffs and trade deficits; (5) "historic trade deals with partners covering 40 percent of all U.S. trade;" and (6) gasoline prices and nuclear energy. As the President would summarize it, "In one year, our agenda has produced a transformation like America has not seen in over 100 years." (Trump Remarks).
3. Social Revolution (社会革命) as Self-Revolution (自我革命) Must Guide the Appropriately Direct the Spirit of Rectification. If the United States has, through an intense if short period of self-revolution, attained a more advanced stage of social revolution, it can serve as template, guide and leading force for global social revolution. To those ends, President Trump considers a number of objectives and expressions of leadership that are meant to highlight the American basic or fundamental political line (a cognitively transactional America First Project) in action.
The President starts with Venezuela. His description, likely irritating to those still embedded in the cognitive premises of the ancien regime (likely including a large segment of his audience, Yan'an style) is discursively significant for its approach. In its choices of what "facts" are important and what facts disappear into the ether of irrelevance to the fundamental political line.
Venezuela has been an amazing place for so many years, but then they went bad with their policies. Ten years ago, it was a great country, and now it’s got problems. But we’re helping them. And those 50 million barrels, we’re going to be splitting up with them, and they’ll be making more money than they’ve made in a long time. Venezuela is going to do fantastically well. We appreciate all of the cooperation we’ve been giving. We’ve been giving great cooperation. Once the attack ended, the attack ended, and they said, “let’s make a deal.” More people should do that. (Trump Remarks)
The President moves on to artificial intelligence (AI). There AI exists in two contexts--the first is transactional--the competition with China for markets grounded in technological leadership. The second is AI as an impetus for energy consumption (one of the unintended ungreen consequences of the anti-fossil fuel green revolution). "And we’re leading the world in AI by a lot. We’re leading China by a lot. I think President Xi respects what we’ve done, in part because I’ve allowed these big companies building these massive buildings to build their own electric capacity." (Trump Remarks). And all originates within and from the core of leadership (领导核心). "And I came up with the idea, you know, you people are brilliant, you have a lot of money. Let’s see what you can do. You can build your own electric generating plant. And they looked at me. They didn’t believe me." (Ibid.).
The President then turns to (on) Europe. For the President Europe, perhaps more than the US "radical left" represents the core of reactionary elements ripe for rectification.
Because of my landslide election victory, the United States avoided the catastrophic energy collapse which befell every European nation that pursued the Green New Scam, perhaps the greatest hoax in history. The Green New Scam, windmills all over the place, destroy your land, destroy your land. Every time that goes around, you lose a thousand dollars. You’re supposed to make money with energy, not lose money. Here in Europe, we’ve seen the fate that the radical left tried to impose on America. They tried very hard. Germany now generates 22 percent less electricity than it did in 2017. And it’s not the current chancellor’s fault. He’s solving the problem. He’s going to do a great job. But what they did before he got there, I guess that’s why he got there. And electricity prices are 64 percent higher. (Trump Remarks).
The UK does not fare better, at least through the lens of energy policy.
The United Kingdom produces just one third of the total energy from all sources that it did in 1999. Think of that, one third. And they’re sitting on top of the North Sea, one of the greatest reserves anywhere in the world. But they don’t use it. And that’s one reason why their energy has reached catastrophically low levels with equally high prices. High prices, very low levels. Think of that, one third, and you’re sitting on top of the North Sea. And they like to say, “Well, you know, that’s depleted.” It’s not depleted. It’s got 500 years. They haven’t even found the oil. The North Sea is incredible. They don’t let anybody drill. Environmentally, they don’t let them drill. They make it impossible for the oil companies to go. They take 92 percent of the revenues. So the oil companies say, we can’t do it. (Ibid.).
The President foregrounds windmills for special evocative treatment. From a semiotic perspective windmills represent or embody, they manifest, the left error of the current techno-bureaucratic institutionalist system that is, for the President, the primary object of rectification.
Instead of closing down energy plants, we’re opening them up. Instead of building ineffective, money-losing windmills, we’re taking them down and not approving any.* * * The Green New Scam, windmills all over the place, destroy your land, destroy your land. Every time that goes around, you lose a thousand dollars. You’re supposed to make money with energy, not lose money. * * * There are windmills all over the place. And they are losers. One thing I’ve noticed is that the more windmills a country has, the more money that country loses and the worse that country is doing. China makes almost all of the windmills, and yet I haven’t been able to find any wind farms in China. * * * They put up a couple of big wind farms, but they don’t use them. They just put them up to show people what they could look like. They don’t spin. They don’t do anything. They use the thing called coal mostly. China goes with the coal. . . They killed the birds. They ruin your landscapes. Other than that, I think they’re fabulous, by the way. Stupid people buy them.(Trump Remarks)
Pix Credit China Daily (China Takes the Lead in Wind Energy Revolution
And then the shaping of the European rectification under the guidance of the American vanguard:
The consequences of such destructive policies have been stark, including lower economic growth, lower standards of living, lower birth rates, more socially disruptive migration, more vulnerability to hostile foreign adversaries, and much, much smaller militaries. * * * They have to get out of the culture that they’ve created over the last 10 years. It’s horrible what they’re doing to themselves. They’re destroying themselves. These are beautiful, beautiful places. We want strong allies, not seriously weakened ones. We want Europe to be strong. Ultimately, these are matters of national security, and perhaps no current issue makes the situation more clear than what’s currently going on with Greenland. (Trump Remarks)
To those ends, of course, the blueprint is set out in the U.S. State Department "Agency Strategic Plan: Fiscal Years 2026-2030.
And that gets the President to the transaction of the moment--Greenland. And of course, nothing here is ever particularly clean cut. First, there is nothing historically odd about the idea of territorial cession as a transaction, especially, it seems, involving Greenland.
The United States has tried to acquire Greenland several times. In 1867, Secretary of State William Seward commissioned a survey of Greenland. Impressed with the abundance of natural resources on the island, he pushed to acquire Greenland and Iceland for US$5.5 million – roughly $125 million today. But Congress was still concerned about the purchase of Alaska that year, which Seward had engineered. It had seen Alaska as too cold and too distant from the rest of the U.S. to justify spending $7.2 million – roughly $164 million today – although Congress ultimately agreed to do it. There was not enough national support for another frozen land. In 1910, the U.S. ambassador to Denmark proposed a complex trade involving Germany, Denmark and the United States. Denmark would give the U.S. Greenland, and the U.S. would give Denmark islands in the Philippines. Denmark would then give those islands to Germany, and Germany would return Schleswig-Holstein – Germany’s northernmost state – to Denmark. (Fortune; a history that President Trump alluded to in his Remarks)
That is quite different from the willingness to engage in a transaction for territory. And, indeed, Denmark rejected an offer from the Truman Administration to purchase Greenland in 1946 ("Ultimately, the U.S. and Danish governments agreed on other ways to incorporate Greenland into America's defenses." Here including the 1951 Defense Treaty). Second, there is a disconnect between the rhetoric of acquisition and the objectives. The Americans have no real taste for additional burdens of governance spaces; they do have a taste for freedom to use and exploit territories as they please (even if "as they please" is defined and constrained by contract). And currently they appear to have a particular taste for national security borderlands with respect to which some have thought Greenland spaces ought to play a role. These transactional, exploitation, and use objectives then get translated and ground up within the more ancient rituals of acquisitions--"you use it [territory] you own it" rules. These confusions appear all over the place and might be considered in the context of the President's remarks.
Would you like me to say a few words of Greenland? I was going to leave it out of the speech, but I thought – I think I would have been reviewed very negatively. I have tremendous respect for both the people of Greenland and the people of Denmark. Tremendous respect. But every NATO ally has an obligation to be able to defend their own territory. And the fact is, no nation or group of nations is in any position to be able to secure Greenland other than the United States. We’re a great power, much greater than people even understand. I think they found that out two weeks ago in Venezuela. * ** We literally set up bases on Greenland for Denmark. . . .We were fighting to save it. For Denmark, big, beautiful piece of ice – it’s hard to call it land, it’s a big piece of ice – but we saved Greenland and successfully prevented our enemies from gaining a foothold in our hemisphere. So we did it for ourselves also. . . . After the war, we gave Greenland back to Denmark. How stupid were we to do that? But we did it. But we gave it back. But how ungrateful are they now? . .. So now our country and the world face much greater risks than it did ever before because of missiles, because of nuclear, because of weapons of warfare that I can’t even talk about. * * *
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Greenland is a vast, almost entirely uninhabited and undeveloped territory. The sitting undefended in a key strategic location between the United States, Russia and China, that’s exactly where it is right smack in the middle, wasn’t important nearly when we gave it back. You know, when we gave it back, it wasn’t the same as it is now. It’s not important for any other reason. You know, that one talks about the minerals. There’s so many. There’s no rare earth. No such thing as rare earth. There’s rare processing. But there’s so much rare earth. And this to get to this rare earth, you had to go through hundreds of feet of ice. That’s not the reason we need it. We need it for strategic national security and international security. This enormous, unsecured island is actually part of North America on the northern frontier of the Western Hemisphere. That’s our territory.
It is all here. Jumbled up of course, but for a transactional mind perfectly logically bricolaged. And that is precisely how a merchant type would want it. The Remarks are a concoction of imprecise language (I don't dare say sloppy because the imprecision is clearly deliberate cloaked in what a transactional opponent might be lulled into thinking is sloppy). It is not exactly clear what the Americans want--Greenland is worthless and it is essential for security; it is an object in commerce and held by a State incapable of exploiting it to comply with its obligations; and so on. That is a transactional not an institutional stance--and thus the rectification--the working style of transaction rather than of institutional solidarity. In the end one does not quite know what the "acquisition of Greenland" actually means other than that the Americans want to be able to do whatever it is they want to do for the protection of their interests and consequentially those of their allies within the inner core of the American territorial peripheries. That does not make it any less galling for the Danish. But it does reveal the praxis of rectification in the new era of the historical development of the United States. And indeed, almost immediately after the speech negotiations appeared to have kicked into high gear (see, e.g. here). And here it is the American version of social revolution through self-revolution .
Nonetheless, social and self-revolution, and its modalities of rectification start at home. The President is as clear on that point as the Democratic Party and its supporters were in seeking then Mr. Trump's rectification between 2020 and 2024. The President declared: "the 2020 U.S. presidential election . . . was a rigged election. Everybody now knows that. They found out. People will soon be prosecuted for what they did. It’s probably breaking news, but it should be. It was a rigged election. You can’t have rigged elections." (Trump Remarks). And, like Mao Zedong in the 1940s (and Fidel Castro in the 1960s) rectification starts with the appropriate disciplining of the intelligentsia and their organs.
You need strong borders, strong elections, and, ideally, a good press. I always say it. Strong borders, strong elections, free, fair elections, and a fair media. The media is terrible. It’s very crooked. It’s very biased, terrible. But someday it’ll straighten out because it’s losing all credibility. Think of it. When I went in a landslide, a giant landslide, won all seven swing states, won the popular vote, won everything. And they only get negative press. That means that it has no credibility. And if they’re going to get credibility, they’re going to have to be fair. So you need a fair press. But you also need those other elements. (Trump Remarks).
The issue isn't about "truth" but ideological stance, and from ideological stance the rationalization of approaches to vesting actions and objects with appropriate signification. That as visible now as it was in 1942 in Yan'an as it has been in the Europe of the Brussels effect and in the America of the rules based multilateral order.
4. For transactions there must be peace! Like that other hegemon, but from a quite different starting (and perhaps ending) point. The new fundamental political line is focused on peace. It is not focused on the normative values around which conflict is considered and ends negotiated. It is focused on peace as an object, a state of being, a space within which it is possible to undertake the sort of translations that might enhance states of substantial non-conflict.
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We now understand that “President Trump is the President of Peace." (President Trump Brokers Another Historic Peace Deal). It ought to follow that the Republic is now, collectively, a Republic of Peace--self-revolution ushers in a state of social revolution. That, one might be excused for thinking, is the thrust of President Trump's message to the Republic. This is a message that has been underscored and elaborated by Secretary of State Rubio, whose discussion of the notion of peace, and states of peace brokered by a strong Republic reflects the more fundamental self-revolution of "transactional-merchant phenomenology and its understanding of peace as an essential element of something larger: "As they say in some movies--peace, like death, is not an end but a doorway. That acquires a quite interesting aspect in transactional spaces." What, then, is peace? Perhaps Secretary Marco Rubio describes it best under conditions of transaction framing merchant realities--peace is the absence of war. War is understood as violent conflict, one that either destroys valuable objects (infrastructure, productive capacity and the like), or human the consumption of whom is the essential element of the process of production (workers, family units, consumers, and operators of economic, social, religious, and cultural productivity) and the object (collectively) of productivity (at its extreme here) and curated. Societal self-pleasuring is the ultimate aim--however that is defined and made suitable for the times; and self-pleasuring consists of the proper interaction of objects and people agreeably arranged and ordered in ways that permit a movement toward the maximization of their own self-and social value and that of the collective. This comes in many flavors of course (and ideology provides one of several languages for constituting these "flavors" in form suitable for both consumption and framing the human condition). But at its heart is the fundamental postulate--that without the end of destruction there can be no movement toward. Nonetheless, peace is not its own object. It is a state of (dis)engagement that permits the fundamental logic of the operation of self and social systems toward the realization of its apex goal and purpose--the regularization of spaces in which transactions may be undertaken for the further fulfillment of self and social revolution. It might be understood as movement toward development (or modernization, however these terms are understood) that improves (or in some systems perfects) things and conditions of life for individuals and collectives. In other words, the object is not peace; the object is the achievement of a state of stable transactions--iterative, perhaps even purposeful beyond the value of the transaction--that then manifest desired states of being. (The Phenomenology of Peace and the Price of the Deal--Text of and Reflections on the Interview: Secretary of State Marco Rubio with Brian Kilmeade of Fox Radio). ("President Trump is the President of Peace" Reflections on the Power of Presidential Self-Revolution (自我革命), the Republic's Social Revolution (社会革命) and the Presidential Message: "President Trump Brokers Another Historic Peace Deal").
It is in this context that one can approach the language of peace in the President's remarks on Ukraine.
"The war with Ukraine is an example. We are thousands of miles away, separated by a giant ocean. It’s a war that should have never started, and it wouldn’t have started if the 2020 U.S. presidential election weren’t rigged." (Trump Remarks). These remarks evidence the same sort of strategic ambiguity as the Greenland remarks. The President starts with an assessment of his power of persuasion over Mr. Putin, so that the 2022 invasion would not have occurred. "It was terrible what happened. I could see it happening, too. After I left, I could see it happening." (Ibid.). This was a transaction the financial ramifications of which drove approaches, one conflated with border control and inflation.
Biden had given Ukraine and NATO $350 billion of staggering sums, $350 billion. I came in, and just like the southern border, just like inflation, just like our economy, I said, wow, this place is in trouble, meaning our country. All of these things were out of control. But the border was out of control. We fixed it with the strongest border anywhere in the world. (Ibid.).And thus the obectification f peace as a core element of the new fundamental political line. Peace, not at any price, but for peace's sake in which price is negotiable and norms are price points.
And I’ve now been working on this war for one year, during which time I settled eight other wars, India, Pakistan. I settled other wars that were Vladimir Putin called me. Armenian, Azerbaijan, he said, “I can’t believe you settled that one.” They were going on for 35 years. I settled it in one day. And President Putin called me. He said, “You know, I can’t believe I worked on that war for 10 years trying to settle it. I couldn’t do it.” I said, “Do me a favor. Focus on settling your war. Don’t worry about that.” What does the United States get out of all of this work? All of this money other than death, destruction and massive amounts of cash going to people who don’t appreciate what we do? They don’t appreciate what we do.(Ibid.).
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5. The Post-Global Mass Line; people are the rulers of rectification. Like the Socialist Path, the Liberal Democratic transactional Path requires discipline, dedication. . . .and results. To those ends resident Trump brings his global vision home in several key respects: (1) home ownership by individuals; (2) caps on credit card interest rates; (3) American crypto-currency hegemony; and (4) mortgage bonds, mortgage rates and a public criticism of the apex American central banker.
But an appropriate working style s also necessary for the American core of leadership; and there is no better example than the way in which he deals with the Davos host country. The language is critically important. And that produces probably the most important part of the speech, the part of the speech that ought to be reviewed, considered, analyzed, and internalized more than anything else that passed from or thorough the lips of the President:
I mean, I had a case with Switzerland. We happened to be in Switzerland. Maybe I’ll give you a quick story. But they were paying nothing. They make beautiful watches, great watches, Rolex, all of them. They were paying nothing to the United States when they sent their product in. And we had a forty one billion dollar deficit, 41 billion with this beautiful place flew over it, isn’t it nice?
So I said, let’s put a 30 percent tariff on them so that we get back some of it, not all of it at all. We still have a deficit, big deficit, 40, 41 million. That’s a big deficit. And I said, let’s put a tariff on. Different tariffs, different places, you’re all party to some cases, victims to them. But in the end, it’s a fair thing. And most of you realize that.
But we put a 30 percent tariff on Switzerland and all hell broke loose. They were calling. I mean, like you wouldn’t believe. And I know so many people from Switzerland. Incredible place. Incredible, brilliant place. * * *
The prime minister, I don’t think president, I think prime minister called, a woman, and she was very repetitive. She said, “No, no, no, you cannot do that. 30 percent. You cannot do that. We are a small, small country.” I said, “Yeah, but you have a big, big deficit. You may be small, but you have a bigger deficit than big countries.” She said, “No, no, no, please. You cannot do it.” Kept saying the same thing over and over. “We are a small country.” I said, “But you’re a big country in terms of…” And she just rubbed me the wrong way, I’ll be honest with you. And I said, “All right, thank you, ma’am. Appreciate it. Do not do this. Thank you very much, ma’am.” And I made it 39 percent.
And then all hell really broke out. And I was paid visits by everybody. Rolex came to see me. They all came to see me. But I realized, and I reduced it. Because I don’t want to hurt people. I don’t want to hurt them. And we brought it down to a lower level. Doesn’t mean it’s not going up, but we brought it down to a lower level. But they pay now, the tariff. (Trump Remarks).
That is the essence of the speech, of the discursive framework of the second Trump Administration and of its democratic centralism and mass line practice in the service of its fundamental political line. It is a story that plays over and over again in the remarks. It is not about the remarks bit its cadence its organization, its Herodotus style logoi structures (on Herodotus and his literary and cognitive style here).
The main theme of the work is the struggles between Greeks and Barbarians, as is explicitly stressed in the prooemium. After a short introduction to legendary times, the Histories start with the conflict between Lydians and Greeks. When the Lydian king Croesus is defeated by Cyrus the Great, the expansion of the Persian Empire becomes the backbone of the work. Herodotus develops a high literary technique of references back and forward, presenting many digressions—the so-called logoi. (Herodotus: i Introduction to the Histpories)
One is back, in a way, to a different sort of golden age of discourse; it is one that belies the structures of Pathos, Logos, and Ethos (Πάθος, Λόγος και Ήθος) in favor of sequential and non-sequential looping that represents not just discourse but policy. It is one that is transactionally conversational, one that is inductive and built on aggregations of iterative discursive performances ("Logos is the word Herodotus uses for his own long narrative. It is also his word for the discrete pieces of narrative told to him by informants; thirdly, it signifies a variety of ideas or communications that take place within the narrative, among the people whose words and deeds are described. Logoi wield a dangerous power of their own; people’s distinctive speech acts, as they often talk past and attempt to manipulate one another in the Histories, help drive forward the causal connections creating the logôn hodos that is Herodotus’ own massive nine-book work." here). For moderns this is excruciating, yet its semiotics points to a way of layering meaning in ways that manage perception that unconsciously point to the mimetic discourse of coding generative intelligence.
6. The Democratic Centralism of the Post-Global. The America First project promises democracy and engagement for American First Adherents (the patriots) and dictatorship for the forces of opposition and reaction. This is democratic dictatorship with liberal democratic characteristics in the new era of its historical development. (For the original Chinese Leninist conception, see Mao Zedong, On the Peoples Democratic Dictatorship (1949). But more importantly, in the global context, the essence of America First is a public facing and inter-governmental form of democratic centralism with the United States as its core (on its Chinese early essence, Mao Zedong, Talk At An Enlarged Working Conference Convened By The Central Committee Of The Communist Party Of China (30 January 1962), a concept closely tied to rectification ("Without democracy there cannot be any correct centralism because people’s ideas differ, and if their understanding of things lacks unity then centralism cannot be established. What is centralism? First of all it is a centralization of correct ideas, on the basis of which unity of understanding, policy, planning, command and action are achieved. This is called centralized unification.").
President Trump says:
Many places, I could give you six, seven places just in the people in this little area. I know every one of them. They’re sort of, they’re looking down. They don’t want to see me and they don’t want to stare me in the eyes. But they’re taking advantage of, everybody took advantage of the United States. But I’ve been very fair and I gave them a tariff and it was fine. But I realized that without us, it’s not Switzerland anymore. Without us, it’s not any of the countries that are represented here. And we want to work with the countries. We want to work with them. We’re not looking to destroy them. I could have said 39%, 40%. I could have said I want a 70% tariff, then we make money with Switzerland. But Switzerland would have been probably destroyed, financially destroyed. I don’t want to do that. (Trump Remarks)
Mao Zedong reminds us: " We must conscientiously bring questions out into the open, and let the masses speak out. Even at the risk of being cursed we should still let them speak out." (Talk At An Enlarged Working Conference). President Trump says:
But we should be paying the lowest interest rate of everybody. I hope Scott’s listening to this because we should be paying the lowest interest rate of everybody. Without us, without us, most of the countries don’t even work. And then you have the protection factor. Without our military, which is the greatest in the world by far, without our military, you have threats that you would never, you wouldn’t believe. You wouldn’t believe. You don’t have threats because of us. And that’s because of NATO. (Trump Remarks).
Mao Zedong reminds us:
We should always uphold the principle of the unity of proletarian internationalism. We always advocate that the socialist countries and the world communist movement must unite firmly on the basis of Marxism-Leninism. The international revisionists are ceaselessly cursing us. Our attitude is, let them go on cursing us. When it becomes necessary we can give them some appropriate answers. Our Party has become accustomed to being cursed. Leaving aside those who attacked us in the past, what about the present? Abroad, the imperialists curse us, the reactionary nationalists curse us, the revisionists curse us; in our country Chiang Kai-shek curses us, the landlords, rich peasants, reactionaries, bad elements and rightists curse us. They had always done so in the past . . . Are we isolated? " (Talk At An Enlarged Working Conference).
And so on. And how does one move along the liberal democratic transactional path? President Trump sends time describing its components: (1) reindustriaization; (2) migration and crime enforcement (against bandits and reactionary elements); (3) safety in the national capital city; (4) rectification of left and right error within institutions of lower level cadres (elected and appointed officials in sanctuary cities for example); (5) destroying transnational criminal gangs (the Somalis are mentioned); (6) eradicating piracy; and (7) dealing with undigested migrant groups and their anti-social 'assabiyah ("Situation in Minnesota reminds us that the West cannot mass import foreign cultures which have failed to ever build a successful society of their own").
What is left?
So together, with confidence, boldness, and persistence, let us lift up our people, grow our economies, defend our shared destiny, and build a future for our citizens that is more ambitious, more exciting, more inspiring, and greater than the world has ever seen.(Trump Remarks)
The full text of President Trump's remarks follows and may also be accessed here in transcript form with thanks to the Singju Post.
Transcript: President Donald Trump Remarks @WEF Davos 2026
- January 21, 2026 10:23 am
- by Pangambam S
- Politics Singju Post
Here is the full transcript of U.S. President Donald Trump’s full address at the World Economic Forum in Davos, January 21, 2026.
Brief Notes: U.S. President Donald Trump delivers a combative keynote at the 2026 World Economic Forum in Davos, touting what he calls a historic American economic boom while lashing out at Europe’s leaders and policies. In this full speech, he defends tariffs, deregulation, fossil-fuel expansion, and strict immigration controls, framing them as the engine of U.S. prosperity. Trump openly blasts NATO, Denmark, Emmanuel Macron, and Mark Carney, and even revives his push to assert U.S. control over Greenland, igniting fresh transatlantic tensions.
President Trump’s Opening Remarks
PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP: Well, thank you very much, Larry. It’s great to be back in beautiful Davos, Switzerland, and to address so many respected business leaders, so many friends, a few enemies.
Welcome to this year’s World Economic Forum with truly phenomenal news from America. Yesterday marked the one-year anniversary of my inauguration, and today, after 12 months back in the White House, our economy is booming, growth is exploding, productivity is surging, investment is soaring, incomes are rising, inflation has been defeated, our previously open and dangerous border is closed and virtually impenetrable, and the United States is in the midst of the fastest and most dramatic economic turnaround in our country’s history.
Contrasting Biden’s Economy with Current Success
Under the Biden administration, America was plagued by the nightmare of stagflation, meaning low growth and high inflation, a recipe for misery, failure, and decline. But now, after just one year of my policies, we are witnessing the exact opposite — virtually no inflation and extraordinarily high economic growth, growth like, I believe you’ll see very shortly, a country has never seen before, perhaps no country has ever seen before.
Over the past three months, core inflation has been just 1.6 percent. Meanwhile, fourth-quarter growth is projected to be 5.4 percent, far greater than anybody other than myself and a few others had predicted.
Record-Breaking Economic Achievements
Since the election, the stock market has set 52 all-time high records. So that’s in one year, 52 records, adding $9 trillion in value to retirement accounts, 401ks, and people’s savings. People are doing very well. They’re very happy with me.
Since my inauguration, we’ve lifted more than 1.2 million people off of food stamps. And after four years in which Biden secured less than $1 trillion of new investment in our country — think of that, $1 trillion, substantially less than that — in four years, we’ve secured commitments for a record-breaking $18 trillion. And we think when the final numbers come out, they’ll be closer to $20 trillion of investment. That’s never been done by any country at any time, not even close.
Just over one year ago, under the radical-left Democrats, we were a dead country. Now we are the hottest country anywhere in the world. In fact, the United States economy is on pace to grow at double the rate that was projected by the IMF just last April. And with my growth and tariff policies, it should be much higher. I really believe we can be much higher than that.
America as the Global Economic Engine
And this is all great news, and it’s great for all nations. The USA is the economic engine on the planet. And when America booms, the entire world booms. It’s been the history. When it goes bad, it goes bad. And I hope we all — you all follow us down and you follow us up. And we’re at a point that we’ve never — I don’t believe we’ve ever been. I never thought we could do it this quickly. My biggest surprise is I thought it would take more than a year, maybe like a year and one month. But it’s happened very quickly.
This afternoon, I want to discuss how we have achieved this economic miracle, how we intend to raise living standards for our citizens to levels never seen before, and perhaps how you too and the places where you come from could do much better by following what we’re doing because certain places in Europe are not even recognizable, frankly, anymore. They’re not recognizable. And we can argue about it, but there’s no argument. Friends come back from different places — I don’t want to insult anybody — and say, “I don’t recognize it.” And that’s not in a positive way. That’s in a very negative way. And I love Europe, and I want to see Europe go good. But it’s not heading in the right direction.
Critiquing the Conventional Wisdom
In recent decades, it became conventional wisdom in Washington and European capitals that the only way to grow a modern Western economy was through ever-increasing government spending, unchecked mass migration, and endless foreign imports. The consensus was that so-called dirty jobs and heavy industries should be sent elsewhere, that affordable energy should be replaced by the “Green New Scam,” and that countries could be propped up by importing new and entirely different populations from faraway lands.
This was the path that sleepy Joe Biden administration and many other Western governments very foolishly followed, turning their backs on everything that makes nations rich and powerful and strong. And there’s so much potential in so many nations. The result was record budget and trade deficits and a growing sovereign deficit, driven by the largest wave of mass migration in human history. We’ve never seen anything like it.
Quite frankly, many parts of our world are being destroyed before our very eyes, and the leaders don’t even understand what’s happening. And the ones that do understand aren’t doing anything about it. Virtually all of the so-called experts predicted my plans to end this failed model would trigger a global recession and runaway inflation. But we have proven them wrong. It’s actually just the opposite.
A Transformation Like America Has Not Seen in Over 100 Years
In one year, our agenda has produced a transformation like America has not seen in over 100 years.
Instead of closing down energy plants, we’re opening them up. Instead of building ineffective, money-losing windmills, we’re taking them down and not approving any. Instead of empowering bureaucrats, we’re firing them. And they’re going out and getting jobs in the private sector for two and three times what they were making in government. So they started off hating me when we fired them, and now they love me.
Instead of raising taxes on domestic producers, we’re lowering them and raising tariffs on foreign nations to pay for the damage that they’ve caused. In 12 months, we have removed over 270,000 bureaucrats from the federal payrolls, the largest single-year reduction in government employment since the end of World War II. We thought that was coming, but we had no choice. To make a country great, you can’t have all federal jobs.
Cutting Spending and Slashing Regulations
We’ve cut federal spending by $100 billion and slashed the federal budget deficit by 27 percent in the single year. It’s going to go down quite a bit more from that, driving inflation way down from the record highs of the Biden administration. Every month, they went up and up and up.
I promised to cut 10 old regulations for every single new regulation. But instead, I’ve cut, actually, until this point, 129 regulations for every one new regulation approved. So every time they come in with a new regulation, we do at least 10. But so far, it’s averaging out to 129, if you can believe it.
The Largest Tax Cuts in American History
In July, we passed the largest tax cuts in American history, including no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on Social Security for our great seniors. We also provided 100 percent expensing. That’s the one they like. And bonus appreciation for all new equipment and capital investments to help companies expand and shift production to America. They are so in love with it. They build a plant. We’re able to deduct it immediately, the whole thing, rather than waiting 38 to 41 years in the old days. This is a miracle taking place.
Nobody thought it would ever be done by any country, but it’s done by us. It was what made my first term the most successful four-year term that we’ve ever had from a financial standpoint. And now we’ve upped it. This is a 10-year program, not a one-year program, but you’re allowed to deduct everything in one year. It used to be 38 to 41 years.
Tariffs and Trade Deficit Reduction
With tariffs, we’ve radically reduced our ballooning trade deficit, which was the largest in world history. We were losing more than $1 trillion every single year, and it was just wasted. It was going to waste. But in one year, I slashed our monthly trade deficit by a staggering 77 percent. And all of this with no inflation, something everyone said could not be done. There were a couple of brilliant people that actually thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I was doing the right thing. Now they all think I’m doing the right thing because they can’t believe the numbers.
American exports are now up by more than $150 billion. Domestic steel production is up by 300,000 tons a month, and it’s doubling over the next four months. It’s doubling and tripling, and we have steel plants being built all over the country. Nobody thought they’d see that. Factory construction is up by 41 percent, and that number is really going to skyrocket right now because that’s during a process that they’re putting in to get their approvals, and we’ve given very, very quick, fast approvals.
Historic Trade Deals With Global Partners
During the process, we’ve made historic trade deals with partners covering 40 percent of all U.S. trade, some of the greatest companies and countries in the world. We have countries as our partner, too. The European nations, Japan, South Korea, they’re our partners. They’ve gone into massive deals with us, especially on oil and gas. And these agreements raise growth and cause stock markets to boom, not only in the U.S., but virtually every country that came to make a deal, because, as you’ve learned, when the United States goes up, you follow. It’s really become a staple.
Reversing Biden’s Energy Policies
In America, I’ve stopped the nation-wrecking energy policies that drive up prices while sending jobs and factories to the world’s worst polluters. They are indeed polluters. Under sleepy Joe Biden, new domestic oil and gas leases fell by 95 percent. Think of that. And they wonder, why was gasoline going up so fast? The gasoline actually topped $5 a gallon, and some places $7 a gallon, and more than 100 major power plants were violently shut down by incompetent people that had no idea what the hell they were doing.
Under my leadership, U.S. natural gas production is at an all-time high, by far. U.S. oil production is up by 730,000 barrels a day. And last week, we picked up 50 million barrels from Venezuela alone.
Venezuela Oil Deal
Venezuela has been an amazing place for so many years, but then they went bad with their policies. Ten years ago, it was a great country, and now it’s got problems. But we’re helping them. And those 50 million barrels, we’re going to be splitting up with them, and they’ll be making more money than they’ve made in a long time. Venezuela is going to do fantastically well. We appreciate all of the cooperation we’ve been giving. We’ve been giving great cooperation. Once the attack ended, the attack ended, and they said, “let’s make a deal.” More people should do that.
But Venezuela is going to make more money in the next six months than they’ve made in the last 20 years. Every major oil company is coming in with us. It’s amazing. It’s a beautiful thing to see. The leadership of the country has been very good. They’ve been very, very smart.
Gasoline Prices Plummet
The price of gasoline is now below $2.50 a gallon in many states, $2.30 a gallon in most states, and we’ll soon be averaging less than $2 a gallon. In many places, it’s already down, even lower, $1.95 a gallon. Numerous states are at $1.99, numbers that nobody has heard for years – actually, since my last administration, we got it down to around those numbers.
I’ve signed an order directing an approval of many new nuclear reactors. We’re going heavy into nuclear. I was not a big fan because I didn’t like the risk, the danger, but the progress they’ve made with nuclear is unbelievable, and the safety progress they’ve made is incredible. We’re very much into the world of nuclear energy, and we can have it now at good prices and very, very safe.
Leading the World in AI
And we’re leading the world in AI by a lot. We’re leading China by a lot. I think President Xi respects what we’ve done, in part because I’ve allowed these big companies building these massive buildings to build their own electric capacity. They’re building their own power plants, which, when added up, is more than any country anywhere in the world is doing.
I read recently an article in the Wall Street Journal that China’s creating so much energy, and they are. I got to hand it to them. But we’re creating as much or more, and we’re letting them do that. I’m very proud of it. It was my idea. I said, you can’t create this much energy. We needed more than double the energy currently in the country just to take care of the AI. And I said, we can’t do that. We have an old grid system.
And I came up with the idea, you know, you people are brilliant, you have a lot of money. Let’s see what you can do. You can build your own electric generating plant. And they looked at me. They didn’t believe me. All of the names that are, I think, in the room right now, if you want to know the truth, they didn’t believe it. And I said, no, no, you can. They came back two weeks and they didn’t have the plant. They said, “We thought you were kidding.” I said, no, not only am I not kidding, you’re going to have your approvals within two weeks.
I always say nuclear will take three weeks. But most are going oil and gas, they’re even going coal in some cases.
Avoiding Europe’s Energy Collapse
Because of my landslide election victory, the United States avoided the catastrophic energy collapse which befell every European nation that pursued the Green New Scam, perhaps the greatest hoax in history. The Green New Scam, windmills all over the place, destroy your land, destroy your land. Every time that goes around, you lose a thousand dollars. You’re supposed to make money with energy, not lose money.
Here in Europe, we’ve seen the fate that the radical left tried to impose on America. They tried very hard. Germany now generates 22 percent less electricity than it did in 2017. And it’s not the current chancellor’s fault. He’s solving the problem. He’s going to do a great job. But what they did before he got there, I guess that’s why he got there. And electricity prices are 64 percent higher.
The United Kingdom’s Energy Crisis
The United Kingdom produces just one third of the total energy from all sources that it did in 1999. Think of that, one third. And they’re sitting on top of the North Sea, one of the greatest reserves anywhere in the world. But they don’t use it. And that’s one reason why their energy has reached catastrophically low levels with equally high prices. High prices, very low levels. Think of that, one third, and you’re sitting on top of the North Sea.
And they like to say, “Well, you know, that’s depleted.” It’s not depleted. It’s got 500 years. They haven’t even found the oil. The North Sea is incredible. They don’t let anybody drill. Environmentally, they don’t let them drill. They make it impossible for the oil companies to go. They take 92 percent of the revenues. So the oil companies say, we can’t do it.
They came to see me. “Is there anything you can do?” I want Europe to do great. I want U.K. to do great. Sitting on one of the greatest energy sources in the world, and they don’t use it. In fact, their electricity prices have soared 139 percent. There are windmills all over Europe.
There are windmills all over the place. And they are losers. One thing I’ve noticed is that the more windmills a country has, the more money that country loses and the worse that country is doing. China makes almost all of the windmills, and yet I haven’t been able to find any wind farms in China. Did you ever think of that? It’s a good way of looking. You know, they’re smart. China is very smart. They make them. They sell them for a fortune. They sell them to the stupid people that buy them, but they don’t use them themselves.
They put up a couple of big wind farms, but they don’t use them. They just put them up to show people what they could look like. They don’t spin. They don’t do anything. They use the thing called coal mostly. China goes with the coal. They go with oil and gas. They’re starting to look at nuclear a little bit, and they’re doing just fine. They make a fortune selling the windmills, though, and I think, really, that’s one that they wouldn’t be surprised if it stopped. They are shocked that it continues to go.
They were very friendly with me. They’re shocked that people continue to buy those damn things. They killed the birds. They ruin your landscapes. Other than that, I think they’re fabulous, by the way. Stupid people buy them.
Europe’s Destructive Policies
The consequences of such destructive policies have been stark, including lower economic growth, lower standards of living, lower birth rates, more socially disruptive migration, more vulnerability to hostile foreign adversaries, and much, much smaller militaries.
The United States cares greatly about the people of Europe. We really do. I mean, look, I am derived from Europe. Scotland and Germany, 100 percent Scotland, my mother, 100 percent German, my father. And we believe deeply in the bonds we share with Europe as a civilization. I want to see it do great. That’s why issues like energy, trade, immigration, and economic growth must be central concerns to anyone who wants to see a strong and united West, because Europe and those countries have to do their thing.
They have to get out of the culture that they’ve created over the last 10 years. It’s horrible what they’re doing to themselves. They’re destroying themselves. These are beautiful, beautiful places. We want strong allies, not seriously weakened ones. We want Europe to be strong. Ultimately, these are matters of national security, and perhaps no current issue makes the situation more clear than what’s currently going on with Greenland.
On Greenland and Denmark
Would you like me to say a few words of Greenland? I was going to leave it out of the speech, but I thought – I think I would have been reviewed very negatively. I have tremendous respect for both the people of Greenland and the people of Denmark. Tremendous respect. But every NATO ally has an obligation to be able to defend their own territory. And the fact is, no nation or group of nations is in any position to be able to secure Greenland other than the United States. We’re a great power, much greater than people even understand. I think they found that out two weeks ago in Venezuela.
We saw this in World War II, when Denmark fell to Germany after just six hours of fighting and was totally unable to defend either itself or Greenland. So the United States was then compelled – we did it, we felt an obligation to do it – to defend our own forces, to hold the Greenland territory. And hold it, we did, at great cost and expense. They didn’t have a chance of getting on it, and they tried. Denmark knows that.
We literally set up bases on Greenland for Denmark. We fought for Denmark. We weren’t fighting for anyone else. We were fighting to save it. For Denmark, big, beautiful piece of ice – it’s hard to call it land, it’s a big piece of ice – but we saved Greenland and successfully prevented our enemies from gaining a foothold in our hemisphere. So we did it for ourselves also.
And then after the war, which we won – we won it big. Without us, right now, you’d all be speaking German and a little Japanese, perhaps. After the war, we gave Greenland back to Denmark. How stupid were we to do that? But we did it. But we gave it back. But how ungrateful are they now?
Weapons Systems and Strategic Security
So now our country and the world face much greater risks than it did ever before because of missiles, because of nuclear, because of weapons of warfare that I can’t even talk about. Two weeks ago, they saw weapons that nobody ever heard of. They weren’t able to fire one shot at us. They said, what happened? Everything was discombobulated. They said, we’ve got them in our sights. Press the trigger. And nothing happened. No anti-aircraft missiles went up. There was one that went up about 30 feet and crashed down right next to the people that sent it. They said, what the hell is going on? Those defensive systems were made by Russia and by China. So they’re going to go back to the drawing boards, I guess.
Strategic Importance of Greenland
Greenland is a vast, almost entirely uninhabited and undeveloped territory. The sitting undefended in a key strategic location between the United States, Russia and China, that’s exactly where it is right smack in the middle, wasn’t important nearly when we gave it back. You know, when we gave it back, it wasn’t the same as it is now. It’s not important for any other reason. You know, that one talks about the minerals. There’s so many. There’s no rare earth. No such thing as rare earth. There’s rare processing. But there’s so much rare earth. And this to get to this rare earth, you had to go through hundreds of feet of ice. That’s not the reason we need it. We need it for strategic national security and international security.
This enormous, unsecured island is actually part of North America on the northern frontier of the Western Hemisphere. That’s our territory. It is, therefore, a core national security interest of the United States of America. And in fact, it’s been our policy for hundreds of years to prevent outside threats from entering our hemisphere. And we’ve done it very successfully. We’ve never been stronger than we are now.
Historical Attempts to Acquire Greenland
That’s why American presidents have sought to purchase Greenland for nearly two centuries. You know, for two centuries, they’ve been trying to do it. They should have kept it after World War Two, but they had a different president. That’s all right. People think differently. Much more necessary now than it was at that time, however.
In 2019, Denmark said that they would spend over $200 million to strengthen Greenland’s defenses. But as you know, they spent less than 1 percent of that amount. One percent is no sign of Denmark there. And I say that with great respect for Denmark, whose people I love, whose leaders are very good. It’s the United States alone that can protect this giant mass of land, this giant piece of ice, develop it and improve it, and make it so that it’s good for Europe and safe for Europe and good for us.
Seeking Acquisition Negotiations
And that’s the reason I’m seeking immediate negotiations to once again discuss the acquisition of Greenland by the United States, just as we have acquired many other territories throughout our history, as many of the European nations have. They’ve acquired. There’s nothing wrong with it. Many of them — some went in reverse, actually, if you look. Some had great, vast wealth, great, vast lands all over the world. They went in reverse. They’re stuck back where they started. That happens, too. But some grow.
But this would not be a threat to NATO. This would greatly enhance the security of the entire alliance, the NATO alliance. The United States is treated very unfairly by NATO, I want to tell you that. When you think about it, nobody can dispute it. We give so much and we get so little in return.
And I’ve been a critic of NATO for many years, and yet I’ve done more to help NATO than any other President by far, than any other person. You wouldn’t have NATO if I didn’t get involved in my first term.
Ukraine War and Election Claims
The war with Ukraine is an example. We are thousands of miles away, separated by a giant ocean. It’s a war that should have never started, and it wouldn’t have started if the 2020 U.S. presidential election weren’t rigged. It was a rigged election. Everybody now knows that. They found out. People will soon be prosecuted for what they did. It’s probably breaking news, but it should be. It was a rigged election. You can’t have rigged elections.
You need strong borders, strong elections, and, ideally, a good press. I always say it. Strong borders, strong elections, free, fair elections, and a fair media. The media is terrible. It’s very crooked. It’s very biased, terrible. But someday it’ll straighten out because it’s losing all credibility.
Think of it. When I went in a landslide, a giant landslide, won all seven swing states, won the popular vote, won everything. And they only get negative press. That means that it has no credibility. And if they’re going to get credibility, they’re going to have to be fair. So you need a fair press. But you also need those other elements.
And I inherited a terrible, terrible situation. If you look, the border was open. The inflation was raging. Everything was bad with the United States when I came into office. But I also inherited a mess with Ukraine and Russia, something that would have never happened. And I know Putin very well. He and I would discuss Ukraine. It was the apple of his eye. But he wasn’t going to do anything. I said, “Vladimir, you’re not doing it.” He would never have done it. It was terrible what happened. I could see it happening, too. After I left, I could see it happening.
Biden’s Ukraine Spending and Border Crisis
Biden had given Ukraine and NATO $350 billion of staggering sums, $350 billion. I came in, and just like the southern border, just like inflation, just like our economy, I said, wow, this place is in trouble, meaning our country. All of these things were out of control. But the border was out of control. We fixed it with the strongest border anywhere in the world.
Settling Eight Wars
And I’ve now been working on this war for one year, during which time I settled eight other wars, India, Pakistan. I settled other wars that were Vladimir Putin called me. Armenian, Azerbaijan, he said, “I can’t believe you settled that one.” They were going on for 35 years. I settled it in one day. And President Putin called me. He said, “You know, I can’t believe I worked on that war for 10 years trying to settle it. I couldn’t do it.” I said, “Do me a favor. Focus on settling your war. Don’t worry about that.”
What does the United States get out of all of this work? All of this money other than death, destruction and massive amounts of cash going to people who don’t appreciate what we do? They don’t appreciate what we do. Talking about NATO. I’m talking about Europe. They have to work on Ukraine. We don’t. The United States is very far away. We have a big, beautiful ocean separating us. We have nothing to do with it.
NATO Spending Reform
Until I came along, NATO was only supposed to pay 2% of GDP, but they weren’t paying. Most of the countries weren’t paying anything. The United States was paying for virtually 100% of NATO. And I got that stopped. I said, “That’s not fair.” But then, more importantly, I got NATO to pay 5% and now they were paying and now they are paying. So something nobody said was possible. They said we will never go up higher than 2%. But they went to 5% and now they’re paying the 5. They didn’t pay the 2 and now they’re paying the 5. And they’re stronger for it.
And they have an excellent, by the way, Secretary General who’s possibly in the room. Mark, are you here? Yes, he’s here. Hello, Mark. We never asked for anything and we never got anything. We probably won’t get anything unless I decide to use excessive strength and force where we would be, frankly, unstoppable. But I want to do that.
OK, now everyone’s saying, oh, good. That’s probably the biggest statement I made because people thought I would use force. I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force.
Greenland: From Trusteeship to Ownership Demand
All the United States is asking for is a place called Greenland where we already had it as a trustee, but respectfully returned it back to Denmark not long ago after we defeated the Germans, the Japanese, the Italians and others in World War Two. We gave it back to them. We were a powerful force then, but we are a much more powerful force now.
After I rebuilt the military in my first term and continue to do so today, we have a budget of one point five trillion dollars. We’re bringing back battleships. The battleship is one hundred times more powerful than the great battleships you saw in World War Two. Those great big, gorgeous ships, the Missouri, the Iowa, the Alabama. Because I thought maybe we could take them out of mothballs. I said, no, sir. These ships are one hundred. Think of that. One hundred times more powerful than those big, big, magnificent pieces of art that you saw so many times ago that you still see on television. You say, wow, what a force. One hundred times each ship. One hundred times more powerful than the big battleships of the past. So that was the end of the mothballs.
NATO: “We’ve Paid For Everything”
So what we have gotten out of NATO is nothing except to protect Europe from the Soviet Union and now Russia. I mean, we’ve helped them for so many years. We’ve never gotten anything except we pay for NATO and we’ve paid for many years until I came along. We paid for, in my opinion, one hundred percent of NATO because they weren’t paying their bills.
And all we’re asking for is to get Greenland, including right title and ownership, because you need the ownership to defend it. You can’t defend it on a lease. Number one, legally, it’s not defensible that way. Totally. And number two, psychologically, who the hell wants to defend a license agreement or a lease, which is a large piece of ice in the middle of the ocean where, if there is a war, much of the action will take place on that piece of ice. Think of it. Those missiles would be flying right over the center of that piece of ice.
The “Greatest Golden Dome Ever Built”
All we want from Denmark for national and international security and to keep our very energetic and dangerous potential enemies at bay is this land on which we’re going to build the greatest Golden Dome ever built. We’re building the Golden Dome that’s going to just by its very nature going to be defending Canada.
Canada gets a lot of freebies from us, by the way. They should be grateful also. But they’re not. I watched your prime minister yesterday. He wasn’t so grateful. They should be grateful to us. Canada. Canada lives because of the United States. Remember that, Mark, the next time you make your statements.
Israel’s Dome and U.S. Technology
What we did for Israel was amazing, but that’s nothing compared to what we have planned for the United States, Canada and the rest of the world. We are going to build a dome like no other. We did it. We did it for Israel. And by the way, I told Bibi, stop taking credit for the dome. That’s our technology. That’s our stuff.
But they had a lot of courage and they were good fighters and they did a good job and we wiped out the Iran nuclear threat like nobody can believe. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it. That Venezuela taking down Soleimani. Wiping out al-Baghdadi when he tried to reinstitute ISIS. We did a lot. I did a lot.
A lot of big things. All perfectly executed. Everyone was perfectly executed. Somebody told me that a military expert told me, “Sir, everything you’ve done has been perfectly executed.” I said, “I know.”
So other presidents have spent, whether foolishly or not, trillions and trillions of dollars on NATO and gotten absolutely nothing in return. We’ve never asked for anything. It’s always a one way street. Now they want us to help them with Ukraine. And let me say, we’re going to. I’m really helping. Not even them.
Ukraine Casualty Numbers
I want to see last week. If you saw, it was 10,000 soldiers. But last month it was 31,000 soldiers died. 31,000. That’s this room times the number of people in this room times 30. Think of it. 30,000 soldiers died in one month. The month before was 27,000. The month before that it was 28,000. The month before that it was 25,000. It’s a bloodbath over there. And that’s what I want to stop.
Doesn’t help the United States. But these are souls. These are young. Young people look like you, look like some of you right in the front row. They go to war. Their parents are so proud. “Oh, there he goes.” Comes back two weeks later. They get a call. “Your son’s head’s been blown off.” I want to stop it. It’s a horrible war.
Stopping the Bloodshed
So we’re since World War Two. They keep going, they’ll exceed World War Two. The numbers are staggering how many people they’ve lost. They don’t want to talk about it. Ukraine and Russia lost just tremendous amounts. And I’m dealing with President Putin and he wants to make a deal. I believe I’m dealing with President Zelensky and I think he wants to make a deal. I’m meeting him today. He might be in the audience right now. But they got to get that war stopped. Because too many people are dying, needlessly dying. Too many souls are being lost. It’s the only reason I’m interested in doing it. But in doing it, I’m helping Europe. I’m helping NATO.
From “Daddy” to Villain Over Greenland
And I’ve until the last few days when I told them about Iceland, they loved me. They called me “Daddy.” The last time, a very smart man said, “He’s our daddy. He’s running it.” I was like running it. I went from running it to being a terrible human being. But now what I’m asking for is a piece of ice, cold and poorly located, that can play a vital role in world peace and world protection. It’s a very small ask compared to what we have given them for many, many decades.
But the problem with NATO is that we’ll be there for them 100 percent. But I’m not sure that they’d be there for us if we gave them the call, “Gentlemen, we are being attacked, we’re under attack by such and such a nation.” I know them all very well. I’m not sure that they’d be there. I know we’d be there for them. I don’t know that they’d be there for us. So with all of the money we expend, with all of the blood, sweat and tears, I don’t know that they’d be there for us. They’re not there for us on Iceland, I can tell you.
Stock Market Reaction and Defense Spending
I mean, our stock market took the first dip yesterday because of Iceland. So Iceland’s already cost us a lot of money. But that dip is peanuts compared to what it’s gone up. And we have an unbelievable future in that stock. That stock market is going to be doubled. We’re going to hit 50,000, and that stock market’s going to double in a relatively short period of time because of everything that’s happening.
But this is a good example. After giving NATO and European nations trillions and trillions of dollars in defense, they buy our weapons. We make the greatest weapons in the world, but now we’re going to make them faster, much faster. I put a cap on the salaries, and I put no buybacks, no stock buybacks, no various other things that they were doing.
I mean, they were making $50 million, but it would take them three years to give you a Patriot missile. I said, that’s not good. My chauffeur can do a better job than that, and he makes slightly less than 50. They make big salaries. If they’re going to make those big salaries, they’re going to have to produce a lot faster.
The good news is we have the greatest equipment in the world. Now we’re going to start making it a lot faster. They’re going to build additional plants. And all of the money that goes into stock buybacks is going to go into building plants. We’re not allowing stock buybacks by defense companies any longer. They’re going to build new plants to make Tomahawks, Patriots. We have the best equipment, F-35s, F-47, the new one just coming out. They say it’s the most devastating plane, fighter jet ever.
Who knows? They called it 47. If I don’t like it, I’m going to take the 47 off it. I wonder why they called it 47. We’ll have to think about that. But if I don’t like it, I’m going to take that 47 off. But it’s supposed to be the stage six. It’s supposed to be the first stage six plane, undetectable, like our B-2 bombers were undetectable. They flew right over Iran. They were undetectable. And they did their job, and they got the hell out of there.
Greenland Ultimatum
So we want a piece of ice for world protection. And they won’t give it. We’ve never asked for anything else. And we could have kept that piece of land, and we didn’t. So they have a choice. You can say yes, and we will be very appreciative. Or you can say no, and we will remember.
Economic Security and NATO
A strong and secure America means a strong NATO, and that’s one reason why I’m working every day to ensure our military is very powerful, our borders are very strong. And above all, our economy is strong because national security requires economic security and economic prosperity, and we have the greatest that we’ve ever had.
Biden and his allies destroyed our economy and gave us perhaps the worst inflation in American history. When they say 48 years, I say forever, but I think 48 years is the equivalent to forever. Whether it’s 48 years or ever, it’s terrible, costing the typical family $33,000. What they did to this country should never, ever be forgotten. It’s early, but he has to be rated as the worst president we’ve ever had by far. The auto pen didn’t many of the—much of the damage. The auto pen—he was the auto pen president, because I don’t believe a sane president would have ever signed the kind of things that he signed.
But now grocery prices, energy prices, airfares, mortgage rates, rent, and car payments are all coming down, and they’re coming down fast. We inherited a mess, but we’ve done a hell of a job in 12 months.
Favored Nation Drug Pricing Policy
One of my most favored nation policy for drug prices, the cost of prescription drugs is coming down by up to 90 percent, depending on the way you calculate. You could also say 5, 6, 7, 800 percent. There are two ways of figuring that. But we have a favored nations policy that every president wanted, no president was able to get. I got it, and other nations approved it. And I had to use tariffs in order to get it because they said no way.
In other words, a pill that costs $10 in London costs $130. Think it—costs $10 in London, costs $130 in New York or in Los Angeles. And I’d say, boy, that’s bad. Friends of mine would say, you know, we go to London, you can buy this stuff for nothing. We go all over the world, we can buy it for nothing. Because basically, America, we’re subsidizing every nation in the world because presidents allowed them to get away with it. It became very tough.
So when I called up Emmanuel Macron, I watched him yesterday with those beautiful sunglasses. What the hell happened?
But I watched him sort of be tough. But he was at $10 for a pill. And I said, Emmanuel – and I have all the big pharmaceutical companies are in total agreement. It wasn’t easy, by the way. They’re tough, smart. They’ve been getting away with this scam for a long time. But they gave it up. But they said, you’ll never get the countries to approve it. I said, why is that? Because they won’t. They always said, we’re not paying any more. Get the rest for the United States.
So over the years, they stayed the same. We just went up, up, up. And I mean, we would pay 13, 14, 15 times more than certain countries would. So I said, no, they’ll approve it, 100 percent. So you’ll never get them to approve it. I said, I guarantee you.
But I actually started with Emmanuel, who probably is in the room too. And I like him. I actually like him. Hard to believe, isn’t it? And I said, Emmanuel, you’re going to have to lift the price of that pill to $20, maybe $30. Think of that. That means it’s a doubling, a doubling of prescription drugs. Might be a tripling. Might be a quadrupling. It’s not easy.
No, no, no, Donald, I will not do that. I said, yes, you will, 100 percent. He said, no, no, no. You’re asking me to double. I said, Emmanuel, you’ve been taking advantage of the United States for 30 years with prescription drugs. You really should do it. And you will do it. I said, Emmanuel, I have no doubt. In fact, I am 100 percent sure you’re going to. No, no, no. I will not do it.
Because, yes, in all fairness to him, he has to double or triple. Because the world being a bigger place than the United States, it’s not that you meet in the middle. You just have to go up some. And we come down a lot. They go up a little. We come down a lot. So we’re at $130. They’re at $10. So they may have to go to $20 or $30. No more than that.
I said, Emmanuel, are you going to be doubling or tripling? No, no, no. I said, here’s the story, Emmanuel. The answer is you’re going to do it. You’re going to do it fast. And if you don’t, I’m putting a 25 percent tariff on everything that you sell into the United States and a 100 percent tariff on your wines and champagnes. And that’s about 10 times more than what I’m requesting. And you’re going to do it.
I don’t want to go public with it, but you may make me do that. No, no, Donald, I will do it. I will do it.
Three Minutes Per Country
It took me, on average, three minutes a country saying the same thing. You will do it. They all said, no, no, no. I will not do it. You’re asking me to double the cost of prescription. I said, that’s right, because you’ve been screwing us for 30 years. And they said, we will not do it.
I said, that’s all right. On Monday morning, we’re putting a 25, 30, 50, I gave different numbers to different countries. This is also national security we’re talking about. Not fair. We’re not going to subsidize the whole world. And every one of those countries have agreed to do it.
So one of the biggest things that I’ve done is the fact that we have now most favored nation. We will pay whatever the lowest price is in the entire world. So our drug prices are going to be coming down by a staggering 90 percent. Again, you could say 1,000 percent, 2,000 percent, depends on the way you want to figure it. But we’ll go with the way the fake news likes it better, because it sounds just as good. You mentioned a 90% reduction sounds much worse.
But drug prices are going to be coming down tremendously in all the nations, and I appreciate them doing it. But they did it in all fairness.
Without tariffs, I wouldn’t have been able to get it done. After declining $3,000 under Biden, real incomes are up in the United States by $2,000, $3,000 and even $5,000 and more.
Restoring the American Dream of Homeownership
Homeownership has always been a symbol of health and vigor of American society. But that goal fell out of reach for millions and millions of people in the Biden era because interest rates went up so high. Today, I’m taking action to bring back this bedrock of the American dream.
In recent years, Wall Street giants and institutional investment firms, many of you are here, many of you are good friends of mine, many of you are supporters. I’m sorry to do this. I’m so sorry. But you’ve driven up housing prices by purchasing hundreds of thousands of single family homes, and it’s been a great investment for them, often as much as 10% of houses on the market.
You know, the crazy thing is a person can’t get depreciation on a house. But when a corporation buys it, they get depreciation. Okay, here’s something we’re going to have to think about, too. I don’t know if too many people think about that. You buy a corporation, they buy 500 houses. They buy hundreds of thousands. They buy 500 houses. They can take depreciation. A person sweats and works and buys one house. They can’t.
But homes are built for people, not for corporations. And America will not become a nation of renters. We’re not going to do that. That’s why I have signed an executive order banning large institutional investors from buying single family homes. It’s just not fair to the public. They’re not able to buy a house. And I’m calling on Congress to pass that ban into permanent law, and I think they will.
Capping Credit Card Interest Rates
One of the biggest barriers to saving for a down payment has been surging credit card debt. The profit margin for credit card companies now exceeds 50%. One of the biggest. And they charge Americans interest rates of 28%, 30%, 31%, 32%. What have happened to usury?
So to help our citizens recover from the Biden disaster, all caused by this horrible, just horrible precedent, I’m asking Congress to cap credit card interest rates at 10% for one year. And this will help millions of Americans save for home. They have no idea they’re paying 28%. They go out there a little late in their payment, and they end up losing their house. It’s terrible.
Securing America as the Crypto Capital of the World
To unleash innovation and savings and financing, I’m also working to ensure America remains the crypto capital of the world. And to that end, last year, I signed the landmark Genius Act into law. Now Congress is working very hard on crypto market structure legislation, Bitcoin, all of them, which I hope to sign very soon, unlocking new pathways for Americans to reach financial freedom.
And I did it for two reasons. Number one, I thought it was politically good, and it was. I got tremendous political support. But more importantly, China wanted that market, too. It’s just like they want the A.I. And we’ve got that market, I think, pretty well locked up.
If I didn’t do it, you know, Biden was totally against it until before the election, when they realized that, you know, there were millions of people voting against him over crypto. And all of a sudden they loved it very much. But it was too late. They blew it. But it is politically popular. But it’s much more importantly, we have to make it so that China doesn’t get the hold of it. And once they have that hold, we’re not going to be able to get it back. So I’m honored to have done it.
Mortgage Bonds and New Fed Chairman
Finally, I’ve instructed government backed institutions to purchase up to $200 billion in mortgage bonds to bring down interest rates. And I’ll be announcing a new Fed chairman in the not too distant future. I think you’ll do a very good job. So I gave away some of it. He did give that away. So we have something. Get something. But somebody that’s very respected. They’re all respected. They’re all great.
Everyone that I interviewed is great. Everyone could do, I think, a fantastic job. Problem is, they change once they get the job. You know, they’re saying everything I want to hear. And then they get the job. They’re locked in for six years. They get the job. And all of a sudden, let’s raise rates a little bit. I call them, “Sir, we’d rather not talk about this.” It’s amazing how people change once they have the job. It’s too bad. Sort of disloyalty, but they got to do what they think is right.
We have a terrible chairman right now. Jerome “Too Late” Powell. He’s always too late. And it’s very late with interest rates, except before the election. He was just fine for the other side. So we’re going to have somebody that’s great and we hope he does the right job.
Mortgage Rates and Housing Market Strategy
Last week, the average 30 year mortgage rate dropped below 6 percent for the first time in many years. Another major factor in driving up housing costs was the mass invasion of our borders. And I have to say one thing about housing, because nobody ever says this. I am very protective of people that already own a house. Of which we have millions and millions and millions. And because we have had such a good run, the house values have gone up tremendously. And these people have become wealthy. They weren’t wealthy. They become wealthy because of their house.
And every time you make it more and more and more affordable for somebody to buy a house cheaply, you’re actually hurting the value of those houses, obviously, because the one thing works in tandem with the other. And I don’t want to do anything that’s going to hurt the value of people that own a house who for the first time in their lives are walking around the streets of whatever city they’re in, very proud that their house is worth 500, 600, $700,000.
Now, if I want to really crush the housing market, I could do that so fast that people could buy houses. But you would destroy a lot of people that already have houses. In some cases, they’ve mortgaged their house and the mortgage would be very low. And all of a sudden, the mortgage without any changes becomes very high and they end up losing the house. I’m not going to hurt. And I speak with Scott, who’s doing a fantastic job, and Howard, who’s doing a fantastic job and all of my people. And I always say, look, you know, I can crush the hell out of the market.
Interest Rates and America’s Economic Position
We can drop interest rates to a level. And that’s one thing we do want to do. That’s natural. That’s good for everybody. You know, the dropping of the interest rates, we should be paying a much lower interest rate than we are. We should be paying the lowest interest rate of any country in the world, because without the United States, you don’t have a country.
I mean, I had a case with Switzerland. We happened to be in Switzerland. Maybe I’ll give you a quick story. But they were paying nothing. They make beautiful watches, great watches, Rolex, all of them. They were paying nothing to the United States when they sent their product in. And we had a forty one billion dollar deficit, 41 billion with this beautiful place flew over it, isn’t it nice?
Tariffs on Switzerland
So I said, let’s put a 30 percent tariff on them so that we get back some of it, not all of it at all. We still have a deficit, big deficit, 40, 41 million. That’s a big deficit. And I said, let’s put a tariff on. Different tariffs, different places, you’re all party to some cases, victims to them. But in the end, it’s a fair thing. And most of you realize that.
But we put a 30 percent tariff on Switzerland and all hell broke loose. They were calling. I mean, like you wouldn’t believe. And I know so many people from Switzerland. Incredible place. Incredible, brilliant place.
But I didn’t realize that they’re only good because of us. And there’s so many other examples. I mean, us, probably other places, but a majority of the money they make is because of us, because we never charged them anything. So they come in, they sell their watches, no tariffs, no nothing. They walk away. They make $41 billion on just us. So I said, no, we can’t do that. So I’m going to bring it up. I still would have a deficit, pretty substantial, but I brought it up to 30 percent.
The prime minister, I don’t think president, I think prime minister called, a woman, and she was very repetitive. She said, “No, no, no, you cannot do that. 30 percent. You cannot do that. We are a small, small country.” I said, “Yeah, but you have a big, big deficit. You may be small, but you have a bigger deficit than big countries.” She said, “No, no, no, please. You cannot do it.” Kept saying the same thing over and over. “We are a small country.” I said, “But you’re a big country in terms of…” And she just rubbed me the wrong way, I’ll be honest with you. And I said, “All right, thank you, ma’am. Appreciate it. Do not do this. Thank you very much, ma’am.” And I made it 39 percent.
And then all hell really broke out. And I was paid visits by everybody. Rolex came to see me. They all came to see me. But I realized, and I reduced it. Because I don’t want to hurt people. I don’t want to hurt them. And we brought it down to a lower level. Doesn’t mean it’s not going up, but we brought it down to a lower level. But they pay now, the tariff.
The United States Is Keeping the Whole World Afloat
But I realize that we have many places like that where they’re making a fortune because of the United States. Without the United States, they wouldn’t be making anything. Think of it. Switzerland made $41 billion on us. And as she said, it’s a small place. And I realized with that, I don’t know, I was so, because she was so aggressive. And I realized in that conversation that the United States is keeping the whole world afloat.
Many places, I could give you six, seven places just in the people in this little area. I know every one of them. They’re sort of, they’re looking down. They don’t want to see me and they don’t want to stare me in the eyes. But they’re taking advantage of, everybody took advantage of the United States. But I’ve been very fair and I gave them a tariff and it was fine. But I realized that without us, it’s not Switzerland anymore. Without us, it’s not any of the countries that are represented here.
And we want to work with the countries. We want to work with them. We’re not looking to destroy them. I could have said 39%, 40%. I could have said I want a 70% tariff, then we make money with Switzerland. But Switzerland would have been probably destroyed, financially destroyed. I don’t want to do that.
America Should Pay the Lowest Interest Rate
But we should be paying the lowest interest rate of everybody. I hope Scott’s listening to this because we should be paying the lowest interest rate of everybody. Without us, without us, most of the countries don’t even work. And then you have the protection factor. Without our military, which is the greatest in the world by far, without our military, you have threats that you would never, you wouldn’t believe. You wouldn’t believe. You don’t have threats because of us. And that’s because of NATO.
One other thing, and I have to say it so importantly, in the old days, and I used to say I’m the youngest in the room. Now I’m among the older. I hate to say it. I don’t feel old, but I’m among the older. But I remember not long ago, 20, 25 years ago, when good news came out about, let’s say, the United States. The United States had a great quarter.
The United States had a great month. All the stocks went up. And that’s the way it’s supposed to be. Now when they say the United States had a record quarter, it’s unbelievable how well it’s doing. All the stocks crash because they say, oh, no, inflation, inflation. They’re going to raise interest rates, and they do. Some of these stupid people like Powell, they raise interest rates. And what they do is they stop you from being successful.
It used to be when we had a great quarter, a great month, great earnings, great anything, any good news, the stock market went up. That’s the way it’s going to be. We’ve got to do that again. Because that’s the way it should be. Now when we have a great month, they want to kill it. Like we did over 5%. People were surprised. We should do 20%. We could do 25%.
Well, we announced good numbers, and the reason is they’re so petrified of inflation. And growth doesn’t mean inflation. We’ve had tremendous growth with very low inflation. In fact, growth can fight inflation, proper growth. So we want to get back to the days when we announced great numbers because we’re going to be announcing phenomenal.
Record Factory Construction and Foreign Investment
You know, all these factories that are being built at record, thousands of businesses are being built right now. Remember, $18 trillion is invested. I think the second number is three, and that was China many years ago. Investments in the country from outside. $18 trillion, nobody’s ever seen that. That’s money coming in and building things, factories. Thousands of businesses are being built, thousands.
Hundreds of big factories, car plants are moving back to the United States. They’re coming in from Canada. They’re coming in from Mexico, from Japan. Japan’s coming in and building plants here in order to avoid tariffs. They’re coming in from China. They’re coming in from all over the world.
We have more plants being built now, car plants, than we’ve ever had built even in the heyday from the 1940s and 50s. And they’re bigger. They don’t use renovations anymore where they take an old plant, they rip it down, they build a brand new plant, super modern plant. But it’s happening at levels that nobody’s ever seen.
Immigration and Crime Enforcement
In 2024, the U.S. built less than 2 million new homes, but Biden admitted more than 8 million new migrants. And those days are over. In 2025, for the first time in 50 years, the United States had reverse migration. Boy, that was nice.
And these were criminals that were being taken out of our country because they allowed people to come into our country from jails, from gangs, drug dealers, murderers, 11,888 murderers. We’ve gotten most of them out. And then ICE gets beat up by stupid people from leadership in Minnesota. We actually are helping Minnesota so much, but they don’t appreciate it. Most places do.
Washington D.C. Safety Transformation
You know, Washington, D.C., is the safest place now in the United States. It was a very dangerous place to walk, and now you can walk with your wife, your kids, right through the middle of the city. Right now, Washington, D.C., is as safe as it gets. It was one of the most unsafe.
I had to admit we sent in the military, the National Guard. Within two months, it was great. Within three months, it’s like a really great place and a safe place and a beautiful place. It’s even been cleaned up. The graffiti is gone. Fences are gone. We don’t have to worry about fences anymore. All of the places, the grasses are cut and replaced with new grass in many cases. It’s all going to happen in the spring.
But Washington, D.C., is beautiful again, and it’s safe. New restaurants are opening up. They’re all closing. Now you can’t get into a restaurant. Restaurants in Washington, D.C., are all opening.
Memphis also. Memphis, Tennessee. New Orleans, Louisiana. We’re there for three weeks. We’ve cut the crime down by 64 percent within another month. Virtually no crime there. We can do that all over. We’re going to help the people in California.
We want to have no crime. I know Gavin was here. I used to get along so great with Gavin when I was president. Gavin’s a good guy, and if he needed it, I would do it in a heartbeat. I’d love to see. We did help them a lot in Los Angeles, a lot early in my term when they had some problems. But we would love to do it.
I will say this. If I were a Democrat governor or whatever, I would call up Trump. I’d say, come on in. Make us look good. Because we’re cutting crime down to nothing. And we’re taking people out, career criminals, who are only going to do bad things, and we’re bringing them back to their countries. But where we’ve done it, it’s been amazing. And we have a capacity to do it at much greater levels.
Cutting Welfare and Ending Sanctuary City Payments
We’re cutting illegal aliens off welfare and other government benefits, and I have directed that starting immediately there will be no more payments to sanctuary cities because they are really just sanctuaries for criminals. They’re really protecting criminals, and those are the ones we have to get out of the country, murderers, drug dealers, the mentally insane. They emptied their mental institutions into the United States.
And despite that, we have the lowest crime numbers that we’ve ever had in the history of the country. Just came out.
Fraud and Piracy
But equally importantly, we’re cracking down on more than $19 billion in fraud that was stolen by Somalian bandits. Can you believe the Somalians? They turned out to be higher IQ than we thought. And we say these are low IQ people. How did they go into Minnesota and steal all that money?
And we have, you know, they’re pirates. They’re good pirates, but we shoot them out of the water just like we shoot the drug boats out. They’re not pirating too many boats lately, do you notice? When they go out into those boats, they want to take over a billion-and-a-half-dollar tanker loaded up with oil, and they say we’re going to blow up your boat. They have powerful weapons. You hit the side of the boat, you blow the whole thing up. The insurance companies are petrified, so they say just give them the boat. We’ll give them money instead.
And I don’t do that. We blow them right the hell out of the water. We see them going out, we blow them out of the water. We don’t have any pirates so much anymore. We do. They won’t be there long.
Drug Interdiction at Sea
We’ve cut down with the hitting of the boats that are loaded up with drugs, including submarines. Can you believe they actually buy small? They call them mini-subs, very fast. They’re meant for drugs. We’ve knocked out two of them. The Democrats say they were fishing. You have ruined somebody’s fishing weekend, I would say. A submarine is not a fishing boat. You don’t fish.
But we’ve knocked down drugs by water, the oceans, the sea, by 97.2 percent. Think of that. And I actually say, who the hell are the 3 percent? Because I would not want to be piloting one of those boats. We knocked them down, and now we’re going to start on land. We’re going to knock it all out. The land is the easy part. What we did on the sea is incredible. And that’s our great military.
Immigration and Western Society
Situation in Minnesota reminds us that the West cannot mass import foreign cultures which have failed to ever build a successful society of their own. I mean, we’re taking people from Somalia and Somalia is a failed, it’s not a nation. Got no government, got no police, got no military, got no nothing.
And then we have this fake congressperson who they just reported is worth 30 million dollars, Ilhan Omar, talking about the Constitution, preaching me. She comes from a country that’s not a country and she’s telling us how to run America. Not going to get away with it much longer. Let me tell you, the explosion of prosperity and conclusion and progress that built the West did not come from our tax codes.
It ultimately came from our very special culture. This is the precious inheritance that America and Europe have in common. We share it. We share it, but we have to keep it strong. We have to become stronger, more successful, and more prosperous than ever. We have to defend that culture and rediscover the spirit that lifted the West from the depths of the Dark Ages to the pinnacle of human achievement.
We live in an incredible changing period. It’s an unbelievable time, but we have to take advantage of the time that we’re in. In our hands are technologies that our ancestors could scarcely have—I mean, they couldn’t have even dreamt some of the things that we see today. And so rapidly they’re produced. I mean, AI two years ago, nobody ever heard of the term, and now everybody’s talking about it. It can have some very good purpose. It could also have some dangerous purpose, and for that we have to watch out. But some tremendous things are happening because of it, and we’re leading by so much. We’re doing so well.
Opportunities for the Future
But opportunities that are bigger and grander than ever before in human history are right before us. It is the pioneers in this room—many of you in this room are true pioneers. You’re truly brilliant, brilliant people. Just your ability to get a ticket is brilliant, because you have about 50 people for every seat. I don’t know what that is, Larry. Everything Larry touches turns to gold. He made this very successful.
But you’re in this room, and some of you are the greatest leaders anywhere in the world. You’re the greatest brains anywhere in the world. And the future is unlimited, and to a large part because of you. And we have to protect you and we have to cherish you. I always say we have to cherish our brilliant people because there aren’t many of them.
A Call to Action
So together, with confidence, boldness, and persistence, let us lift up our people, grow our economies, defend our shared destiny, and build a future for our citizens that is more ambitious, more exciting, more inspiring, and greater than the world has ever seen. We’re in a position to do things that nobody else has ever even thought of before, and many of the people in this room are the ones that are doing it. And I want to congratulate you, and I’m with you all the way. You can do things that nobody else can even think about.
So I congratulate you on your tremendous success, and the United States is back—bigger, stronger, better than ever before. And I’ll see you around. Thank you all very much. Thank you very much. Thank you.
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