- 5/17/2025
Fox News TV || President Donald Trump sits down with ‘Special Report’ anchor Bret Baier to discuss his visit to the Middle East, the Russia-Ukraine war and more. #foxnews #news #politics #usa #trump #us #specialreport #bretbaier #exclusive #middleeast #world #war #new
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00:00Welcome back to Special Report in Abu Dhabi, the UAE, with President Donald J. Trump.
00:14Putin doesn't go to Turkey. You thought about going, if he was going.
00:19Well, I had a problem. I mean, I consider the Middle East very important.
00:23And I had a problem, because Thursday, I was going to be UAE, okay, which is where I am now.
00:30We're going to be leaving in a few hours and have another couple of stops.
00:35It's a pretty grueling schedule. A lot of people said, how the hell do you do it?
00:39By the way, how the hell do you do it?
00:41I don't know. I think it's genetics. It's genetics.
00:44I had a father who was very strong, and I had a mother who was very strong.
00:47They lived to ripe old ages, and they were great people.
00:50And it's meeting after meeting. And not only that, it's speech after speech.
00:55Big ones.
00:55It's not like big ones. Like last night, if you look, he got up and made a beautiful speech.
01:04Mohammed, he got up and made a beautiful speech. I wasn't told I even had a speech to make.
01:08So I had to make a speech off the cuff. Do you think Biden could do that? I don't think so.
01:13Actually, it was a pretty good speech. I looked at it. It was pretty good.
01:16I didn't know I was doing it.
01:17But, you know, it's meeting after meeting with the highest level people.
01:22These are great people. They love us again. They were not feeling love at all.
01:27They were going to China. They're not going to China anymore.
01:30You were going to go to Turkey. Putin doesn't show. Zelensky shows.
01:35No, I was never scheduled to go to Turkey.
01:36No, you weren't scheduled. But you were talking about maybe you would go if it all came together.
01:40I might have. But I tell you what. I would not have wanted to disappoint UAE because that was my stuff.
01:47Yeah, big deal.
01:48And if I went to Turkey, I couldn't go here. And it would have been very hard for me to say I'm not doing it.
01:55On the substance, what do you think is going through Putin's mind?
01:58You know, you said get to the table. You said stop bombing. He hasn't stopped bombing. He's not at the table. And what do you think is happening?
02:07Well, he is at the table. And he wanted this meeting. And I always felt there can't be a meeting without me because I don't think a deal is going to get through.
02:16There's a lot of hatred on both sides. I have a very good relationship with Putin. I think we'll make a deal. We have to get together.
02:24And I think we'll probably schedule it because I'm tired of having other people go and meet and everything else.
02:31And with that being said, I think Steve Whitcoff has done an incredible job. But it's a very tough job.
02:35And it's a it's a job that because of position that I think I'm the only one that's going to be able to do that one.
02:44And I think we'll do it fast, too. I think Putin is tired of this whole thing. He's not and he's not looking good.
02:51And he wants to look good. Don't forget, this was supposed to end in one week.
02:56And if he didn't get stuck in the mud with his army tanks all over the place, they would have been in Kiev, Kiev in about five hours.
03:06And who gave the javelins? Do you remember who gave the javelins? Was it Barack Hussein Obama? No, it was Donald Trump gave the javelins.
03:13Do you think your perception of it has changed? Is Putin now the obstacle to peace in your mind?
03:21Look, I had a real rough session with Zelensky because I didn't like what he said.
03:29And he was not making it easy. And I always said he doesn't have the cards and he doesn't have the cards.
03:36And, you know, I'm being honest. He doesn't have the cards.
03:37You're dealing with a massive army and you're dealing with somebody that's brave, that had great equipment.
03:44But I haven't seen you get personal on true social. You said, Vladimir, stop.
03:49He hasn't stopped. And you had once said that maybe you need to look at other things like sanctions or banking.
03:56OK, so because maybe they need to be pressured in a different way.
04:00And I'll be doing that if they don't. I don't want to see 5,000 people.
04:04You know, outside of the money, which is a big deal, but the money is the money, the money we can make up.
04:09I can make up the money on one trip like this. OK, I mean, think of it.
04:15This trip, I made 12 times the money that we're talking about.
04:21I made that money in a few days. I've always been good.
04:24It's not about the money. It's about pressuring Putin, right?
04:26I mean, I know, but I've always been good with money. I make money I made in four days.
04:31I made 12 times what we spent in Ukraine. So the money is the money.
04:36What what bothered me? I hated to see the way it was, you know, excuse me, pissed away.
04:43I hated to see that checks were said for 60 billion dollars every time Zelensky.
04:49I think he's the greatest salesman in the world, far better than me. Zelensky, he comes to Washington.
04:56He walks out with 100 billion every time he came, 100 billion, 100 billion.
05:00Now his abilities were shrinking because the last time I only got 60 billion.
05:04But Congress is very upset about, you know, they're saying, where is all this money going?
05:08And I'm focused on we sent checks. We don't know we sent quit. We sent just checks.
05:12We said just cash. Where is it? The Europeans have been very badly hurt by this.
05:18They spent a lot of money. Also, they spent 100 billion. We spent 350.
05:22It shouldn't be that. It should have been the other way around. But are you going to put the screws to Putin?
05:26Wait, they have not been treated right by anybody.
05:30This is a war that they're, you know, spending a lot of money on.
05:34We've been treated worse than that because we had a very stupid person as a president.
05:38And if I can solve that problem, and it's a bad problem, because I will tell you, Putin, it was the apple of his eye.
05:45He never would have done it if I was president. Never, ever would have done it, 100%.
05:49I think you, most people, actually even Democrats say that it wouldn't have happened.
05:53But we inherited a mess, okay?
05:56I think it's going to get solved.
05:59But you know that Putin wanted the whole thing.
06:02He didn't want a piece. He didn't want a chunk.
06:05He wanted the whole thing.
06:06Somebody said, well, what do we get out of it in terms of, let's say, Ukraine?
06:10Right.
06:11You know what they get out of it?
06:13A large portion of the country.
06:15It's just, there's, Senator Lindsey Graham has 73 co-sponsors on this bill to sanction Russian oil.
06:22And anybody who buys Russian oil, he's making the pitch for the bill saying,
06:25why should China get the benefit of cheap oil from Russia as Putin continues the war?
06:31At some point, there has to be leverage on Putin.
06:34And I assume that you've talked about that.
06:36Nobody uses leverage better than me.
06:38Look what I did to Iran.
06:39So it's changing.
06:41It's not changing.
06:42I always had that.
06:43I will use that if I have to.
06:45I'd rather not use that.
06:47By the way, that's a big deal.
06:48I just put it on Venezuela.
06:51It's secondary sanctions, it's called.
06:53And I just did it with Venezuela.
06:56And you could do it with Iran, too.
06:58I just did it with Iran.
06:59It's basically, if you buy oil from Iran, you can't do business with the United States.
07:04And you see the ships just leaving that port.
07:07You know, in Venezuela, it was amazing.
07:09Chinese ships.
07:10But why not do it with Russia?
07:10You had to see that, well, I will if I don't, I, honestly, I will, if we're not going to
07:16make a deal.
07:17We're going to see whether or not, this is Turkey time.
07:19You know, this is now, we're talking Turkey.
07:21And we'll see what happens.
07:23That would be crushing for Russia because they're having a hard time now with the economy.
07:28Oil prices are low, you know.
07:30It would change the dynamic.
07:31Okay, so, like, he's incompetent.
07:34He doesn't want to see the war because, you know, it's, he, everything he said was wrong.
07:40The way he talked about Putin, the way he said the threats, I mean, you know, it's just wrong.
07:45But here's what was really wrong.
07:47He let oil go from $65 to $100 a barrel.
07:55Putin was making a fortune.
07:58Now I have oil down, so it's, nobody's making a fortune anymore.
08:02And it's going to go down further because I'm drill, baby drill, you know.
08:07He closed up everything.
08:08And then he opened it.
08:09You know, what people don't realize, they said, oh, no, he's using it.
08:11He closed it up.
08:13And it drove oil through the roof.
08:15And then he said, go back to Trump.
08:16Go back to Trump.
08:17In other words, go back to what I was doing.
08:19And he didn't, but they did to a large extent.
08:21He didn't go all the way.
08:23And I would have been double that by that time.
08:25But he didn't go all the way.
08:26And what happened, he forced the prices up, the oil prices up.
08:29And that, Putin made a fortune during that period of time.
08:34Yeah.
08:35Did you see this thing with the former FBI director, James Comey?
08:38I did.
08:39I just saw it on the news.
08:40You know, he puts up this post showing 8647 in the sand, saying cool shell formation on a beach walk.
08:47Your director of national intelligence was asked about it last night.
08:50And she said this.
08:51Whatever James Comey intent, he and people like him need to be held to account according to the law,
08:59which is something that he claims to have given his life for and stands by the rule of law.
09:04Fantastic.
09:05The rule of law says people like him who issue direct threats against the president of the United States,
09:10essentially issuing a call to assassinate him, must be held accountable under the law.
09:15Do you believe Comey should be in jail?
09:18I do.
09:18Do you?
09:21So, I saw that this morning.
09:24You know, there's a big time gap.
09:27And he knew exactly what that meant.
09:29A child knows what that meant.
09:31If you're the FBI director and you don't know what that meant, that meant assassination.
09:38And it says it loud and clear.
09:41Now, he wasn't very competent, but he was competent enough to know what that meant.
09:47And he did it for a reason.
09:49And he was hit so hard.
09:52Because people like me.
09:53They like what's happening with our country.
09:55Our country has become respected again.
09:57And all this.
09:58And he's calling for the assassination of the president.
10:01Obviously, he apologized and said he wasn't calling for violence.
10:04But what do you want to see happen?
10:07I don't want to take a position on it.
10:09Because that's going to be up to Pam and all of the great people.
10:13I have cash.
10:13I have Pam.
10:14I have great people.
10:16And I'm going to let them.
10:17Because if I tell you something, they'll say, oh, I'm not going to get involved.
10:21But I will say this.
10:22I think it's a terrible thing.
10:23And when you add his history to that, if he had a clean history, he doesn't.
10:30He's a dirty cop.
10:31He's a dirty cop.
10:33And if he had a clean history, I could understand if there was a leniency.
10:39But I'm going to let them make that decision.
10:41But he knew exactly what it said.
10:43It's a dangerous time.
10:45I see security around here.
10:46It's very tight.
10:47You're in the Middle East.
10:48You've had two assassination attempts.
10:50One, obviously, where you got hit by that bullet in Butler.
10:54There's a lot of frustration that we still don't know about that shooter in Butler.
10:58And we don't know about his communications.
11:01We get stonewalled all the time asking questions about it.
11:04Is there frustration on your part?
11:06Will we get transparency?
11:08Will we know the bottom line story?
11:10It's very interesting because we have great people.
11:13I think Pam is incredible.
11:15I think Cash is incredible.
11:17And they're doing a great job.
11:18They're being recognized as doing a great job.
11:22I was given an explanation early on, you know, sort of a little bit pre them.
11:29And I thought it was strange.
11:30You know, the one guy had 18 cell phones.
11:32Okay.
11:33I have a lot of cell phones, but I have like two.
11:35You know, I call that a lot.
11:37And I think I probably make more calls than him.
11:40It's like that's all I do.
11:41And I had to, why does somebody have 18?
11:45Another one, the first one, the one from Butler, he had three apps, very unusual apps, and two of them were foreign apps.
11:54And then he ends up with a white shoe lawyer, meaning a super lawyer from Pittsburgh, you know, the big city.
12:04And they live outside of Butler in a little place.
12:08Where do they get this lawyer that would represent IBM and would represent ExxonMobil?
12:13You're the president.
12:14Can't you find out?
12:15No, no, I know, I know, I know.
12:18I'm relying on my people to tell me what it is.
12:21You know, we have deep-seated craziness in this country.
12:26And I'm relying on my people.
12:28And so far they, and they're good.
12:32But so far they, and in this case it's Secret Service, they tell me it's fine.
12:40But it's a little hard to believe, to be honest with you, okay?
12:43It's a little bit hard to believe, as I get that throbbing feeling.
12:46Yeah, yeah.
12:47I get a little throbbing feeling.
12:48Well, if you find out, we'd love to know.
12:50We continue to ask.
12:51Yeah, I know, I know.
12:52And a lot of people ask us.
12:53It's a little bit, it's a little bit strange.
12:55We have incredible people in there now, so can't blame that.
12:59Well, you've been very generous with your time.
13:00I'll just wrap it up with this.
13:02This is, in the minds of Democrats, Republicans, a very successful trip, big picture.
13:09Because it's this way, do you want to do more foreign policy trips?
13:13Do you want to go talk to China's Xi Jinping?
13:16You're a force of personality as far as getting things done on a business front.
13:21Do you think that that's the model that you're going to have going forward?
13:24Yeah.
13:24So, well, it's a very hard model.
13:27It's a very taxing model, you know, when you do this.
13:32So, when you say, do you want, is it fun?
13:35Yeah.
13:36Now, I did say I was standing next to all three of them over the last few days.
13:42And, you know, with tremendous fanfare and everyone going crazy and everything else,
13:46it's at a level that nobody's ever seen before.
13:48Honestly, nobody's ever.
13:50I'm getting calls back in the United States.
13:52We've never seen anything like this.
13:54It's so good for our country, so I'll do it again.
13:56And I'll do it.
13:57And, you know, I would certainly China, where it's important.
14:00It's important in a different way.
14:04This was very important to keep in our fold.
14:08You know, it's just they're in our fold.
14:11They are back loving the United States again.
14:14That was a full embrace.
14:15And nobody's ever seen anything like it.
14:18I mean, seriously, I asked, have you ever done this before?
14:22Last night, two nights ago, I said, have you ever done anything for an...
14:25No.
14:27Would you?
14:28No.
14:30Not even close.
14:31You know, with the hundreds of camels and the horses and this, it was beautiful.
14:37I mean, all three, all three.
14:40If you said which was the best, I couldn't tell you.
14:43And they were different.
14:44They were all at the top level.
14:46Nobody's ever seen anything like it.
14:48It was an honor.
14:50But that really, to me, it showed love.
14:52It showed, you know, there's a love.
14:54It's almost like they were shut out for a long time.
14:57Just shut out and treated horribly.
14:59And they shouldn't have been.
15:01And all of a sudden, they were allowed back in and to give you an embrace that's 20 times
15:06what it perhaps should be.
15:09I mean, it was just a beautiful thing to see.
15:12So we're in great shape.
15:13The Middle East is great.
15:14Now, we have one problem in the Middle East, Iran.
15:16And I'll get that problem solved.
15:17It's going to get solved one way or the other.
15:19Hamas and Israel, that's eventually going to get solved, too.
15:22Well, that's a big problem.
15:23I think Iran is right now the big problem.
15:25That's also a problem.
15:27Hamas is big.
15:27And we want to take care of the people.
15:30Look, people are starving.
15:32You know, you see what's going on right now.
15:33People are starving.
15:35One of the things that one of the three great leaders that I saw two nights ago said to me,
15:42please help the people, the Palestinians.
15:46I said, other than the obvious, what do you mean by that?
15:51He said, they're starving.
15:53And he meant it with his heart.
15:55They're starving.
15:57So I've already started working on that.
16:00It's a deep problem, but we'll get it solved.
16:03And a very immediate and a very big problem is, you know, I'm so proud of what we were able to do with India and with Pakistan.
16:11Well, it's a potential problem like that that we have here.
16:17I'll get it solved.
16:19And one way or the other, I'll get it solved.
16:20It's either going to be done nicely or it's going to be done violently.
16:23And I, 99.9% want to do it nicely if we can.
16:28Well, Mr. President, we appreciate the time.
16:30Safe travels home.
16:31Thank you very much.
16:32Thank you very much.
16:33Thank you, Brett.
16:33Good job.
16:34Thank you very much.
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