https://hughhewitt.com/https://hughhewitt.com/former-and-future-president-donald-trump-on-chairman-xi-vp-harris-and-the-closing-days-of-campaign-2024HH: Good morning. I am back now with Former President, and I believe future President Donald Trump. Good morning, Mr. President. Welcome back to the Hugh Hewitt Show.
DT: Good morning.
HH: I believe, and I have to tell the audience, full disclosure, I have already voted for you and J.D. Vance. And so I’m not a bipartisan or non-partisan person. I’m hoping you win. I am cautiously optimistic. I appreciate you’ve made the program part of your closing kick. So this is a hypothetical, Mr. President. If somehow Kamala Harris managed to win this, she would have to deal with Xi Jinping, with whom you have dealt for a long time. How would Xi handle her?
DT: Like a baby. He’d take all the candy away very quickly. She wouldn’t have any idea what happened. It would be like a grand chess master playing a beginner. We would lose our country or be in World War III. It could be that that would happen, too, because she’d get exasperated. She’s in no way able to handle him. He’s a fierce individual. I watched her charade last night on CNN. It was an embarrassment that she’s running for president representing a major party.
HH: That was pretty bad. I’ve spent two hours talking about that last night. I think she’s melting down, and her internal polls are bad. But I want to stay on Xi for a moment. I think he’s the biggest threat to America. I think he’s dictator for life, and I think he’s ruthless. Can you deter him from attacking Taiwan, Mr. President?
DT: Yes. But I don’t think he’s a threat to America if you have the right president. I got along with him very good. I was tough on him, too. I had, you know, we took in $400 billion dollars-plus worth of tariffs. He wasn’t thrilled with that, but I had a good relationship with him until COVID. That was a bridge too far, and I broke it up.
HH: But he’s leaning in pretty hard on Taiwan right now. He encircled the island this week with their live fire drills. Do you think you can stop him from this nonsense, because it would crash the world economy if he did that.
DT: You don’t know what’s going to happen. He’d rather do it under them than have to do it with me. Very simple.
HH: There’s a guy named Jimmy Lai who’s very important to America’s Catholics, to the world’s Catholics. He’s a Catholic in Hong Kong, and he’s, you know, a great publisher, a billionaire like you. Xi has him in jail. Do you think you could speak to Xi when you’re back in the presidency about getting Jimmy Lai out and out of the country?
DT: 100%, yes.
HH: Thank you.
DT: And don’t forget, I got basketball players, I mean, you know, look. When I was there, basketball players stole things from Louis Vuitton and great stores, right? And they were being drafted, and to be drafted. It was a big story. And it was an automatic 10 years in China. I got them out. I said listen, do me a favor. Let these guys out. They went there with the national basketball team, USA, was playing China.
HH: Yup.
DT: And they got caught stealing things. And I got them out, and I got them out relatively easy. I asked him would you do me a favor…
HH: If you get Jimmy Lai out, that will be a great victory for freedom around the world. And he’s an old man. He needs to come and be in America.
DT: By the way, 100%, I’ll get him out. He’ll be easy to get out. But we don’t have people that even talk about it. We don’t have people to talk. We have…
HH: No, we don’t. They’ve abandoned him. So Mr. President, everything about deterring China from attacking Taiwan, and we’re going to get to Iran in a moment, depends upon your secretary of Defense. Now I’ve got a lot of friends who are on your list – Tom Cotton, Mike Pompeo, Michael Waltz, my son actually works for Waltz. Will you get your secretary of Defense named early, like the week of the election so they can get to work?
DT: I could. Yeah, I could, except it sounds, are you talking about earlier than the victory? I’d rather have the victory first and then name people after.
HH: No, no, after the election, like the first week after the election.
DT: Oh, yeah, I’d do that very soon. I could do it. I have, I have many good choices. I have four or five good choices. You named a couple of them. And they’re very good. A lot of really very good choices.
HH: Because that’s the chain of command – you to the secretary of Defense, then the combatant commanders.
DT: Yeah, that’s right.
HH: And that SecDef has to be strong.
DT: Gotta have a guy you can work with. And you have to have a guy that can be…for that position. No, absolutely. But I’ll tell you, you say Jimmy Lai. That’s going to be so easy. I’ll get him out. There’s no reason for him being there right now except that he doesn’t respect Biden and Kamala. Who would? Who would respect them? They can’t find…I watched her last night, and she’s like a child almost.
HH: It was pretty awful last night. She can’t communicate very well, and today’s Wall Street Journal number…
DT: I think it was the worst performance, yeah, it was the worst performance. She hasn’t had a good one, but this was the worst performance. When you watch her over a longer period.
HH: And I know you’re joining me by cell…
DT: And last night, you know, with Bret Baier, the way they were rushing the questions, you know, her people were screaming at him to stop. Now with you, because you have a tendency to go much longer than you agree to, my people will say, “Thank you, sir. Thank you.” And you go through them like it’s candy, okay? You go through them like Grant took Richmond, okay?
HH: Your comms people are pros. Your comms people are pros. Let’s go back to the biggest threat – nuclear war. It’s probably Iran. And our enemies, the other ones can be deterred with someone like you and a good secretary of Defense. I’m not sure about Iran, because they’re run by fanatics. We talked about it last time. Do you think you can get Israel and our Gulf State allies to get rid of that regime before they get a nuke, Mr. President?
DT: Well, I don’t necessarily know that you have to, but I think that we are in much better position. Had they followed Biden’s advice, they would be waiting for a bomb to drop onto them. But fortunately, you know, Bibi calls me quite a bit, and we have a lot of talks. But I always say make up your own mind. But Bibi has his own opinions. Had Bibi listened to Biden, he would right now be waiting for a nuclear bomb to drop on his head, okay? And now, the opposite. He put them in a very good negotiating position. I think he could survive this. You want to know? I think he’s in position where he can fight them or he can make a deal, and a good deal, a real deal.
HH: And do you think the Abraham Accords will bring in Saudi Arabia quickly after you return to office?
DT: Yes. Yes, very quickly. And not only Saudi Arabia, but many other countries. I even mention, when I did all the things I did with Iran, Iran was broke. You heard me say that. They were ready to make a deal. I could have made a deal with them. But then, we had that accident happen, despite getting millions and millions of votes I got the first time. And it would have been for him to make. So I said good luck, make that deal, it’ll be easy. They never made the deal. And they put us at risk by not making that deal, but they could have made a deal. I really think that Iran right now can be spoken to very easily. And three or four months ago, or a few months ago, I think it would have been much harder.
HH: If necessary, will you use force to stop them from getting a nuclear weapon online, Mr. President?
DT: Yes, I will.
HH: All right. I want to go to a big question, and I want to let you have the floor on this big question. It’s not the greatest connection in the world, but it’s an important…biographers are going to be writing about you for decades and centuries. And one of the questions they’re going to come up against is why do some people hate you so much? I mean, Trump Derangement Syndrome is a real thing. I’ve run into it. We saw it online repeatedly, the stuff they call you, the Hitler stuff, the fascist stuff. I saw your post on Truth Social. Why do you destabilize people this way?
DT: Well, it’s a gift, or it’s something like being left a gift. But it’s one way or the other, because I have a tendency to win. It’s a nice thing, and that bothers people. Sometimes, I play a little bit rough, but they play rough. They are rough and vicious people. They are vicious people. They’re dirty people. They’ve weaponized government. They’ve weaponized everything. And it’s actually made me more popular. It’s hard to believe. That’s, they’re also going to be wrestling with for years, because every time they do something, it makes me more popular. And even I’m surprised about the others. But the people, the thing I’ve learned is the people are very smart. They get it. They get it better than the Democrats get it. And every single time they’ve pulled that weaponization, every single time, with Fanni, you know, Fanni is…with Fanni, with everybody, every time they do this, it’s shocking. You know, my pollster will call me, “Sir, you’re up seven points.” The next time, “Sir, you went up six points.” And it’s rather amazing. But Trump Derangement Syndrome, I don’t know, it’s, I think I’m a nice person. But I’m a negotiator, but I win. And look, I’ve won for the Republican Party. I’ve taken the Republican Party and made into an entirely different party…The Republican Party is a very big, powerful party. Before, it stood, it was an elitist party with real stiffs running it. You know what a stiff is?
HH: Oh, gosh, yes.
DT: A stiff is a person that you know what. They’re stiffs.
HH: And you know, you’re having fun, too.
DT: Yeah, I am.
HH: I do think part of it is that you enjoy yourself and they don’t. But I really, I know biographers are going to study this, this particular line. Were you aware when you got into politics that people would end up hating you this much?
DT: Well, they hated me, and it’s stupid, because I won. You know, when you win, look, I wasn’t supposed to beat Hillary, and I’ll tell you little secrets. That was in, I guess, 2020. I made phone calls for a congressman. And when we had like 38 more than they thought, remember that? That was me. I did that. I did all of that. I did tele-town halls for congressmen. I’m doing it right now.
HH: Yeah.
DT: I’m doing it right now. You’re going to have more congressmen in the Republican Party then you think, because I’m making tele-town halls, meaning I call their districts. And the advantage is I’m the only one people will get, the concept is look, I’m the only one that people get on the phone for, and they get on by the thousands. If I make a call for a congressman who’s even or a little down, even if it’s for somebody that’s even, a little down, or a little up, nothing to worry about, right? A little down, a little up. And then I make 35, 40 calls. Every one of them will win. And nobody knew that in, was it ’20 or was it ’22? I guess it was ’20. And we took in…
HH: But when Ronald Reagan hammered Democrats, when Ronald Reagan crushed them in 1984, they did not hate him. So I don’t really understand how otherwise sane and rational people lose their perspective. You will be there for four years. You will exit in January of ’29. You will restore the American defense system. You will get some trade deals worked out. I’m going to talk to you about the EU going after Apple and the English Labour Party, Great Britain’s Labour Party is going after Elon Musk. I’ll talk to you about all that. You defend America. Why does this upset so many people? You must think about this.
DT: Well, it’s a personality type a little bit, I guess. Maybe Ronald Reagan was a softer person. He was. He was a softer person. I liked him. I liked his style. But with me, so much comes at me at one time that I can’t necessarily be that nice, because it’s too much. I can’t, I can’t, I don’t have…
HH: That makes sense.
DT: …probably with everybody like I am to you.
HH: That makes sense.
DT: And again, I don’t have the time. I just don’t have the time. And it’s easier for somebody like…but nobody every came in like I did. Excuse me, nobody ever came in. They went after me before I got elected. They said we’re going to impeach him when I was, before I was even in office. It was a terrible thing. These people are crude, rude, and vicious. And by the way, she’s only a vessel, and so is Joe Biden. He’s not the leader of the party and never was. He’s a vessel. And he was a perfect vessel, because he would have done anything they told him. He got out when they told him to get out. And she’s no different. She’s a vessel. I watched her last night. She’s got no intelligence. She’s got nothing. She’s got nothing. And you can’t have a leader like that. And so instead, this very powerful party, the Democrat party that’s vicious and crooked as hell, they take over people. They envelop people unless they had the right person. But they don’t have, they sort of like these people, because they’re like clay. You can do whatever you want with them.
HH: So you’re going to have a very tough choice the day after you take the oath of office, or maybe even the day that you take the oath of office. You’re either going to have to pardon yourself, or you’re going to have to fire Jack Smith. Which one will you do?
DT: Oh, it’s so easy. It’s so easy. In fact, he’s a crooked person. He’s a …person. We had a brave, brilliant judge in Florida. She’s a brilliant judge, by the way. I don’t know her. I never spoke to her. Never spoke to her. But we had a brave and very brilliant judge. And what she has suffered through with these out of control people, she was listening to why, you know, putting out statements. She doesn’t move fast. She doesn’t do this. She doesn’t do that. Well, she moved fast. But the fact is, we had, and the big case was that case, the documents case. You even said oh, that’s the big case.
HH: Yes, I did.
DT: We won the documents case. We’re in the process of winning all the other cases, I think. Even sometimes when we have to go to appeal. We got immunity at the Supreme Court. It’s so easy. I would fire him within two seconds. He’ll be one of the first things addressed.
HH: Will you pardon Hunter Biden?
DT: I wouldn’t take it off the books. See, unlike Joe Biden, despite what they’ve done to me, where they’ve gone after me so viciously, despite what, and Hunter’s a bad boy. There’s no question about it. He’s been a bad boy. All you had to do is see the laptop from hell. But I happen to think it’s very bad for our country. I was, I think you know this, but most people don’t, because most people aren’t of your talent. I could have gone after Hillary. I could have gotten Hillary Clinton very easily. And when they say lock her up, whenever they said lock her, you know, they’d start, 30,000 people, lock her up, lock her up. What did I do? I always say take it easy, just relax. We’re winning. Take it easy. Take it easy. I could have had her put in jail. And I decided I didn’t want to do that. I thought it would look terrible. You had the wife of the president of the United States going to jail. I thought it would be very bad if we did that. And I made sure that didn’t happen, okay? I thought it would be bad. What I didn’t know is that they were going to play dirty with me. Who thinks that? Who would have…
HH: I didn’t see it coming. Two impeachments. I did not see it coming. Now they will impeach you again on Day One if you fire Jack Smith or you pardon yourself.
DT: Nobody saw it.
HH: Are you prepared to be impeached again and again and again if they have the House, because they just will?
DT: No, I don’t think they’ll impeach me if fire Jack Smith. Jack Smith is a scoundrel. He’s a very dishonest man, in my opinion, very dishonest man. And he’s a mean man. He’s a mean man, but his problem is, he’s so mean that he always goes too far like the raid of Mar-A-Lago. You know, I’m going to sue them. I am suing them, essentially…but I’m suing them for raiding Mar-A-Lago. They went into my young son’s room, and they went through his clothing. They went through my wife’s room. And they went through her clothing, as you know.
HH: It’s the beginning, that was the beginning of your great comeback. Let me now talk to you a little bit about, again, biographers thinking long term. Your politics are most like that of Nelson Rockefeller’s in my lifetime. I just think you are Nelson Rockefeller, except he collected art, and you collect golf courses. Did you ever know Rocky?
DT: Yeah, I did know him. I knew him.
HH: What did you think of him, and what do you think of my comparison of your politics?
DT: I don’t think we’re, I don’t think we’re that similar, actually. I don’t think we’re that similar. But I respected him greatly. He was a man that was the biggest upset that he never became president. You know, he could have been president, because…
HH: He was always mad, yeah.
DT: …Yeah, well, he was mad that he couldn’t crack, he couldn’t crack it, and he was a very talented man.
HH: Well, he was a developer. He built 30 Rock. And you’re a developer. You built Trump Tower. I just think the similarities, you’re not a particularly conservative, you’re not as conservative as Ronald Reagan, and you’ve tried to make that point. You’re kind of a moderate Republican, aren’t you?
DT: I think I’m conservative on some things. I’m very, very conservative on trade, maybe more conservative than any human being that’s ever lived. I’m very conservative on the border. No, I would say I’m, I would…in a way more conservative than Reagan, because on trade, nobody’s more conservative on trade than me. Look what I’m doing with the tariffs. I will have our country making a country, and I’m a really good businessman. That’s what I really am. And I will have our country making a fortune with trade in a short period of time.
HH: I believe that, and I think you’ll bring back nuclear energy. But Reagan had a 600-ship Navy. You’re starting at 275-280. Do you think you can get the Navy back funded and doing innovative things like the submersibles?
DT: Well, I do, but the problem is over the last 40 years, we just don’t build ships anymore. When you go to shipyards, they don’t even make, I mean, the Gerald Ford aircraft carrier, it came in, you know, 100% over budget, billions and billions, $16 billion dollars or something. And I went to go look at it, and one of the first things, I said this ship is a disaster. It’s being built for seven, eight years, and it’s not even built. Then I went to look, and I said how come the elevators are magnetized? They’re magnet elevators, which is no good. You know, it’s okay in good weather, but not when you have the ocean pounding them, right? And instead of hydraulic elevators, right? And I looked at that beautiful sight of the airplanes being flown off the ship with the steam, and I said why are we using electric? Why are we not using, for the catapult, there’s a catapult, you know, they said for 50 years, we used steam. And I went to the ship, and I said to them, the admiral came, it was a little goofy, but the admiral came to see me, and I said, “Admiral, with all due respect, this ship is five years late. It’s over budget by $10 billion dollars, and the catapult doesn’t work, and the elevators, I’d like to see your catapulters.” And I did. I said let me ask you a question. Which is better – steam or electric. Steam is better, sir. Why is it better? Well, it’s stronger, it’s this, you know, a lot of reasons. It didn’t matter. I said why do they use steam? They met with the architect of the boat. I said have you designed a ship before? You know, it’s like the biggest ship in the world. I think it’s the longest ship. It’s, you know, the Gerald Ford…
HH: The Ford.
DT: The big, you know, number one style. And I was raising things that was so stupid. We’re using electric. We have electric. Everything has to be electric. The cars, well, but I said which is better. The steam, sir. Why do they use electric? Because you can go back and forth quickly, but you can’t put the plane on. By the time you put the plane on, it takes 48 seconds, and by that time, you have a new burst of steam….blowtorch and a hammer. With electric, we have to send an MIT, a Dr. John…of MIT, because he’s the only one smart enough to fix it. Nobody can fix it, sir. And if a wave hits it, it’s over. It shorts out. Now who were the geniuses that do this? So we have a problem. We don’t build ships anymore. Do you know in World War I, we would build a ship, in World War II, we would build a ship a day. Think of that. A ship a day.
HH: That’s what we need.
DT: We don’t build a ship a year.
HH: That’s what the Chinese are doing.
DT: Yeah, we need to…
HH: Do you think you can get, I mean, task J.D. Vance, task whoever your secretary of Defense is, we want a ship a day? I mean, we don’t. I’d take a ship a month if we could get that.
DT: Well, it’s something that I’m considering. And you know…there are a lot of great shipyards all over the world. People allowed that to happen. They’ve taken the shipping business, just like they almost took the car business. I hope you asked me that I stopped the bit China plant in Mexico, right? You do know that, right?
HH: No.
DT: I stopped it. I mentioned it a little bit in my last couple speeches. But they were building the biggest plant. And I said if I’m elected, I’m going to put 100% tariffs on every car. None of them is going to come into the United States. When they heard that, they stopped building their plant. I did Detroit such a favor. And I stopped it just by making a statement. Because the most beautiful word in the dictionary is the word tariff. But these people that within our country, well, look at her. She doesn’t even know what a tariff is. She is so incompetent…
HH: Mr. President, I have not talked much about her, because there’s nothing to argue about. She’s empty. She’s vacuous.
DT: She’s an empty vessel. But she’s beautifully pushed around by a very smart, very powerful, very liberal, viciously liberal but very, very smart, powerful party called the Democrats. And they’re vicious. They’re too vicious, because that’s why they put somebody like Jack Smith in. Everything he’s lost, he’s lost almost everything, by the way. You know why he lost? Because he went too far. He went too far.
HH: Well, let me close with this, Mr. President. Elon Musk made the mistake, I think he did a great thing for the country buying X and being in favor of you. So the United Kingdom’s Labour government is coming after him. The EU is going after Apple and Google. Our “allies” are trying to destroy our greatest companies. Now I want you to use tariffs on China. They’re our enemy. And I want you to shut down Iran again. But what are you going to do about the EU and the UK attacking our companies?
DT: Well, the EU and the UK going after Apple and Google and all our companies, they are great companies. If they do that, then they’re not our friends. And do you think they’re our friends? Let me tell you, they’re just as tough as China, almost. China has a little edge. But if you go to the EU, what they’ve done is very vicious. They have, they don’t take our cars. They don’t take our farm product. They don’t take anything. You have a $312 billion dollar deficit with the EU. You know, the EU is a mini-but not so mini, is a mini-China. They treat us very, very badly. And I will tell you, if they’re attacking our companies, which I know they are. You know, Tim Cook called me up last week. And he said, sir, I don’t know what to do. I said what’s your problem, Tim. He said they won’t want any of these calls, because there’s nobody in this administration that has any brains. I said what’s wrong? They fined me $15 billion dollars, and now they’re going to add another $2 [billion]. So it’s $17 billion dollars. And I said, can Apple afford that, because that’s a lot of money. But they fined him, and I said did you do anything wrong? He said no, but everybody sort of says that, I guess. But let me tell you. All of those companies will be set free if you have the right president. If you have the wrong president, like her, those companies will eventually be put out of business, because they’ll keep doing it. They’ll just drain those companies. These are great American companies. And whether you like them or not, a president has to protect them. They have to. That’s what I don’t understand about Google. Google is being sued for antitrust by these people, and how can they possibly be on the side of those people? But they are, I guess, although I think they’ve become, if you look at Google lately, I think you’re going to see they’ve become much more inclined towards Trump. They’re starting to like Trump, because they’re starting to get it. But all over…
HH: Well, they are beginning to. Mr. President, I do not want to make you late.
DT: All of those companies will be in good shape. Don’t worry about that. All of those companies…
HH: You’ve got all the momentum in the world. How do you feel about what your internal polls show you?
DT: Well, they show me that we’re going to win the election, because we’re winning in Georgia big, very big. We’re winning in Michigan. The auto workers are with me all the way, because I’m doing the mandate that we’re going to build cars. And we’re going to get, we’re going to get big factories in Detroit and other parts of Michigan, big. And South Carolina and other places. They’re going to get…
HH: Well, I’m going to Pennsylvania for Dave McCormick tonight. How do you feel about the Keystone State?
DT: Well, I feel good about Dave McCormick, too. And I think I’ve helped Dave a lot. I put him, every one, don’t forget, I have rallies, I had a rally, 55,000. I had a rally, 100,000 people. That would be the Butler rally. One was 55, and was 100,000 people, 101,000 people. I put Dave out front. You know, Dave was with me. One minute, he was on the stage one minute before the bullets flew from the maniac. He was standing there one minute, and so he got lucky. He got off the stage. But he was there one minute before. He was there right at the beginning, and they flew right at the beginning. He was off the stage. He had just gotten off the stage. He’s a very good man, and he will be a great senator. And I think I was extremely helpful to him.
HH: I agree with that, and Bernie Moreno, and Eric Hovde, and Mike Rogers.
DT: All of them.
HH: And you’re doing great. Thank you for your time this morning. I hope I talk to you on Election Day, and I’ve already cast my vote for you, so everyone out there who says I’m easy on Trump, I’m not easy on Trump. I just know what’s good for the country. Thank you, Mr. President.
DT: Thank you very much, Hugh. Thank you.
