>> all right, chris. the pope's visit raising lots of questions. let's try to get answers. joining us on the phone is gop front-runner donald trump. good morning, mr. trump. >> hi, alisyn. it's been a long time. >> let's talk about the pope's visit. let's start there. the pope has been talking about one of your signature issues and that, of course, is immigration. the pope has a different take on immigrants. he in fact spoke out to people who might not feel comfortable to immigrants. let me just read his sort of poignant words. the pope said yesterday, perhaps it will not be easy for you to look into their souls. perhaps you will be challenged by their diversity. but know that they also possess resources meant to be shared so do not be afraid to welcome them. what do you think of the pope's words? >> i think his words are beautiful. i respect the pope and i like the pope very much. i will say this, we have a

country that is going through tremendous problems. we owe $19 trillion, so, number one, we can't afford this process. we have tremendous crime problems, as you know, the illegal imgrants are coming in. you just have to look at san francisco and so many other instances, california, where a woman was absolutely decimated, killed by an illegal immigrant. a veteran, at 66 years of age, by the way. and many thousands of cases, we're having tremendous crime waves. we have a lot of problems coming in. drugs pouring over the borders. we have to seal our borders. we have to do something about illegal immigration. people like my plan very much and i think it's a plan that's going to happen. >> let's talk about your plan, it's a two-parter. you talk about building a wall. >> building a wall, that's right. >> then you talk about deporting 11 to 12 million undocumented immigrants -- illegal

immigrants. >> illegal immigrants living here. that's the part that you've not been terribly specific about. how would you specifically go about doing 11 million mass deportations? >> through good management and through a process. and the process is the bad ones goer and they never come back. they're never coming back. >> yes. >> really good ones and there are many, they will go and they will come back legally. they will come back on an expedited system. and they'll come back legally, alisyn. you go into the 1950s, dwight eisenhower who was a respected president was doing the same thing. he had to get rid of the illegal immigrants. he did that. it was done in the 1950s by dwight eisenhower. >> let's talk about what it looks like nowadays. would you use the national guard? the police, the army? >> i would use a different way,

done differently and warmly and h humanly. you know i had a good hispanic poll the other day, the hispanics, the ones that are here legally don't want to see this where everyone is pouring into the country illegal. you use the word illegal immigrant, that's what it is, you're illegally in the country. we're going to build a wall. let people in but they're coming in legally. >> you know what our history is with undocumented workers, they've been given jobs. they often pay taxes. >> alisyn, they're coming back in, but they're coming back in legally. >> but, mr. trump, i want you to specifically explain how you are going to get rid of them? you know what this harkens to, what it reminds me at least of, remember the indication of

illegil illi illian gonzalez, he was splashed all over the media, it gripped the nation because you watched federal agents pull this boy from his family. are you going to separate families? >> no, we're not separating families. we're taking the families and taking them as a units. we did it as dwight eisenhower did it with over 1 million people in the 1950. it was something that was done -- now, we're a politically correct society. we can't do anything about it. we're more about -- we're a society that can't do anything about it anymore. we can't function anymore. we have millions of people in the country -- listen, they're not paying taxes. they're taking jobs from other people. we have a country that desperately needs jobs. they're taking jobs from other people. >> millions are paying taxes. >> alisyn, what i'm saying is this, it starts with we build a wall. and the wall will be very easily built and a very effective wall.

it's going to have a big open gate. and people are going to come into the country through that gate. they're going to come in legally. it's going to be a country that's run with a border. we're not going to have people pouring drugs across the border. cartels are bringing drugs across the border. >> no one wants the criminal aspect. you're with everyone. >> by the way, do you know that the gangs that you see, all of these terrible gangs that you see. many of those gangs are made up of illegal immigrants. and they're tough dudes. by the way, they're going day one. they're going to be out of here day one. the rest is, the good people, they're going and coming back in an expedited way. they're going to come back legally. you watch with good management how nicely that will work. >> okay, we will wait to see what your specific strategy is for that. let's talk about another topic that the pope has talked about and that's climate change. the pope has said he is clear that this is say problem that

cannot be left to a future generation. do you agree that climate change say pressing problem? >> no. i think that clean air is a pressing problem. you want to have clean air, you want to have clean water, that's very important to me. and i've won many environmental awards. i am not a believer in climate change. it's gone global warming and climate change, now they cull it extreme weather. that's the new one because weather tends to be a little more extreme. a lot of the big bloods and big things. 1890, they have the greatest flood. 1904, the greatest rainstorm. you know, look. it's weather. i can't watch the evening news anymore. every time you turn on the evening news, they show, there's a big rainstorm. there's a tornado there's this. i mean, you can't watch the news anymore, it's always weather. and frankly, it's been that way for so long, honestly, weather changes. and you have storms and you have

rain and you have beautiful days. but i do not believe that we should imperil the people in our countries, by the way, china is doing nothing. you look at these other countries, they're doing nothing. all they do talk. we're going to imperil, actually the middle class and lower classes people with no money are going to be imperiled by doing this because it costs so much. nobody knows exactly if it's going to work. you have scientists -- i don't know if you remember a number of years ago in europe, the scientists were passing around e-mails and notes to each other talking about what a hoax it is. >> look. i know what you're referring to the east anglo scientists -- >> i mean in clean air, clean water. all of those things. but i don't think we should destroy our country. if we have climate change or

global warming, it's going to be of the nuclear form because we have incompetent politicians watching over us. that's the big problem. >> you're saying that global warming is man-made and you don't believe it's a pressing problem. it's good to get you down the record with that. let's talk about the polls. there's a quinnipiac poll just out at 6:00 a.m. this morning, basically what it shows is that your lead has slipped a bit. before the cnn debate in august, you were at 28%. now, you're at 25%. you're, of course, the republican front-runner. however, there are people catching up with you. ben carson was at 7%, now at 17%. kfl kfl at 12%. jeb bush has gone from 7 to 10%. marco rubio, 7% to 9%. do you think your lead is

slipping? >> no, i don't. if you look at the nbc poll, it's a much bigger margin. if you look at zogby or reuters, i don't think i heard your statement, is it slipping, i know you want to get people to watch. it's interesting your reporter in south carolina who is absolutely terrible. she covered my speech. i made a speech to the african-american chamber of commerce in south carolina. wonderful people. and the room was full. every seat was full. when i went to the stage, everybody rushed forward. they all rushed to the front of the room. it was a ballroom. they all rushed to the front of the room. when you did that, you had half of the seats in the back were empty because everybody was standing in the front. we had a great time. it was like a great thing. she stars off, the cnn reporter, absolutely horrible reporter, she starts off saying, oh, look, the room is half empty. the room wasn't half empty, everybody was standing next to

me. you can tell jeff zucker, i think it was terrible, disgusting reporting. >> that's not what i heard her say, what i heard her say about the south carolina event what was surprising, it was mostly white people, this was the african-american chamber of commerce but it was populated mostly by a white audience. >> well, they had many african-americans and many white people, too. the room was full. they all rushed to the front which was a great honor. i let them stand there the whole speech. she showed empty seats, well, of course, there were empty seats because people were standing in the front of the room. it's just another hit job. it's one of those things. honestly, alisyn, a terrible reporter. >> mr. trump, i think she's a wonderful reporter. >> we disagree. >> we do. governor huckabee said about the president what he found the most disturbing thing for him there are people who may not be in line with the pope's values

who were invited to seat pope in washington, d.c. an openly gay episcopal bishop, transgender activist, a nun who is an activist. let me play to you what mike huckabee said about questioning president obama's faith. >> i'm also concerned about a guy that believes he's a christian and pretends to be and then says he is but then does things that makes it very difficult for people to practice their christian faith. i'm disappointed if a person says i'm a christian, but you invite the pope into your home, and then you invite a whole bunch of people who are at odds with the catholic church policy." >> what do you think about those statements? >> well, you know, i'm very -- i'm doing very well with evangelicals. and i spend a lot of time with evangelicals. i must tell you, many evangelicals feel the way mike

do. many do. they feel that president obama has not been good with christianity. he's stopping religious freedom to an extent. they feel very hurt by the president. maybe that's the best word, or disappointed by the president, having to do with christianity. mike is expressing himself. i see that when i'm out on the trail and i'm meeting with evangelicals. i'm leading every poll in iowa, everywhere, with evangelicals. they feel very disappointed by the president what mike is saying is not surprising for me to hear. and it's a very strong statement. >> it is. >> in making speeches to thousands of evangelicals, taking questions they're very hurt by the president, there's no question. >> do you believe that president obama is pretending to be a christian? >> i don't get involved in people's faith, alisyn. it's not for me to discuss his faith. that's for him to discuss. >> let's talk about what's going

on with you and fox news. why are you in this spat with them? >> well, only because fox news has not treated me fairly. >> what does that mean? how so? >> excuse me, speaking of polls i think they just announced a poll this morning or something. to the best of my knowledge, i'm number one in that poll which is an interesting little -- and by a lot of. which san interesting dichotomy. but fox news has not treated me fairly. certain people have not. they have pundits on the show. one of them made a total fool last night. he totally lost it. i watched it. it looked like he was having a nervous breakdown on television. an he used words that are so unbelievable, maybe he'll be fined. a guy named rich lowery, who i never even heard of. but he said something that i've never heard on television before. i was shocked. but he lost it. it was wonderful watching this guy lose it because, you know,

he's a bad guy. but they are not fair to to me. and i've expressed it to them. they understand. for instance, they won't put up certain poll numbers. and the poll numbers are phenomenal. i say why aren't you putting those numbers? well, we're not going to put up the numbers. and the poll numbers -- >> i think what you're talking about, the reason i done want to use it, it's an online survey, that's not, you know, sort of considered one of the legitimate polls, the go-to polls that we use. back to fox for a second. you say they're treating you unfairly. do you not want to hear other voices who criticize you? >> i do. i do. i don't mind being criticized. and i don't mind it at all. and i won't use names and there's certain people who criticize unfairly. if i do something wrong, alisyn, i have very thick skin. i don't mind being criticized. i'm a smart person.

i do thinks wrong, whether i do, sigh don't mind, they can come at me 15 different ways. but when i'm right or when i don't deserve something. i think it's very, very unfair to speak incorrectly. >> yeah. >> so i will correct people. i believe in that. >> when you say you have done a lot of things wrong, what's the last thing you've done wrong in this campaign? >> um -- well, i don't know. i'd rather not get into that. i'm sure i've made mistakes. i'm leading in every single poll. i don't know if you saw the florida poll that came out, i'm absolutely kill bush and rubio, and it's their state. i don't know? i guess there are things i could have done differently. look i have a very simple theme. i want to make america great again. we're run by incompetent people.

53 incompetent people running this country led by the man at the top. we can do such good things to make our country back. >> i know your slogan, mr. trump, is make america great. i'm curious, when was america great? in your mind when was the heyday? when was the year that america was great? >> well, it's been hurt badly. honestly, before this president, too. going into iraq was a tremendous mistake. by the way, i was the only one with a vision of all of these candidates -- i was the one with the vision, don't do it. but going into iraq was a tremendous mistake for our country. it destabilized the middle east. and that was bush's role. it destabilized the middle east. and iran is taking over iraq, they're going to take off the massive oil reserves, by the way, isis has a good chunk of them, too. that was a bad mistake. >> you are on the record about that. >> we spent $2 trillion, instead of rebuilding our country we spent trillions of dollars,

thousands of wounded warriors who i love. >> prior to the iraq war, are you saying the clinton years is when america was great? >> i would say reagan, clinton. we didn't -- the country wasn't decimated like it is now. the country didn't owe $19 trillion alison. the country -- right now, we're $1.5 trillion to china, we so $1.5 trillion to japan. think of it, they suck our money out. and we owe them. it's like a magic trick. we owe them $1.5 trillion. >> back to fox news, don't you need fox news and viewers to win it? >> i don't know i'm on "60 minutes" sunday. it's a very powerful show. i went on steven kphen colbert

other night. and he killed the ratings. it was massive ratings. it dill the "tonight show." >> i watched that. he served you up a big old meatball of a softball to ask you once and for all, you believe president obama was born in the united states now that you have seen his birth certificate. and you didn't want to answer that. why not? >> no. i talk about jobs, i talk about our military, helping our vets. i don't talk about that question. it's just something that i won't talk about anymore. every time people get on that question, that's all they want to talk about, the birth certificate, was it real, was it not real? all they want to talk about is that. so i don't talk about it. what i talk about jobs, our vets who, by the way, are living like third class citizens and i'll straighten it out. i talk about many other things,

trade, but not that subject. >> let's talk about scott walker. he dropped out of the race, as you know. he suggested that people in the bottom tier follow his lead and also drop out so that someone else can coalesce as a front-runner to beat you. let me play for you what scott walker said. >> i encourage other republican presidential candidates to consider doing the same. so that the voters can focus on a limited number of candidates who can offer a positive, conservative alternative to the current front-runner. >> what do you think of that plan? >> well, first of all, i think he's a nice person. and, you know, honestly, i can understand how he feels. i came into iowa, everyone said that scott walker was going to win iowa. i came into iowa. and almost immediately, i was just killing him at the polls and beating him in iowa. with the crowds, with the polls with everything. and they say that it was my entering the race that destroyed his campaign. i didn't go after scott walker

very much. but for whatever reason, when i came in, he went down. and then he went down to almost nothing. he went down to zero. and he was leading. he is like i am now, i don't want to say result happened, to be careful, it hasn't happened, but scott walker was actually leading and went down to zero. so obviously, he made a lot of mistakes. the thing that hurt him, i go, according to what they're all saying was me. so i can understand fully what he's saying. >> it seems that you have your sights set on marco rubio. you have been critical of him. he's been critical of you. he says in terms of you, you have not offered specifics with syria and isis. let me play for you what marco rubio has said about your foreign policy credentials. >> i think the most important thing a president will ever do is look at national security for our country. i think up to this point he

hasn't answered the national security. carly fiorina is not in government. she knows more about it than he does. >> mr. trump, what are your specifics? >> he's got the worst voting record in the united states senate. he's never there meaning he doesn't work or too lazy to go back and vote. marco rubio wants to tell every single thing that he knows to everybody so that the people on the other side, so that the enemy can learn about it. i want to be unpredictable. a couple weeks ago, a very good article about my business acumen. they said he's so unpredictable and difficult to fight because he's unpredictable. i don't want to know what marco rubio knows about syria. i know about isis trying to talk out isis and that wanting to go against assad. and saying i can't believe it, americans are killing my enemy,

this is the greatest thing happening to me. we are run by incompetent people. i have a good chance of winning. i don't want the other side to know exactly what i'm going to do so that they can start thinking tab planning it. i want to be unpredictable. >> i can understand being unpredictable with the enemy and not telegraph that. >> and i give answers generally because you have to do that unfortunately to get elected. >> yes, to the voters. >> don't forget, alisyn, i was the one that said don't go into iraq. that is was 2003. >> what do you know about marco rubio? >> look, marco rubio sits behind a desk and in committee. i create jobs all day long. i know more about this all of us put together. believe me, we'll have a winning strategy. if marco rubio is so good, how

come we're doing so badly? >> will you clue in the voters as to what you will do? >> i'll clue them in because i have to a certain extent. if i win this thing, i don't want the other side to know what my views are. where i'm coming from. i watch obama saying we're going to do this, we're going to do that. every time they tell a midlevel accounting person from isis, they have a news conference to announce it instead of being quiet for a few months. then everybody else scrambles. and you can't get anybody else. you got to be cool and you got to be unpredictable. and you just can't go in and say exactly here's my plan. and i do have plans. and by the way, plans are always subject to massive change. and they change. you got to win. and i know how to win. these guys don't know how to win. marco rubio, he's like a kid. he shouldn't even be running in this race, as far as i'm concerned. he's a kid. >> i want to ask you about

something funny that is "saturday night live" has just announced who will be playing you this season. their completian taryne killian. he's funny and he does say lot of impersonations he's played john boehner and tom brady. are you familiar with his work? >> i am, yes. >> what do you think that he's going to be parodying you? >> i look forward to it, "saturday night live" is terrific. i hope he does say good job. darrell hammond was great. i thought darrell was fantasticing. i hope he does a good job. >> darrell hammond did do an impeccable donald trump. >> he was have good. a nice guy, too. i see him around. people really related to that somehow. i'm not sure that i always benefited, to be honest. >> but you saw the similarity? >> i saw the similarity with

darrell, i saw the similarity. i thought he was terrific but we're going to see what happens. i mean, i'll let you know. i'm not sure i'll like it. but you know what, if i don't like it, i'll let you know. >> i would like to know that. has "snl" asked you to go on this season? would you consider it? >> i'm not allowed to say that. >> why is that? >> because i'm not allowed to say that? >> because you're in negotiations with them? >> well, i'm just not allowed to say it. silencio. perhaps you understand what that means? >> i believe i am reading you loud and clear. it's always interesting mr. trump, when you won't answer something. >> people get totally confused when i don't answer something. >> you pride yourself in being the straight talker. >> general douglas macarthur, i

consider him a great general, and general patton, they're telling all of these things, and we're going to syria and do this and that and we're going to fight russia. by the way, russia wants to kill isis because they have a bigger problem than we do with isis. then we're going to go in and start world war iii fighting syria over russia. he's a kid. he has no right -- frankly, he was very disloyal to bush. bush was his mentor. fact that bush was his mentor didn't stop this young guy who is overly ambitious for wanting to run. bush looks foolish and he looks like he's a very disloyal guy, frankly. >> donald trump, great to get your comments. we appreciate talking to you.

we appreciate having you on "new day." please keep us posted on some of the things that you didn't want to reveal today. >> i will, alisyn. thank you. >> we have extended invitations to jeb bush, ted cruz, marco rubio to also come on to reaction.