eastern, i'm jose diaz-balart and we begin with breaking news from florida where president-elect donald trump is set to announcing a $100 billion economic investment into the u.s. by the japan tech conglomerate soft bank. it is the first time trump has opened up his private club to cameras since his election victory nearly six weeks ago. meantime, trump's pick for health and humans secretary, kennedy will make the rounds on capitol hill today. he's scheduled to meet with more than two dozen senators who will decide whether he will oversee the health agencies and the president-elect putting on a public show of support for some of his other cabinet choices including his defense secretary pete hegseth and tulsi gabbard by inviting them to join him at the army navy game in maryland over the weekend. and the president-elect scored a

legal ivanka abc agreeing to pa to a museum. he sued the network and george stephanopoulos for defamation after saying he was found liable for rape, when he was found liable for sexual assault. jacqueline from "the washington post," and victoria soto, from the university of arkansas and matthew dowd, chief strategist and a senior political analyst. so vaughn, the president-elect said last week that investments of a billion dollars or more would be fast tracked into the united states. as soft bank, is that the first company reacting to that? >> right. this is notable because this is the first donald trump hosted event that he has held since his

election victory more than a month ago. in this is a billionaire japanese investor who years ago in 2016, during donald trump's transition held a similar type of event at trump tower announcing $50 billion investment in technology. and this go around he's making the commitment to invest $100 billion toward a.i. specific and other technology investments and it is not clear where the investments will go. but he does run what amounts to the largest private equity firm invested in technology specific ventures. so for donald trump, he has somebody here who is coming into the united states and has been a committed partner to his over the last years and said that he will continue to invest in u.s. groups. so for donald trump, having this sort of investment, we saw these sort of events during his first administration, it is a way for him to kick off by suggesting

that not just u.s. billionaires and investors are willing to put money into u.s. investments, but also overseas investors are willing to come to the united states for growth and development, jose. >> matthew, how unusual is it for a president-elect to announce executive decisions and proposals like this before inauguration day? >> it is highly unusual. but as you know, and we all know on this panel, we've gotten very used to donald trump not following any sort of usual pattern on anything, from his picks from head cabinets, to all of the things he does as president, after president. it is very unusual. i find, i don't know what the right word is, ironic or fascinating, is that he's announcing this as a big coup that this japanese investor is putting $100 billion in the u.s. it kind of underlying that says that the u.s. economy is doing great and it is robust in order to attract $100 billion.

which kind of inconsistent with donald trump's statement that the u.s. economy is in shambles and it is a wreck and the worse ever and he's going to come in. it seems the u.s. economy is doing well to have a $100 billion investment announcement. >> jackie, meanwhile, robert f. kennedy jr. is on capitol hill it week where he's expected to face a lot of questions about his skepticism of vaccine and vaccine mandates. "the new york times" reports that a kennedy attorney helping him review candidates for top health roles took part in a 2022 effort to revoke approval of the polio vaccine. now mitch mcconnell wrote in part, quote, efforts to undermine public confidence in proven cures are not just un informed, they're dangerous. how much ever of a hurdle is thr kennedy. >> this is one of the nominees that might encounter the most resistance on capitol hill. it is not just people like mitch mcconnell who has been really at

the forefront of his criticisms of rfk because of his personal experience, but there are others that have low-lying levels of concerns about rfk's push to undermine public confidence in vaccines. the trump campaign has gone out of this wear to say this is not a priority of the trump administration. trump said that on friday in his "time magazine" interview where he defended the polio vaccine specifically but did leave the door open to review other vaccines. but we'll see how rfk meetings go this week but he's going to meet a fair amount of skepticism, and not just for his views on vaccinations, but other ideology he has with republican senators for his views on abortion. so there is a laundry list of items he'll have to go through and his public confirmation hearing is one to watch. >> and vaughn, let's turn to

pete hegseth, trump's pick for secretary. hegseth he said he would release the person from their nondisclosure agreement. take a listen. >> he told me e release for from agreement. would you want to know if anybody nominated for a high level job in washington assaulted someone. if someone has an allegation to do. come forward and make it. like they did in kavanaugh, we'll decide whether it is credible. right now he's being tried by anonymous sources, that will not stand. >> and trump continues his support for hegseth, right. >> exactly. he was at the army-navy game this week with the president-elect. and for donald trump, he's made a commitment and stood by his

nominee, hegseth and gabbard and despite the obstacles once the confirmation proceedings begin. but in the case of pete hegseth, this is notable because while on one hand, he has privately suggested to the likes of lindsey graham and others that he would be willing to essentially null that nondisclosure agreement with the woman who alleged the sexual assault by him. but at the same time, pete hegseth's attorney for the last several weeks has threatened to sue this woman for defamation if she were to make any alleged statements about pete hegseth. and of course, their versions of events run counter to one another. and so one on hand he's suggesting that he would be fine with her coming and putting her name and story out publicly even before the u.s. senate at the national airwaves, his attorney is publicly suggesting that they would be willing to file a lawsuit against her, which, of course, her name has been

private here from the settlement that they struck in the aftermath of that sexual assault allegation and the police report that was filed. >> victoria, what position is hegseth in today vis-a-vis two weeks ago? >> well, in terms of trump's support, president-elect trump is going to be with hegseth until he's not. and i think we saw that with matt gaetz. right now, at this moment, he is fully behind him. i think in the next week or so, depending on if this information about the woman comes out, and folks like lindsey graham could say, well you know what, i don't have enough information and i might pull back and you might see a matt gaetz all over again. but there is going to have to be a tipping point. and like we've seen with tripp, he's all or none. so right now he's in the all category. but let's not be surprised if suddenly he retracted within next couple of days or within the next couple of weeks. >> jackie, hegseth seems to be at least today in a better

position politically than he was two weeks ago. but as victoria was saying, this could all change in a moment. >> it is very true and that is why you hear republican senators keep calling for fbi background checks. at the end of the day, that is what this will come down to, whether or not something pops up that hasn't been publicly revealed so far or any of the hegseth accusers or anonymous people testify at the hearings and that could sway whether or not he gets confirmed. right now in terms of the position that hegseth is in, trump transition officials feel like they've crossed the rubicon and been able to rehab his standing on capitol hill through his meetings and defenses and reactions to these allegations that have been made in recent weeks. they've so far has gotten at least one lawmaker, joni ernst,

to come back from her puicseemi opposition to hegseth and she's someone who the transition was really putting a lot of public pressure on. and senators have gotten the message that is what could happen to them too if they came out against any more of these potential nominees publicly before there is anything that -- else that comes out that could be a negative determine at of what happens during these confirmation hearings. >> and here is what bernie sanders had to say about preemptive pardons for the january 6 select committee who trump has mentioned. >> that is an outrageous statement. that is what authoritarianism is all about. it is what dictatorship is all about. you do not arrest elects officials who disagree with you. who undertake an investigation. >> you know, donald trump has

been claiming for years that his cases are politically motivated. if the president issues preemptive pardons, what precedent do you think that would set? >> an awful one. i think this is a bad message that it sends. i thought the clemency that he did, the pardon on his son was a bad message for many different reasons. i think people that fight against authoritarian regimes and fight against autocracy or bad policy like the civil rights movement understand that they could be -- something could happen to them. but part of the moral high ground is you don't remove yourself from that or put up a wall on that. i think the presidential pardon in total needs to be re-examined. it is way to broad and contingent upon what one person thinks and i think it hurts the democrats if he does this, because it takes away any moral high ground about accusing donald trump. because if on day one he pardons 1200 people, then it gets all

thrown in this mix of well everybody does it so what is the problem in it. i think it is a horrible precedent. >> thank you very much. we have this breaking news from germany right now where chancellor olaf schultz lost the confidence vote in the german parliament setting up a february election for the biggest economy and most populous country. he was expected to lose the vote called for himself in november to clear the way for earlier than planned elections. up next, new calls for the feds to take action after a new york airport and an ohio air force base had to shut down over the weekend due to drones or unidentified flying objects. plus, what we know about an indictment that could come any time now against the man accused of killing health care ceo. and good night to time changes, the new push to lock

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questions in the skies. >> there is no question that people are seeing drones and i want to assure the american public that we in the federal government have deployed additional resources and technology to assist the new jersey state police in addressing the drone sightings. some of the drone sightings are in fact drones, some are manned aircraft that are commonly mistaken for drones. >> many officials, however, say more answers are needed. kathy hochul wants to give state officials the pow to deal directly with the drones. joining us now mia. it is great to see you. when secretary mayorkas said there is no doubt people are seeing drones, just a couple of days before that other federal officials said the major of these things were manned aircraft people were confused for drones.

what have you heard from federal officials today? >> reporter: we're hearing that they are aware of these drones of course, but they're not sure where the unidentifying drones with coming from and that is leading to frustration. we know that attorney general garland was briefed on this today and we heard from an fbi official that there is active threat to the american public. still a lot of unanswered questions here and that is leading to pressure from local officials to ask the biden administration and congress for more resources in the search efforts. jose. >> and you've been on the ground in new jersey and looking out for drones. i know that you spent -- when we spoke on saturday, that you were just back from spending the whole night looking for drones with police and others. what are you hearing from them? >> reporter: so, yeah, we were in ocean county, new jersey, in seaside heights with detective demeco and on his radar we saw the thermal camera where it appears to be several objects

going by much faster than' plane. when i asked him what those were. he couldn't tell me and that operation attracted several residents who have been conducting their own search. we've been talking to residents in new jersey. here is what they had to say. >> so would you say this is kind of been an overreaction to the story? >> i think it is definitely an over reaction. i don't think it is that big of a deal. >> it is that scary. i don't know what to think about it. >> it is called a scary, i don't know if it is aliens or what not, or i've been seeing that they change colors and stuff in the sky. so it is kind >> when i first s them, i was -- i didn't know what they were. i thought it was a plane. and then then like one day i just looked and i realized that they weren't moving. >> reporter: again, a lot of frustration here. a lot of confusion. this information too going online and folks are asking for the clarity from government officials to put an end to all of this. jose. >> mia, thank you very much.

and up next, the latest on the suspect in the murder of united health care ceo. what his mother told the fbi just one day before his arrest. plus an update on speaker nancy pelosi as she recovered from a hip replacement in a german hospital. you're watching jose diaz-balart reports on msnbc. re watching jot reports on msnbc i brought in ensure max protein with 30 grams of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks! —uh. —here i'll take that. [cheering] ensure max protein, 30 grams protein, 1 gram sugar and a protein blend to feed muscles up to 7 hours.

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23 past the hour, it is now been a week since luigi mangione was charged with the murder of

brian thompson and we're learning that a new york grand jury could hand up an indictment against him as soon as this week. as he adds a prominent defense attorney to his legal team. joining us now, priscilla thompson from pennsylvania near the prison where he's been held. tom winter and criminal defense attorney danny receivales. what is the latest this morning. >> reporter: well, as you noted, mangione now has a higher defense on his side in karen freedman. she's someone who worked in the manhattan district attorney's office for more than seven years as the chief assistant district attorney so she knows the office that is prosecuted this case very well and spent decades working in the criminal justice system in north ew york and com with a lot of experience as this indictment could be imminent. we know that last week his attorney was in the courtroom just behind me saying that they were going to fight extradition.

they would they would fight this and we know she did visit him on from i to meet and talk to her client. and we know that he has had no other visitors and her partner and her attorney and it does appear his family has had an opportunity to see him. but of course, we also heard from the manhattan district attorney alvin bragg on friday, when all of the visits occurred saying that he had some indication that mangione may not try to fight extradition and if that were to happen the soonest we could see him in court would be tomorrow to waive extradition, paving the way for him to make his way back to new york. >> priscilla, thank you very much. so, tom, where do we know this indictment is heading, maybe this week? >> right. so one of the things that danny and you were texting about this before the show is this idea of

what the governors need to do. so in new york, there is certain requirements of kathy hochul and certain requirements of governor josh shapiro. those need to be met for him to be bought to new york and for the pennsylvania governor josh shapiro to in fact hand him over. and one of the most common parts of that is an indictment in this particular instance. so if the indictment is handed up by the grand jury, there is no rush on that. it is not something that has to happen today or tomorrow. he's being held without bail in pennsylvania. then, at that point, along with some otherite criteria, kathy hochul could say send it to josh shapiro and the portions of law would be met on his side and then at that point he could sign over mangione. so that is the legal technicalities of this and how it goes back and forth and each

state is different which would make sense. but those are the common things that need to occur. >> and tell us about this new high-profile attorney he got. >> she's as high powered as they get for new york. if you are going to hire someone in north ew york, she would be top ten. if you're charged by the manhattan d.a., she spent a lot of time there and as a high ranking prosecutor in the mast d.a. office. so he's in good shape with her and the reality is this case must end up being either a plea or a trial on the insanity defense. the possible defenses are narrowing every day and we're at very inception of this case. this is going to be a real tough one, no matter who defense counsel is. >> it is been 12 days since the shooting, if you're a defense

attorney, what would you be looking at as that window continues to narrow. >> you consider a someone else did it defense. but like i said, as every day more and more evidence piled up and i'm sure there are things that the government has that we haven't heard about yet. that is just what is being publicly reported. so you look at the images and the ballistics match, if the dna ends up matching, and the fingerprints. those are all things that independently a defense attorney could cast a reasonable doubt on. fingerprints are not a science, their just a technique. but taken as a whole, it starts to look like a really difficult case to defend and you might start looking at a nontrial disposition or the possibility of an insanity defense. >> what does nontrial disposition mean. >> a plea. no matter what tv and movies have to think, it is fallen out of favor since the '70s

and '80s. although a 2017 case where someone drove into times square and killed someone, a use of the insanity defense here in new york city. >> and his mother told the authorities day before the arrest that her son could be a person of interest. it didn't help in the case at the moment because that is not how he was found. >> my colleague reported that she goes to the san francisco police department, they go to the san francisco office of the fbi, who tells the new york fbi office, hey, we have a mom here, she said that this might be her son and she's looking at a photo and they relate that to the nypd. that is the way system is supposed to work. one of the challenges of this and i think over time, one of the things i would imagine both nypd and fbi, et cetera, will look at here, in this day and age, when this person's photos have been put all over the internet, we're looking at ones

taken since his arrest. but prior to that, when those photos are out there, they receive such a volume of electronic tips. they receive such a volume of phone tips. how do you sort through those. when i talked to you on "nightly news," we were aware there were three or four names on a smaller amount of that that the nypd was really on the opportunity for trying to find individuals and had receives some information on all of those -- that was not the person by sunday morning. so you're going through a cue saying look, there is some reasons why this might be the person now. we have to research this information, do the photos match and are there any sort of travel patterns that match. real detective work needs to be done and you could scluz people. but you could imagine the volume of of that cue, jose. there are people who call in ex spouses or ex boyfriend or

ex-girlfriends and saying on the basis of photo, we could exclude all of these people. a huge swath of people and that will help them focus on potentially the right lead sooner, but of course, i'm tip toeing along the a.i. in law enforcement and civil liberties and all of the questions that pop up from that. so all things long-term that need to be looked at. >> so tom, now, what stage of the investigation, what is the stage of the investigation now? >> it is exactly what danny alluded to. every single component of this, and 've talked about this, they think they have the person now they want to tie back as much evidence as humanly possible to him. they have over 80 images of a timeline of his travels through new york city. now they're going to try to match the travel outside of new york city. how did he get out of here and where did he go next. every single restaurant and stop and bathroom and everything to

take him from 55th street on the morning of the shooting all the way to that mcdonald's in altoona, pennsylvania, that is the goal for them and along the way pick up as many clues as possible. so they're not just relying on a print, not relying on an i.d., they're relying on such a volume of evidence that is connected that it just becomes a point for a defense attorney for or him to where they could go beyond the idea of reasonable doubt. >> and danny, there is a possibility this investigation could bring in some one or people well beyond the possible crime that was committed. >> you mean possible co-defendants. there is no evidence that the shooter acting anything other than alone. he suggested it, just because he writes it doesn't mean that he did. but there is no indication that he tracked with co-conspirators and they tracked him so much, as

of yet we haven't heard there is anybody else in those images. but how did he get the gun or told it is a ghost gun. did somebody buy it for him or give it to him. and that could run awy in new york and that could be a federal charge as well. but to danny's point, nobody has told us or suggested in nur reporting. >> thank you very much. really appreciate it. let's go right now to mar-a-lago in palm beach, from, where president-elect trump is speaking. >> they'll going into detroit and a lot of place where's we want them. you saw how well i did with the auto workers. how well we did with the teamsters and the nonunion were record 98%. 97%, nobody has gotten numbers like that because we're bang

bringing business back. we lost them over years ever stupidity, i call it. i call it the years of stupidity, the decades of stupidity through the department of government firsty, elon musk has been working very hard with vivek, we're going to eliminate hundreds of billion dollars of wasted fraud and i could only tell, you i'll give you an early report, we'll finding things that you wouldn't believe. so we're looking to save maybe $2 trillion. and it will have no impact, actually it will make ife better. we'll never cut social security and things like that. it is just waste, fraud and abuse and we'll immediately restore the sovereign borders of united states and stop illegal immigration which is costing us, i believe trillion dollars of a year. a cost, nobody has seen anything like it. i don't know how could you be satisfied releasing prisoners

into the united states. think of this. you're release prisoners from jails all over the world, not just in south america, from the congo, they're a big sender of people. but from all over the world, they're sending prisoners all of their jails, some of their jails are empty and they will be empty soon if this ever continued. i spoke with the president of mexico and as you know, i spoke with justin trudeau of canada. and we told them it is not fair, not right. you can't let theme se people c into our country and they understand and have very much on notice and will have to stop this from happening. they'll have to stop it. we lose a lot of money to mexico and canada. tremendous. we are subsidizing mexico and canada. i get along with the people of mexico and canada very well. but we can't let that happen. why are we -- why are we supporting and giving other

countries hundreds of billions of dollars. it is not fair. it is not right and the people of mexico and canada fully understand that. we've talked about it before. but now we're doing something about it. we started and then we have to fix the covid situation and that is what we did. but now we're doing it. we're doing it from the beginning. howard will be largely in charge. we'll be working on to together. howard is errific. and i think we have fantastic peopling come in. so all of the policies will help us rapidly defeat flation and cre millions ever new jobs an put money in the pockets. pay off debt. we're going to be paying off a tremendous amount of debt. we're $36 trillion, don't want to be there. and we're going to be using a lot of money that we make, we're going to be opening up a lot of businesses. they're going to be pouring in because of our tax policy. and we're going to use the money that we made to pay off debt.

and to reduce taxes. we're going to further reduce taxes. if you remember, when we reduced them last time, that brought a tremendous amount. we brought it down to 21% and that is the biggest tax cut in the history of our country and nobody ever thought this would happen. but this is what is supposed to happen. we ended up taking in more refrn at 21 than we did at 40% which is amazing. this is the most exciting period of reform and renewal in all of american history, the golden age of america, i call it. it is began. so it is the golden age of america and that is what it is going to be. and we hope we don't have any intervening problems because things happen like out of nowhere came the china virus. out of nowhere came other things. we don't want to have -- when i left, we had no wars. we had no problems. middle east was good. we did the abraham accords. we did things that nobody

thought were even possible. but think of it, four years ago, we had no wars. you didn't have russia going into ukraine. they wouldn't have done it. they weren't even thinking about it. and when they saw what happened in afghanistan, i think they gave them an idea. but they wouldn't have done it. president putin would have never gone in and now you look at all of the people are dead. all the cities are destroyed. you know, it is nice to say, they want their land back but the cities are largely destroyed. they've left kyiv because probably maybe they want to use it or occupy it but they haven't done it. they've done a lot of damage. but relatively compared to the other cities. very little. but many of those cities are gone. those beautiful towers, those beautiful buildings that they had are now laying on their sides. destroyed, totally destroyed. the turrets and all of the

magnificent thousand-year-old, 2,000-year-old structures that were very strong with blown to smithereens. you look at with some of the cities and not one building standing. so when you say take over the country, take over what? take over what? that is 100-year rebuild. it will take 100 years to rebui have it the same it was. if i was president, that war would have never hanned. nor would israel would have ahappened. so we're inheriting big challenges all over the world. again, we have no wars or no problems. we had no inflation. we had it less than 1%. perfect number. and then we had inflation the likes of which i say i don't believe the country has ever seen inflation like that. they say 38 years. i don't know. i think it is probably ever. but we're going to take care of all of it. we're going to get the prices

down by energy, the energy is going to come in. we have more energy thanib else. we're going to use it. we don't have to buy energy from venezuela when we have 50 times more than they do. it is insane what we're doing. so we'll not rest until america is richer, safer and stronger than it has ever been before. and we have a big head start of the last time we didn't. and last time we didn't know the people. we didn't a lot of things. but by time we got it up and going, it was incredible. again, we built the greatest economy in history for that period of time. and we'll do it again. i believe substantially more so. because we understand number one the people of washington, i know them. i didn't know any of them virtuely. i relied on other people for recommendations. some were very good, we some great people. bob lighthouser was great. we sh some great people but we have some people that i wouldn't have used in retrospect and now i know them better than anybody.

better than they know themselves. so once again i would like to thank massa for what he's done for that investment. which will end up being $200 billion, i believe. but i just want to thank him. he is just an out standing man. when you that kind of brain power wants to invest in this country and that is money that he can't invest elsewhere. that sos a big investment. but it makes me feel very good. we're absolutely on the right track. so thank you to massa and we'll take a couple of questions. jeff. >> mr. president, you mentioned the wars. could you tell us what you said to prime minister netanyahu in your call on saturday? and have you spoke tone president putin since your election. >> i'm not going to comment on the putin question, but i will comment on bibi. we had a very good talk. we discussed what is going to happen and i'll be very available on january 20th. and we'll see. as you know, i gave warning that if these hostages aren't back

home by that date, all hell is going to break out. and very strong. but we generally just discussed -- i asked him, where are things. mike waltz, they're doing a great job. he's doing a fantastic job. but he was very much involved in the call. but it was a recap call more than anything else. >> -- to stop the ban on tiktok next month. >> who? >> how do you plan to stop the ban on tiktok next month. >> we'll take a look at tiktok. i won youth by 34 points and there are those that say that tiktok has something to do with that. now, joe rogan did and some of the other people that were recommended by my son baron, he knew names and i said who is that. and he said, dad, i can't believe you don't know and i did the interviews and it was sort

of cute. but we did em and that had an impact. so we're taking a look at. it but we want youth. republicans are always 30 points down in youth. i don't know why. but we ended up finishing. there was one poll that shows us down about 30, 35 or 36 points up with young people. so, i have a little bit of a warm spot in my heart, i'll be honest. >> are you going to take the idea of reemtive strikes against iran nuclear facility. >> against who? >> against iran nuclear facilities. >> i can't tell you that. it is a wonderful question. but am i going to do preemptive strikes. why would i say that? could you imagine if i said yes or no. would you say, that was strange that he answered that. am i going to do preemptive strikes on iran? is that a serious yes. how could i answer a question like that. >> president trump, would you be in support of israeli strikes on

iran? >> how could i tell you a thing like that now. you don't talk about that before something may or may not happen. i don't want to -- >> i don't want to insult you. i think it is not something that i would ever answer having to do with there or any other place in the world. >> president trump -- >> can i ask just clearly, do you believe there is a connection between vaccines and autism? >> look, i right now, you have some very brilliant people looking at it. i had dinner the other night with the head of pfizer and eli lilly and rfk and oz and we had -- and other people within the administration, that are involved, in the medical, and we're looking to find out. if you look at autism, so, 30 years ago we had -- i've heard numbers of one in 200,000, 1 in

100,000 and now i'm hearing of numbers of 1 in 100. so there is something wrong and we're going to find out about it. >> mr. president trump -- >> one more. >> could i follow up on robert kennedy. he's on the hill today. he's meeting with senators. what do you say to people that are worried that his views on vaccines will translate into policies that will make their kids less safe. >> i think he'll be much less radical that you may think. he has an open mind. i i wouldn't have put him there. but there are problems. we don't do as well as other nations and they use nothing. and we're going to find out what those problems are. and another thing that came up, the dinner was fascinating because they had bobby and i had, again, the head of pfizer, you know who that is, he's a highly respected man who is running an incredible company, likewise with lilly, the top two people and we had the head of

industry, also. so all companies were represented. and i said, let's have it out now. a little bit. and you know what came out of that meeting is that we're paying far too much, because we're paying much more than other countries. and we have laws that make it impossible to reduce and we have a think called the middle man. the horrible middle man that makes more money frankly than the drug companies and they don't do anything except their a middle mab. we're going to knock out the middleman. i'm going to be unpopular after that. i don't know who these middle men are but they are rich as hell. and we're going to knock out the middle member and we're going to get drug costs down at levels that nobody has ever seen before. and that really, i tell you, we spent more time talking about that, with bobby and with the executives and oz, all of them, we spent more time talking about that than anything else. >> what about the polio vaccine? >> well i'm a big believer in

it. and i think everything should be looked at. but i'm a big believer in the vaccine. >> do you think schools should mandate vaccines. >> i'm not a big mandate person. i was against mandates, mostly democrat governors did the mandates. and they did a very poor thing. it was -- in retrospect they made a big mistake having to do with the education of children. they lost like a year or two years of their lives. mandate was a bad thing. i was against the mandate. >> is that something -- >> mr. president. >> did you expect ron desantis to point marco rubio to the seat? >> i don't know. ron is doing a good job. that is his choice. nothing to do with him. lara is unbelievable. i mean, she was incredible. the job she did at the rnc, as chairman along with michael

watly, the combination, but i could just speak for lara, she's so highly respected, by women, i mean even her workout routines are through the roof. she lifts 150 pounds. i don't know how the hell she does it. she's a bad example for men in women's sports because i don't think i would be able to beat her, i don't believe. she's an incredible woman. and people oftentimes talk about nepotism. i never had-when i put her there, people said how do you get her to do it. she would have run for the senate in north carolina. ted bud would be the first to say and he wouldn't have run. nobody would have run. and she just said, no, i want to really focus on my children. when the election and my family. she's got a great family. when the election started getting closer, i asked her would she go to washington and work on the chairman of the

committee along with michael wattly and they did such an unbelievable job, especially on cheating. they stopped it. or at least they stymied it. too big to rig and we won in a landslide. we won tremendously. she did an amazing job. now ron is going to -- because marco has been really a star already. and we haven't started. but, you know, we see signs from some people very early, we see signs of stardom. and marco has done incredibly. he so rnfor it. it was such an easy decision. the marco decision was such an easy. but believes a vacancy in florida. and ron is going to have to make that decision. and he'll make the right decision. i also know that lara has got so many other things. she's got so many other things. people want her to be on television and give her contracts. her predominant thought is our country and her family. those are they are thoughts.

but she's got so many other things that she's talking about. he'll make right decision. >> mr. president, mr. president -- >> should senators who oppose your nominees, should they be primaried? >> if they unreasonable. i've give you a different answer, an answer that you'll be shocked to hear. if they're unreasonable, if they're opposing someone for political reasons, or stupid reasons, i would say it has nothing to do with me. would you say they probably would be primaried. but if they're reasonable, fair and disagree with something or somebody, i could see that happening. but i do believe that if they're -- i think we have great beam. i think we have a great -- a great group of people. pam has been unbelievably received. he take a look. pam bondi. so many have just been unbelievably received. i think pete hegseth is making tremendous strides over the last

week. he's going to be -- look, he went to princeton and harvard and from the first day i met him, all he wanted to talk about was mimt. he's just a military guy. i think he's a natural. this was my idea. and you know pete hegseth gave up a lot. because he was going pig places in -- big places in fox. he didn't hesitate. i said do you want to do this and he said absolutely. and and i said, if it doesn't work out, you'll never have the opportunity you did in the world of entertainment or business or whatever you want to call it. you'll never have that opportunity again. in fact, it could be just the opposite, because it is nasty out there. he said, don't care. i have to do it for my country. he gave up a tremendous amount, if it didn't work, it would be a tragedy. because -- but that is what he loves. he loves military. he would come to see me about a soldier that was unfairly

treated. and could i help. that is the only thing i virtually ever talked to him about. and i've seen him many times and i don't have a suggest anything other than military. and he didn't say i would like to think about or talk to my family. and he said not even a contest. and he was going through the roof. he was doing great. he has the number one show with will and rachel. that is great chemistry. and in this doesn't work out, it would be sort of tragic. yeah. >> would you consider pardoning eric adams? >> yeah, i would. yeah. i think that he was treated pretty unfairly. i haven't seem it all. being upgraded in an airplane many years ago. people have been upgraded.

you're all-stars and i want to upgrade that person from nbc. i'm going upgrade them and ma means you spent the rest of your life in prison. i have to see it. because i don't know the facts. i think was treated -- it is very interesting, when he essentially went against what was happening with the migrants coming in and he made some pretty strong statements, like this is not sustainable. i said he'll be indicted soon. and i said it not as a prediction, a little bit light heartedly, but i said it. i said he's going to be indicted and a few months later he got indicted. i would certainly look at it. >> -- troops in syria, are you planning on pulling them when you get into office or will you -- >> well we have 5,000 troop as long the border. and i asked a couple of generals, so we have an army of 250,000 at syria and you are an

army of 400,000 and many more people. turkey is a major force by the way. and erdogan is someone i got along with great. but he has a major military force and his has not been worn out with war. it hasn't been worn out with -- he's built a strong powerful army. and we have 5,000 soldiers in between a 250,000 person army and i said what do you think of that situation and he said they'll be just -- they'll be wiped out immediately. and i moved them out. and i took a lot of heat. and you know what happened? nothing. nothing. i saved a lot of lives. now we have 900. they put some back. but 900, if you're talking about too, now one side has been wiped out. but i know who it is. turkey. okay. turkey is the one behind it.

he's a very smart guy. they've wanted it for thousands of years and he got it. and those people that went in are controlled by turkey. and that is okay. it is another way to fight. but, no, i don't think that i want to have our soldiers killed b. -- but i don't think that will happen now because one side has been decimated. >> are you concerned about more unrest in that region. >> nobody knows the final outcome in the region. nobody knows who really the final -- i believe it is turkey and i think turkey is very smart. he's a very smart guy. and he's very tough. but, turkey did an unfriendly takeover without a lot of lives being lost. i can say that assad was a butcher. what he did to children, you remember i attacked him with the 58 missiles, unbelievable missiles coming from ships 700

miles away and every one ever them hit the target. that was the line in the sand. obama drew it and he said if anyone goes across the red line and assad killed many more children after that and obama did nothing and i hit him with missiles. president xi was hitting here the night he was in dining room having chocolate cake. the famous chocolate cake. and that is when i explained what we were doing. as the missiles were shot. and it was -- it was amazing as to precision. because every one of those missiles hit its target from a long distance away. had president obama drawn the line and where it metropolitan -- where it meant something, russia was not getting very much out tv. but now the time is taken up with ukraine and we'd like to get them to stop on ukraine and

ukraine stop also. as you know, when i went to the cathedral, which is fantastic, the job that they've done in france, and the job that macron, emanuel does, a phenomenal job on the rebuilding of that cathedral and it is magnificent and they treated -- meaning i'm the representative of our country and we were treated with great respect. and one of the people that came to pay his respects is, as you know, ukraine. zelenskyy. and he would like to have peace. he wants peace. everyone is being killed. it is the worst carnage that this world has seen since world war ii. i've had pictures of fields with bodies are lying on top of bodies. it looks like the old pictures of civil war. where just bodies are all over.

just if you saw those pikes, you would feel more strongly about it. it has got to stop. >> what about -- >> and we're trying to get it to stop. >> mr. president trump -- >> we're going to see. we're going to be talking to president putin and we'll be talking to the representatives, zelenskyy and representatives from ukraine. we have to stop it. it is carnage. >> what about the drones? >> thank you. good to see you. >> you could comment on the drones that are flying around new jersey? it seems like people have a big -- >> the government knows what is happening. look, our military knows where they took off from, if it is a garage, they could go right into that garage. they know where it came from and where it went. and for some reason they don't want to comment. and i think they'd be better off saying what it is. our military knows and our president knows. and for some reason they want to

keep people in suspense. i can't imagine it is the enyemi because it is the enemy they blasted it out. even if they were late, they would blast it. something strange is going on and they don't want to tell the people and they should because the people happen to be over bedminster. they're very close to bedminster. i think maybe i won't spend the weekend in bedminster. i've decided to cancel my trip. >> you have received any intelligence briefing on the drones? >> i don't want to comment on that. >> do you have any reason to think they're a threat. >> two quick questions. first, on vaccines, do you want rfk jr. to revoke any vaccines? >> no. i want him to cam back with a report as to what he thinks. we're going to find out a loxts we're doing two things. we're going to have tremendous cost savings out of this. and we're also going to have very serious decisions about certain things, whether it is pesticides.

europe doesn't use pesticides. and yet they have a better mortality rate than we do. they don't use pesticides. they use its in an excuse not to take our farm product. we spent billions and billions of dollars on pesticides. and something bad is happening. again, you take a look at autism today versus 20, 25 years ago, it is like not even believable. so we're going to have reports. nothing is going to happen very quickly. i think you're going to find that bobby is much -- he's a very rational guy. i find him to be very rational. you're not going to lose the polio vaccine. that is not going to happen. i saw what happened with the polio. i have friends that were very much affected by that. i polio. i have friends that were very much affected by that. i have friends from many years ago and they have, obviously, they still are not in such good shape because of it. and many people died. and the