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Real America’s Voice
HEGSETH: “PROJECT FREEDOM” IS SEPARATE FROM IRAN WAR | WAR ROOM WITH STEVE BANNON AM EDITION
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- [00:00]
Donald Trump
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human. This is the primal scream of a dying regime.
- [00:14]
Pete Hegseth
Pray for our enemies. Cause we're going medieval on these people's
- [00:19]
Donald Trump
not got a free shot on all these networks lying about the people. The people have had a belly full of it. I know you don't like hearing that. I know you try to do everything in the world to stop that, but you're not going to stop it. It's going to happen. And where do people like that go? Share the big lie.
- [00:34]
Scott Bessent
MAGA Media I wish in my soul,
- [00:37]
Donald Trump
I wish that any of these people had a conscience. Ask yourself, what is my task and what is my purpose?
- [00:44]
Scott Bessent
If that answer is to save my
- [00:47]
Donald Trump
country, this country will be saved. War Room here's your host, Stephen K. Banner.
- [01:01]
Pete Hegseth
Tuesday, the 5th of May, in the year of our Lord 2026. The President and we. I kind of figure this might happen. He's a little bit delayed. Gonna go the Oval Office. He's going to sign a proclamation about youth fitness. As soon as we get heads up from the White House, we'll go there. We may dip in and out of that, but we would definitely be there if he takes any questions from the. From the media today over the Pentagon. We started the day by, we, we started the day by saying, with a press briefing from the Pentagon, Pete Hegseth and, and General Kane talking about a project operation was it Freedom. The. And this is this effort now to keep the Straits of Hormuz open. And as Eric Bolling just told us, 11 vessels so far today. I think three yesterday. And I think it was confirmed that because it's this question of how many vessels and how many vessels Is that the, is that the President. We're getting ready to. Let's go ahead and jump into the present right now.
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Bryson DeChambeau
Upwards of 30, actually.
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Donald Trump
Yeah. All top.
- [02:17]
Bryson DeChambeau
Yes, sir.
- [02:17]
Donald Trump
If they weren't really good, we don't allow them. You're going to be really good. Like Gary Player as an example, he won 168 tournaments over a very average career. You know that. Think of it, he won 168 tournaments. 18 majors, nine and nine senior. He has more championships than anybody, national championships than anybody. And I played with him. He just, he's very proud of it. Actually played with him on his 90th birthday. He very easily won a tough course from six. He very easily shot a 70, and it was the easiest 70. And normally if you shoot a 70 and you're 90, you'd run around so excited. Gary's like, all right, let's have a little lunch. That's the most unexcited human being I've ever seen. Because he's been doing it all his life. He's been winning top three in history. My opinion. I don't think it's my opinion, just based on the record. Gary is top three. Jack and Tiger and Gary, greatest golfer. So thanks for being here. And as you know, we have the US Open champion, and he won two US Opens, but that last one was unbelievable. He had a. I think Gary's one of the greatest shots ever hit to win a U.S. open. Certainly one of the top. They say one of the top three. I don't know what the other two are, but he hit an unbelievable sand shot, sank a four and a half foot putt, and he won the US Open. And he's been a great golfer from the day he was born, if you believe in genetics, because I do. But he won, you know, he won the US Amateur years ago, and he won it quite easily. But he's a great person and a great friend of mine, Bryson DeChambeau. And thank you, Bryson. And you're very much in charge of this whole operation. Sports. He's so much into physical fitness. All you have to do is take a look at him and you say, why is he even doing this? Because I think if you didn't work out at all, you'd still look almost like you do right now. But you are doing great. And everybody respects Bryce, and he's the longest hitter in golf, and he's straight. And frankly, maybe the best part of his game, Gary, is he's a great putter. Absolutely. You played with him. Right. And an asset to the guy. And he's a great asset, and he's a great person. And we have, along with the University of Florida's basketball coach, Todd Golden. Todd. Where's Todd? Right here. Todd. Hi, Todd. Good to see you, Mr. President. And what a job, by the way. What a job you've done. I see that. I'm a little busy to watch the games, but I always see your team is right up there.
- [04:52]
Todd Golden
Yeah.
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Donald Trump
You did a fantastic job as a young guy. An American hockey hero. TJ Oshi, who's one of the best hockey players in the world. T.J. Mr. President to be.
- [05:04]
Bryson DeChambeau
Thanks for having me.
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Donald Trump
How's your golf game? The hockey. The hockey players. Bryson was saying the hockey players seem to be the best of the athletes. Seem to be the best golfers.
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Todd Golden
It's the greatest game.
- [05:15]
Donald Trump
Yeah, that's great. And he's a good golfer. He's a three handicap. Maybe better, Right? That's very good. But stick, right, but stick, stick to hockey. Right? As a three, he has to stick to hockey. That's great. What, what a career you've had to at a young age. And professional baseball pitcher Noah Syndergaard sometimes referred to as Thor and he looks like Thor to me. That's some. Where is he? It's very hard to make. They look great. That is a man I wouldn't want to get into a fight with him, I can tell you. That would not be a good situation. This year we celebrate 250th anniversary of our country and it's our nation's founding. It's a big deal. In addition, we have the World cup and we have. Which is just now started and we have the Olympics. I got them both and I was very proud of myself. I tried to say I got the 250th also, but nobody. That didn't work out too well. But I did get, I did get both the World cup and I got the Olympics. And I was very proud of that. But I was very sad actually because I got them in my first term and I said, oh, wow, I'm not going to be able to go as president because they were in six years. So I wouldn't be president. I thought I'd easily win the election, which by the way, I did. And unfortunately bad things happened. It was a rigged election and I said, I'll do it again. I had the ultimate poll. I did so well and I had the ultimate poll. And we won in a landslide. We won every single swing state. We won the popular vote. We won everything you can win. We won 87% of the counties in the United States. And I ended up with the Olympics and I ended up with the World Cup. And very importantly, maybe the most important is we have the 250th anniversary on June 14th. We're going to have the UFC and the biggest fight they've ever done by far. It's the hardest ticket I've ever been involved with. And they're building a 5,000 seat stadium right in the front of. Right by the front door of the White House. And then they're going to have anywhere from 75 to 100,000 people on the park right past the White House with eight tremendous screens. And then we have Roger Penske. So that's Dana White's dream. What that is. It's going to be amazing. And then we have Roger Penske is going to have a big championship Indy around The capital and the Indy racers. And he's been trying to get it here for 25 years. And he said, I came to Washington exactly 121 times, and I was never able to get it. I came once to see you, and we had it done in a half an hour. And he's Fantastic. He's won 20 Indianapolis five hundreds. Can you believe that? Other, you know, countries. And I say it all the time. I gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, like I gave to Gary, too, because of his career. And then Roger on his 18th, I called him, I said, come on, I want to give you the president. You won 18, Japan, Germany, all these countries, they spend billions and billions of dollars, and they don't, you know, it's very hard for them to win. They don't win very, very much. They spend all their money, and Roger just wins it all the time. So I gave it to him on the 18th win, and since then he's won. That was four years ago. Since then he's won two more. So he's going to be here with the IndyCars, and it's going to be their biggest race, maybe ever. They're going to be circling the Capitol. We have Pennsylvania Avenue closed down. And I said, do you like the course? He said, I love the course. I said, pick the best course. We'll get it for you. Don't go the easy way. Pick the best roads. I don't care. It doesn't matter. And he picked a per. He said, it's as good as you can get. And unfortunately, pick the most important roads in the city, which is a little tougher, but we got it done for them quickly. And that's going to be in August. So we have a lot of really exciting things happening. So today I sign a proclamation recognizing national youth sports and fitness. And I'll also sign the very first copy of the new revitalized Presidential Fitness Test award, a certificate in recognition of achievement of the gold standard of physical fitness. And this is something that Bryson Dechambeau wanted to do very badly. Bryson's amazing. I mean, I say he's somebody that can put on 25, 30. At one point, I guess he put on almost £50. Remember, he looked like a linebacker for the. And he decided he didn't like himself at that weight. It was all muscle, Gary. It was crazy. He looked like a massive football player. He wouldn't want to play Menachem. And he said he didn't like it. He developed too much speed. This is the problem with people. He had too much speed. He wanted to bring it down a little bit so he lost. He can put on weight, like up and down like a yo, yo. And he doesn't take the shot. Okay, he doesn't need the fat shot. He just. I said, do you ever take this shot? He didn't even know what the hell I was talking about.
- [10:22]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
What shot?
- [10:23]
Donald Trump
No, he can put it on. He's a scientist. He's like a scientist with his body. He's a great guy and he's an absolute champion. So I appreciate it. But Bryson really wanted to bring it back because we are bringing it back. It's something that's a lot of people, the wrong people probably were involved. I don't know. But this is a group of people that physical fitness is everything. Gary Player, by the way, you talk about golf, but he was always considered in the best shape of anybody. He was long ahead of the rest of the world. Now you see all these guys have a 28 inch waist. They walk down. It's like, like robots, right? But Gary was always. He was way. He was way ahead of everybody else. From the late 1950s until 2013, grade schoolers across the country competed against each other in the presidential fitness test. But others. And then we had the Obama administration. Wonderful, wonderful person. Barack Hussein Obama. Have you heard of him? We had the Obama administration, which phased out this wonderful tradition of physical fitness. Thank you, Barack, very much. Great job. And we're bringing it back. We're bringing it back. My administration is working very hard to defend America's cherished athletic traditions and pass our values of excellence and competitiveness to the next generation. So important, we are working on historic reforms to save college sports. And we banned men from competing in women's sports. That was sort of an easy one. They say, you know, the radical left says that's an 8020 issue. No, it's 99 1. They say 80 20. Who are the 20%? I've never met anybody. Nobody's ever come up. So I've been president for five years and nobody's ever come up to me, say, sir, you have to allow men to play in women's sports. You know, I've never had one person say, it's really important that we allow women to be challenged by men in women's sports. And doesn't work. So we did that. And with the help of Secretary Kennedy, who's with us, we're striving constantly to make America healthy again. And that's what we're doing. We have unbelievable numbers coming. Bobby will mention it. We have Unbelievable numbers coming. So these next few years will be a golden age for American sports, just like it's a golden age for America. You know, we hit an all time high stock market today. Despite that, we're in a little skirmish, military, I call it a skirmish because Iran has no chance. They never did. They know it. They express it to me when I talk to them. Then they get on television, they say how well they're doing and they have no navy, totally wiped down. They have no air force, totally wiped down. They have no, they have no anti aircraft capability, totally wiped out. No radar. They have no leaders. The leaders are wiped out, the whole thing. And then I read the papers and they say how well they're doing. They're not doing well. That's why you have no credibility. No credibility. The news, the fake news has no credibility. But the President's cup, it's going to be something and we're going to have that. We're going to do very special presentations to Johnny, who as you know, is the commissioner, he's a fantastic person who runs the soccer. And if, I don't know if you know this, but. So more tickets have been sold earlier than at any World cup they've ever had and the numbers are more than double. They've never seen anything like it. So it's really soccer. I don't know if soccer has taken off or not to get up, but I can. The World cup is doing numbers like they've never done, they've never done anywhere close. And we have the Patriot Games in honor of our 250th anniversary this fall. It's going to be all on television. And with that, it's like the ones that we have here. We're going to continue to win, win, win. Our country is doing great. We're breaking records in every way. And it was too bad, but I had to do it. We can't let Iran have a nuclear weapon. You might be too young for this. I don't know what they probably know. They, they probably know better than most people. But you can't let a bunch of lunatics have a nuclear weapon or the world would be in trouble. The world would be in trouble. So we just hit records on the Dow. It was supposed to be done in five or six years. Somebody said it couldn't be possible to reach 50 on the Dow. And I reached 50 in the first year and then I reached 7,000 and by the way, just set a new record. The S and P just set a new record, much higher. 7,500, but they said even harder than 50 on the Dow is getting to 7,000 on the S and P. We did that by the end of the first year. All before the end of the first year, Gary. So think of that. They said we couldn't do it in four years, and we did it at the end of the first year. And then. You ever have this? And then I said, I called all my people and I said, we just set every record in the book. The economy is going great. I ended eight wars. Nobody else ended. Ever ended a war. And the person that won the Nobel Prize, Maria, she's a good person. She said, I don't deserve this. This deserves to President Trump. There's never been a man that deserves a Nobel, but he ended eight wars, including India, Pakistan, which would have been a nuclear war. Eight of them. And I called everybody in, Gary, and I said, you know what? We just broke every record. And now we're going to take a hit because we have to make a journey down to Iran to take the nuclear weapon. They would have had a nuclear weapon in within two weeks. Remember, we sent that beautiful B2 bomber in and we blew up their nuclear potential. It was obliterated. For those that are not aware and to a point where they. It would take them weeks to dig down, and we wouldn't let them dig down. We have our eyes on there all the time. But it was a very important thing. So we would have had an Iran with a nuclear weapon and maybe we wouldn't all be here right now. I can tell you the Middle east would have been gone, Israel would have been gone, and they would have trained their sights on Europe first and then us because they're sick people. These are sick people. And we're not going to let lunatics have a nuclear weapon. The power of a nuclear weapon is something I don't even want to talk about. It's not going to happen. And we have beaten them deadly. They're talking, oh, now they're reduced to little boats with a machine gun on the front of them because they had a navy of 159 ships. Every single ship in the first week was right, Pete. Every single ship they had is resting underwater right at the bottom of the sea. They have no navy. It's totally wiped out. Same thing with their air force. So we're doing well, but it's all about, you know, having a great country. And one of the things I think that when they talk about physical fitness, one of the things I notice about friends of mine, all of the people all of the great athletes here is their mind is better than people that aren't fit. It's because I think of mind, you know, once you, once you hit a ball well, or you do whatever it is that you run well or play hockey as great as you play it, but once you, I mean, you obviously have to have a certain physicality. You can't have somebody with a great mind and zero, zero athletic talent. Right. But when you get up to that league, it's all about the mind. The mind is so important and these people express it, I think better than anybody. So with that, I'd like to ask somebody that's done really an incredible job. He has got some group of people that love him, some big group of people. It was a big day when he endorsed me for president. Very unusual because I happen to be a Republican. I would say that Republicans were not too big in the Kennedy family, but they're big now because he's the biggest. He's the biggest in the group and everybody respects him a lot. He's doing a fantastic job. So, Bobby, would you say a few words, please? Yeah.
- [18:35]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
Thank you, Mr. President. When my. Almost immediately after my uncle was elected and my team 60, 61, 60, he came across some federal data that showed that 5% of American kids were obese. And that was more than double the European number. And he became very concerned that Americans were becoming soft. And he published an article before his inauguration called the Soft American in which he said that there's a national security issue, it's threatens our economy. We need a vigorous population that is in good shape, spiritually, morally, physically, if we're going to continue to exercise leadership around the world. And he launched a physical fitness test which became a milestone for my generation for several generations after me. It was an enduring rite of passage for us that everybody in my generation remembers. It was a benchmark also because we did pull ups, sit ups, shuttle runs and a number of other events. And it was a benchmark for measuring national physical fitness. Around that time, my uncle came across correspondence between Teddy Roosevelt and the head of his, the commandant of his Marine Corps. And Teddy Roosevelt asked him, what are the metrics? What are the physical requirements for a Marine? And Roosevelt or the commandant wrote him back saying that a Marine had to walk 50 miles in a single day with a 30 pound pack. My uncle wrote a letter to his commandant and said, can today's Marines do the same thing? The following day he had a cabinet meeting. It was on a Friday and he had private cabinet meetings, unlike the ones that Were we have to go through here? My uncle was. I'll just say this. My uncle was proud. He was the first president that televised press conferences and he was very proud. He did more press conferences than any president in history. He did 64 in his thousand days in office. This president does that every two months. He does a press conference every day. Abbott made intra better for women, worst are also televised. But it's the most transparent administration we've ever seen, the most successful administration in history. He went into that cabinet meeting, a private cabinet meeting, that's morning and he said to the cabinet, one of you has to do a 50 mile hike this weekend to show the American people that we're in shape and his cabinet could have done it. We have a bunch of thoroughbreds on this cabinet. Pete and Scott and Sean, Duffy and Linda and Tulsi and Doug Burgum and Jameson and all the rest. There's a lot of people who could probably do a 50 mile hike.
- [21:33]
Donald Trump
What about me? You didn't mention mine.
- [21:36]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
9 miles a day on a golf course every weekend. So he could do it in the
- [21:40]
Donald Trump
breeze when I'm not using a car. Go ahead.
- [21:46]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
My father was the only one who could do it. And he went into the Justice Department that night and he had a bunch of guys in the Justice Department who were former marines who had gone to Harvard on the GI Bill and played on the same football team and he hired them all. When he came into the Justice Department he said, you guys are going on a 50 mile hike with me tomorrow. And they got up at 4am and they started on the C and O canal tow path. We were frozen, it was middle of winter and they were going to walk to Camp David. One by one they each dropped out. My father was the only one who made it. The last guy to drop out was his best friend. His name was Dave Hackett. Dave Hackett's legs had swollen up and he said, I got to quit. And my father said, you're lucky your brother's not the President of the United States. Because the press was following and there was no way that my father could quit. I was at Camp David that night, watched him come in. His feet were bleeding, they were covered with blisters. It was part of the message that President Kennedy wanted to send the American people. If we were going to maintain our national authority, our national, our international leadership, our moral authority as a nation, that we had to pay attention to our physical condition. Physical fitness was a critical part of that. And I think it's very unfortunate that President Obama and President Biden abandoned it. He said competition is not good for kids, which is not true. If we're going to be competitive internationally, we need to be competitive with each other. We need to teach people how to win and how to lose and how to process victory and defeat. And today, since that time, the presidency has presided over the worst public health crisis in history. We're now the sickest nation in the world. We've gone from 5% of our kids being obese to 20%. 70% of adults are obese or overweight. And 77% of our children cannot qualify for military service. And that should be an eye opener for all of us. And I'm so grateful to President Trump for his leadership and his vision of reinstituting the physical fitness and challenging Americans to compete with each other in a friendly, congenial way and to help each other get in shape so that we can prepare for a great future that this administration is going to provide for this country.
- [24:24]
Donald Trump
That was great, Bobby. Do you ever see a picture of Bobby working out?
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T.J. Oshie
It's like
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Donald Trump
I said, you gotta be kidding me. He's in great shape. I didn't know that about your father. That's very impressive. Huh? Did he work out a lot? He was a great guy.
- [24:45]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
He was an athlete, and he was always in good shape. And he played sports every weekend.
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Donald Trump
Was he? Your uncle was a great athlete, too, wasn't he? A very good athlete.
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Bobby Kennedy Jr.
My father was the only one of the brothers that lettered in football. Jack was a swimmer, which allowed him to save his crewmates when his ship went down off the Solomon Islands. So he was able to swim, drag one of his shipmates to shore because he'd been on the swim team.
- [25:15]
Lyndon Kennedy
2.
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Donald Trump
Great story. Very interesting, Bobby. That was very good. It's quite interesting. Everybody was listening. You know, usually people are sort of wandering off as people speak, but that one Bryson speaks. Why don't you start it? Yeah.
- [25:27]
Bryson DeChambeau
Secretary Kennedy, thank you for those inspiring words from your uncle. And thank you to the President of the United States for helping re establish this Presidential Fitness Test. It's been something that we've been looking forward to doing for a long time, since 2013. I remember going through the Presidential Fitness Test as a kid and getting that award, and it was quite an honor. So being up here and a part of that is quite instrumental and going to be amazing for our nation's future. Re establishing the gold presidential, the golden standard. The Presidential Fitness Test has been a huge deal for me, is that these kids now are going to have a Healthy future. That's really an important thing for us to note here is that we want to make sure our kids have the best opportunity to succeed in life. And not only from their mind, but their health and their well being. Their physical fitness is a huge priority to helping them become better human beings in general for our needs. And so what's quite honestly cool is Secretary Hegseth here has allowed us to be involved in over 160 schools, military bases, with DOEA and institutionalizing this presidential fitness test in those schools. So I have to say thank you so much for helping establish that and hopefully here soon we can do that across the nation, which we believe has tremendous, will have a tremendous effect on these kids and their future. So I just wanted to say thank you to the President, thank you to the cabinet members for everything you've done. And we're going to go out there and have a great day on the field and give these kids some fun things to go and play with, whether it's football, soccer, doing some pull ups. Can you guys do pull ups? No, we'll help you. But that's a part of the Presidential Fitness test is aspiring to help these kids become a better version of themselves. And that's why I couldn't be more excited to be a part of. I want to say thank you to the athletes that are here today and to Gary Player. He's always been an inspiration to me and albeit I'll never get to your record, I thank you for giving me aspirations to hopefully get one eighth of what you have. So thank you. And lastly, just want to say that kids most important thing you can do is always get 1% better a day. That's the most important thing I can give you guys. Try to be a better version of yourself every day because one day you could be up here as well. You could be up here as well. So thank you Mr. President. Thank you everybody for being here and I can't wait to see what we can do out there today.
- [27:50]
Donald Trump
Thank you Bryson. And this is really for Bryson because he's worked so hard on this. He's really, he really put it together. He's got the best athletes in the world. I think it's actually 41 or 42 and all top, top people, all big names, top people and they all want to do it. And Bryson, I was given a little idea by Bobby. He mentioned Camp David and it's a special place and I think we should have our next meeting, the full meeting at Camp David. Okay, that's great. So it's Like a very special place. So we'll do that. I'd love to have Gary say a few words. He's won 168 tournaments. Think of it. That means he won every weekend. I say, well, when did you not win? It's a record, I think, that will never be broken. And he won 18 majors, nine senior and nine regular, and many other things. And he is a very special guy. And, you know, if you think about the power of positive thinking, I don't know if Gary has the time, but he is the youngest winner of the British Open, what they call now the Open Championship. And he won it when he was 23. I think, Gary, 23. If you want, you could tell that story, because these are all people that love sports and they love golf. But the way you asked, you'd like to practice. My name is Gary Player. I'm from South Africa. You're not giving me the time to practice. I must practice on this course. And the people thought, who is this? He said, you don't understand. I'm going to win this tournament. They never heard of him. He came out of South Africa. He's winning everything. He won the South African Open, like, 14 times or something. It's incredible. But if you want to tell that story, I think it's a fabulous story. But as a man with a powerful. It's really the power of positive thinking. Go ahead, Gary.
- [29:37]
Gary Player
Well, Mr. President, first of all, thank you very much for having us and hosting this today. I've been around almost every president for the last 65 years, and I've never seen a president who loves this country as much. They all did, and they all did great works, but I've never seen a president who loves the country as much as you do. And I say thank you because I've traveled more miles than any human being before without being repetitive. And I've never seen a country like this. The freedom that exists, which is so important to all of us. And no sport can change. The world can give people a chance that don't have any hope. It can give them hope. As we've seen, many people with little education have become world champions. Only in America have you got that opportunity. And the other thing is to Mr. Kennedy, who I have absolute, utmost respect for. You know my great dream now I'm finished with tournament golf. My great dream is for the youth of America. The youth of a nation are the trustees of posterity. These are the people that are going to be the future champions. And when I talk, I always talk about the importance of Fitness, it's so important. Please, can we bring it back in the school? And as Senator Kennedy has so aptly said, to eat properly. This is so important, what you put in your body. And the big thing that I wish and I pray every day, and wherever I talk and I do a lot of talking, I say to the young people, just love this country because you don't realize what's going on around the world. Even the students of the great universities of America realize, really don't understand what's happening around the world today. There is a silent war taking place against America today. And what we've got to do is make these kids realize that freedom and exercise and education. Start reading some books. Yes, keep your phone, but also read some good books and listen to what Mr. Kennedy has said. What you put in your body is so important. What a wonderful job he's done. And all your cabinet members, of which I say thank you for maintaining this great word, this cherished word, freedom.
- [31:49]
Donald Trump
Thank you very much, Gary. And Gary is way ahead of his time, always. And how many masters did you play in, Gary? The record? I think 52. 52. Think of it. 52. And most of them you had to qualify after you won it. How many times did you win it?
- [32:04]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
3.
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Donald Trump
3. So when you win a 3, you get to play a little bit, but most of the time you had to qualify. But 52 matches, it's amazing. And did well in every single one of them. Pete, could I ask you to say a few words? Sure.
- [32:20]
Scott Bessent
Yes, sir.
- [32:21]
Donald Trump
You could maybe speak a little bit about a subject that they want to hear about also, if you want, but just say a few words.
- [32:28]
Scott Bessent
Absolutely, sir. Well, fitness standards, competition, that's what we're all about at the War Department. So bringing those things to education is something I remember as a kid. I mean, the Presidential Physical Fitness Award was the pinnacle event at Forest Lake Elementary School every year. And I wanted to be the best, and I wasn't. But I worked my tail off every year to try to get there.
- [32:51]
Donald Trump
Pull ups, push ups.
- [32:52]
Scott Bessent
I couldn't do the V Sit and reach. I could never beat that one. But I remember it because it was. It was something my country clearly elevated is important. We should be in shape. We should compete. And there's winners and there's losers that we need to infuse into our young people. And obviously, it takes young people to run a military. And as the Secretary pointed out, almost three fourths of American young people do not qualify for military service. And a lot of that has to do with their physical fitness. So we're proud at the War Department to put this first in into Department of War education activity. Our schools, 161 of them across 30 installations. It's going to be mandatory for the young kids of those service members who use those schools. And we hope that's a pilot for all of American education. We hope the rest of America follows. We need young, strong, healthy Americans, whether you serve in the military or any other aspect of your life. And I think this presidential fitness test, Mr. President, is a great, a perfect thing to respond store that sets those standards high for young people and something for them to achieve. The idea that competition is bad is the beginning of decline of a nation. Competition is critical to who we are and ensuring America stays on top. And speaking of staying on top, Mr. President, we are, as we talked about this morning, Project Freedom is ongoing. We're ensuring that we have control of that strait, which we do. And ultimately Iran has a choice to make and they know we're in the strong position. We hope they make a wise choice. And nobody better to make that deal,
- [34:17]
Donald Trump
Mr. President, than you. Thank you very much.
- [34:19]
Gary Player
Thanks.
- [34:20]
Donald Trump
You're doing a great job. A man who's in a very. You talk about athletes, this is a very serious athlete happens to be in charge of a little thing called housing.
- [34:31]
T.J. Oshie
Thank you, Mr. President, and thank you to all the great athletes and ambassadors that are here and to the kids that are here. You know that word competition? I made a living competing, you know, and being in the top physical fitness that I could be and playing in the National Football League. And one thing I want to remind the kids, and really our country is competition brings out the best in us, be it in sport, be it in business, be it in education. And you always want to be the best you can be, as Bryson said, every single day, getting better. And I'm grateful that I had an opportunity to play in the National Football League. But it taught me how to be a good teammate. It taught me how to be humble in victory and to be steadfast, you know, in defeat, as all these great athletes know. And Mr. President, thank you for just your leadership in our country, but also for this important issue of having physically healthy children and a physically healthy nation. And Bobby, thank you for reminding us of your uncle and your father of how important it is for us to be to look at the man holistically, spiritually, morally, physically, mentally. And I think America historically has been the leader in all of those areas. But we are at a critical function in our nation. And so I would encourage everyone. This transcends politics. You know, physical fitness is good for every man and woman and child in the United States of America. So, Mr. President, I'm committed to this. I've seen the benefits of it in my own personal life. My family and my cabinet colleagues are 100% behind this. And so I would encourage all the young people of America, parents, teachers, educators, to take inventory and hear what these leaders are saying about the national security of our country and make sure that we're encouraging our young people to get out, get your hands dirty, get your knees, get on the monkey bars, start running and jumping and playing together. Because if you're a good teammate, the stronger team we are, the stronger the country we are. So, thank you, sir.
- [36:31]
Donald Trump
Well, thank you. I have to just say, we have a star named Linda McMahon, and she's made a tremendous amount of money on sports. They are great athletes, in my opinion. Wwe, her great husband, what they built is incredible. They sold it for a fortune. Billions and billions of dollars. He made more than Bryce and Gary Blake, if you add it up. Could you say a few words? And she's one of our great stars. She is a phenomenal person. Go ahead.
- [37:04]
Lyndon Kennedy
Well, that intro is a hard act to follow.
- [37:05]
Donald Trump
That's true.
- [37:06]
Lyndon Kennedy
But I think what we really. We've talked a lot about fitness, and I think that's incredibly important because that's what all this is about. But, you know, the great set of axiom, sound mind and a sound body. So as Secretary of Education, clearly I want all of our schools to be able to adopt, you know, these programs. We don't control curriculum for the Department of Education. But I sincerely hope the emphasis that is being refocused on kids and being fit and being able to compete. That's what you've said, Pete. All of us are saying the same thing. But let's not forget, it's also a sound mind in a sound body. In order to have a sound mind, you do have to eat well, you do have to exercise, you do have to train, and you do have to be fit to do that. And if we all are, we are the best of who we can be. So I encourage all of you to enjoy playing and competing and being good sports, you know, while you're doing. But don't forget, you're studying all of your academics, because it is all part of the total package.
- [38:08]
Donald Trump
Thank you, Lyndon. Great job. Appreciate it. So we have a couple of other guys, if you guys wanted to say anything or we'll just take some questions. And if you'd like you could ask the big guy, how fast did he throw it? He threw it very fast. It was very scary. Scary. You want to say something? I guess I'll just reiterate the. Thanks, Mr. President. Thank you, the cabinet members, for this opportunity to be here. Thank you, Bryson, to allow me to be in this elite company of people. It's pleasure to meet all you guys.
- [38:36]
Bryson DeChambeau
Let me look at you. You're an embodiment of the physical.
- [38:40]
Donald Trump
Serious. He is seriously a good physical. And coach, you've done great in Florida. Thank you very much.
- [38:46]
Todd Golden
No incredible honor to be here. This is something that I'm passionate about, and I think it's imperative that we're doing this for our youth right now through experience. My wife and I have two young kids, 9 and 7. They're very active, very athletic, but I can see some of their classmates and some of their teammates, you know, staring at screens all day. And again, as I said, it's really important that we do this now. And not only will. I think this will improve the overall physical health of our young people, but I think it'll also help the mental health of our young people as well.
- [39:15]
Donald Trump
And just in case you don't know, he is a coach who just came to a team and just took it right from the beginning. Just unbelievable job you've done.
- [39:23]
Todd Golden
Thank you very much.
- [39:23]
Donald Trump
You're a very rich guy. I want to represent. He comes in, just congratulations. Who's going to win in hockey?
- [39:36]
Todd Golden
This is tough when Colorado is a favorite.
- [39:38]
Donald Trump
I like Minnesota, though. All right, we're going to watch. Okay, you're going to watch. Great job. Thank you. Great job you've done. Thank you. And we're going to go outside. Did you want to ask a few questions of any of the people here, please? Can I ask you about Iran, Mr. President? Yes. They've fired at U.S. ships several times in the last 24 hours. What do they need to do to violate the ceasefire? Well, you'll find out, because I'll let you know. They know what to do and they know what to do. They know what not to do, more importantly, actually. And, you know, they fired them in little boats with pea shooters. You know, the pea shooters. Little boat with a little. You know why? Because they don't have any boats anymore. Their navy is comprised of. They call them little boats.
- [40:23]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
Right.
- [40:25]
Donald Trump
And they're fast. Yeah, they're so fast that they had eight of them, and they're all gone. And they're fast, but they're not fast like a missile. A missile is Slightly faster. They're all gone. So they're looking around for little boats to try and compete with our great navy. We have a navy that's unbelievable. You know, we set up a blockade, as you know very well. Not one ship, A couple tried, and they got their engine shot out. You remember, I think it was one of them. It was a great display. A ship wanted to go through, break the blockade. They were warned not to. And then they were warned again by a young Annapolis captain of the ship with a great look. Central casting. These people are central casting, I'll tell you. And he said, don't do it. Then he said, evacuate your engine room with this unbelievable loudspeaker that goes over water. He said, you have 10 seconds. And then from four miles, with one bullet, it went right into the engine. And, Gary, the ship stopped very quickly. They hit the engine with one shot. It wasn't a missile. They don't want to waste a missile on it. It's too easy. And we had Another one in 2000, one of the biggest ships in the world. They were warned. And he said, go back now. Go back right now. You will be shot at within 10 seconds. Yes, yes, I am going back to Iran. I am going back. And that was the end of that, right? He went. It took him 10 miles to. The ship was so big. But they respect us. They didn't used to respect us, but they respect us more than we've ever been respected. Our country now is the hottest country anywhere in the world. We had a country that was dead when we had that group of people that ran this country with their open borders, letting anybody come in from the Congo, from countries all over the world. They came in from prisons and mental institutions. We had a country that would have been a deadhead if they won the election. This country would have been a dead country. Now we have the hottest country anywhere in the world. Go ahead. Thank you, Mr. President.
- [42:35]
Scott Bessent
You said recently that if Iranians were
- [42:38]
Donald Trump
armed, they could take over their regime.
- [42:40]
Lyndon Kennedy
Do you plan to arm them soon?
- [42:42]
Donald Trump
Well, I don't want to say that, but, yeah. I mean, people say, why aren't they protesting? They want to protest, but they don't have any guns. So you could have 200,000 people protesting and have five or six sick people with guns, and when they start shooting them right between the eyes and you see a guy fall and another one fall and you have no guns, Very few people would be able to stand there and do it. I mean, I understand. I tell them not to. Don't Forget, they killed 42,000 people last month, 42,000 unarmed protesters. And they had no guns. So they had 250,000 people crowd. And they had snipers. They had, like, four or five snipers in buildings up high. And you're standing there, and all of a sudden the guy on your left goes down and somebody. That's what happened with a woman Protest. They had 200,000 women protesting a year ago, and everyone thought that was the end of Iran. And then all of a sudden, a woman dropped dead with a bullet right there. Always right there. Then another woman dropped. And then the word started to spread, and then there was panic, and then they ran and, you know, so I don't want that to happen. We don't need that. You know, we don't need it. But the only reason that they want to protest so badly, but they don't have weapons. Yeah.
- [44:02]
Scott Bessent
Thank you, Mr. President, next week, you have a very important meeting with President Xi in Beijing. Secretary Bessement has said that a top priority on the agenda will be Iran. What do you hope to achieve with President Xi as it relates to Iran?
- [44:17]
Donald Trump
Well, I have a very good relationship with President Xi. You know, I find him to be a tremendous guy, and we get along well, and you see how we do. We're doing a lot of business with China and making a lot of money. We're making a lot of money. It's different than it used to be. But I'll be talking about. That'll be one subject. But he's been very nice about this. You know, in all fairness, he gets, like, 60% of his oil from hormones. And he's been. I think he's been very respectful. We haven't been challenged by China. They don't challenge us. And he wouldn't do that. I don't think he'd do that because of me. But I think he's been very respectful. And we've offered, you know, if he wants to send the ships to the United States. I think one of the big things that's happened is I made a statement. Send you. Send your ships to Texas. It's not that much further. Send your ships to Louisiana. Send your ships to Alaska. Alaska is actually very close to a lot of the Asian countries. People don't realize it. You know, Japan is back and forth. It's like. It doesn't seem it, but it's a very short route. Two days shorter than almost any other route. We're making tremendous big deals with South Korea and with Japan. But I said, send your ships. All of a sudden, I Don't know if you saw the graph today. This is Space Force, which I created. Space Force has. They just sent out some photos of the ships that are lined up all the way down the ocean like, like it's a highway. It looks like the Long Island Expressway for ships. And they're all heading to Texas, Louisiana. We've made up this list. And that's why when I. When I decided that I have to do this for the good of the world, not just the United States, in a way, we would have been in less trouble than a lot of other places. Certainly the Middle east would have been blown up. There wouldn't be a Middle east anymore. They would have controlled. They would have taken over the Middle East. Now, now they're trying to survive, and they won't be successful unless they make a deal. Oh, if they don't make a deal, they won't be successful. They'll go very quickly and methodically. Believe me, it'd be very easy. But we have so many alternatives. It's amazing. And nobody knew this, you know, because as an example, Japan got 90% of their oil of their. Most of their energy, but most of their oil from the hormone strain. South Korea got 43% of it. By the way, their ship was shot at. They were not in the cavalcade of ships. They had. They decided to go it alone and their ship got the hell knocked out of it yesterday. But they didn't shoot the ships that were guarded by us, I'll tell you that. We knocked down a lot of missiles. So what happens is that we have a situation where we have total control. As you know, the blockade's been amazing. It's like a piece of stuff steal. Nobody's going to challenge the blockade, and I think it's working out very well. We're going to see. I can say this. Iran wants to make a deal. What I don't like about Iran is they'll talk to me with such great respect, and then they'll go on television. They'll say, we did not speak to the President. We did not. I just spoke to. We did not speak to the president. So they play games, but let me just tell you, they want to make a deal. And who wouldn't, when your military is totally gone? We could do anything we want to them. Who wouldn't, Please. On the filibuster, Mr. President, you posted a lot about wanting to eliminate the filibuster. It hasn't happened. Are you disappointed in leading? Yeah. No, I'm disappointed. I like John a lot, but he, you know, he has a couple of Republicans that are foolish people. A couple of them alike. A couple of them I can't stand. Actually, if you want to know the truth, although I do. I am at, according to CNN, 100 approval within the Republican Party. That's almost. That's better than your record, gary. I'm at 100% approval. Did you see the CNN poll? Nobody talks about cnn. I think the people that did that poll probably got fired. But within the Republican Party, in Maga, which is basically 100% of the party, I think, but 100%, no, I think that you're going to see some very interesting things. The filibuster, if you had a. We should have the Save America Act. We should have voter identification, voter id. We should have proof of citizenship. We should have mail in voting for the military and people that need it, but not for everybody. Because anytime you have mail in voting, they're going to cheat. And they cheat like dogs, and they have to cheat. You know, in all fairness to the Democrats, when you have men and women sports, when you have open borders, when you have transgender mutilization. Don't listen to this. Kids of your children, of your children. Transgender mutilization of your children for everyone. When you have policies like that, you have to cheat. It's the only way they can win. And we shouldn't allow them to cheat. And we should terminate the filibuster because if they get the chance, they'll do it in the first hour.
- [49:20]
Scott Bessent
Back and thank you. When Iran is seeing 50% inflation, they've moved.
- [49:25]
Donald Trump
Money from the economy is crashing.
- [49:27]
Scott Bessent
Would you allow their financial system then to fail?
- [49:30]
Donald Trump
Well, I guess so. Because we're making it fail.
- [49:32]
Scott Bessent
Is that what it takes?
- [49:33]
Donald Trump
I hope it fails.
- [49:35]
Gary Player
Is that what.
- [49:35]
Donald Trump
You know why? Because I want to win. If it. Well, it's. No, it takes getting pounded on by the military, I think for more. But in addition to that, there it is failing. You know, we have sanctions on them, tremendous sanctions. Scott Bessant's done a great job. We have sanctions that nobody's ever seen before. No, they're failing. Their currency is worthless. Their inflation is probably 150%. The real number is 150%. They aren't paying their soldiers. They can't pay their soldiers. The money is worthless. No, it's. They should do the smart thing. You know, they should do the smart thing. And. Because we don't want to go in and kill people. Really don't. I don't want to. I don't want. It's Too tough. Great people. I know the people. I have so many Iranian friends from New York and from other places over the years. They're great people. I don't want to. I don't want to kill them.
- [50:29]
Scott Bessent
Gas prices in the United States. Gas prices in the United States are $1.48 a gallon.
- [50:39]
Donald Trump
You said they would come back down. They'll drop lower than they were.
- [50:43]
Scott Bessent
Will Project Freedom or Scratch ships to make that happen?
- [50:46]
Donald Trump
Well, it will because. So people don't realize. Some of These tankers hold 2 million barrels. One of them holds four. I think it's the largest one in the world. That sucker is big. I've never seen anything like it. A ship. It's bigger than aircraft carriers. And, yeah, it has a big impact. It's so much. You know, there are like 400 ships in there. 400. That in itself. Now, the best is when it ends. It just neutralizes. But what's happening is people are learning to buy oil from the United States. I mean, they're making the trip and they have safer. Probably it's a better product, too, by the way. But they have. They're learning to buy. They're changing their habits. So when I did this, I thought the market would go down 25%. And I think I thought that was a great deal if it did. If it went down 25%, I was satisfied. I said, because we cannot let these people have a nuclear weapon. They'll use it. We can't. I also thought oil would go up to 200, 250, maybe 300. And I knew it would be short term, but I thought it would go. I looked today, it's like at 102, and that's a very small price to pay for getting rid of a nuclear weapon from people that are really mentally deranged. Yeah.
- [52:06]
Scott Bessent
Just on politics.
- [52:07]
Donald Trump
The world is like, by the way, other presidents should have done this. 47 years they've been toying with these stupid people. In many cases. Stupid people. This should have been done by Obama. He went the other way. He was giving them cash. He sent planeloads. A Boeing 757, took the seats out and put green, green cash, 1.7 billion in the plane. Every bank in Virginia, D.C. and Maryland was stripped of their cash. They took out all the cash from the banks, they put it into a plane, a Boeing 757 packed with cash, and they flew it to Iran. And they let these guys just. I don't know what the hell they did with it, but they took it and then gave them billions and billions of dollars and bribed him basically to be friends. And after giving him tens of billions of dollars, they screwed Obama. Okay, that's not the way we play. No, we do it the old fashioned way. And they should wave. They're very proud. Maybe you won't see a white flag, but essentially that's already what they are. They need. They should wave the white. The flag. The white flag of surrender. In hockey they say uncle, right? When are they gonna. When are they gonna cry uncle? But, but. And they have another expression. If this were a fight, they would stop it. But, you know, we have to go out and we have to do it. And it's, it's very sad. It's very sad to see. Even shooting those boats. They've got three, four guys, they got a little machine gun in front. They're shooting at one of our ships that's meant for it. It bounces. It would never even know they're being shot at. And then they take it out with an Apache helicopter. In about two seconds, they go, Apache, Apache ship, northwest 10 degrees, turns around, poom. I don't like that. You know, you lose people. All these people. It's so unnecessary. It's so unnecessary. One thing we have, we have the greatest military in the world. I built it because I built it in my first term. I didn't think I'd be using it at least so much in my second term. But we have the greatest military, the best equipment in the world. We had 111 missiles shot at one of our assets, one of the aircraft carriers, a week and a half ago, two weeks ago. Think of this. 100 sophisticated missiles shot at one of our aircraft carriers. And every single one of those missiles was shot down with no problem whatsoever. If you would have said that 10 years ago, five years ago, it would have been an impossibility. You would have had to take those shots. Every single missile was laying in the water far away. I mean, not even. They weren't even upset. And they're the coolest people if you ever see them. You know, Pete, when they do the missile. When they do, right, they say, missile coming, missile coming. And these guys, it's like, almost like they're very smart. These are extremely smart people. They go to very good schools. But they shot down. Who would think they're getting. They're like a needle in a haystack. 111 missiles shot. 111 missiles were knocked down into the water. Didn't even get close to the aircraft carrier. No, there's. Nobody has a military like this. Okay, a couple of more and then I want to go out and watch these great athletes. I'm not talking about him and him and him. I'm talking about these kids because I think you're going to be far better as an athlete than anybody behind you. Okay. Do you agree? I think you're going to be a better athlete. What sport do you play? I play football. Oh, there you go. Do you think. Do you think you're gonna be better than him? You'll be faster. You're gonna be so much faster than him. He's gonna be like lightning. He was known for his speed, by the way. I don't know. I think pretty good. What sport do you play? I don't play sport because my mom didn't sign me up. But I. But I'm trying to play gymnastics. Gymnastics. That's a good sport.
- [56:25]
T.J. Oshie
It's a great sport.
- [56:26]
Donald Trump
What do you play? I do dance, but I also do volleyball. Nice and tall. Volleyball player.
- [56:33]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
Amazing.
- [56:33]
Donald Trump
What about you? Look at this guy's a big guy. Me, I'm. I'm doing football right now. And next year I'm going to be trying to do powerlifting. Oh, whoa.
- [56:41]
Bryson DeChambeau
All right, let's go.
- [56:42]
Donald Trump
Wow, that's awesome. And you'll never compete against women in powerlifting. Did you see that? They had a man powerlifter and he decided to go the opposite direction. Took a record, stood for 18 years. He beat it by 119 pounds. Okay. They put a little quarter of an ounce. Quarter of an ounce. For 18 years it stood. This guy came. He was a failed power lifter, but he went on the other side and he decided that he wanted to go into women's sports. And he broke the record by 118 pounds. Think that's fair? So I don't think we'll have to worry about you. Yes, sir. You're going to do good. Are you a strong person? Yes. Good. You think you can take me in a fight? That would be embarrassing. How do you. What sport do you play? I play volleyball and in the summer I'm trying to get into soccer.
- [57:40]
Pete Hegseth
This is the war room. We are going to continue, obviously to the end of the hour with the president. He's going to take some more questions. The Charlie Kirk show is next. We're back at five. Five to seven tonight we've got Peter Navarro.
- [57:54]
Donald Trump
Just look at it.
- [57:54]
Pete Hegseth
Alex Degrasse, hopefully. Caroline Ren. Get your all up and redistricting from the White House. Current economic update. We'll see you back here at 5.
- [58:01]
Donald Trump
You know that guy, you know that guy? Do you think you could be as good as him someday? Not easy. Better. Won't be better.
- [58:11]
Gary Player
This young man today, of all the young men I met, he had the best manners possible. He was a smile. I said, how are you? He looked me in the eye, he said, fine. Thank you, sir.
- [58:24]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
How are you?
- [58:25]
Donald Trump
Not just good. Are you a good golfer?
- [58:29]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
Yes.
- [58:30]
Donald Trump
So what's your handicap? Do you have a handicap here? So this man is 90 years old. Do you think you could beat him? I'm betting on Gary. I'm betting on you Will. You will, you will. Hey, you know what else? And he doesn't show up. That's a big, you know, a lot of guys can play, but the flag goes up and bad things, bad things happen. And I think being in good shape helps you in that respect.
- [58:54]
Gary Player
You see, if it wasn't a cherished table, this is very historic. I could get on this table and do 50 push ups like that. Most people can't do that even when they're going in the army. Right. So you've got to keep in shape.
- [59:06]
Donald Trump
Yes, sir.
- [59:06]
Gary Player
And you tell everybody how you love this country.
- [59:09]
Donald Trump
Yes.
- [59:09]
Bobby Kennedy Jr.
Okay, good.
- [59:11]
Donald Trump
Good. Way to end. So we're going to go out, we're going to say hello to the athletes. We have young and great athletes. We also have some big superstars out there waiting for us. And thank you very much and Bryson, thank you very much. You really took this and brought it to a level. It's true. Biden and President Obama decided that it wasn't important and they're so wrong. Thank you very much, everybody. Me. Thank you, everybody.