Transcript - Interview: Chris Berg of KVLY Fargo, ND Interviews Donald Trump - September 7, 2018 | Factba.se

Chris Berg

00:00:00 - 00:00:20 (20 sec)

Mr. President, welcome back to North Dakota. Thank you for being here Sir. Congratulations on the job numbers. Wages going up. I want to start with President Barack Obama speaking in Illinois today about the midterms. A couple of things he said and get your reaction to them. One he said the crazy things coming out of the White House. Two, he suggested that you're using fear to divide American in order to hold power. Your reaction is what?

Donald Trump

00:00:20 - 00:00:38 (18 sec)

Well I sort of watched that speech and I must tell you I sort of I dozed off. I dozed off watching him. I've always sort of dozed off watching him. He's trying to make a comeback because the Democrats are really in shambles. They've gone so far left that I think even he can't handle it. We are so proud of the economy; the economy was going down.

Donald Trump

00:00:38 - 00:00:56 (19 sec)

Had the Democrats gotten in instead of being up four point two, I think you would have been down four point two. That's how bad it was going. You understand that Chris, it was going totally in the wrong direction. The White House is really doing a great job. We are a, I said last night jokingly, but meaning it, we are a well oiled machine.

Donald Trump

00:00:56 - 00:01:13 (16 sec)

You look at what we're doing on trade. You look at what we're doing for the economy. You look at now even North Korea came out with a very big statement yesterday. You saw that and about President Trump that it was a real positive. The last days of Obama a lot of people thought we'd be in a war with North Korea.

Donald Trump

00:01:13 - 00:01:35 (22 sec)

You look at what we're doing against terrorism and, of course, the big tax cuts, and regulation. So many of your people I just saw some of your business leaders. They were just telling me, all from all over North Dakota. They're saying that their businesses are doubling and tripling because of what we've done in regulation, which I think is just as important as the tax cuts... and the tax cuts.

Donald Trump

00:01:35 - 00:01:41 (7 sec)

So we've set something that really is going to be in motion for a long time, unless it gets disturbed by a foolish election.

Chris Berg

00:01:41 - 00:02:04 (22 sec)

I get your reaction to this as well. I know you took a lot of pride in the unemployment numbers that you've created. Since 1970, we've had nine times -- nine months --unemployment below 4 percent for those on your watch. Today Barack Obama said that well, let me remind you the unemployment numbers have been like this since 2015 and 2016. Essentially saying, "Hey don't give President Trump the credit. Remember what I did." Your reaction?

Donald Trump

00:02:04 - 00:02:27 (24 sec)

Well, they weren't like this. And also he was going from a much lower base I took over. If you look at him from the Great Depression forward, he had the worst improvement of anybody -- percentage wise -- of any president in modern day history. It was not much of a rally. And we have a major rally going on right now, in terms of jobs, in terms of... I think even in terms of world recognition, going beyond anything else.

Donald Trump

00:02:27 - 00:02:45 (18 sec)

The world respects our country now. They didn't respect our country when he was running it. They were laughing at our country. We're making great trade deals now and we're making fair trade deals, but we're making them good for us. And we didn't have that. If you looked at NAFTA, Mexico was taking out a hundred billion dollars a year.

Donald Trump

00:02:45 - 00:03:12 (26 sec)

Canada was taking out 58 billion dollars a year, at least, by the way, at least. Now we're making the deals fair. All over the world we're with China and that's going to work out very well for us. We're with the European Union. That's going to work out very well. If you look at your farmers, you look at your people sending things into the European Union, or sending them into China, you couldn't get them in. We're going to clear up those problems.

Donald Trump

00:03:12 - 00:03:31 (20 sec)

So we had a four point two. It was lifted up to four point two. It was adjusted upwardly as you saw last week. And that's now... it was from four point one -- they lifted it up four point two. I think next quarter is going to be fantastic. And you're right no matter where I go people are thanking me. A lot of the people here -- I just arrived and they're saying thank you for saving our country.

Donald Trump

00:03:31 - 00:04:00 (28 sec)

Thank you. They really mean it too. I mean I had a man come up to me, who's a strong tough guy and he had tears coming down his eyes. And he said, "Thank you Mr. President for saving our country." People mean it. And I understand exactly what they say, because we were going in the wrong direction. And all you have to do is look at these Democrats running for office with open borders and we're going to pay for everybody's education, meaning from other countries they are going to walk in -- illegal immigrants -- education, health care.

Donald Trump

00:04:00 - 00:04:04 (4 sec)

We have a country. We have to be able to afford it. We have to be able to take care of our own people.

Chris Berg

00:04:04 - 00:04:13 (10 sec)

Last question about President Obama, Sir. He also said that you should stop politicizing the Justice Department. Here's my question for you. I'm assuming you've seen these FISA warrants. Have you?

Donald Trump

00:04:13 - 00:04:15 (2 sec)

I have not seen them. No I have not.

Chris Berg

00:04:15 - 00:04:19 (4 sec)

So I'm assuming you've seen some confidential classified information.

Donald Trump

00:04:19 - 00:04:20 (1 sec)

But what I have seen...

Chris Berg

00:04:20 - 00:04:25 (5 sec)

Can you can you say that Barack Obama did -- did he politicize the Justice Department against your campaign?

Donald Trump

00:04:25 - 00:04:44 (19 sec)

Oh I think so. I think absolutely. And I think his whole group is a disgrace. What they did to my campaign. And I can tell you this all you have to do. You don't have to see anything. All you have to do is watch fair news -- fair news -- not fake news and you'll see what's going on. And look what's actually now starting to go down in my opinion.

Donald Trump

00:04:44 - 00:05:06 (22 sec)

They're finally starting to go down. What they did with respect to my campaign is a disgrace. And what they did with respect to Hillary Clinton, where they gave her a pass on everything, that was so serious. The things that they did when you...when you get rid of 33,000 e-mails. When you do the kind of things that they were doing and that campaign.

Donald Trump

00:05:06 - 00:05:24 (18 sec)

Also probably, you could include Bernie Sanders in that whole thing. But when they did to me -- whether it's surveillance or a much stronger term -- because I believe it was a much stronger term --than that and a lot of other people do. Nobody politicized the Justice Department more than Barack Obama.

Chris Berg

00:05:24 - 00:05:33 (9 sec)

Strong statement. Also breaking news on Air Force One you said hey Attorney General Jeff Sessions should investigate who wrote this anonymous Op-ed to The New York Times?

Donald Trump

00:05:33 - 00:05:33 (1 sec)

I think he should.

Chris Berg

00:05:33 - 00:05:36 (3 sec)

If he doesn't investigate it. Will you fire Jeff Sessions finally?

Donald Trump

00:05:36 - 00:05:52 (15 sec)

We're going to look and see what happens. I think it's a national security matter. They should look at it. They should look at it very strongly and we should find out who it is. Because why should we live with somebody in the White House, who is really subversive in a sense. I mean if you look at it, it really is subversive.

Donald Trump

00:05:52 - 00:06:07 (16 sec)

So we'll take a look at that and we'll take a very good strong look. We'll find out. Eventually we're going to find the person. Now I can say at a high level, it's not going to be. You're not going to find it. In fact all of our top people have come out with letters saying this is disgraceful and, you know, it would be really hard for them to do that.

Donald Trump

00:06:07 - 00:06:12 (5 sec)

And then all of a sudden it's found out that it's them. So we're going to find out who it is.

Chris Berg

00:06:12 - 00:06:17 (5 sec)

So you won the presidency on your gut. You've talked about how you've got great gut instincts.

Donald Trump

00:06:17 - 00:06:20 (2 sec)

No I don't talk about that but other people do.

Chris Berg

00:06:20 - 00:06:21 (2 sec)

I think we can agree you've got great gut instincts.

Donald Trump

00:06:21 - 00:06:24 (3 sec)

Well I guess I do. But hey, I won the presidency.

Chris Berg

00:06:24 - 00:06:31 (7 sec)

So what I want to know is when you first saw this New York Times piece, in your gut, Who's the first person that came to your head that wrote it?

Donald Trump

00:06:31 - 00:06:51 (20 sec)

Well I could think of four or five. Mostly people that either I don't like or respect, but they're there because in some cases they have to be governmentally, meaning they're protected. You know, we have a lot of people that are protected. And a lot of people call those people bad names. But I thought of two or three or four people, people that I have no idea...

Chris Berg

00:06:51 - 00:06:52 (1 sec)

Do you want to name them?

Donald Trump

00:06:52 - 00:07:13 (21 sec)

No, I don't want to name them, but we'll see. Sometimes those people turn out to be the opposite. You know you think maybe they could be the one they turn out to be extremely straight. But the fact is that we'll find this person. You don't want to have that going on. I will say that whole issue is reverberating in the opposite direction.

Donald Trump

00:07:13 - 00:07:33 (21 sec)

People think it's disgusting that the New York Times would do that. They think it's absolutely disgusting that they would do such a thing, because unless you know who it is, you can't ..it's a one way street. They can say something about you. Now when we find out that this is a failed person, in so many different ways -- that you know -- you can fight it back very easily, like the book.

Donald Trump

00:07:33 - 00:07:55 (22 sec)

It's a discredited book already. Everybody came out -- almost everybody -- came out where there are quotes like General Kelly, General Mattis, so many different people they came out. And they really hit the book hard, because they didn't say the things that it was attributed. But when you have somebody where it is anonymous and you take a look at what's going on that's a really unfair situation.

Donald Trump

00:07:55 - 00:08:06 (11 sec)

So we'll figure it out eventually it's going to come out. I would hope that you and your all of your brilliant reporters all over the country and, maybe the world, will figure it out probably before I do.

Chris Berg

00:08:06 - 00:08:20 (14 sec)

All I can say the people here in the heartland are upset, because we feel like we're having the will of the people thwarted and your agenda thwarted. One more question sir. I know Representative Meadows and Representative Jordan are calling on you to release these FISA documents. Are you going to do that?

Chris Berg

00:08:20 - 00:08:20 (1 sec)

And if so when?

Donald Trump

00:08:20 - 00:08:35 (15 sec)

The answer is, first of all I have a lot of respect for those guys, and we're looking at it right now. I've just given it to the lawyers, and we're looking at it very strongly, and we might very well do it, because we have to get to the bottom of all of this corruption from the past administration. That was corruption.

Chris Berg

00:08:35 - 00:08:44 (9 sec)

Two questions sir. One, in March you tweeted out trade wars are good and they're easy to win. Right now our farmers... it's not good for them, and it's not easy for them.

Donald Trump

00:08:44 - 00:09:04 (20 sec)

Well, it's not bad for them, because if you look at, as an example soybeans, they dropped 50 percent five years before my election, they came down 50 percent, and now they're about the same as, what I was talking about when we came out with tariffs. We have to open up other countries like China, they take advantage of us, and Canada they take advantage of us, and many places take advantage.

Donald Trump

00:09:04 - 00:09:21 (17 sec)

So we're not going to let people take advantage. The farmers are great. They're on my side. They voted for me. They have trust in me, they have faith in me. I will follow through. Just give me a little time, a little time and if you push it too hard, we won't be able to make the right deal. But Canada's in the White House right now, they're negotiating.

Donald Trump

00:09:21 - 00:09:36 (15 sec)

Remember, we're the bank that everybody wants to rob, and in this case, it's other countries, but we're the bank that they all want to rob, and I don't want them to rob, and I want my farmers to have open markets, so they can sell their product in those open market.

Chris Berg

00:09:36 - 00:09:39 (4 sec)

Last question sir. You broke a record here today raising over a million dollars...

Donald Trump

00:09:39 - 00:09:40 (0 sec)

Chris Berg

00:09:40 - 00:09:52 (12 sec)

...in one day for this campaign. There's people out there -- and you and I both know, it's those independent, undecided voters are going to win this race for one of these U.S. Senate candidates. For the people on the fence, why should they vote for Kevin Cramer over Senator Heidi Heitkamp?

Donald Trump

00:09:52 - 00:10:11 (19 sec)

I'll just tell you that Heidi, who I've gotten to know a little bit, will always vote for Schumer and Pelosi. It's very simple. That's not our agenda. That's not the people of North Dakota. That is not the agenda that we want to hear about. That's open borders, that's crime coming in. That's, you know, giving money to everybody that doesn't deserve the money.

Donald Trump

00:10:11 - 00:10:31 (20 sec)

That's so many different things that the people of North Dakota don't want. Kevin Cramer is a winner. They know him. He's been representing you for a long time. He's got a substantial lead, because everybody loves him. He's a very special guy, and he loves this state, and he loves the people. And he's going to be voting for Second Amendment things, he's going to be voting for the things that we need, including judges.

Donald Trump

00:10:31 - 00:10:52 (20 sec)

Right now, we have a great judge. Now Heidi may vote for it because she's going to be forced to vote for it. But I'll guarantee you, if we were losing, she wouldn't vote. She'll only vote if we're going to win, if we don't need her. But Kevin will vote for what's right, and Kevin is going to vote for what's right, also for the people of North Dakota.

Donald Trump

00:10:52 - 00:10:55 (3 sec)

So you have an incredible candidate he's going to be one of the great senators.

Chris Berg

00:10:55 - 00:10:57 (2 sec)

Mr. President thank you for being here.

Donald Trump

00:10:57 - 00:10:57 (0 sec)

Chris Berg

00:10:57 - 00:10:58 (1 sec)

God bless you sir. We are praying for you.

Donald Trump

00:10:58 - 00:10:58 (0 sec)

Donald Trump

00:10:58 - 00:11:00 (1 sec)

Thank you very much.