https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/16/us/politics/donald-trump-press-conference-transcript.html?_r=0 as prepared by the Federal News Service. Excerpts.
The transcript of the press conference is available from numerous sources.
The people get it — much of the media doesn’t get it. They actually get it, but they don’t write it. Many of our nation’s reporters will not tell you the truth, and will not treat the wonderful people of our country with the respect that they deserve. Much of the media in Washington, D.C., along with New York, Los Angeles in particular, speaks not for the people, but for the special interests and for those profiting off a very, very obviously broken system. I am here to change the broken system so it serves their families and their communities well. Our administration inherited many problems across government and across the economy. To be honest, I inherited a mess. we have imposed new sanctions on the nation of Iran, who has totally taken advantage of our previous administration, and they’re the world’s top sponsor of terrorism, We really are searching for peace, but it's peace through strength. I see stories of chaos. Chaos. Yet it is the exact opposite. This administration is running like a fine-tuned machine, despite the fact that I can’t get my cabinet approved.
We’ve directed the elimination of regulations that undermine manufacturing and call for expedited approval of the permits needed for America and American infrastructure and that means plant, equipment, roads, bridges, factories. People take 10, 15, 20 years to get disapproved for a factory. They go in for a permit, it’s many, many years. And then at the end of the process — they spend 10s of millions of dollars on nonsense and at the end of the process, they get rejected. Now, they may be rejected with me but it’s going to be a quick rejection.
We’ve ordered the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice to coordinate on a plan to destroy criminal cartels coming into the United States with drugs.
We’ve ordered a crackdown on sanctuary cities that refuse to comply with federal law and that harbor criminal aliens, and we have ordered an end to the policy of catch and release on the border. No more release.
I’ve also worked to install a cabinet over the delays and obstruction of Senate Democrats.
Intel just announced that it will move ahead with a new plant in Arizona that probably was never going to move ahead with. And that will result in at least 10,000 American jobs.
People are now looking at the illegal giving out [of] classified information. How does the press get this information that’s classified?
I’ve never seen more dishonest media than frankly, the political media. I thought the financial media was much better, much more honest. They wrote about the women and me, front page, big massive story. And it was nasty they totally misrepresented those very wonderful women, They never gave us a retraction and frankly, I then went on to other things.
...Same thing with Australia. I said “that’s terrible that it was leaked” but it wasn’t that important. But then I said to myself “what happens when I’m dealing with the problem of North Korea?” What happens when I’m dealing with the problems in the Middle East? Are you folks going to be reporting all of that very, very confidential information? I watch CNN, it’s so much anger and hatred. He’s saying no. It’s OK, Jim. It’s OK, Jim, you’ll have your chance. But I watch others too. You’re not the only one so don’t feel badly.
John Podesta saying bad things about [Hillary Clinton]. I will say this, if John Podesta said that about me and he was working for me, I would have fired him so fast your head would have spun. [Leaked emails purportedly showed Donna Brazile sharing information with the Clinton campaign prior to a debate held during the Democratic primary.] He said terrible things about her. But it wasn’t classified information. If you look at the RNC, we had a very strong defensive mechanism. I don’t want to be hacked. And we did that. And you have seen that they tried to hack us and they failed. The DNC did not do that. I picked up the papers the next morning and said, oh, this is going to be front page, it wasn’t even in the papers.
Again, if I had that happen to me, it would be the biggest story in the history of publishing You know the word “tone.” The tone is such hatred. They will say, “Donald Trump rants and raves at the press.” I’m not ranting and raving. I’m just telling you. You know, you’re dishonest people. But — but I’m not ranting and raving.
I don’t want to be one of these guys that say, “Yes, here’s what we’re going to do.” I don’t have to do that. I don’t have to tell you what I’m going to do in North Korea...I’m going to do with Iran. You know why? Because they shouldn’t know. And eventually, you guys are going to get tired of asking that question.
TRUMP: Where are you from?
QUESTION: BBC.
TRUMP: Here’s another beauty.
TRUMP: Wait. Let’s see. Who’s — I want to find a friendly reporter.
QUESTION: Mr....
TRUMP: Are you a friendly reporter? Watch how friendly he is. Wait. Wait. Watch how friendly he is. Go ahead....So you should take that instead of having to get up and ask a very insulting question like that.
You go to some of these inner city places and it’s so sad when you look at the crime. You have people — and I’ve seen this, and I’ve sort of witnessed it — in fact, in two cases I have actually witnessed it. They lock themselves into apartments, petrified to even leave, in the middle of the day. They’re living in hell. We can’t let that happen. So, we’re going to be very, very strong. That’s a great question and — and it’s a — it’s a very difficult situation because it’s been many, many years. It’s been festering for many, many years. But we have places in this country that we have to fix. We have to help African American people that, for the most part, are stuck there. Hispanic American people. We have Hispanic American people that are in the inner cities and they are living in hell. I mean, you look at the numbers in Chicago. There are two Chicagos, as you know. There’s one Chicago that’s incredible, luxurious and all — and safe. There’s another Chicago that’s worse than almost any of the places in the Middle East that we talk, and that you talk about, every night on the newscasts. So, we’re going to do a lot of work on the inner cities.
I actually thought I had a meeting with Congressman Cummings and he was all excited. And then he said, well, I can’t move, it might be bad for me politically. I can’t have that meeting. I was all set to have the meeting. You know, we called him and called him. And he was all set. I spoke to him on the phone, very nice guy.
QUESTION: I hear he wanted that meeting with you as well.
TRUMP: He wanted it, but we called, called, called and can’t make a meeting with him. Every day I walk and say I would like to meet with him because I do want to solve the problem. But he probably was told by Schumer or somebody like that, some other lightweight. He was probably told — he was probably told “don’t meet with Trump. It’s bad politics.”
We had a totally divided country for eight years and long before that. In all fairness to President Obama, long before President Obama we have had a very divided — I didn’t come along and divide this country. This country was seriously divided before I got here.
It’s a great honor to be with you. Thank you. Thank you very much, thanks.
END
John E comment: What is the State of the Union speech going to be like? Whether times are good or bad, every president has a State of the Union speech and says the state of the union is strong.