report 16 - more quotes from oval Q&A

Some quotes from the mini-press conference. Please check video/audio accuracy.

Q: CJ Roberts said that tariffs are taxes paid by Americans, but you say they come in from other countries.

A: (He did not directly answer the specific question.) “I think that they might be paying something, but when you take the overall impact, the Americans are gaining tremendously. They're gaining through national security. Look, I'm ending war because of these tariffs Americans would have to fight in some of these wars. They're gaining in national security. They're gaining in economics. They're gaining in so many different ways. And they're gaining in self-respect for our own country. Other countries used to laugh at us.”

Q: Thank you for saving viewers lives with cheaper weight loss drugs, and Walmart announced a cheaper Thanksgiving dinner than under Biden you’re getting gas close to $2 gallon.

A: “Thank you very much.”

He then answered at length about the Walmart dinner and then said Democrats lied about “affordability.”

“And we are the affordability when we are the ones that have done a great job at affordability, not the Democrats. And yet, we just lost a couple of elections. Very Democrat areas maybe won't be full. They weren't very Democrat when I ran a year ago, because I did one of those areas, but we just lost an election. They said, based on affordability, it's a con job by the Democrats. The Democrats are only good at con and cheating on elections.”

Q: What actions will you take against Mamdani in NYC, whom you called a communist?

“I think you have to look, if he is a communist, you know, there's not going to be a lot of activity. So you wouldn't need bridges and tunnels and all the different things that were being planned for New York, I think. And look, I hope, I hope, New York does well. That's all I can say. I love New York. I grew up in New York. I did well in New York. Always did well. And I hope New York goes well.”

Q: Is it safe to fly given the reductions in flights because of ATC staffing shortages?

“Fair question, as Sean Duffy has a cutting in certain areas 10% and they want to make sure it's 100% safe.”

Q: Is it time for Republicans to make some concessions to end shutdown?

“Well, I think it's time for them to end the filibuster and just put everybody back to work. Vote in voter ID, vote in no mail in voting, except for military, far away military and people that are very sick. No, I'd like to see one day voting. I'd like to see not 65 days of voting from all over the place. No, I'd like to clean up the elections the border. We've done a great job. We have a great, strong border. Now, I'd like to see new rules on immigration that can be fair and good, you know, rules that they're never going to get. There's so many things we could put in, including tax cuts that we could get, and we could do it all ourselves. But you to do that, you have to end the filibuster. The filibuster is and they'll do it too. They'll immediately do it. You know, they're going to what they're going to do is, what the Democrats will do is they're going to make Puerto Rico a state, they're going to make dc a state. They're going to back the court. They're going to end up with more

electoral votes. They're going to end up with four senators because of the two states. And they're going to do this 100% they would have done it, except Manchin and Sinema got in their way. They would have done it. So if they're going to do it, I would do it. I would do it before them. And you think, the longer this, the longer like Israel, Israel attacked first that That attack was very, very powerful. I was very much in charge of that. When Israel attacked Iran first, it was, it was a great day for Israel, because that attack did more damage than the rest of them put together. What I'd like to see is, I'd like to see voter ID. I'd like to who wouldn't approve voter ID? The Democrats. Why wouldn't they approve it? Because they cheat. There's only one reason not we don't have voter identification, and we should have, if we got rid of the filibuster, and one day they'd have voter identification. The only reason they don't want is because they cheat.”

Q: What is your view on extending increased ACA tax credits?

“We're looking at all of that right now. We're looking at all there are a lot of great ideas out there, including for health care, because Obamacare is a disaster. The Obamacare premium is going to go up 17 or 18% and that's not my fault. I didn't want Obamacare. That's the fault of the people that put it and the Democrats and now they want to subsidize further. But you know, where you take it from them? You take it from a lot of other people. We could have much better health care, much better health care at a much lower price.”

Despite numerous attempts by your pooler, the president declined to take a question about grocery prices.

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S.V. Dáte

White House correspondent

HuffPost

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