Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck sat down with President Donald Trump Wednesday for an exclusive look at the first 100 days of his return to office — the first such presidential return after a loss in more than 130 years. They touched on a range of topics, including Mexico’s rocky status as a failed narco-state, the potential need for military intervention, the onslaught of executive orders, the ongoing battles in the courts, and, of course, the unsteady, barbed status of Ukraine war negotiations. The interview has been edited for clarity.
“Mr. President, your first 100 days,” Beck began, holding up a thick stack of executive orders. “This is the first 89 days.”
“Yeah,” Trump grinned. “We work hard.”
Glenn Beck: So, I remember when I was at Fox [during President] Barack Obama. … It was shock and awe. We couldn’t keep up with it; it was going too fast. You have put that to shame. Blew them all away. Blew them all away. Was that by design?
Donald Trump: No, there were just so many things that the country needed. I mean, honestly, this country? What [the Biden administration] did in four years was so disastrous for the country. I wish I didn’t have to do so much! But they did things that were just horrible.
With energy: They terminated [the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge], which is the biggest [oil] find in the world, in the whole world, in Alaska. They terminated it.
‘I don’t have to negotiate. I don’t have to negotiate. I’m talking to people out of respect, but I don’t have to.’
They did things on the border that are shocking, just absolutely shocking. You know, we have the best border we’ve ever had now, and three months ago it was the worst border in history — probably for any country, not just here.
There was no border! There’s never been a border like that, where prisons and gangs and drug dealers and murderers are allowed to walk in without being checked or vetted. So it wasn’t by design. It was just that they have so many things. I mean, we’re doing a lot more. There [is] a lot more to come.
GB: I want to get into this a little later, but this seems appropriate to bring it up here. Where the hell is Congress? Where are the Republicans?
DT: Well, I think they’re working hard. I think you’re going to see that if we pass the — as I go — the big, beautiful bill. You know, we’re talking about one bill. As you remember, it was a debate on: Should we do one big one, or should we do three or four? Or two? And we’re doing it in one bill, which I thought was much more beautiful, because it’s everything — it’s everything. It’s tax cuts, it’s regulation cuts, it’s things that you wouldn’t believe. … It’s big, and we get that done. It’s beautiful, and we are getting along very well.
I will tell you: The Republicans? We had a majority a few months ago of one in the House [of Representatives]. Now we have seven. That’s a lot. We won two races and picked up a couple of others, in addition. But we’re up to seven. That’s a big difference.
GB: Will all your work go away, however, if they don’t codify?
DT: So we’re going to codify, and we’re going to wait till after the bill is passed, and then we’re going to work on nothing but codifying. As an example, the other day I did shower heads and sinks. Isn’t it nice? You go into a new building, a hotel, and no water comes out, no water comes out of the sink. All of that’s done …
And we did a little thing, very little thing, but it was a big thing to some people: straws. We are now making … plastic straws, as opposed to paper that melts in your mouth. And so many different things. It’s been really amazing. A lot of them [are] common sense.
GB: What is the one thing that you think is maybe overlooked, that you think is the most significant thing that you did?
DT: I really think we’ve done a lot … the biggest tax cuts. We had a tremendous four years.
GB: But I mean the thing that you think yourself, “Why isn’t this getting more attention? This is big!”
DT: Well, if you look at — and this is not the biggest thing, but it’s a big thing: men in women’s sports. How these people can be promoting it even now is unbelievable. The men playing in women’s sports. When you know, we put a whole thing out on that, and that’s no longer a part of our fabric, hopefully.
We have a couple of people like … the governor of Maine, who wants to play the game, and she’s going to lose an election if she runs. I don’t know if she runs. I couldn’t care less, but she was one that wanted to take it on …
… Open borders, to me, are amazing. We had open borders. We have nice, closed borders. Now, people can come into our country, but they have to come in legally. But how amazing is that when you have — because you’re asking about things that I see that are amazing — that’s amazing that you can have an open border, where prisoners from all over the world are allowed to come into a country.
We had 11,888 murderers allowed into the country. We’re taking them out as rapidly as we can. And by the way, we’re being met with strong resistance from judges that are — I don’t know where they come from.
GB: So let me go there. There are some amazing stats that I looked up. I don’t think most Americans know this. Bill Clinton turned away 12.3 million people; formally returned home 1 million. …
George W. Bush: 10.3 million people; 2 million, he turned around formally. Six injunctions.
Barack Obama: 5.5 million; 3 million, he formally turned around, and he had 12 injunctions.
You have 60, yeah. Thirty last time, 30 this time. You’re 100 days in, and you have 190 cases against you.
DT: It’s obstruction, and what they’re doing to the country is unbelievable, but we’re getting it done, and we’re winning. But it’s so much more difficult than it should be when you have a murderer that people are protecting. … You read so much about the wonderful man from Maryland, who was just wonderful, but he had on his, he had on his knuckles, tattooed, MS-13. Like we didn’t know he was MS-13? And the Democrats are working hard to protect him.
And … I don’t want to get into his reputation, but it’s not exactly stellar, and when they do that, that’s like … how they protect open borders, as I said, or so many of the other things, you know — transgender for everybody!
GB: What does it tell you that the Democrats are trying to protect him, stop you at the border, and when you shut down USAID, which a lot of their money was coming from — all the color revolution money was there and coming back here for color revolution — that they immediately respond to that, to Tesla, or to Elon?
DT: Well, they don’t want to do anything about it. When you look at the kind of money that we found, fraud, waste, abuse; when you look at billions of dollars given to people that had nothing. I mean, Stacey Abrams was given $2 billion into an environmental account where she had $100. Two billion! Now, $2 million is a lot; $200,000 is a lot, right? Giving $2 billion out of that grouping? … And that was nothing compared to some of the ones that we found, and the press doesn’t want to write about it, by the way.
GB: I hear from … my audience … every day. They’re concerned about tariffs … but they’re also concerned about justice and not seeing the wheels of justice turn. Like, Stacey Abrams, if she did something illegal, she should go to jail. Is [the Department of] Justice going to be pursuing these people in Russiagate or whatever the crimes might be?
DT: Well, I think [Attorney General] Pam Bondi is doing a fantastic job. She’s our law enforcement person who’s doing outstanding work. I really think so. I think [FBI Director] Kash [Patel] … is doing a really great job. Now, it’s very early, so I can’t really tell you, but I think a lot of the things that you’re talking about have to be looked at. They have to be looked at.
GB: Let me go back to the border here for a second. Mexico. It seems that it is a failed narco-state. Is Mexico a failed state? A narco-state?
DT: I would say, with all due respect, and I really like [Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum] a lot. I’ve gotten to know her, and I really like her. She’s an elegant, beautiful woman. But I think it’s run by the cartels, yeah, and they have so much control over it. And I think the politicians are … they’re afraid. I think the police are probably afraid. A lot of them are shot!
GB: I had a guy, an ATF agent, reach out to me, and he said, Glenn … people in our ATF actually trace the numbers. He said they keep talking about all these guns that are in the hands of cartels and how they get them across the border from America, right? All of those numbers correlate with the numbers that come from the Pentagon, from the arms that we officially ship to their military. And he said it: They’re taking the military guns and using those.
DT: Nothing surprises me. When you see the kind of drugs coming in, it comes in from China. You know, we tax them 20% because of what they’ve done with fentanyl. But it goes through Mexico, largely. And it goes through Canada too, by the way, right? A lot goes through Canada, but it comes through Mexico and Canada. But when you watch Mexico, what’s happening, it’s pretty amazing.
And we’ve shut down the border! We’ve shut it down. And I didn’t need laws passed; we just needed a new president. He said, “shut down the border”; we shut it down, and we shut it down tight. But yeah, Mexico has got some very big problems.
GB: If I were in Mexico, and I was living in a failed narco-state, and everybody I voted for was being killed, and my family was being threatened, I would try to get across the border as well. It would only make sense! But when your government won’t do anything about it, or can’t do anything about it, honestly, I would be in bed at night next to my kids, praying that special forces might just pay some people some visits in the middle of the night.
DT: And I’ve asked. I said, “Would you like some help? I’d be glad to give you help.” “No, no, no, we don’t want help.” They really don’t want help. But, “Please, please, we do not want help.”
GB: But isn’t it, at some point, doesn’t it —?
DT: Well, I can’t tell you about that, because that would be breaking news, but you know, you could say at some point maybe something’s gonna have to happen. It can’t go on the way it is.
Look, when we closed the borders, that was a big deal, and we had to fight very hard to close. That was not just as simple as I said. It happened, but there were lots of skirmishes that went on because that was a big revenue source for some people, a lot of people.
But we’re here to help Mexico, if we can. I like the president very much. I like the people, so many of their representatives, but it can’t be easy for them. Really, I think it’s a very dangerous job.
GB: The last administration — they didn’t want to check anybody’s ID or ask any questions on the way in. In the height of COVID, we don’t even check them for that. Don’t check them; bring them in! Now they all seem to want to check them on the way out. And the judges are — I think it was Sen. Mike Lee who said this is a “judicial insurrection.”
I’m not a big fan of Andrew Jackson. I know you are. Andrew Jackson took care of this constitutionally, right? Would you consider taking care of this some way or another with the judges in a constitutional way?
DT: I hope we don’t have that problem, and I hope we don’t have to get into it, but I will say we have millions of people in this country right now that are criminals, and you see how fast we’re getting them out, and we’re going to get them out even faster.
But when you have to get out and do court cases for individual people, and you would have, in theory, millions of court cases, you know what that means? If you had one court case, it takes forever. Millions of court cases? They’re really saying you’re not allowed to do what I was elected to do? I was elected, for a very big part of it, [to address] the border and get people out, because I said — and the stats reveal it — when you look at Tren de Aragua, when you look at MS-13, when you look at these gangs and just really bad criminals coming in.
You know, we have many murderers — 50% of them killed more than one person. They put them into our country through open borders, and now we have to go to court to get them out. I don’t think the people of our country are going to stand for it.
GB: You were elected for several things, one of which was to reduce the size of the government. And thank you for the Department of Education. Thank you for USAID. Thank you for the things you’re doing on that.
It was announced, I think, yesterday, that Elon [Musk] is possibly reducing his role — not leaving, but reducing his role in May. [The DOGE’s goal] was to cut $2 trillion. It was reduced to $150 billion. Are lawsuits [cutting that number]? Is that the deep state?
DT: Well, that’s money found, and it’s a lot of money, you know? It’s $150 billion, and think of it: That’s a lot of money. Now that’s continuing, and it will continue. You know, it’s not easy. These are thieves. In many cases, thieves. In some cases, it’s incompetence and all, but it’s also thieves. The number [of cuts] is continuing.
But if you just stopped at that number, that’s a tremendous number. We found things that you wouldn’t believe, and then there’s others that you look at, certain roles of Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, where people who don’t exist are on … a ride. That’s just building up. That number’s building up very rapidly.
GB: I think you’re going to be remembered as the AI president. I don’t know if you feel this way at all, but AI is going to define the next [generation], and you are the first one to really talk about it, really take it on, and surround yourself with people who know what this is. Has Elon been helping you at all on AI?
DT: He probably knows more than anybody else that I know about it. We have some great people here. I don’t know if that’s how I’m going to be defined, but AI is certainly very important. And we’re pressing it very hard.
We have trillions of dollars being invested, and whatever it is, it’s big, because the biggest people are coming in and companies with more money than anything else you can imagine — more than even the car plants.
But AI is one of the biggest things I’ve ever seen. You know these places that they’re building, if you said $200 million, $300 million, that’s for a corner of the building, right? These are the biggest things, and I’m making it possible, as you probably know, with AI.
The one thing is you need massive amounts of electricity, and I’m getting it for them … and I’m letting them build their electric plant. In other words, they’re becoming a producer of electricity. They can use nuclear if they want for the energy they need to create electricity,
GB: As Sen. Eric Schmitt [R-Mo.] said, we use 3% of the power. They’re going to need, by 2027, 99% of the power.
DT: They need more electricity than we have right now in our country powering everything.
GB: And you’re going to cut all of the red tape and get that built?
DT: We’re going to get it done very quickly. We’re going to let them become utilities, actually. We’re going to let them build their own electric plant. Because when they first came to me, I heard this number — that we have to double electricity.
And we’re way ahead of China right now. … Way ahead on AI, and they don’t have the problem with electricity, because, you know, that takes one person’s approval, right? We have to go through a process, and I call it a national emergency. We have to be — we’re going to be — number one. We’re going to be number one on everything. We have to be everything — we have to be, or we’re going to lose our spot.
That’s not going to happen if we have competent presidents. We will do great if we don’t have competent presidents. We just witnessed four years of the most incompetent human being anyone’s ever imagined, and it really hurt this country. But we’re bringing it back fast.
GB: You say “if we don’t have competent presidents.” You and I have talked before about tariffs, and I give you the benefit of the doubt, because you’re the best negotiator this country has ever had, probably the best the world has seen. And you’ve earned the right. It concerns me that Congress is not stepping up. Regulations and tax cuts — those things have to go through to be able to complete all of this.
DT: I think you’ll be surprised! Now, when I say Congress, [I mean] Republicans. Because we have majorities. They’re not big majorities. In the Senate, we’re up three, which is OK. And in the House, we’re up seven, as I said, and we are going to be coming forward with the biggest bill, I think, in history. And I think you will say that if we get that passed, you’re going to give them very good marks. Good, because everything’s in that, OK? And then all we have to do is work the bill; work the magic.
But it’ll be the biggest tax cut in history, but it’ll be the biggest regulation cuts in history. It’ll be so many other things. … We will get no votes from Democrats. It’s horrible. The divide is so incredible when you look at what’s going on. I mean, [Senate Minority Leader Chuck] Schumer [D-N.Y.] did the right thing, and he ends up being excommunicated from his party when you think about it, right? Well, the level is just so bad. Their policy is so bad.
They’re great at cheating and they’re great at certain things, but they are so bad on policy. They’re so far off when I watch them trying to prosecute the same things that they’ve just lost an election in a landslide [over], and they’re still going through the same things. It’s crazy, and they don’t know who their leaders are. They have a new one, [Rep. Jasmine] Crockett [D-Texas]. Have you ever seen her talk? This is going to be their leader!
GB: Oh, I hope she’s the next candidate for president.
DT: We can hope in one way. … It’s demeaning to our country. But you don’t see anybody out there [leading].
GB: This is pure conjecture here, but in trying to understand you and the moves that you made, when you called the tariff day “Liberation Day,” that hearkened to me back to the end of … World War II.
And I’m wondering, because of all of the moves you’ve made — NATO, the endless wars, everything else that goes along with this — are you signaling to the world that this is not just tariffs — this is an end to the order that we built after World War II? Because it might have been good after World War II for everybody, but we’re not the suckers any more. That’s long past. It’s time to transform.
DT: You’ve said it so well, because people don’t talk about that. Even I don’t mention it enough. We helped countries after World War II. We helped them rebuild. And the Korean War, [we rebuilt] with South Korea. And we never stopped. And they became very successful. And they stole our businesses.
Look, South Korea took our car business, our shipbuilding business — so many different businesses, technology, electronics. If you look at Japan — and I’m not knocking them, I think it’s great what we did for them. The one I’m knocking, and the people I’m knocking, are our presidents and our leaders — that we allowed all of that to happen.
GB: I was talking to somebody last night who’s around the economy and knows it quite well, and I said to them, “I’m not a fan of tariffs. I’ve talked to the president about it. However —”
DT : You might be.
GB: I might be, in the end. However, I don’t see anyone else with another option, and I feel like this is our last chance. And if you can’t get it done, if we can’t make this turn, then we’re done. And this individual reached out and put their hand on my shoulder and said, “No, Glenn, we’re done.” How serious is the situation that America is in if we don’t turn this corner?
DT: So we have one big chance to become really amazing, and that’s on me, whether we like it or not. I hate to put that weight on my shoulders, but that’s what we have, because we were ripped off by every country. I always say, friend and foe — and honestly, the friend was oftentimes worse than the foe — ripped us off on trade, ripped us off on the military too.
Hey, Glenn, when I got involved with NATO, I wasn’t a big expert in NATO, but I have a lot of common sense, and I figured it out in about two minutes: Nobody was paying. I mean, they weren’t paying their bills.
So we were defending Europe, and we were getting ripped off by Europe with trade. It was massive — no country can sustain that. We were paying most of the bill. When I say most, I mean, 80%-90%, and maybe 100%. And I got involved, and I said, “You’re going to have to pay your bills, or we’re not going to be here for you any longer.”
And they said, “Well, does he really mean that?” And they said, “You mean, if we don’t pay the bill, you’re not going to be here?”
“Nope, I’ll be gone.”
GB: Good for you.
DT: And they said, “Hmm.” The secretary general of NATO, [Jens] Stoltenberg — good guy — said he has done something that I’ve never witnessed before, because [George W.] Bush would come in, give a speech, and leave. Obama would come in, give a speech, and leave.
Joe Biden let it get out of control. But he said, “Trump came in, didn’t give a speech, made a nice speech, but he didn’t care about it. What he cared about was the fact that nobody was paying.” They weren’t paying their bills.
So we were ripped off. We were defending them, and they were killing us with the European Union, which was formed for the sole purpose of taking advantage of the United States. And I said, “This isn’t going to go on.” And so I’m not so popular in Europe because of what I’ve done, but in many ways I am popular. People don’t want to see.
GB: I think if it wasn’t for their press, which is worse than ours because most of it is state-run, I think you would be popular because the people are in the same position.
DT: They get it.
GB: Yeah, they get it. It’s happening in their country. And I don’t understand how —
DT: It is happening over there.
GB: Oh, I mean, I just read a report that they said Sweden, the Netherlands, could be out by 2030. You know, I talked to [former British Prime Minister] Liz Truss just a couple of weeks ago, and she said, “Glenn, England is a failed state.” How are the —
DT: She’s been very nice. She’s been saying good things about me. Yeah, you know, she got —
GB: The shaft.
DT: I think so. I mean, she basically said, “I want to reduce taxes.” And they threw her out. And she was right. You know, I reduced taxes. It’s one of the things that made us do so well, because we had the strongest economy in history during my first four years. You know, my first four years were incredible. I think we’re going to do even better now. But we have a chance to do something that’s monumental, and I’m in the process of doing it.
GB: But how do you negotiate with a group of elites who were for the World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset”?
DT: I don’t have to negotiate. I don’t have to negotiate. I’m talking to people out of respect, but I don’t have to.
So we’re this giant store that people want to come in and buy from. We’re the United States. We have the richest consumers, etc., right? But we’re not going to be that way for long if we don’t do something. But we’re this giant store, and they all want to come in and they want to take our product, but to take our product they’re going to have to pay, and we’ll either make a deal with them or we’ll just set a price.
Because some countries are worse than others. Some countries have ripped us off really badly, and some countries have just ripped us off a little bit, but almost all of them have ripped us off, because we’ve had really poor leadership.
We’re negotiating with 70 different countries. We’re negotiating; we’re showing great respect. But in the end, we may make deals — but either that, or I just set a price. I said, “Here’s what you’re going to pay for the privilege of servicing the United States of America.”
And they have an option. They can maybe talk to me a little bit or they cannot shop. You know, they don’t have to shop at this big store, or they can shop. But in any event, they’re going to have to pay.
Look, we owe $36 trillion for a reason. The reason is trade. Also the endless wars, the stupid wars that we fought — we go into the Middle East, we blow it up, we leave, we don’t get anything. And you, you’re a big fan of exactly what I’m saying.
GB: Let’s not do that. It doesn’t work.
DT: It’s stupid. Endless wars, endless wars that — they don’t even want us. So — all of that stuff. You know, when I left four years ago, we had no wars. We had no Israel and Hamas [war], and by the way, it would have never happened because Iran was broke. They were broke. I had sanctions that were so strong on Iran. They were totally broke. They had no money for Hamas or Hezbollah.
We didn’t have Russia-Ukraine. That would never have happened, either.
We didn’t have the Afghanistan embarrassment, one of the great embarrassments in the history of our country.
We didn’t have any inflation. Don’t forget, I charged China hundreds of billions’ worth of tariffs. They talk about inflation — we had no inflation because that doesn’t cause inflation. Stupidity causes inflation. High energy caused inflation. When they took over my energy, we were making it like nobody’s ever seen. And then the prices doubled. By the way, because of that, [Russian President Vladimir] Putin went in. … You see what’s going on with —
GB: Yeah, I do.
DT: It makes it much harder for Putin to prosecute the war. So we have a lot of great things on the horizon.
GB: One of your spokespeople came out today and said that you’re tired, getting fatigued, with [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelenskyy. I think he treated you poorly in the Oval [Office], myself. He’s kind of a punk. But is he the problem?
DT: You said it.
GB: Yeah, is he the problem? Is Putin the problem? Or is Europe the problem?
DT: So, look: Russia is a very big military force, and Ukraine isn’t. Without Ukraine — and I’m the one that supplied the Javelins [anti-tank missiles] to them, so, you know, I did a lot for them, because the tanks got stuck in the mud, and then they got Javelined, right? And they always say, “Trump gave the Javelins,” and it was, in that case, “Obama gave sheets.” He gave sheets! They said nothing.
But Biden gave money like nobody’s ever seen — $350 billion! He gave military equipment, gave storage. We had massive storage bins full of ammunition — buildings as long as the eye could see.
… But this war is so bad. And it’s — and remember this — I say it here. I say it every time. This is Biden’s war, not my war. I’m just trying to end it. And I’m actually ending it. Yes, for money, but I’m not ending it for that. Number one, I’m ending it because they’re losing 5,000 people a week. Young soldiers are being killed, Russian and Ukrainian both. But in the end, Russia has a lot of soldiers, and they have a very big military.
And things were said, like when Zelenskyy was in the Oval Office, I was talking about getting it done, and he starts screaming, “But we need security!” Meaning: security after the fact. I said, “Security? I don’t even know if we can get this deal done.” He’s asking for more, just more and more and more. And he doesn’t have the cards, as you know, because you see what’s happening over there. He doesn’t have the cards. So hopefully he’s going to get it done.
Because I don’t believe that Vladimir Putin would be doing this for anybody else but me. A lot of people have said it too. I think he had the idea of going all the way through. I think he’s willing to make a deal, and I would say thus far he’s been easier to deal with than Zelenskyy. Thus far.
GB: Mr. President, I have to tell you, I didn’t understand why gold was going up so fast until I walked into the Oval. You have transformed the Oval.
DT: It’s good. And I think I’ve transformed it — maybe more importantly — in what we’re doing with our ideas, our policies, because we had some really bad things happening to our country. And we now have a strong border; we’re now respected.
When you take a look at the money that’s pouring in through the tariffs, you’re going to see. … That would be an ambition: I’m going to make you a fan of it.
GB: I would love to be a fan.
DT: Not that I want to do, you know, tariffs.
GB: Yes.
DT: But I want to save our country. Yes, we were losing $5 billion a day. You can’t do that. It’s not sustainable. So we’ll be doing another interview in a year or two years from now, and you’re gonna say, “You know, you were right on that.” I’ve been right about a lot of things.
GB: I have been corrected by your actions before, so thank you.
DT: It’s a great honor to be with you.
GB: Always. Thank you.
DT: Thank you. Thank you very much.
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