FOX "Hannity"- Transcript: Trump Interview

Interview

Here with reaction, author of the brand-new book, "Crippled America: How to Make America Great Again," 2016 Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is with us. Sir, how are you?

DONALD TRUMP, R-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Hi, Sean.
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HANNITY: you know, I know we have a lot of polls out there. You're leading by 13 points in one, Carson in another by 6. I notice you're up by 20 in Florida. You're beating Hillary in Florida. You're up in Georgia by a lot, New Hampshire by a lot, South Carolina by a lot. What do you make of all this?

TRUMP: Well, I think, overall, we're just doing well. The one poll was a little bit negative, the Wall Street Journal poll, which I understand The Wall Street Journal's always negative, as far as I'm concerned. The Reuters poll I think was terrific, and I know it's very professionally done. They do an amazing job. And I would go with that poll every day.

And I think that we're up with just about every poll nationally. ABC/Washington Post was really strong. But maybe most importantly, we're up now in Iowa. The last two polls that came out, we're up in Iowa. And we had a little bit negative last week, and now we're up again in Iowa.

So I'm very happy because I went there twice last week. In New Hampshire, we're way up. I mean, in just about every -- Florida, we're way up. South Carolina, we're way, way up. I mean, that one is really up. And it's been great. You know, in Florida, if you look, I'm higher than Bush and Rubio put together.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: I only...

HANNITY: Yes. You have a 20-point lead. You're beating Hillary there. You're winning in Georgia. You're winning in South Carolina, a big lead in New Hampshire.

Let me ask you about Iowa. The GOP establishment has telegraphed what they're planning to do to you, and that's spend a lot of money in negative ads. I understand the Club for Growth has been up there with negative ads questioning your conservatism. Do you think that played a part in what happened last week with the polls for Iowa?

TRUMP: I really don't know. I mean, Club for Growth -- they came up to my office. They asked me for $1 million. I said, No, thank you. I mean, I -- you know, I want to be, like, an intelligent person. I said, No, thank you, and then they started going negative. Had I given to them, I guarantee you they would have loved me. But they came up, they asked for a million dollars, and then they go negative.

I think people are wise to it. I don't think that has an impact. But look, anybody that who hits me, we're going to hit 10 times harder. So if, as an example, Bush or Rubio or any of them come out, we're going to just - - dollar for dollar, we're going to go after them. We have more money than anybody else by a factor of about a thousand. So we'll go after them the same way.

Actually, we're going to start some ads, I think, over the next two days, and certainly, in Iowa, we're going to start ads, and in New Hampshire and I think in South Carolina, too. So we're going to start advertising a little bit because so far, I was going to have spent $25 million by this time. I've spent nothing. I feel guilty because I've spent nothing because we haven't needed it. But we're going to start spending a little bit of money over the next three or four weeks.

HANNITY: Is your strategy, Mr. Trump -- is it going to be if they hit you with ads, and they're willing to spend tens of millions of dollars -- are you saying that you will respond with at least an equal amount of money, if not more?

TRUMP: Yes, we're going to respond. And so far, they have not hit me, and I'd rather have that from the standpoint that I think it's better for them. I think it's better for me. I think it's better for everybody.

If they hit me, though, I will hit them at least as hard and maybe double and triple as hard. So we'll see. But so far, they haven't. And I think really what the Republicans have to do is speak positively, not negatively. I think the negative ads are going to hurt the Republicans much more so than it's going to hurt me. I really believe it's going to be bad for a lot of people.

HANNITY: Earlier today, you called for Jeb Bush to get out of the race. You have been particularly hard on him. Why do you think he should get out?

TRUMP: Well, I think I've been equally hard on Rubio. I think Rubio doesn't have it. If you look at his stance on immigration, he's very well. He was a member of the gang of eight, number one, and he wants essentially open borders. If you look at Rubio, he wants open borders. That's why I don't understand why he's doing as well as he's doing, which isn't that well, frankly. But he wants open borders, very weak on illegal immigration. He's totally pro-amnesty. And I think that Rubio is an overrated guy. I think I've hit him just as hard as Jeb.

Now, Jeb has just not materialized. You know, everyone thought, Oh, well, maybe he'd some day lead, but he is certainly not leading. He's dropping like a rock. And I really think that some -- I think Walker was very smart. He got out. Governor Walker got out of the race. He could have languished. He could have gone along for a long period of time, Sean, and you know, nothing would have happened. I don't think anything's going to happen positively for Jeb, and I think Rubio is overrated.

HANNITY: What about Dr. Carson? What do you make of him? He's become the person most competitive to you. What do you make of that? How do you interpret that? He's kind of soft-spoken. If anything, he's the anti-Trump. You know, you're very outspoken. You're very passionate. You fight hard. He's very soft-spoken, kind of the opposite of your personality. What do you make of his success up to this point?

TRUMP: We need a very strong, high-energy person to make new trade deals, to change things around the way this country is going. We are languishing. We are going down, Sean. I mean, I can't say it any stronger than that. We're going down. You look at what's happening, $19 trillion in debt, and all of the problems we have -- ISIS -- we can't beat ISIS. We can't win anything.

We don't win anymore. You know, we're a country that can't win anymore. We don't win anything! We don't win trade deals. We don't win militarily. We don't win any way. You look at the deal we made with Iran, where we give them $150 billion and we get nothing. We lost everything. We don't even get our prisoners back. Now they want to negotiate and they want 19 to 1. They want 19 prisoners, and maybe they'll give us some of them back. And they also announced that, We want other things besides that.

I mean, we are so laughed at throughout the world. And you can't have a low-energy person. Now, Dr. Carson is lower-energy than Jeb Bush. And I like him a lot, but he's not for dealing. He's not for making deals. The Chinese, I deal with them all the time. I have them as tenants. They buy apartments. I deal with them all the time. I made a great deal with them in the Bank of America building in San Francisco. I deal with them all the time.

They are ferocious people in terms of negotiating. They are ferocious, just like Iran, the Persians are great negotiators. We need the right people. I want to turn around the trade deals. I'm bringing in the best people in the world. I have to -- Carl Icahn and some of the greatest people in the world. We're going to turn it around.

HANNITY: You know...

TRUMP: But you know, Ben Carson can't do that. It's not his thing. He has no chance. And we have to do it. We have to make our country rich again before we can make it great again.

HANNITY: You know, Mr. Trump, I have been saying this. It is really a scary time when 95 million Americans out of the labor force, millions more in poverty and on food stamps, 50 million in poverty, 46 million on food stamps, median income down $5,000. This president will accumulate more debt than every other president before him combined.

You know, I was looking at your new book today, and my first impression -- because you -- I've interviewed you enough. I've asked you specifics about ISIS and Putin and foreign policy. I've asked you about health care. You told me health care savings accounts. I've asked you about choice in education and the economy and the 2nd Amendment.

All these questions I've asked you -- I got the impression -- and here's your new book -- that you wrote this book to answer people who have criticized you saying you're not specific because you lay out a lot of the things that you've been telling me in the interviews we've had together, where you get very specific.

Is this book in response to that criticism that you don't get specific, and this is your plan for the country?

TRUMP: I think it's really not, Sean. I think this. Our country maybe is too specific. We send 50 soldiers over to Syria, and we make an announcement, a presidential announcement that we are sending 50 soldiers. Those soldiers now are being sought after by the enemy. They're being targeted by the enemy. They know they're coming. We shouldn't be announcing that we're doing this. We should be less predictable. We're so predictable.

When President Obama announced that we're leaving Iraq -- we should have never been in Iraq, and I said that for many, many years. We should have never been in Iraq. But when he announced that we're leaving and a date -- we are going to leave by this date -- the enemy just sat back and waited until we left, and you see what's happened since then. It's a disaster. Iran is taking over Iraq. ISIS developed. All of this developed because of a certain guaranteed date.

Now, for him to have said that was a disgrace. When he said it, I couldn't believe it. But how about these 50 soldiers, these great soldiers -- and these are...

HANNITY: It's insane!

TRUMP: ... the top of the line -- these people go over there...

HANNITY: It's insane!

TRUMP: ... and he announces to the world that we're sending 50 young people over there -- I think it is absolutely disgraceful that he's doing that. And he's putting them at such risk. Now, so just let me -- I want to be much less -- this country has to be less predictable. We're totally predictable. He announces whatever we do. We're going to attack here, we're going to do that.

General Douglas MacArthur, General George Patton -- they wouldn't be talking to you and they wouldn't be talking to other people. They would be doing their job. They're not talking to the press. You know, they shoot first and they talk later. For us to be doing what we're doing as a country is absolutely insane!

Now, let me just -- just to finish, I wrote a book in 2000. I said that Usama bin Laden will come back into the United States. When one of your competitors heard that I said that in a book that was written a couple of years before the World Trade Center came down and that I had Usama bin Laden, that commentator, who's very respected even by you, said, Whoa, Trump wrote that Usama bin Laden -- it was called "The America We Deserve" -- that Usama bin Laden is coming back into the country, I can't believe he knew this!

I know a lot! I mean, I think -- you know, in a lot of the polls, I've gotten the highest marks on military and protection and nuclear, and by the way, by far the highest on the economy. I'm up in the 70s on the economy, in fact, so high that you'd almost say, Why do we even have to waste our time with doing what we're doing?

So no, I wrote this book because I wanted to say -- it's a tough title, "Crippled America," and it's a tough picture. It's the worst picture I've ever taken. It's, you know, a mean picture.

We need strength now. We don't need Ben Carson. He's a wonderful man. I like him a lot. But we don't need somebody that doesn't make a deal. He's never employed anybody, maybe a nurse. But I've employed tens of thousands of people. And I've employed, by the way, many thousands right now of Hispanics. They're incredible people.

But I've employed tens of thousands of people, made great deals. That's what we need right now in this country. We don't need low-energy, low-key people.

HANNITY: We'll take a break. We'll have more with Donald Trump right after this break -- the debate over debates and a preview on his appearance on "SNL."

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

HANNITY: All right, back with reaction, the author of the brand-new book, "Crippled America: How to Make America Great Again," 2016 GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump.

I have never in my life witnessed a more whiny human being than this president! He whines about FOX News. He whines about talk radio. And it's embarrassing that Assad and Putin and the mullahs are kicking sand in our face! And I don't really think that's funny, especially giving the Iranians nuclear weapons.

But I wanted to get your take on it. To me, it wasn't that funny, considering the bad state of affairs he's created.

TRUMP: Well, it's very simple. First of all, the Republican candidates -- we almost bonded that day more than any other day. I mean, it was sort of amazing. We all almost came together because John Harwood was a disaster. I mean, he was so terrible, he probably ruined his career.

And I thought Becky and I thought Carl were absolutely fine, but I thought Harwood was terrible.

And you know, we -- there was no -- there's no anything there. We just bonded. And I think, frankly, they were the ones that looked bad, not the candidates. In fact, I got very high poll numbers from the debate. They were very complimentary towards me, and some other people in the debate.

But our president, you know, is talking about this. He's been a terrible president. Everything he does is wrong. The Iran deal is wrong. "Obama care" is wrong. The military is wrong. We can't do anything right! We're like the gang that couldn't shoot straight. We can't do anything right!

We bomb a hospital. Nobody knows what happened. Everything we do is wrong. It just doesn't work. The country's not working anymore. We're $19 trillion -- the country doesn't work anymore. But he's sort of OK, and I would say not great at, you know, delivering little quips like that.

HANNITY: Yes. Well, let me ask you then...

TRUMP: He was a great divider -- he, Sean, a great divider. I really thought the one thing he would be a cheerleader for the country. I didn't know. Maybe he doesn't have the experience, he probably wouldn't be -- who knows. But he's turned out to be an unbelievable divider, and even comments like that are very divisive comments. But the bottom line, he's been a terrible president!

HANNITY: Yes. You have said you were not going to do the CNBC (sic) I guess Universal (sic) debate that they had planned, that you will negotiate directly with the TV networks on debates. Where do you stand now as it relates to debates, moderators going forward? What is Donald Trump's plan?

TRUMP: Well, honestly, I don't even know why that was even said because I don't care. I mean, they give me a podium. They've asked me some very negative questions, including your Megyn. They've asked me very, very disgraceful questions, frankly. And last time with Harwood, the same thing happened. They were inappropriate questions.

And I take them and I do them and I do whatever I have to do, and it comes out just fine. So I don't really care. I like the idea of debates. I've done well in the debates, according to everybody, and according to the polls, I've led every debate, number one in every debate, which you know, and I couldn't say it unless I did. Even CNBC said the last debate, it was their debate, they said I won the debate.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: So I like the debates...

HANNITY: Let me ask a very important question.

TRUMP: I like -- no, but I like the debates. I don't really care that much, I'll be honest. This is more of an issue for other people.

I do say this. The networks are making a fortune with the debates. I think they should give money to the wounded warriors and to the veterans. They are making a fortune.

HANNITY: I agree with that.

TRUMP: They used to have 2 million people watching. Now they're having 24 and 25 million people watching, even though it is because of Trump, but I won't say that.

HANNITY: Let me...

TRUMP: But they have 24, 25 million people watching, they should give some of the money to the wounded warriors and to the veterans.

HANNITY: Let's say you become president. Let's talk about the first 100 days. What would you do specifically on the economy? What would you do on health care, the borders? What would you do about Putin and this horrible Iranian deal? Walk me through those 100 days, how fast you think you could act and get on that path, as you say, to make America great?

TRUMP: Well, I'd do a lot of things very quickly. One good thing about executive orders is that the new president can go in and sign a new executive order and knock it out immediately. We can counter it immediately. And you don't have to go through Congress, you know? So his horrible order that he signed on illegal immigration, where people are just flowing into the country, horribly, without any checks or balances -- we don't even know who's coming in -- that would be ended immediately.

I would work immediately on "Obama care" repeal and replace, and we would do something terrific there. I would immediately get Carl Icahn and the greatest geniuses of negotiating, and we would work on Japan and China and Mexico because they're taking our job, and I want to bring our jobs back.

I'll save Social Security. I'll save Medicare. Ben Carson wants to get rid of Medicare. You can't get rid of Medicare. You know, Medicare's a program that works. There's fraud, there's abuse, there's waste, but you don't get rid of Medicare. You can't do that. People love Medicare. And it's unfair to them.

I'm going to fix it and make it better, but I'm not going to cut it. I will get rid of the fraud, the waste, the abuse, all of the problems, but we will have Medicare. When Carson wants to get rid of it, that's a disaster.

You look at Rubio at the border. If I'm not in -- you know, all of these people, including Ben Carson, are very, very weak on illegal immigration...

HANNITY: Listen, I...

TRUMP: And they're all for amnesty.

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: We better secure our border.

TRUMP: And I will tell you there's nobody that has my attitude on creating the border. And I will build a wall, and Mexico will pay for the wall. Sean, they're going to pay for it because they're making a fortune. We give them billions of dollars. People don't know this. We give them billions of dollars, and we have a trade imbalance with Mexico, $45 billion a year!

HANNITY: All right, we...

TRUMP: A wall is peanuts. No politician is going to make them do that, but I will.

HANNITY: "Saturday Night Live" -- you excited?

TRUMP: And that's just a few of the things.

HANNITY: How's...

TRUMP: Yes, I am...

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: Have you looked at what is going to happen?

TRUMP: Well, right after I finish with you, I'm going over to see Lorne Michaels and the people at "Saturday Night Live," and we're going to start working on it. And we had fun. I did it 11 years ago. "The Apprentice" was number one, and they asked me to do it. I did it 11 yeas ago. So here we are 11 years later for a different reason, I guess, I'm doing it this time. But it'll be a lot of fun.

HANNITY: All right, Mr. Trump, as always, thank you for your time. We appreciate it.

TRUMP: Thank you. Thank you very much, Sean.

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