Press gaggle transcript of President Trump speaking with reporters aboard Air Force One (May 14, 2025). Trump discusses meetings with foreign leaders (Syria’s president, President Erdogan/Turkey), lifting sanctions on Syria, efforts to secure American hostages, relations with Israel, possible talks involving Putin and Ukraine, secondary sanctions on Iran/Russia, and a question about a $2 billion Emirati deal using "Trump digital coins". The exchange also touches on domestic political friction (Sen. Schumer) and Trump’s general support for crypto. The tone is conversational and often repetitive; many answers are high-level or deflecting.
Chapters
Hello, everybody. The jet fighters will be surrounding the plane in about seven minutes. Oh, I heard they threw you out of the press conference.
They tried, but Caroline stopped them.
Caroline said, you're lucky. You're lucky. You were a little out of control.
How's the trip going? So much longer. Meeting with the Syrian.
I think it's going well. Great relationships. And now we're meeting with the group. That's fantastic. Yamir is a great guy. I know. I know him all very well. You good. Thank you. You're going to be surrounded by eight fighters, you know, in about seven minutes. And you say, do we need them? And when they say yes, that doesn't make me feel good. Right.
What's the threat?
Did they tell you what the threat is?
No, there's. Let's assume there's no threat. We have to assume that.
How did you find the Syrian president?
Right, Right. I think very good. Young, attractive guy. Tough guy. Strong. Very strong pass fighter.
Does that worry about.
He's got a. He's got a real shot at pulling it together. He's working with President Erdogan, who I'm very friendly with him. He. He feels he's got a shot. It's a torn up country.
Do you think Syria will join the Abraham accordion?
Yeah, but I think they have to get themselves straightened out. I told him, I hope you're going to join with us right now. He said, yes, but they have a lot of.
What about Leban? Do you think there's a path for. For Lebanon to normalize relations with Israel?
You know, a friend of mine is the new ambassador to Lebanon, and I didn't even know. And I never knew his relationship, but he was born in Lebanon. And he said, I'd like to be the ambassador. He's a very successful guy. And I said, you know, that's very dangerous. He said, I don't care. I love my country. And it's worth it to do sort of a beautiful story. You may want to go and interview him sometime, Michelle. He's a great guy, but he's. You know, there's a danger there for a very successful man to go and do that. I said, you sure you know what you do it? It's like Doug taking pictures. So how you got some good shots, I guess this is a beautiful scene. The. The last scene at the airport I thought was beautiful. We rode out together. They generally don't do that. They don't generally be presidents.
There have been some reports of the Syrian president wanting a Trump Tower in Damascus. Did that come up at all?
No, I haven't done it. I have to wait a little while. Let me take scom down a little while with the, you know, the country. I think he's going to deal. He's got the potential. He's a real leader. You know, he let her charge and he's pretty amazing. Did you see him? Did you get to see him? No, no, he was there. Yeah, he was with us at the event.
Did the PGA Tour or Liv B all come up at all in your conversations with the Crown friends?
No, no. You mean they live. Yeah. No, it didn't been in dispersion.
What about that Saudi. The Saudi intelligence agent. The 911 families want the Saudi intelligence agent to be extradited to the United States to face charges for 911. Did that come up in conversation?
But I, I know all about it.
But it didn't come up on Israel. You're not going to Israel. Does this trip sideline Israel at all?
No, not at all. No. This is good for. Is having a relationship like I have with these countries, the Middle Eastern countries, essentially all of them. I think it's very good for Israel.
Can I ask you again? On Israel, I'm a hostage deal. Did you, did any of your people speak with Israel about the release of the American hostage?
I'm sorry.
On the sanctions lifting of Syria? Let me ask an email first. What credit does Israel deserve, if any, for that release of the hostage?
Been fighting a long time. They're waring and I think they deserve a lot of credit. I think my people deserve a lot of credit. Maybe the most credit. He wouldn't be there. But weren't for us, he wouldn't be living right now. Probably none of the hostages would be living right now. We probably have 20 that are living that will be getting out step by step. You know, we've gotten a lot of them out. Last time, a couple of weeks ago, 10 people walked into my office, the Oval Office, and they said they had a 59 on their, on their shirt in front. And I said, what does that represent? The number of hostages? I said, oh, that's a lot. They said, well, 24 are living and now it's 20. The number is 20 and living or dying. And the young people, Young people don't die. You know, young people are killed. They don't die. Okay, so the, the 24 living of the 59. 24 living is now down to 20. And we got he done out. His family was so thankful. We did a good job with it. We'll continue to do it.
President Trump on Thursday. If President Putin doesn't show up in Turkey for the talks with Ukraine, what will you do?
Well, I don't know if he's showing up. I know he, he would like me to be there and that's a possibility. We could end the war. Be thinking about that. Not tomorrow. We're all booked. Understand.
That said, we're going to go UAE.
Tomorrow and so we have a very well situation now. That doesn't mean I wouldn't do it to save a lot of lives and come back. But yeah, I think they're thinking about something. I don't know that he would be there. If I'm not there. We're going to find out. Marco's going and Marco's been very effective.
How are you feeling about how Putin is handling this? I know you had said a few weeks ago you thought maybe how Putin is handling this. You said a few weeks ago you.
Thought maybe it was terrible. A week. I'll let you know in a few news.
Again, has any of your team been in touch with Israel, you, your team about lifting the sanctions on Syria, which there was a reaction?
Well, in touch. I mean, we told them we're doing it. The reason I did it, and I think it's been very popular actually, certainly in the Middle east, it's been popular virtually everybody. But the reason I did it is because I spoke with President Erdogan, who I get along with him very well and I spoke to Mohammad, as you know, it's with them and they thought it was very important to do it gives them a much better chance of survival as a country.
Can you show what Netanyahu thinks about it?
Well, I think what's happened is Turkey feels we should do it. Other countries, if you looked at my speech last night, which I assume most of you were at, I think the biggest applause was when I said that we're lifting these sanctions on Syria and that's because they want to give Syria a chance to live and to be great.
Mr. President, an Emirati government backed firm did a $2 billion deal an Emirati government backed firm did A $2 billion deal using the Trump digital coins. How did that deal come about?
I don't know anything about it. I really don't know anything about it. But I'm a big crypto fan. I will tell you, I've been that from the beginning, right from the campaign. I'm a believer in crypto. And if we're not going to do it, China's going to do it. It's like, AI, I'm a believer, die because we have to have it. We're leading China by a lot. And in crypto, we're leading China by a lot. So I'm a big crypto.
You need to know about that, too.
Senator Schumer said he wants to block your Justice Department political appointees until he gets answers about questions.
Schumer is, you know, he's become a Palestinian. Something wrong with him? I don't know. I've known him a long time, and there's something wrong. He's lost his confidence totally. And it's just something wrong with him. I don't know what it is with. Shuber. Yeah. You have a question? Go ahead.
I've got two questions on Iran and Russia. Are you still considering secondary sanctions on Iran's oil exports?
Let's see what happens over the next week. I don't really want to answer it because I want to see what happens over the next week. Okay.
And then on Iran and Russia, are you considering sanctions on Russia for supporting Iran and for the continued war in Ukraine?
Well, again, I don't want to talk about it, but I'm always considering the secondary sanctions. I had the secondary sanctions on Iran and drove them into bankruptcy, and there would have been no October 7th. There would have been no money for Hamas or Hezbollah or anybody else. So I've always said, as you know, I put secondary sanctions on Iran again, and hopefully they're going to make the right decision, because something's going to happen one way or the other. Very simple. It's going to happen one way or the other. They can't have a nuclear weapon. So we'll either do it friendly or we'll do it very unfriendly, and that won't be pleasant. Thank you very much.
