WASHINGTON – President Trump departed the White House on Sunday morning for Norfolk, Va., taking a jab at Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker before boarding Marine One.
“Number one, he’s wrong. Number two, I really believe he’s afraid for his life,” Trump said. “Somehow, when you can have 40 or 50 people killed over the last couple of months, hundreds of people wounded—there’s no place like that [Chicago] in the world. Hundreds of people wounded, 50, 55 people shot and killed. And Pritzker gets up and says what a wonderful place it is. He added, “We’re going to straighten it out.”
When asked about a federal judge’s order limiting military involvement in Portland, Trump repeated his criticism of local officials and the judiciary, claiming the city was “burning to the ground.”
“I wasn’t served well by the people that picked judges,” he said. “I appointed the judge and he goes like that, so I wasn’t served well. That judge ought to be ashamed of himself.”
Before departing, Trump also claimed his administration had made major strides against drug trafficking. “There’s nobody coming in on the water — that I can tell you,” he said. “There’s no drugs coming into the water.”
Throughout the exchange, Trump fielded questions on a wide range of topics, from foreign policy to domestic unrest.
On international affairs, he said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposal to extend the nuclear arms treaty “sounds like a good idea to me.” He also voiced optimism about ongoing negotiations in the Middle East, calling his administration’s plan involving Hamas “a great deal for Israel” and “for the entire Arab world.”
“They’ve started negotiations in the last couple of days,” Trump said when asked about the release of hostages in Gaza. “We’ll see how it turns out. But I’m hearing it’s going very well.”
Pressed on whether the proposal would allow for flexibility, Trump replied, “We don’t need flexibility, because everybody has pretty much agreed to it. You’re going to have peace in the Middle East for the first time — they say, really, 3,000 years.”
Turning to domestic issues, Trump said he intends to “fix” the Affordable Care Act, calling Obamacare “a disaster for the people.” He blamed Democrats for recent federal layoffs, describing them as “Democrat layoffs,” and insisted the economy remains “record-setting.”
“We’re ready to go back,” he said. “Prices are way down. We’re doing better than the country has ever done, and the Democrats hate seeing that.”
Moments later, the president boarded Marine One for the short flight to Joint Base Andrews, where Air Force One awaited to take him to Norfolk for the naval review.
