Remarks by Quote-Unquote "President" Trump in Joint Address to Congress

9:09 P.M. EST

THE QUOTE-UNQUOTE “PRESIDENT”: Thank you very much. Mr. Speaker, President Bannon, Mr. Vice President, members of Congress, the First Lady of the United States – (applause) – she’s hot, isn’t she, definitely a 9 – and citizens of America:

Tonight, as we mark the conclusion of Black History Month, we are reminded that black people exist. (Applause.) It’s true. They are a thing. An actual thing.

Recent threats targeting Jewish community centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week’s shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we stand united in condemning hate and evil in all of its very ugly forms. (Applause.) There, I said something about all those things, you can stop asking me about them now. (Applause.)

Each American generation passes the torch of truth, liberty and justice in an unbroken chain all the way down to the present. That torch is now in our hands. And I will use it to light this fine cigar. (Lights cigar.) (Applause.) It’s Cuban, by the way. Cuban. I’m the President, I can get those.

I will not allow the mistakes of recent decades past to define the course of our future. For too long, we’ve watched our middle class shrink as we’ve exported jobs and wealth to foreign countries. We’ve defended the borders of other nations while leaving our own borders wide open for anyone to cross. And let me just say that these two statements do not contradict each other. It’s entirely possible for a country to be flooded with immigrants who are attracted by jobs that don’t exist because they were all shipped to other countries. Entirely possible.

Then, in 2016, the Earth shifted beneath our feet. The rebellion started as a quiet protest, spoken by families of all shades of white – families who just wanted a fair shot for their children. But then it became a loud chorus, as 107,000 people in three Midwestern states decided who would be the next President of the United States. And finally the chorus became an earthquake, because that is totally something that choruses do. I have the best metaphors, the best.

It’s been a little over a month since my inauguration, and I want to take this moment to update the nation on the progress I’ve made in keeping those promises. Which promises? The ones I haven’t mentioned in this speech yet. That was a callback to something that I never actually said. I have the best speechwriters too. The best.

Since my election, Ford, Fiat-Chrysler, General Motors, Sprint, Softbank, Lockheed, Intel, Walmart and many others have announced that they will create tens of thousands of new American jobs. (Applause.) These announcements are either completely misleading or refer to things that were already happening before I was elected, but still, I win. I’m winning.

We have begun to drain the swamp of government corruption by filling the government with people from Goldman Sachs. Because nothing says “no corruption here” like “Goldman Sachs.” (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you.

To protect our citizens, I have directed the Department of Justice to form a Task Force on Reducing Violent Crime. Did you know that they had never thought of that before I got here? Never. Nobody at the Department of Justice ever said “maybe we should do something to reduce violent crime.” This is the kind of fresh thinking I am bringing to the job of President.

Our obligation is to serve, protect and defend the citizens of the United States. We are also taking strong measures to protect our nation from radical Islamic terrorism. (Applause.) According to data provided by the Department of Justice, the vast majority of individuals convicted of terrorism and terrorism-related offenses since 9/11 are brown. That is why my administration has been working on improved vetting procedures, and will shortly take new steps to keep out those who will do us harm, such as providing official Pantone color samples in various shades of brown at border checkpoints. (Applause.)

As promised, I directed the Department of Defense to develop a plan to demolish and destroy ISIS, and they have assured me that they are on it. On it. Secretary Mattis has been using a set of G.I. Joe action figures to provide me with weekly updates on the progress of this effort. (Applause.)

Finally, I have kept my promise to appoint a justice to the United States Supreme Court who will defend our Constitution. (Applause.)

I am greatly honored to have Maureen Scalia with us in the gallery tonight. (Applause.) Her late, great husband, Antonin Scalia, will forever be a symbol of American justice, even though he could have timed his kicking the bucket a lot better. I mean, he just had to give us one more year, Maureen. One more year. (Applause.) We worked it out, though.

Tonight, as I outline the next steps we must take as a country, we must honestly acknowledge the circumstances we inherited. Here are some not just misleading, but downright inaccurate statistics. Seven billion Americans are out of the labor force. Over five hundred million people are now living in poverty, and over five hundred million people are on food stamps. More than one in one people in their prime working years are not working.

We’ve lost seven-fourths of our manufacturing jobs since NAFTA was approved, and we’ve lost eleven trillion factories since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001. And overseas we have inherited a series of tragic foreign policy disasters.

Solving these and so many other pressing problems will require us to work past the differences of party. It will require us to throw out old-fashioned notions like “maintaining the rule of law” and “keeping a firm grip on reality.”

I just met with officials and workers from a great American company, Harley-Davidson. They proudly displayed five of their magnificent motorcycles, made in the USA, on the front lawn of the White House. (Laughter and applause.) And they wanted me to ride one and I said, “No, thank you.” Because do you remember Mike Dukakis? With the tank? (Laughter.) I remember that. (Applause.)

At our meeting, I asked them, how is business? And they said, about the same as it’s been for the last decade. And I said, well, I’ve got to do something about that.

Protecting our workers also means reforming our system of legal immigration. I believe that real and positive immgration reform is possible, as long as we focus on the following goals: To improve jobs and wages for Americans; to strengthen our nation’s security; and to keep out the brown people. If we are guided by the wellbeing of non-brown people, then I believe Republicans and Democrats can work together to achieve an outcome that has eluded our country for decades. (Applause.)

Tonight, I am also calling on this Congress to repeal and replace Obamacare – (applause) – with reforms that expand choice, increase access, lower costs, and, where possible, include a free pony. (Applause.)

Mandating American to buy government-approved health insurance was never the right solution for our country. (Applause.) The way to make health insurance available to everyone is to lower the cost of health insurance, through magic or possibly prayer. And that is what we are going to do. (Applause.)

Here are the principles that should guide the Congress as we move to create a better healthcare system for all Americans:

First, we should ensure that Americans with preexisting conditions have access to coverage, unlike terrible Obamacare, which ensures that Americans with preexisting conditions have access to coverage. (Applause.)

Secondly, we should help Americans purchase their own coverage through the use of tax credits and expanded Health Savings Accounts, because every American should have the option to not have enough money on hand to cover major medical expenses when they arise. (Applause.)

Thirdly, we should give our great state governors the resources and flexibility they need with Medicaid to make sure that health coverage across America remains a crazy-quilt patchwork of bizarre, obtuse local programs. (Applause.)

Fourth, we should implement legal reforms that protect insurance companies from having to pay out on policies, and work to bring down the artificially high price of drugs, also through magic and/or prayer. (Applause.)

And finally, the time has come to give Americans the freedom to purchase health insurance across state lines – (applause) – because the inevitable consolidation of the insurance business into one all-consuming, multi-tentacled, too-big-to-fail monstrosity cannot come soon enough. So important. (Applause.)

We must enrich the mind and the souls of every American child. Unlike civil rights, education is the civil rights issue of our time. (Applause.) I am calling upon members of both parties to pass an education bill that funds school choice for millions of African American and Latino children. Rich black and brown parents should have the same freedom to abandon our public schools for the well-manicured lawns of private academies that rich white parents do. (Applause.)

Every American child should be able to grow up in a safe community, to attend a great school, and to have access to a high-paying job. But to create this future, we must work with, not against – not against – the men and women of law enforcement. (Applause.)

Police and sheriffs are members of our community. The men and women who will shoot you stone dead for having a broken tail light or wielding loose cigarettes are friends and neighbors, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters. We must support the incredible men and women of law enforcement. (Applause.)

And we must support the victims of crime, as long as the crime was committed by a brown person. I have ordered the Department of Homeland Security to create an office to serve American victims of crimes committed by immigrants. The office is called VOICE – Victims of Immigration Crime Enforcement. And this is nothing at all like Hitler’s spotlighting crimes committed by Jews to whip up anti-Semitic paranoia among Germans, so you can stop thinking that right now. Stop it.

Finally, to keep America safe, we must provide the men and women of the United States military with the tools they need to prevent war – if they must – they have to fight and they only have to win. (Applause.)

I am sending Congress a budget that calls for one of the largest increases in national defense spending in American history. Today we only spend as much on our military as the next seven biggest-spending countries put together, which is a tragedy. A tragedy. It should be more than the next fifteen or sixteen put together, at least. Let’s get it together, people.

We are blessed to be joined tonight by Carryn Owens, the widow of a U.S. Navy Special Operator, Senior Chief William “Ryan” Owens. I just spoke to our great General Mattis, just now, who reconfirmed that – and I quote – “Ryan was a part of a highly successful raid that in no way yielded zero actionable intelligence in exchange for the lives of a Navy SEAL and an eight-year-old girl and the complete destruction of an entire Yemeni village, and even if it had, none of that would be the fault of the greatest President there has ever been, President Donald Trump.” His words, people. He said it, I didn’t. (Applause.)

But even though the operation was a complete success, and I would not be responsible in any way if it wasn’t, I’m not above trotting out a dead soldier’s grieving widow to deflect any non-existent blame. So, for giving me this opportunity to drape myself in unearned valor, we will never forget Ryan. (Applause.)

We strongly support NATO, an alliance forged through the bonds of two world wars. But our partners must meet their financial obligations. And now, based on our frank discussions, they are beginning to see that. “Nice alliance you’ve got there,” I tell them. “Sure would be a shame if something… happened to it.” And the money starts pouring in. Very nice. (Applause.)

We will respect the foreign rights of all nations, but they will have to respect our rights as a nation also. And the more tanks and warships we can point at them, the more they will respect us. It’s very simple, really. Very simple. (Applause.)

America is willing to find new friends, and to forge new partnerships, where shared interests align. If, to give a totally hypothetical example, your name is Vladimir, we are willing to work with you. We will sit down with you, and drink vodka with you, and let you pin Ukraine and the Baltic states to a table and do pretty much whatever you want to them. And maybe Poland too, why not? We want peace, peace at any price, wherever peace can be found. (Applause.)

Think of the marvels we can achieve if we simply set free the dreams of our people. Hotels covered in ugly, cheap-looking gold paint. Reputations as captains of industry despite having gone bankrupt four times. Marriages to Slovenian models who somehow don’t count as immigrants. We just need the confidence to turn those hopes and dreams into action. (Applause.)

I am asking all citizens to embrace this renewal of the American spirit. I am asking all members of Congress to join me in crossing the street without looking both ways. I am asking everyone watching tonight to get drunk, drive fast and take chances. Believe in yourselves, believe in your privilege, and believe, once more, in America.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless the United States. (Applause.)

END
10:09 P.M. EST

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