'How Did You Deliver This News To Putin, Sir?': Trump Asked About Fresh Tariff Threat Against Russia

In an Oval Office meeting with NATO Sec.-Gen. Mark Rutte, President Trump was asked about his tariff threat against Russia.

Transcript

00:00some tremendous potential that's what i would say how did you deliver this news to putin sir

00:04how did you tell putin this was coming uh i speak to him a lot about getting this thing done

00:13and i always hang up say well that was a nice phone call and then missiles launched into kiev

00:18or some other city and i said strange and after that happens three or four times you say

00:24the talk doesn't mean anything my conversations with him are always very pleasant i say isn't

00:30that a very lovely conversation and then the missiles go off that night i go home i tell

00:36the first lady and i spoke to vladimir today we had a wonderful conversation she said oh really

00:42another city was just hit so it's like look he's uh i don't want to say he's an assassin but he's a

00:51tough guy it's been proven over the years he's fooled a lot of people he fooled bush he fooled

00:57a lot of people he fooled clinton bush obama biden he didn't fool me but what i do say is that uh

01:05at a certain point you know ultimately talk doesn't talk it's got to be action it's got to be

01:11results and i hope he does it uh it's it's potentially such a great country to be wasting

01:19so many people on on this and the money and look at what's happened to his economy look at what's

01:27happened so and with the threat in 50 days yeah i mean look i hope he's i hope he's going to do it

01:34he knows the deal he knows what a fair deal is if there is such a thing as a fair deal they can know

01:43there's no winners here this is a loser he's a loser and i dealt with him from the beginning

01:48and it wouldn't have happened but i will say it was ukraine was the apple of his eye

01:52we talk about it it was the apple of his eye but it wasn't going to happen and he understood that it

01:58wasn't going to happen and then i noticed after i was out i noticed soldiers forming at the border

02:04and then i heard horrible stupid things being said from the other side and i said they're really

02:12uh handling it very very wrong it's a shame yeah one thing and that is about president trump because

02:19you can offer in january on the 12th of february you had your first phone call with putin i think

02:24you did exactly what i hope you would do that is breaking the deadlock starting the conversation

02:28because you have to test him i know putin very well from the days i was prime minister and then once you

02:33have to test him and you did this and you really gave him a chance to be serious to get to the

02:38table to start negotiations steve whitkoff marco hubino we all tried to help him but you've now

02:43come to a point where you say well hey we actually thought we had probably four times a deal i mean

02:49you would have called and said this looks good and then the deal wouldn't happen because bombs would

02:54be thrown out that night and you'd say we're not making any deals it was like but you're making the

02:59development was crucial because you had to start that process and you were the only one who was

03:04able to do that i think we'll get it done do you think he's reasonable enough to nikon