Thanks so much. Guest thank you. Announcer 1 after the briefing, briefing, the president spoke to the conservative Political Action conference. He has addressed the group every year since taking office. This year he spoke for about 90 minutes. I think it is that time of year again, folks. [applause] you know, it is just possible attempt topelosi may rip up every page of the president s speech you are about ready to hear. [applause] but she will never be able to destroy the message of freedom, liberty and american patriotism enshrined in all of our hearts. [applause] rip up all you want, madam speaker, but no matter how hard you try, you cant rip up the spirit of the American People and those yearning for freedom across the globe. [applause] impressions and unquantifiable numbers on television, right now, right here we mark the official start of the takedown of socialism in america. [applause and cheers] [chanting usa] fire. Hold your hold your fire. [laughter] nationalists,es, libertarians, populists, republicans, independents, and even some democrats who dont recognize their party anymore, we have one simple goal. To put the final nails in the coffin of socialism in america. [applause and cheers] socialism has never worked anywhere at anytime for anyone except for the dictators who pull all of the strengths. In short, socialism is a loser. Bad, it socialism is so is even more tragic than a monologue. Jimmy kimmel monologue. I like that one. Socialism is not just about making you poorer monologue. , sicker, or depressed. It is about destroying the dignity of each person and depriving any deplorable of due process. And we watched this happen the last three years as the democrats attempted a coup to stop, to prosecute and remove our duly elected president who was chosen by the American People to lead our country. The next time a democrat tells you he is democraticsocialist, just ask him, do we even know the final results from the Iowa Democratic caucus . You know, if you cant run a caucus, why would we trust you to run our government . [applause] squad, andbama, the major Democratic Candidates demand that we rethink america. Do you want to rethink america . That is the choice we have in front of us. The democrats want to transform america which means we make america. Remake america. We have been making America Great again. [applause] charge . S leading the president donald j. Trump. And under his leadership, we are going to keep America Great. [applause and cheers] because President Trump is leading the battle against socialism. He is fighting for you. He is the voice of the forgotten, the ones silent men and women of america. Once silent men and women of america. He loves you and there is no doubt he loves our great country. [applause and cheers] methis next part gives particular joy because nancy pelosi refused to say it. Im going to say it. I have the high privilege and distinct honor to present to you the president of the United States, donald j. Trump. And im proud to be an american where at least i know im free and i wont forget the men who died who gave that right to me and i gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today because there aint no doubt i love this land god bless the u. S. A. From the lakes of minnesota tennessee s of across the plains of texas from sea to shining sea from detroit down to houston and new york to l. A. Where theres pride in every american heart and its time we stand and say that im proud to be an american where at least i know im free and i wont forget the men who died who gave that right to me and i gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today because there aint no doubt i love this land love this land god bless the u. S. A. And im proud to be an american where at least i know im free and i wont forget the men who died who gave that right to me and i gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today because there aint no doubt i love this land [applause and cheers] [chanting usa] pres. Trump well i want to , thank you. Im thrilled to be back at cpac with the thousands of proud american patriots who love our country, respect our flag, honor our history. [applause and cheers] pres. Trump uphold our laws, protect our constitution, and always put america first. Right . We say that, and if it wasnt so, the Fake News Media would be all over us. They say it wasnt so. He exaggerated i say it all the time. They never change. Every once in a while you see somebody who did well, lets say well in new hampshire, or did well, not even win it, in iowa. And the whole life of that person is made, because we won the election. We did well in those places. Sit down, everybody. Sit down. We won the election so its great. [applause and cheers] and i came here and i got to know matt and mercedes. I did a speech. They said, would you speak . Too. Very famous thaen i guess more famous now. But i was very famous. I made a speech. They liked the speech. They said, you ought to run for president. We had a big crowd. The apprentice was doing so well. A hot, to put it mildly, show. Matt said you want to run for president. I said i would give it a little thought. A couple of years later, we said lets do it. [cheering] ill never forget, one of the people, respected guy. Charles he said on this isnt so good, but he said on fox, he said, now, why would he do this . You have 17 of the most talented professionals ever assembled that are running. Why would he run . Hes not going to run. And if he does, hes only doing it for fun. Do you think this has been fun . [laughter] pres. Trump does anybody think does anybody think mercedes, do you think this has been fun . You know this has been just a ball. Weve had a ball. But you know what . You know what . Were doing so well, and were doing so much, no administration has ever done what weve done in the first three years. Nobody. The tax cuts or [applause and cheers] Supreme Court judges. 218 judges. Were up to 218, including dc. But together were defeating the radical, socialist democrats, the Fake News Media, the crooked politicians and the hatefilled left wing mob. And i told you i was gonna be nice today. See . [laughter] pres. Trump i said, lets be nice today. Its hard to be nice when they treat you so badly, right . Only a fool is nice when they treat you so badly. Were defending our faith, our values, our heritage, our borders, our rights, and our godgiven freedoms. Were doing that. This is an incredible look at all those people back there. This place has grown. Look. [applause and cheers] [cheering] pres. Trump wow wow thats fantastic. [applause and cheers] i dont know who they are, matt, but they must be very special this little group , over here. For matt to block out half the arena for this group of people, im trying to figure out, who are they . At first i thought they were the fake news. I said, it is too bad they have such a good location. I dont know who you are, but youre very important. Its true. Very important people. [applause and cheers] were exposing the corruption of the washington democrats and were draining the washington swamp. [applause and cheers] i just didnt know how dirty it would be. I didnt know how deep it would be. When i said, drain the swamp, for a long time, you know, i was given that expression. A speechwriter gave it to me. I said, thats so hokie. [laughter] pres. Trump i said, thats the worst. I dont want to use it. Anyway, it ends up in one of the speeches. I said, we will drain the swamp. Right . The place went crazy. I said, lets try it again. And we did it again. And the place went crazy. Now heres the bad part. I never knew the swamp was so bad. Its really bad. But were winning, and were winning not easy, but were winning. A lot of dirty people. A lot of very bad people. A lot of bad people. And i think i think justice will be had. I do believe that, or i wouldnt be very happy right now. We got through everything. We got through they gave us the they gave us the mueller hoax. They gave us the russia, russia, russia crap. They get us the one phone call that was a perfect phone call. Oh, lets get him out of office for that phone call. But you know, the republicans stuck together, except romney, of course. You know romney. [booing] pres. Trump lowlife. Lowlife. Except romney, they stuck together. And even him, i got half a vote, so [laughter] pres. Trump i think because he will i did actually vote he couldnt do it all, because he wanted to get some nice, free publicity for himself. But it was 52. 5 out of 53 votes. I guess you can say that, right . 52. 5. Right . So think of it. The republicans were fantastic. I tell you what, thats when you find out who your friends are, really. It is. And we had 52. 5 votes. And in the house, we had 107. Think of it, 1070 with the republicans. 1070. And we got three democrats. And one came over and left the democrat party. [applause and cheers] van drew. Jeff van drew. [applause and cheers] and really, together were preserving this exceptional nation that our ancestors fought and died to build. We are making America Greater than ever before. We really are. I think its gonna be greater than ever before with what were and died to build. Doing with our military, and what were doing also to get rid of very bad people. We have such bad people. And theyre not people that love our country. Were getting people that really love our country. And its so important. And if i wasnt able to fulfill that, no matter what other things weve done, i would not consider this journey to be a success. So just remember that. [applause and cheers] one of my most important promises to the American People was to end americas longrunning wars in the middle \east. American forces, and were all warriors, folks, but 19 years, i see the people. I go over and i say hello to those incredible soldiers over at walter reed. What talent you have at walter reed. Those doctors, by the way, they have to be and whatt in the world they do. [applause] and i see the arms and the legs missing. And i see whats happened to some of these incredible, beautiful people. And i see the strength, the spirit. The spirit that they have. Most of them, i mean, even if they cant walk, if theyve lost both legs, they want to go back. Sir, we want to go back. I want to go back. And its just incredible to see it. And im gonna mention it a little bit later, but you know, we knocked out soleimani, the father of the roadside bomb. [applause and cheers] we killed him. And al baghdadi. And al baghdadi. [applause and cheers] [chanting usa] s. Trump solemani was the solemani was the they called him the father of the roadside bomb. He thought it was great. Kept getting bigger and more sophisticated. One young man, he said, my last day, it was my last day in afghanistan. And they had the mine detectors. He said, i trusted this man with my life. He was the best. Ive never seen anything like it. He could detect those. We felt so safe. But unfortunately, his last day, they made them out of plastic so you couldnt defect them. It went off, killed the man who was the detector and badly, badly injured a lot of people. And he was one of them. He said, think of it, sir. I said, why did it go off . He said, because they made it out of plastic and the plastic doesnt get detected by the metal detector. And that was the last day and he lost his legs. But we took that son of a bitch out, didnt we . [applause and cheers] should have been done a long time ago. [applause and cheers] that should have been done a long time ago. That should have been done a long time ago. And al baghdadi, hes the father of isis, and we defeated isis in the middle east. We have defeated 100 of the caliphate. But we said to the europeans, take your soldiers. We killed many, many terrorists. When i took over, by the way, it was a mess. I hate to say this, republicans, but they had maps. And it was all red. Red meant isis. I hate to say this. Lets change the color. I actually did change the color. But they showed me maps. And large portions of iraq and syria, isis, and we dont want them ever to come here. And i had some great people. I have some incredible generals. And i had a decision to make, because they were not doing it right. We made the decision and we took them out. Remember i got to 98 . And i said, now i can bring our people back home. Sir, and then what happened is the press. They didnt care. They went crazy. He didnt complete the job. I was at 98 . They said, he didnt complete the job. I said, general, complete the job, and they completed the job. But the europeans should be helping us, because many of those people that were guarding now, thousands and thousands of isis fighters and others, and many of those people will go home to france, and germany, and u. K. , and others, and we say, take them. No, no, no. We dont want them. See this is it. We do things for other people and they forget. Sometimes our allies treat us worse than our enemies. I hate to say this to you, but sometimes they do. Its very sad. Did them a big favor. But thats all right. Its all working out very well. But we took out al baghdadi, who everybody was after. Youd see him all the time, speaking with a fan. That was an old picture. He was young he got older. , but they were looking for him for 16 years. One of the first things i said is there got to find this guy, al baghdadi. Yes, sir. All of a sudden, they walk in and say, we have him, sir. They were following him. All over the middle east. Hed move from place to place to place. They said, sir, we had him. I had to give an order and i gave an order. Ill tell you what, 66, the most incredible soldiers youve ever seen, they went in on eight helicopters. And you know, in modern day warfare, you can watch. I mean im watching it from the , situation room. Do you believe in . You cant make a movie like this. For instance, theres no dog like conan. No dog. [applause and cheers] there is no dog like conan, right . [applause] in fact, conan, after the operation was a tremendous success they were looking for him for a long time. And it was a lot of violent fighting. Then ultimately we got him. He was at the end of a tunnel. The end of a tunnel. And conan was going after him. Conan almost was electrocuted. You know that story. But the guys went after him. And we got him. But you wouldnt believe how great it felt, and when you saw the professionalism of these soldiers, i cant even tell you. There is nobody has a military like we have. Theres nobody with the talent that we have. Incredible. [applause and cheers] they got him and he knew it. He knew it. He knew it. [applause and cheers] as soon as he heard that first little explosion, that took him about three seconds. Blew the hell out of the wall. I said, why dont they go through the front door . He said, sir, you go through the front door, you got a lot of bullets coming at you. They went through a solid concrete wall. They put stuff up. Boom. So fast. So now theyre shooting the other guys from behind. Thats much better, right . [laughter] pres. Trump guys are saying, who is that . Who is that . [laughter] pres. Trump guys are unbelievable. You dont have a movie like that. And conan actually conan was given more press than your president. There was like about a half a days story. Somebody else would have done it, it would have been the greatest thing that ever happened. But thats all right. I do it for a different reason. I do it because we have to, to keep ourselves safe. I do it also for all of the people that they killed and wounded. [applause and cheers] they killed and wounded a lot of people. But American Forces cannot be the policemen for the entire world. Were all over the world, and a lot of times, were not even appreciated. It is taken for granted. We cant be the policemen for the world. And the democracy builders, we just cant do that for every nation that seems to have difficulty. Especially for those nations that dont appreciate what we do. And there are many of them. Many of them. And that goes with trade also. Weve changed the whole thing around. Their job is to be secure. And my job is to make sure that were secure and to defend our country first. Our country. Today the United States [applause] tryingrs they have been to do this, and today the United States signed a deal with the telegram so we can hopefully begin the immediate process of bringing our troops back home. [applause and cheers] 19 years 19 years were there. Thank you. And as you know, others wanted to do it. We got it done. Just signed it. And i want to thank a lot of people. We really have to thank. You know who we have to thank . The families and those incredible people that lost their lives to start off with, ok . [applause] those incredible families. Ive gotten to know so many families. We have to thank our Wounded Warriors that came home missing limbs, serious, serious. Our great Wounded Warriors. Were taking good care of them. [applause] and i want to just thank our military because you know we have been really a police force there for a long time. Were not supposed to be a police force. Were supposed to be fighting soldiers. We could win that war easily if we wanted to lose, kill a Million People that have nothing to do with it, that dont know anything about us. And its really a great feeling. I watched the ceremony today, early in the morning on our television. And mike pompeo, secretary of state [applause and cheers] secretary of defense esper has done a great job. Pompeo and esper were in different locations, signing with different groups. Pretty complicated deal, i have to be honest. But in exchange for the talibans action against alqaeda and other terrorists who could threaten us, were prepared to begin those force withdrawals. And if the taliban and the Afghan Government live up to their commitments, and they may or they may not, but i think they have a lot of reason why they will. I think they will. That means that the longest war in american history, by far it is not even close will be over. [applause] and, again, the agreement was made possible by the extraordinary bravery of our american warriors, the sacrifice of these incredible people. Their allies. I want to also thank i will say this. Nato came in and secretary general of nato. We had 28, essentially 28 countries participating in this. And theyre very happy to be out. Very happy to be soon to be doing other things. Ill say this for the taliban. Theyre great fighters. You know that obviously. Theyre great fighters. All you have to do is ask the soviet union. Are they great fighters . They are great fighters. But theyre tired also. This is 19 years, 19 years. So im very happy to announce that