Known. This election marks the Largest Senate gains for a president s party in a first Midterm Election since at least president kennedys in 1962. There have been only four Midterm Elections since 1934 in which a president s party has gained even a single senate seat. As of now we picked up, it looks like, three, could be four, perhaps it could be two. But we picked up a lot. And most likely the number will be three. You people probably know that better than i do at this point because youve looked at the more recent numbers. 55 is the largest number of republican senators in the last 100 years. In the last 80 years a sitting president s party has only gained a cumulative total of
eight senate seats, averaging one per decade. So if we picked up two, three or four, thats a big percentage of that number, so in the lastle last 80 years you think of that. In president s Midterm Election he lost six senate seats including in the deep blue state of massachusetts. Republicans captured at least four senate seats held by democrat incumbents and these are tremendously talented, hardworking people that did this. Indiana, north dakota, florida, missouri, we also won two open senate seats in tennessee. I want to congratulate our great champion who did such a great
job in tennessee, marsha. And in utah, and arizona is looking very good. Really very good. Shes done a terrific job. That was a tough race and shes done a fantastic job. In each of these open seats democrats recruited very strong candidates with substantial fundraising and media support. We were getting bombarded with money on the other side. In the House Republicans dramatically outperformed historical precedents and overcame a historic number of retirements. The most House Republican retirements in 88 years, 43 House Republicans retired. Now, i will say this, in many cases they were chairmen of committees and they left because any werent chairmen because the republicans have a rule for six years and what that does is wonderful in one way, it lets
people come through the system and become chairmen and in another drives people out. When they are a chairman you dont want to go and youre a big deal and all of a sudden youre not doing that anymore so they leave. We had a lot of them leave. I guess you can flip a coin as to which system is better, the democrats do the other. Some of their folks have been on those committees for a long time as chairmen. In 2010 President Obamas first midterm, he lost 63 seats. By contrast as of the most current count, it looks like around 27 house seats or something and well figure that out pretty soon. We also had a slew of historic wins in the governors races. The governors races were incredible. Again, its very well funded, talented and skilled. Democratic candidates and people that worked very, very hard, respectfully, for those candidates like oprah winfrey
who i like, i dont know if she likes me anymore but thats okay. She used to. But she worked very hard in georgia, very, very hard. And if you look at them, four governors races crucial to 2020 and the president ial race, florida, iowa, ohio and georgia. The big ones. Florida, iowa, ohio and georgia. Cant get much more important than that. They were incredible. They were actually incredible campaigns too. Incredible. As of right now, republicans will control the majority of governorships across the country including three great women who worked very hard, governors of alabama, south dakota and iowa. They worked very, very hard and theyre very talented. By expanding our senate
majority, the voters have also clearly rebuked the Senate Democrats for their handling of the kavanaugh hearings, that was a factor, i think, maybe a very big factor the way that was handled, i think, was Tremendous Energy was given to the Republican Party by the way they treated then judge kavanaugh, now justice kavanaugh. And expressed their support for confirming more great proconstitution judges. Candidates who embraced our message of low taxes, low regulations, low crime, Strong Borders and great judges excelled last night. They excelled. They really i mean, we have a list of people that were fantastic and im just going to point them out. Mike bost, rodney davis, andy
barr was fantastic. I went to kentucky. For the most part i didnt campaign for the house, but i did actually make a special trip for andy barr because he was in a very tough race in kentucky and he won. That was a very tough race. The polls were all showing that he was down and down substantially and he won and that one i did do, pete stauber of minnesota. Great guy, hes new and ran a fantastic race. On the other hand they decided to lets stay away. They did very poorly. Im not sure that i should be happy or sad but i feel just fine about it. Carlos carbelo, mike coffman, too bad, mike. Mia love, i saw mia love, shed call me all the time to help her
with a hostage situation, being held hostage in venezuela but mia love gave me no love and she lost. Too bad. Sorry about that, mia. And Barbara Comstock was another one, i mean i think she could have won that race, but she didnt want to have any embrace. For that i dont blame her, but she lost substantially lost. Peter roskam didnt want the embrace. Eric paulsen didnt want the embrace and in new jersey i think he could have done well but Didnt Work Out too good, bob hugin i feel badly because i think that could have been won, john faso decided not to embrace whether its me or what we stand
for, but what we stand for meant a lot to most people and weve had tremendous support and tremendous support in the Republican Party among the biggest support in the history of the party. Ive actually heard at 93 , its a record but i wont say that because who knows. But weve had tremendous support. America is booming like never before, doing fantastic. We have larry kudlow here and he said the numbers are as good as hes ever seen numbers at any time for our country, but hes a young man so he hasnt seen that many numbers. Where is larry . Youre a young man, right, larry, and you havent been doing this too long but theyre as good as youve ever seen, and we may have if you have a question for larry, well do that but i want to send my warmest appreciation and regards
to majority leader mitch mcconnell. We really worked very well together. We have been working very well together. We actually have a great relationship. People just dont understand that, which is fine. And also to perhaps looks like i would think Speaker Nancy Pelosi and i give her a lot of credit. She works very hard and shes worked long and hard. I give her a great deal of credit for what shes done and what shes accomplished. Hopefully we can all Work Together next year to continue delivering for the American People including on economic growth, infrastructure, trade, lowering the cost of Prescription Drug, these are some of the things that the democrats do want to work on and i really believe well be able to do that i think well have a lot of reason to do it and i will say just as a matter of business, i spoke with some successful people last night, we
were watching the returns so if the republicans won and lets say we held on by two or one or three, it would have been very hard having that many republicans to ever even get support among republicans because there will always be one or two or three people that for a good reason or bad reason or grandstanding, we have that too, youve seen that, youve seen that, plenty of grandstanding but for certain reasons that many people, youre always going to have a couple that wont do it. So that puts us at a very bad position. In other words, had we kept and this is no im saying this for a very basic reason, its common sense, it puts us in a tough position, we win by one or two or three and youll have one or two or three or four or five say, look, were not going to go along with that and we wouldnt even be able to get it in many cases out of the republicans hands before we sent it on to the senate and now
we have a much easier path because the democrats will come to us with a plan for infrastructure, a plan for health care, a plan for whatever they are looking at and well negotiate. You know its been very hard in the senate because we need essentially ten votes from democrats and we dont get those because the democrats do really stick together well. I dont agree with them on a lot of policy but i agree with them on sticking together. They stick together great so we. Into the senate. We dont have the ten votes, and what happens . It doesnt get passed. Even if it gets out of the house it doesnt get passed so under the new concept of what were doing, i say come on, let me see what you have. They want to do things. You know, i keep hearing about investigations, fatigue, like
from the time almost from the time i announced i was going to rung, theyve been giving us this investigation fatigue. Its been a long time. They got nothing, zero. You know why . Because there is nothing but they can play that game but we can play it better because we have a thing called the United States senate and a lot of very questionable things were done between leaks of Classified Information and many other elements that should not have taken place and all youre going to do is end up in back and forth and back and forth and two years is going to go up and we wont have done a thing. I really think and i really respected what nancy said last night about bipartisanship and getting together and uniting. She used the word uniting and she used the Bipartisanship Statement which is so important because thats what we should be
doing. So we can look at us, they can look at us. Then we can look at them and itll go back and forth and itll probably be very good for me politically. I could see it being extremely good politically because i think im better at that game than they are actually, but well find out. I mean, you know, well find out or we can Work Together. You cant do them simultaneous, by the way, oh, you can them. No, you cant. If theyre doing that were not doing the other just so you understand. So we wont be doing that, but now what happens is we send it to the senate and well get 100 democrat support and some republican support and if its good i really believe we have republicans that will help with the Approval Process and they will really help with the Approval Process. So it really could be a beautiful bipartisan type of situation. If we won by one or two or three or four or five, that wouldnt happen and the closer it is, the
worse it is. This way theyll come to me. Well negotiate. Maybe well make a deal. Maybe we wont. Thats possible, but we have a lot of things in common on infrastructure. We want to do something on health care. They want to do something on health care. There are a lot of great things we can do together and now well set it up and get the democrats and well get the republicans or some of the republicans and ill make sure that we send something up that the republicans can support and theyre going to want to make sure they send up something that the democrats can support. So our great country is booming like never before and were thriving on every single level, both in terms of economic and military strength, in terms of development and in terms of gdp. Were doing unbelievably. I will tell you our trade deals are coming along fantastically. The usmca and south korea is finished. Usmca has gotten rave reviews. Were not going to lose companies to other countries anymore. Theyre not going to do that because they have a tremendous economic incentive meaning its prohibitive for them to do that, so its not going to be like nafta which is one of the worst deals ive ever seen although weve made some other pretty bad ones too. Now is the time for members of both parties to join together, put partisanship aside and keep the American Economic miracle going strong. It is a miracle. Were doing so well and ive said it at a lot of rally, some of you have probably heard it so much you dont want to hear it again but when people come to my office, president s, Prime Minister, they all congratulate me, almost the first thing on what weve done economically because it is really amazing. And our Steel Industry is back. Our Aluminum Industry is starting to do really well. These are industries that were dead. Our miners are working again. We must all Work Together to protect our military. We have to do that. To support our law enforcement, secure our borders and advance really great position including environmental policy. We want Crystal Clean water, we want beautiful perfect air. Air and water has to be perfect. At the same time we dont want to put ourselves at a disadvantage to other countries who are very competitive with us and who dont abide by the rules at all. We dont want to hurt other jobs. We dont want to hurt our factories. We dont Want Companies leaving. We want to be totally competitive and we are and right now we have just about the cleanest air, the cleanest water weve ever had and its always going to be that way. We insist on it. So environmental is very important to me and with that ill take a few questions if youd like. Whoa. I didnt know what happened. All right. Go ahead, jon. That was a lot of hands shooting up so quickly. Theres a lot to talk about. Mr. President , you talked at length just now about bipartisanship, the presumed Speaker Of The House nancy pelosi talked about it last night. Im sure thats encouraging for the American People, but do you really believe given what the relationship has been like between this white house and the Democratic Party that that will happen . I think theres a good chance, john. I think theres a very good chance. Will you have to compromise on certain issues to the point where it could hurt you in 2020 and do you expect that when the democrats take over the chairmanship of all these important committees youre going to get hit with a blizzard of subpoenas from the Russian Investigation to your Cell Phone Use to your tax returns . Then youre going to if that happen, then were going to do the same thing and government comes to a halt and i would blame them because they now are going to be coming up with
policy. Theyre the majority in the house. I expect that they will come up with some fantastic ideas that i can support on the environment, on so many Different Things including Prescription Drug prices, which weve made a big dent in already, including some of the thing that is were working on for the vets. Weve gotten choices approved but there are a lot of other elements we want. There are many things we can get along on that we agree with them and they agree with us. I would like to see bipartisanship. Id like to see unity and i think we have a very good chance maybe not on everything but i think we have a very good chance of seeing that. Go ahead. One question on the lame duck, sir, and one on your cabinet. You toyed with the idea during the campaign of a shutdown before the midterms in order to secure border wall funding. Are you prepared to go on a Shutdown Strategy during the lame duck since this might be
your last, best chance . Not necessarily. To secure that . Look, i speak to democrats all the time. They agree that a wall is necessary. A wall is necessary and as you know were building the wall. We started but we should build it at one time. You want much more money and you want it much sooner. We need the money to bill the whole wall. Now we have the military. Now we have other elements of a wall that are pretty nasty to be honest with you, but its nevertheless, its pretty hard to get through it but, no, id like to see the wall. Many of the people that will be dealing with, you know, in 2006 they approved the wall essentially. It wass very Strong Border fence but it was the same thing. And they all approved it. They all agreed. I have statements from every one of them saying we need the wall. They sound like me. But we do need it because we have people coming and im not just talking about the caravans. We have people coming through our border that you physically cant put that many people. Its a 2,000mile stretch. You cant put that many people
along that stretch to guard it. And even if you did tremendous fight wog ensue. So we need the wall. Many democrats know we need the wall and well just have to see what happens. I mean well be fighting for it. They have done everything in their power to make sure i got the military 700 million and 716 billion. The wall is a tiny, tiny fraction of the cost of that but their whole agenda has been to try not giving me anything for the wall. I really believe politically theyre hurting themselves. I actually think politically thats a good thing but no shutdown snare yee. I cant commit but its possible. Can you give us clarity, sir, on your thinking currently now after the midterms about your Attorney General and your Deputy Attorney general, do they have longterm term security . Id rather answer that at a little bit different time. Were looking at a lot of Different Things including cabinet im very happy with most
of my cabinet. Were looking at different people for different pentagon, you know, its very common after the midterms. I didnt want to do anything before the midterms but i will tell you that for the most part im extremely happy with m