Or can the discord among the republicans be overcome . Were going to be smart, were going to be vigilant, were going to be proid ud of o country again. This is an msnbc exclusive town hall with donald trump. From the university of Wisconsin Green Bay, here now, chris matthews. Good evening. And welcome to this exclusive town hall. Tonight, for a full hour, our guest is the frontrunner for the republican president ial nomination, donald trump. [ cheers and applause ] thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Interesting situation here. Were up here in green bay. Right. And my calculations say if youre going to win the general election, you got to win up here. States like wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, nfl places. Sure. Right . I think, you know, certainly itd be helpful. Were leading by a lot. In terms of votes, were millions of votes up on cruz and millions of votes up on kasich. But well have to see what we do. I mean, all you can do is do your best, right, folks . We do our best. Lets talk about [ applause ] before you get to the general election, you got to win the republican nomination. What is wheres your leverage there . Youve talked about north asia, north atlantic treaty, the middle east, mexico, the ability to walk, the ability to say no more trade, the ability to say were not going to buy your oil. Its always leverage, its always im going to walk. What is your leverage are republican bosses w es when you to cleveland when they try to keep you from winning the nomination on ballot . First, the voters. I have millions more votes than anybody else. Its not even close. You know, youve reported on it. Were setting records in terms of republican primaries. If you look at new hampshire, if you look at south carolina, no matter where you look, were setting records. Thats my leverage. And these are people that are really they really like donald trump. They really like what im saying. People that were going to make America Great again. Thats what it is and what my leverage is. Now, without me, they lose millions i think millions of people and nobodys going to have a chance. I will beat Hillary Clinton. And i havent started that process yet. I have two people left. We started off with actually 18 people. Right. And now theres two left. Youre counting jim gilmore. Im counting jim sort of. Let me ask you about the steps you get through. Cleveland is going to be in july. If you go in there short of if you have 1,237, you got it. Right. If you come in short and they try something on the first ballot now, im watching, listening. Mitt romney is up to something. He wants it. You can tell he wants s it. Paul ryan is making himself clearly available with the Statement Last week. What are you going to do if they deny you the first ballot victory . Were going to see what happens. I can say this, chris, were up above everybody else. Were hundreds of delegates above cruz. We just, you probably heard last night, missouri was just certified so i won missouri in addition to Everything Else. Were way, way up in votes. Way, way up. If were a little bit short, i think its a very unfair process. Let me just explain whats the jimmy, six inches, two feet . Let me explain. Normally youre talking about running and have 17 people, 18 people, again, including gilmore. So we have 18 people and during a long period of time, we had 14 people, 13 people, 12 people. You know, in primaries. We had a lot of people in the primaries. So id get 25 , 28 . Those are phenomenal numbers when you have that many people running. So in those early states, which i won, but you cant get 50 when you have that many people running, theres never been so many people running. Im going to come very close to the 1,237. I think im going to beat the 1,237. Were doing phenomenally in new york. You probably saw the poll that came out in new york, Emerson College which is its all about you not getting to 1,237. You going to be Teddy Roosevelt . You like Teddy Roosevelt. In 1912 he didnt get the nomination, he walked out, split the pear, beat the party in november and lost it to wilson. If theyre going to be fair, they got to be very happy. How can they give up millions of people that really feel disenfranchised they dont like you. Theyre going to lose then youre going to have four Supreme Court justices they dont like. You said last night on cnn youre not going to stick to the pledge to back the nominee. You sticking to that . I have not been treated properly. People understand. I dont want an endorsement from somebody that doesnt feel like oh, i love trump, if he wins, hes going to be the guy. I dont want that endorsement. Im not looking for that endorsement, so when they ask me about cruz and the endorsement, i say no, no, put no pressure on cruz. Tell him he doesnt have to endorse me. Please dont endorse me. Right. It doesnt matter. The endorsements dont mean very much. I have great endorsements. I have some phenomenal endorsements. I have senator sessions, Jeff Sessions endorse me. Everybody thought he was going to endorse cruz. He endorsed me because he knows im much better on security. Im better on a lot of things. I watched you, mr. Trump, on every issue. You always talk about leverage, always talk we can walk away from a deal with the saudis on oil, walk away from the chinese, dont have to buy their stuff anymore, dont have to pay for our troops in europe if they dont want to do it. You say your leverage is the ability to walk. Do you have the ability to walk in the republican nomination, can you walk . I can always do that. I can always walk. I dont want to let people down. I have millions of people more than cruz has. I have millions of people now, the system is not a good system. When you take louisiana, i went to louisiana, i campaigned there. I won the state. Now the numbers come out and i have less delegates than cruz. Thats not the american way. I went out as you know, i won louisiana. Big victory. Everything great. But because of arcane rules and a lot of nonsense, frankly, i get i end up getting a few less delegates than cruz. Thats not the way the systems supposed to work. Its not the way its supposed to work. 3 5 of the people we got at nbc says youre right, if you get the most votes you should be the nominee. Im trying to figure out what your alternative is if you dont get it. I dont want to tell you as much as i respect you. I did an interview with chris at the university of pennsylvania many, many years ago. That stuff doesnt work with me. Keep on is that a true thing . It is true. You were a celebrity even then. I was a celebrity. Lets talk about something. I like your question of leverage. My leverage is the voters, chris, just to end it. I have millions more votes than inelse. Was Teddy Roosevelt right to walk . Studied well, i think possibly he was, but boy, did that cause a problem. Sure did. Let me ask you about this thing the other day with your campaign manager. Do you think you got to handle it differently from the start with maybe an apology to the young woman reporter . Something like that, maybe yeah. Give her an interview . Something to deescalate the issue and show respect for her . I dont think so. I think if he called up to apologize, i think youd be in the exact same place and people that have seen that tape are going, give me a break, you have to be kidding. But there was contact. Whats contact . I mean, theres contact every time thats what this law says. Unwanted touching, unwanted yeah, she excuse me, she grabbed my arm twice. You see the picture of me looking like who is this person . And getting her off me. What do you make of the bruises on the picture . I dont know who created those bruises. I really dont know. I mean, you know, two days later she comes in and said she had some bruises. This argument infuriates her and a lot of women because youre not showing belief in her credibility. I just gave why would show make up a story about bruises . Why would anybody do that . 15 minutes away in front of a very large crowd, i gave a speech and we talked about that. I said, who saw the tape . And everybody raised almost a, a lot of people raised their hand, threequarters raised their hand. Big audience. I said, who thinks he did something really wrong . I said, stand up, please. Or raise your hand if you dont want to stand up. Not one person in the room. Your exam ra cameras were there. Not one person in the room raised their hand. Were getting its out of control. Political correctness, whatever you want to call it. Its totally whats the right approach, though, if you accidentally bump into somebody, accidentally trip them, you say im sorry. Dont you say some apology and roespect for the other person . I think thats fine. Wouldnt that have been appropriate there . Im not sure he maybe didnt say it there. What he was doing, in my opinion, just in watching the tape because nobody remembers the incident because it was so minor, its not like you know Jupiter Police remember it. Excuse me. I think that they are what theyve done is, i think, outrageous. Theyre destroying a very good person. Hes a good person. Forget about politics. Hes a good person with a wonderful family, four beautiful kids. And theyre destroying that man over nothing. You take a look at that tape and shes grabbing me. Now, maybe i should press charges against her. Shes not supposed to be grabbing me. Shes touching me. Shes grabbing my arm. And im going like this. Im saying, who is it . You know, the News Conference was over. She wasnt supposed to be asking questions. She pushed her way through, came through the secret service, grabs my arm, and i think maybe this was just and let me tell you something, just so you understand, if she went down, she made the statement that she went down, or essentially almost went down. Almost went down. Nothing there was nothing there. She didnt even have a if i give you a little shot on the arm youre going to go, ow. Im a strong guy. Youre going to go oh. Youre going to have some sort of a facial she didnt have any facial she did say in real time that it hurt. When was the realtime . When did they record that. Youre skeptical about her. Im a very skeptical person about her, yes. Why dont you have any sympathy for her . I dont think that look. First of all, she was doing her job. It was my tape. I looked at that tape and we have heads being cut off in all over the world, frankly, but we have peoples heads being cut off in the middle east. Peoples heads being cut off. We have people drowning in steel cages. Heres a woman, and it didnt even look like there was physical touch. That was almost like it was just blocking her away from me. And hes supposed to be a criminal . For that . Yeah, but western society claims that were better with women. Look, nobody respects women more than i do. That i can tell you. You dont respect her, though. Nobody well, you know, shes somebody that yeah, i would say i dont have Great Respect for her. I think for her to do what she did to this man over what he did is outrageous. Its outrageous. She quit her job over it. She must believe in her story. Did she quit or get fired . I dont know. I think she quit. You do . I think maybe the other way. Youll find out. Well find out in court. Lets talk about the well find out in court. The easiest thing for me to do, youre fired. Thats so easy. Thats a very easy everybodys happy. [ applause ] everybodys happy. Theres a middle i cant do that because im loyal to people. And you know, when they went to cruz and kasich, oh, you should fire him, they didnt even see the tape i dont think. You should fire him, you should fire him. I dont do that. If somebody is being, really, i just thought it was a very unfair situation. This is not good for me. Okay . How do you think women react when they see this . The numbers arent good. I think a lot of women would say, give me a break, i dont understand why. I mean, the numbers arent good. The numbers were good. The numbers arent as good with women as they were. But nobody respects women more than i do. Lets talk about isis. Its the number one concern of a lot of people since last week. Right. How do you beat people . When we fought the germans or italians, you know, the army puts their hands up at the end because they know its hopeful. Right. Uniforms. How do you fight people who wrap themselves in dynamite, they get up, brush their teeth in the morning, shave i suppose in some cases. They go off to the airport with the idea of blowing themselves up, killing themselves that day, that morning. How do you beat an army like that . This gets down to something that we havent dealt with before in our history. How do we beat that kind of mentality . We have to be so tough and so vigilant and do things, frankly, weve never done before. They want to die for their cause. Maybe they do and some of them do and, you know, a lot of people are trying to figure out why they do this, how they do this. Theyre recruited. Are they drugged out . Theyre recruited. Are they drugged out when they do it . Whats going on when they walk in and blow themselves up . Are they all drugged out . Is somebody drugging them . Theres a lot of things going on. When i talked about we have to be very careful because we have people coming into this country, its a very bad situation. We have thousands and thousands of people coming into our country, we have no idea where they come from, who they are. Oftentimes, its the second or first generation. Its not the first wave of immigrants. Its these people in belgium had been living there, born there, theyre belgians. How do with you deal with that situation . Look at the guys in boston. They were here. What do you do came here as young kids and became radicalized. Does banning entry into the country temporarily encourage them to be on our side against the terrorists or encourage them to be on the other side . Banning them, i take a lot of heat for it. Chris, theres something going on. 1. 6 billion muslims in the world getting a message from donald trump leading the fight for the republican nomination for president saying, stay out of my country. How does that encourage them to fight isis . How does that encourage them to fight the bad guys . They have a problem, too. They have a big problem. I have been called saying what you are doing is a great thing, not a bad thing. The two are any muslims telling you that . The San Bernardino i have, actually, believe it or not, i have a lot of friends that are muslim and call me. In most cases, theyre very rich muslim. They get in the country . Theyll come in. How do you let them in . Theyll have exceptions. Wait. Chris, chris, with the San Bernardino situation right. Many people saw that apartment with bombs all over the apartment. Yeah, i agree with that. Bombs on tables. See something, say something. Not one person, with all the people they said its racial profiling, thats why they didnt call. You know why they said that . Some lawyer said, you saw this, you better come up with a good excuse. They said its racial profiling. A lot of people saw what was going on in that apartment. Not one muslim. Im with you on this. Of course im with you. Thats not the question. Why didnt they report them . Youre saying ban chris, why didnt they report them . Youre saying ban them from entering the country. They get the message. Everyone in the world. Anywhere theres muslims, you know, they know you dont want them. They get the message. Theyre little more ill disposed po fight isis, a little bit more after that once they say the americans dont even like us. Maybe theyll be more disposed to fight isis. Maybe theyll say we want to come back into america, we have to solve this problem. Cruz is pushing, he wants patrol cars riding in neighborhoods thinks theres muslim People Living there, looking in the windows for plotting. Its an insane idea. Theyre not street criminals. Theyre plotting bombings, if they are. Were going to go up and down the street ths. That will make them more militant against us. Hes toughening up his stance. What do you think of his stance . Patrol cars. We have to look at the mosques, be extremely careful. Were making enemies here. Were making enemies by doing nothing. Were knocking down world trade centers, were shooting planes into the meant gone. Yeah. Probably the other plane was going toward the white house, had very brave people. What are we going to do, sit back and say we want to be nice to everybody . We cant be so nice. Sometimes we create more trouble than we went into. Do you think it was smart to go into iraq . Was it smart to put our troops in the holy land of mecca . I thought it was one of the worst decisions in the history of our country. Are you more hawkish or less hawkish than hillary . Im probably more intelligent than hillary. Answer the question. Are you more likely to engage militarily than hillary . I would never want to make a blanket Statement Like that. I would have never gone into iraq. I said from a very early day, you saw that from the earliest tape, i dont want to bo ingo i iraq. I was a real estate guy, a business guy. Nobody cared that much. There were articles a long time ago, i said youre gong to destabilized middle east. That happened. When we got out, we set a date which was terrible, we should have left some soldiers back. I always said, take the oil. You know who has the oil now . You need Ground Troops to do that. You need Ground Troops to take the oil. I said take the oil. Ground troops and isis. I said keep the oil. We already had the troops there. When we were leaving, i said dont leave, keep the oil. Okay. Your most controversial suggestion was dont take Nuclear Weapons you may have been hooked into this by dont take what . Nuclear weapons off the table. I have been trying to think how we could conceivably use a Nuclear Weapon in the middle l east or europe in fighting isis. Why put it on the table, leave it on the table if you cant imagine where to use it . I didnt say dont take it. I said i would be very, very slow and hesitant to pull that trigger. Why did you say i dont want to talk about it . President s dont talk about use of Nuclear Weapons. We were talking about nato, by the way, is obsolete. You got hooked into something you should have talked about. I think, well, someday maybe. Maybe . Of course. Where would we drop a Nuclear Weapon in the middle east . Let me explain. Somebody hits us with isis. You wouldnt fight back . To drop a Nuclear Weapon into a com