LIVE: Trump Makes Announcement With Commerce Secretary Lutnick From the Oval Office | AC1N

Today, we're thrilled to announce one of the largest energy infrastructure investments in American history. Thanks to the agreements my administration has secured with the Republic of Korea, they will invest up to $200 billion dollars. That's the Korean government. $200 billion to build a six-gigawatt power generation facility in Texas. That's a major plant. That's about as big as you'll see. Eight new large-scale nuclear power plants, and at long last, Alaska liquefied natural gas pipeline. That's a big one, and that's why we have a lot of people from Alaska, including a very great governor and your great senator, Dan Sullivan. We're joined on this occasion by Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, who's very involved in this whole situation, a big one. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Alaska Senator, as I said, Dan S. Sullivan. You know, the Democrats put up another man in the race named Dan Sullivan. He's a fraud. Dan Sullivan's a fraud. That Dan Sullivan is a disgraceful fraud.

They put it up for confusion and everything else. And I believe he actually tried to get his initial, because his initial I think was J. And he said, "No, I have nothing to do with this." But despite saying he has nothing to do with it, I believe he tried to get his initial made to an S. So it could be exact because it was Dan S. Sullivan and Daniel J. Sullivan. He tried to get it to be Daniel S. Daniel S is the good one. Let's see. How do you remember that? Super, right? Super intelligence. So vote for the guy with S because I don't know if they got the, unless he's already got that. It's so corrupt. The Democrats are corrupt.

But Dan Sullivan, the senator of Alaska, has been a great senator. He's been working on this deal and other deals in Alaska, the pipeline for almost 20 years, and we're now getting it done. And so I want to thank in particular Dan Sullivan for getting this deal done wherever you may be.

And I want to thank as well Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy, who's fantastic. World's tallest governor, by the way. The tall guys. I think Barron might have you. I have a son who's pretty tall. Have a couple of them actually that are tall. But I want to thank Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy. He's been fantastic. He's a great governor. Also as somebody who's a warrior, representatives Nick Begich, and he is really a warrior. We've been together in a lot of good fights, and Nick has done a fantastic job. Thank you, Nick. Really appreciate it. Westinghouse CEO, a man who's done unbelievably and bringing a company to a very high level. Dan Summer. Dan, thank you. Thank you, Dan. Where are you? Come here. Young guy. Look at you. Nice young guy. It's nice to be young, isn't it? Young is very successful. But he's done a great job at Westinghouse. Next year is CEO John Ketchum. John, hi John. How are you? Great job you've done. Great company. Somebody that I relate to. He's the head of Related, a big real estate company, but he was a competitor of mine and a friend of mine, but he's a real estate man at the highest level. CEO Jeff Blau. Thank you, Jeff. Great job you've done. He's an unbelievable real estate person, I can tell you. Lewis Energy CEO Rod Lewis. Rod. Hi, Rod. Hello. Thank you very much. And Glen Farm CEO Brendan Duval. Brendan. Hi, Brandon. How are you? Thank you. Lot of great people in this transaction.

The colossal package of investments we are announcing today is a major step toward securing our critical energy supply chain, ensuring American energy dominance, and making our partnership with South Korea and the entire Pacific region stronger than ever before. As you know, in our trade agreement with South Korea, they have to invest hundreds of billions of dollars. And for doing that, I reduced their tariffs to 15%. But they paid to get them reduced, and part of that money is going into this project. Otherwise, this project is so big, probably, I don't know, maybe the money wouldn't be available, very, very easily available. But Japan is paying $550 billion unrelated, Europe pays $650 billion, and South Korea is about $250 billion. It's all money that you never heard about before, but we make great deals. That's what we do, right, Jeff? Jeff does that. The natural gas power plant that will be constructed in Texas will be among the largest ever built anywhere in the world. The eight new nuclear reactors built across the country will solidify our position as the world's leading producer of nuclear power.

And we've really taken that lead once we were able to show the tremendous safety that's now taking place with respect. It's become safe. And once we were into that, we really pushed and pushed it hard. We're now the leading producer of nuclear power. Pretty amazing considering we got a very late start over certain countries in Europe. And by building the Alaska LNG pipeline, we will deliver nearly 4 billion cubic feet of liquefied natural gas per day. And that makes us, puts us at a level that's not comparable with anyone else. The United States is already the largest natural gas producer and exporter in the world, and this pipeline will help us expand those exports even further. For five decades, politicians have talked about the Alaska pipeline. I've been hearing about it from the time I'm a little boy. The Alaska pipeline's going to be built someday. I was always fascinated by it. But today, with the help of Senator Dan S. Sullivan, and don't get it confused with anybody else, remember they put up a fake. It's a fake Sullivan. Guy knows nothing. In fact, I think he just switched to the Republican party, didn't he? He just switched over.

He was never a Republican. He still isn't a Republican, but we're finally getting it all done. But it just shows you how dirty and disgusting the political game is to do that. But this alone will be one of the largest energy projects in American history and a gigantic win for the people of Alaska. It will create up to 12,000 construction jobs immediately and 1,000 operational jobs. It'll also save Alaska households up to $1,500, maybe even as much as $2,200 per year on energy costs. It's amazing. So now I'd like to ask a man, and I have to tell you this because he has an election. It's a crooked deal. It's crooked as hell. I'll say it. When they put up a man with his exact name, they picked him out of a hat. They said, "Anybody named Dan Sullivan in Alaska?" and they put somebody up against him because they know they can't win without cheating. That's what they do is they cheat. But this is a great senator who is totally responsible for this pipeline, for what we're doing. So many of the jobs we've done and so many of the jobs, you know, I won Alaska by a lot. Many, many points. Did I win it by how many points? Like, you know, 15, sir. Yeah. How about 22? A lot of points. So, we shouldn't have a problem. But one of the reasons I won is we've done more for Alaska than anybody in history times 10. And this is a man that worked with me by shoulder to shoulder. But to say a few words, I'd like to ask Secretary Lutnick to start, Secretary Burgum, Secretary Wright, Governor Dunleavy, but I'd like to start with Dan Sullivan. So, he's running for office. He's a spectacular senator, not just for Alaska. He's great for the world, for our country and the world. What he's done is so important. And he's got my ear and he's had my ear for a long time on Alaska. We did so many jobs between Cove Road and all the different things that we got approved that nobody else could have ever. All these energy projects are all mine and I got them done working with Dan Sullivan. So Dan, could you say a few words and then we'll go to the rest of the group.

Mr. President, I would say this is the most important project in our state by far. This is the project that is going to keep our kids and grandkids in Alaska with a great bright future. This is the project that our state has been working on to try to get done for almost a half century. And the reason is it's going to deliver low-cost energy to Alaskans, to our churches, to our schools, our hospitals, our businesses. And we need low-cost energy. This will deliver low-cost energy to Alaskans for 50 to 100 years. Not to mention our military, which we're all working together to grow our military, a huge military buildup. They need the energy, as you said, Mr. President, 12,000 jobs just to build this project. And this could unleash all kinds of other opportunities in Alaska. Manufacturing opportunities. The sky is the limit when we get this project done. And Mr. President, I want to thank you and your team. You know, you have been focused on this from day one. Literally, your executive order on unleashing Alaska's extraordinary potential focuses on this Alaska LNG project and pipeline. Your first State of the Union address. You highlighted how this was a really, really important project for you and your team here. They have been absolutely outstanding. All your cabinet officials, your chief of staff, everybody. Howard Lutnick in particular, Mr. Secretary, thank you. But, Mr. President, this one is huge for Alaska. It's why I've been, as you mentioned, sir, working on this relentlessly for well before I was a US senator because it's the most important thing for my constituents, but it's great for America. This is going to be the biggest LNG project in our country. We'll be able to get gas, of course, to Alaskans first and our military, and we need it, but to our Asian allies. So, Mr. President, thank you again and everybody here. We're going to get this done. We're going to get this done. This is really exciting for my state, my constituents, and the United States of America. So, thank you again, Mr. President.

Thank you very much. Great job. Secretary Lutnick, please.

Secretary Doug Burgum, please.

Thank you, Mr. President. So much gratitude to share today, starting with President Trump and Howard Lutnick. As was just described, this is a historic deal that changes the future of Alaska and it changes the future of geopolitics of oil. Not only are we going to be in a position to lower the price and drive affordability through this strategic piece of national security infrastructure for Alaskans. It also is going to help Hawaii. Hawaii imports their oil today from the Middle East. They're going to be able to import natural gas. Our territories where we have military bases in Guam, American Samoa, Marianas Islands, which are all managed as part of the Department of the Interior. They all are dependent on foreign sources for energy. We'll be able to fill that from Alaska. Japan, who's an ally of ours where we have 50,000 troops. It's almost 30 days for a shipment to come from the Middle East, if it gets there at all to Japan. It's eight days from Anchorage to Tokyo, most of that through US territorial waters. Korea also much closer to be able to ship to them. The Philippines, Taiwan, all of our allies can be dependent on American energy. And so not again, President Trump when he ran, he was running on America first, but that meant prosperity at home. It meant peace abroad. This critical piece of national security infrastructure is going to deliver on both that prosperity and on the peace. And it wouldn't have happened without President Trump's leadership, his EO on day one, January 20th of last year on the first page. One of the 54 items of unleashing Alaska's energy potential was this pipeline. He's delivering on that and of course wouldn't have happened without the incredible delegation and the leadership in Alaska. So Dan Sullivan, Governor Dunleavy, Congressman Begich, you guys have been fantastic in helping make this happen. But without Howard Lutnick, Chris Wright, Lee Zeldin, the whole cabinet you've assembled, this is a team effort. Extraordinary President Trump, thank you for your leadership and a big day for America, a big day for Alaska.

Thank you very much. Thank you, Secretary. Chris Wright, please.

Yeah, today is pure joy. I have been an energy nerd my whole life. The way to make America better is much more energy infrastructure, much more energy resources. President Trump has always been about energy addition, energy expansion. In his first term, in his campaigns as a businessman, he got how central energy was. The first time I ever sat in the Oval Office on the other side of the desk from the president, he brought up this project on day one of this new administration and said, "Do you know about this project? We need to build it." And I said, unfortunately, fortunately, I do know about this project because I've known Dan Sullivan before I came into politics. And Dan Sullivan talked to me about this project years ago. The Alaska LNG project will be the largest energy infrastructure project built in 50 years. It is transformative for the state of Alaska. Absolutely. But for the United States to have a Pacific Coast LNG export terminal, our fastest growing export, the fastest growing energy source on planet Earth is natural gas. This puts the United States geostrategically positioned and grows our ability to export that to our friends and allies while hitting a home run for the state of Alaska. I can also turn Dan Sullivan off blocked on my phone. Then he said, "Well, that's not going to work because I'll get a new phone and I'll have a different middle initial and so I'll still be able to get through to you." And then he was smarter. He got my wife's cell phone number. So Dan has always been able to reach me. And I will tell you, I love his passion. He cares about the people of Alaska. He gets how important energy is to Alaska and our country. And he has been ceaseless on this. And to achieve difficult things, you have to be ceaseless, principled, and right. But the combination of President Trump, it's just an incredible alignment of stars. Dan Sullivan's relentless pursuit of this project, Governor Dunleavy and Representative Begich's passionate champions. Anyone they meet, they talk about this project. Then Howard Lutnick comes in in a negotiating way to find a way to make this happen. And Secretary Burgum in charge of the interior and so many of the lands in Alaska had to say, "We're going to be practical. How are we going to benefit the environment and build energy infrastructure, make our country better and save the economic future of Alaska?" I am thrilled to be partners with all the gentlemen and the businessmen to my left. It is incredible day for America. God bless your leadership, President Trump. Same to you, Sullivan, and all my other partners here. Love you guys.

Thank you. Great job. Thank you. And we'll maybe not totally finish off because we have a couple of people that I think everybody wants to hear from, but a man who's really been a great governor and friend of mine, Governor Dunleavy, please.

Mr. President, this is an incredible day for the state of Alaska. I have to condense two hours of just discussing with the people all the things that your administration has done for this great state. You have to realize we're only 740,000 people in the top of the world. We could be forgotten that this president on day one issued an executive order for the great state of Alaska across the board directing his departments to do everything they could to unleash Alaska's energy. President Trump by far, and I've said this before, has been the greatest president in the history of our state. 1959, we became a state. No president, in my opinion, and the opinion of many other Alaskans has come close to doing what the president has done simply by looking out for Alaska. If it's everything from the King Cove Road to the Tongass National Forest to oil to this massive, massive gas line, this will save the state of Alaska. This will transform the state of Alaska. This is probably the largest project ever in the Arctic. Probably one of the largest, if not largest project in the Pacific. And it's going to transform our great state for 50, 60, 70 years. And it wouldn't have been done without the President of the United States, Donald Trump. There's no doubt about it. I want to thank you for the great team you put together. You've put together, I think, a world-class team in Doug Burgum, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary Wright, and then Secretary Lutnick. I can't say enough about your secretaries and your staff, Mr. President. They have executed what you want to have happen for this country and for the great state of Alaska. These guys have been incredible. Secretary Lutnick has been fantastic on this project. He's basically taken this project and moved it not just into life, but into a reality that is going to transform the entire country, the entire Pacific basin. And I just want to thank Dan Sullivan. Dan Sullivan I knew back in 2012 when he was with the state of Alaska. He had a role as the Department of Natural Resources commissioner as well as attorney general. He has been working on this gas line since 2012. And everywhere I go, whether it's in Japan, Korea, anywhere here in the United States, Dan Sullivan is there selling Alaska to everybody on how great this state could be. And I want to thank Dan. I want to thank President. I want to thank all the secretaries. Thank you very much. This has been fantastic. Fantastic.

You know, at the end of the day, this is a transformative opportunity for the state, for the nation, and you know, I think it really speaks to the level of teamwork that we have with the administration and among our delegation. Leaders like Dan Sullivan, like Governor Dunleavy have been pushing this project for years, for years, trying to find a way, and we have found a way to bring that energy to market, to our benefit, to the benefit of the nation, and to the benefit of so many allies around the world. We're seeing right now a realignment, a realignment for energy flows globally. And people have recognized that there's a price to be paid when you're rolling the dice in certain areas of the world that aren't as stable as the United States. The United States offers our allies and our friends abroad something that they can't find anywhere else. And that's reliable energy flows. And that's what Alaska is going to bring to the table. And Mr. President, I can't thank you enough for being a partner for Alaska and your cabinet. Incredible work. Secretary Burgum, Secretary Lutnick, Secretary Wright, you have prioritized Alaska from day one. We couldn't have a better partner than you. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Would anybody like to say anything? Anyone, do you want to talk about the real estate business? Good. So, Mr. President, yeah, please, please.

Yeah. John Ketchum with NextEra. And this administration has just been amazing in supporting energy dominance across this country. And NextEra is spending a billion dollars a week trying to finance and fund and build the energy infrastructure this country needs. And this announcement today is just an example of what this administration has been able to accomplish. So, thank you so much, Mr. President, for your leadership.

A billion a week. That's a lot of money. That's a lot. Every week. Not every month. Every week. Every week. Wow. That's pretty good, I think. Well, the country is doing great. And if it wasn't, you wouldn't be spending a billion. Spending a lot less. Do you have any questions, please? Mr. President, President, please come.

Thank you, Mr. President. Jennifer Schonberger with Fox Business. Building on the discussion here. The United States is a net exporter of crude oil. Yet, California has to rely on foreign crude oil because it doesn't have refineries. And so how much will this new LNG facility help not just with Alaska and Hawaii but other consumers here in the United States? Do you have any thoughts or...

Yeah, I do and it's a great question because it's so unfair what California is doing. They closed their refineries. You know, they had a lot of refineries. They were actually the third or fourth biggest oil producer in the country. Nobody thinks of California that way. They have a lot of oil in California, but they don't use it because of the environmental lunatics and this will help the people of California a lot. You know, they're being charged so much. It's so sad to see and how they keep electing these people that have no idea what they're doing. But we have maybe just very shortly I could ask Chris Wright because he is an expert on how they've destroyed California and the refineries. Chris, do you want to give that a quick shot?

No, no, you're right. California has just stood in the way of building any infrastructure. So they can't get oil delivered to the states. We're a net exporter of oil, as you said. They import over 60% of their oil from abroad. And then they refine that oil in California until they force so many of their refineries to close they can't even produce enough gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. So they're going to have to build a new pipeline to bring refined products to California. Well, they're going to be an energy island. They strangled their own oil and gas industry and their refining industry. So, California's been dead set on making energy expensive, impoverishing their citizens, and encouraging all the businesses and people to leave the state. That's just the exact opposite of President Trump's goal, which is lower energy prices to make things more affordable, increase job opportunities to raise wages up. I don't know why California does what it does. I will tell you the Trump administration has been ceaseless in trying to help the population of Californians. They are Americans. This should not be imposed on them.

Mr. President, on this project that has been announced today, two questions. What is the timeline for completing the LNG project? And secondly, I was in Alaska just a few weeks ago. Energy costs are exceedingly high. Is there any consideration of constructing another oil refinery for...

Well, this is going to bring those prices down. One of the reasons Alaska prices are going to become way down. When do you see completion of the job, fellas?

Gasoline prices in Alaska are going to tumble. Well, as soon as the war ends, which is going to be soon, the Iran war, prices are going to come way down regardless, but gasoline price because of this project and a couple of others in Alaska are going to tumble. Now, if the Democrats come along, I can't speak...

to that. They will, you're going to have double the prices will double if they come along. You end up in a depression, recession, something very bad. They have the worst policy. It's why they haven't gotten elected. People have to understand what's happening. If they, if anything were done to hurt Alaska, uh, the prices would go up so high. And remember, our gasoline prices, having stopped Iran from having a nuclear weapon, our gasoline prices are lower than Biden's. And he didn't stop them from nuclear weapons. When the war is over, which will be very soon, uh, gasoline prices are going to drop like Iraq. Yeah, please.

Mr. President, there is a report that Ken Paxton was complaining about your midterm convention and he felt like it hurt him. What's your reaction to that?

Well, I haven't heard that, but I can tell you that the convention was amazing. As you probably know, we had 107 million views. Think of that. We had uh over a hundred million views. I think 107. The NFL had 25 million views. So, we had four times what the NFL did. And you know, it's possible that could be true. I don't know if it's possible, but other people were helped greatly. This was a national convention, midterm convention, never been done before. Um, and we went directly against the NFL, was just the timing worked out that way. And we had 107 million versus 25 million views, which was a big story in the entertainment world and sports world. So, I think the convention, I would imagine they do it again often. Somebody said it won't do as well because I won't be around, but I'll be around in some form. I don't know what form I'm going to be around in, but the uh the convention, you know, just based on the views that it got, it it was the most watched thing on television and that included the NFL, which is pretty amazing.

Mr. President, Mr. President, last week with in your meeting with Xi, did you discuss the release of political prisoners such as Americans?

I did. I did with President Xi. I did. We talked and I think we had some very very important discussions, hopefully fruitful discussions.

Mr. President, I have a question about Fly Dubai and then about your new ads. Have you spoken to Prime Minister Netanyahu yet about the incident on the Fly Dubai? What do you think the pilot was trying to do?

I think it's an incredible story. It seems, I mean, I can relate the story, but you're better off getting it from him. But by this time, I guess they have a lot of fake stories out there and you know, you never know what's happening. But I did speak to Bibi Netanyahu at length about this event. And it seems as though the co-pilot was perhaps a terrorist or perhaps a wack job and he stabbed the pilot. The pilot was in very bad shape. I guess he still is in very bad shape. But he had the sense to, amazing, to in a way he was a hero to open the door. You know those doors are solid steel. You can't get them open from outside. He was able to fall back and get the door open and scream. And a plumber, an Israeli plumber, never flew a plane, was rarely in planes, very rarely flew. An Israeli plumber saw what was happening and strong. You know when you lift pipe all day, you're strong. And he saw what was going on. He heard the screaming. He was toward the front where you had security in the back. You know, you had security and you had another flight crew, but they didn't have time. The plane was going sharply down at an unbelievable angle. So sharp that the rudder ripped off the back of the plane. Plane wasn't designed to go at a speed anywhere near that. And so it was well beyond its limits. And he ripped with the G-forces as they were, he ripped this guy out of the seat, threw him back, the crowd got him, the passengers got him, grabbed him, and having never flown a plane, he took the stick, lifted it up, and leveled out the plane before it crashed. Now, this is the story that I heard. I don't know if it's true, but that's the story that I got from Bibi and from a couple of probably early. I don't know if you've heard that story yet. I think it's an amazing. So, a plumber never flew a plane. Strong guy. Lift him up, throw him back. The crowd was was they knew they were going to die shortly because the G-forces, but they were able to hold him because he was going crazy. And he was crazy. And this plumber, never having flown a plane, had the sense to lift a stick. Who would? And you know, it's not like planes are different today. He used to have a little steering wheel. What? Today they fly differently. And when I asked why he did that, he said he watches that show Air Disasters. You know the show? It's that crazy show. I never want to watch it because I watch it. I don't like watching it because bad things happen. But he said he watches it a lot and uh he learned from watching that show sort of how to fly. I mean you tell me this is the craziest thing and then shortly thereafter the pilots, you know, were there because they have emergency pilots on these planes and the security guys, but they were in the back of the plane, they came up, they took over the plane. I think it's the most amazing story. Did he want his lady to tell him? They said he wanted a crash. They don't know that. They don't know that kind of information. But supposedly a plumber grabbed the stick and through watching this unbelievably crazy show. I watched it numerous times. Actually, I don't want to watch it. Although now maybe I will start watching it. But he learned about flying, you know, because they always talk about this should have happened, that should have. He grabbed the stick, pulled it up, leveled out the plane before it crashed.

Jeff, I think it's true. And he happened to be a Jewish plumber. Jeff is very proud of it. A Jewish plumber, Jeff.

Hey, sir. Um, last year, US reported the lowest poverty rate on record and, um, median household incomes went up, uh, to a new record, right? With this investment that you're announcing today as well, instead of trillions of other dollars of investments you've announced over the last year, right? How do you expect that trend to continue?

I think it's great. Thank you for that question. So, we announced the lowest poverty rate in the history of our country. The best numbers we've ever had and we've also announced the best uh individual income numbers. In other words, people's individual income was higher than at any point. Higher than inflation by the way. And our inflation numbers are way down other than for oil, which is still lower than Biden, but is coming down rapidly. And as you probably noticed, we've taken out uh over the last couple of days more oil than we took out during the pre-war days from the Hormuz Strait. Taken out a lot of oil, and so far there's not a thing they can do to stop us. It's pretty pretty amazing. I think our navy has been incredible and I think that our military is truly in a class by itself. Mr. President, Mr. President, go ahead, please.

Mr. President, uh, yesterday the Supreme Court lifted the ban on deportations to third countries for migrants. I just wanted to see if you have a comment about that decision. And, uh, are you hopeful that in Massachusetts?