So, we had incredible job numbers today. You saw that. And we have good everything, good numbers, but the job numbers just came out and they were fantastic. Far better than even anticipated. They anticipated pretty good, but they had no idea it was going to be that. And unfortunately, we're in a world where for the last 15 years or so, when you have good numbers, the market goes down. When you have bad numbers, the market goes up because too much emphasis is placed on inflation. And you don't have to have inflation by having growth. And we have great growth. And that doesn't mean inflation. In fact, it can be anti-inflation growth. So I hope the market starts to learn that when you have good numbers, the market should go up, not down.
Question. So given those job numbers, do you think the Fed should cut rates at its next meeting? And do you think new chair Kevin Warsh can convince the rest to make that decision?
I'd like to see lower interest rates because each point, think of this, is $600 billion.
Okay. So, you know, you said yesterday you're interviewing some candidates for permanent director of national intelligence. Who's under consideration for it?
I have five interviews and we'll have a very good person watching things, Bill Pye, but I have five interviews. So, cutting rates are just getting back to you. You save hundreds of millions of dollars when you take one. Hundreds of millions of dollars. Two points, you save double hundreds of millions of dollars. And so I therefore, you know, from that sample, but someday we're going to have to go back to the old theory when we're doing so good. We have more auto plants being built than we've ever had. We have more plants being built than we've ever. All these numbers are good, but when the numbers are good, we should be allowed to grow, not to stifle the growth.
We had a Fed here that didn't understand that.
Financial markets now pricing in a cut actually for the October meeting.
I would like to see that, but I leave that... I leave it up to Kevin, but I've always said, I've said it for years, when you have a country that's doing well, the market should go up. The market should... And the reason they go down is if it's doing well, people said, 'Oh, we have to stop inflation.' And it doesn't mean inflation. In fact, it could be just the opposite.
What would the hike before the midterm elections mean though? If they were to hike, $600 billion every point.
Why do you want Bill Pye to cut the office, Mr. President? Why do you want Bill Pye to cut the office of the director of national intelligence and how long is he going to be in that role?
Depends on how long it takes to get somebody approved. He'll do a very good job. He'll watch it closely. But Bill Pye is very good. He's very talented. Got a great job at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac. The value there is close to a trillion dollars. We built a value that's incredible. So he's done a very good job in that. He'll do a good job. He's watching for, you know, during this time period.
And you wanted to cut the number of people working there.
I wouldn't mind. I've heard that's way too high for way too long. Yeah, I wouldn't mind. If he could, I wouldn't run the...
Artificial intelligence. Are you considering the possibility of the US government taking stakes in some AI companies?
Well, something I did it with Intel. So, I made a deal on Intel. You know, we made, I made for the country $50 billion. We took a stake in Intel was given to us by our helping. I said, 'Look, we'll help you, but you have to give us 10% of the company.' That was Intel just 9 months ago, and as I think you know, we made about $50 billion on that deal.
Would you want to do it right now?
I did a very good job. I should be a stock broker.
Mr. President. Yes, sir. Beautiful. I'm going to change the subject if you don't mind. Did you get a chance to watch game one of the NBA finals? What'd you think?
I did. Well, I'll be going to game three. I guess it's game three on Monday. I thought it was amazing. I think the Knicks have an amazing team the way they played. Started off slow and it just got stronger and stronger. We looks like he's going to be a great player, but they really played well. I thought...
Did you see Webby crossing his arms during the US national anthem? Did you have any thoughts on that?
I did not see that. Is that what he did?
What did he mean by that?
Well, I guess you have to ask him.
Well, who's your favorite Knick?
Brunson is fantastic. Towns is fantastic. They just have a great team.
Why do you think that the game you're going to, the cheapest price for the game three you're going to is $8,000. Everyday Americans can't afford these sporting events.
No, but they can watch it on television. It's sort of similar to watch it on television, but that's the way life goes. You have some. But now the game wasn't a big, if the team wasn't a big success, you could go very easily. So, you know, you can do that too. But that's the way life is. You know, they've had great success. And don't forget, they've suffered also losses and they've suffered during the bad time. Now they have a good time. They have a team that's amazing. I don't think they've lost a playoff game, right?
Do you have any... Very unused before? Is it, has anyone ever had this kind of a run in a playoff game? I don't... Do you have any...
On the new promenade you announced yesterday, Mr. President? Where is the funding going to come from?
Promenade. It's not a lot of money and it's going to be beautiful. You know, it's always been the Lincoln Memorial has always been very tied to the Potomac River, but they built two roadways behind it unexpectedly at the time many years ago, but after the memorial was built, it used to have a tie to the river and then the highways cut it off. And we have a really beautiful plan where it goes over beautiful, a beautiful series of platforms that bring you right down to the river. It's beautiful.
What's a promenade? It's a beautiful promenade. Probably, well, it could come from a lot of... We have a lot of sources of funding. We won't have to go back to Congress or we have a lot of sources of funding and a lot of people have asked me to stay involved with the Kennedy Center. We had a judge who's totally conflicted, but that's all right. He's a totally conflicted judge. Should be ashamed of himself, but they've asked me in the strongest of language to stay involved with the Kennedy Center. We want to see because the building, well, I mean it's very, it's very dangerous number one. Number two it was losing for years tremendous amounts of money. So I'm considering that but a lot of people have asked me to get it fixed. We have to fix the Kennedy Center both physically and from the standpoint of attendance.
Mr. President, on oil and gas prices, I know you're saying that the oil prices and gas prices will fall after the conflict ends. Would you limit exports of gasoline if prices in the short term go up?
So, we have a lot of alternatives, but the beautiful thing from our standpoint is we have more oil and gas and coal and everything else than any other country on the planet. And then when you add Venezuela to it, there's, we have probably 64% of that type of energy. That's unbelievable. The Venezuela is working out very well. We're getting along incredibly. The country is happy. The people love the USA and we have a lot of, you know, the big oil companies are moving in there now as we speak and we're going to be taking out millions of barrels of oil.
Are US oil majors doing enough to boost output in the US? Are you asking them to do more?
Well, we have everything we need. The world doesn't. But I will say people thought it was going to be a lot worse. You know, today I looked at $96 a barrel. People thought that was going to be $300 a barrel. And in the meantime, we're having great success with Iran. They're not going to have a nuclear weapon and they're in no position to have a nuclear weapon.
Senator Tillis said he won't support Todd Blanche's confirmation unless Todd Blanche condemns January 6. Do you have a reaction to that?
Senator Tillis is a loser. That's why he didn't run. He didn't run because I wouldn't support him. And he's just an angry man because he's not going to be a senator any longer. He wasn't respected in the Senate. He fought a lot of people. He fought Pete Hegseth. Beat Hegseth turned out to be a gem. Now Senator Tillis is a loser. Stone cold. And he's an angry man because I basically, he was forced to leave the Senate because I wouldn't support him and he quit. So now he's trying to make trouble by, you know, opposing anybody. Todd Blanche is a brilliant guy who everybody likes and everybody respects. And Tillis is always like, 'I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that.' He should have done it before when he was a senator. He would have gotten wiped out in a race, but he needed my support. And I said, I can't give you my support. He's not qualified. He's not good for the position of senator. I didn't hear about what he did with Todd Blanche. Todd Blanche is fantastic.
Sir, on the AI companies potentially taking these equity stakes. Have you spoken to Sam Altman or any of the other... There's so much money that is so big that there are concepts where pieces could be given to the American public where the American public essentially becomes a partner with the companies.
And I will tell you, yeah, I have spoken to all of them. There's something very interesting about it where it almost becomes a partnership with the American public and we'll look into that. We're going to, we are looking, I actually have a meeting scheduled in the very short, very near future with, did you know that, with all of the companies and we're talking about it where the American people can benefit from the success of AI and by doing that they're going to like it better because we're leading China. We're leading everybody in the world with AI and we want to keep it that way. It's probably the biggest industry maybe that we've ever seen.
Which companies in the meeting?
