
President Donald Trump ’s interview with ABC News aired after he held a rally in Michigan on Tuesday to mark the first 100 days of his second term.
The rally was his largest political event since returning to the White House in a state that has been especially rocked by his steep trade tariffs and combative attitude toward Canada.
The Latest:
Trump got testy with ABC interviewer
The president indicated that he personally chose Terry Moran to conduct the interview for ABC for his first 100 days in office.
The comments came as the two sparred over deported El Salvador native Kilmar Abrego Garcia and evidence — or lack thereof — that he was a member of the MS-13 gang, designated by the U.S. as a “foreign terrorist organization.”
“They’re giving you the big break of a lifetime, you know, you’re doing the interview,” he said. “I picked you because frankly, I never heard of you, but that’s OK.”
Trump then stressed again that he picked Moran for the interview, “but you’re not being very nice.”
ABC: “What’s the one thing, just one thing, that you think is the most significant thing you’ve done in these 100 days?”@POTUS: “The border is the most significant… It’s totally closed down.” pic.twitter.com/2mvuStYYb6
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS: "I'm doing one thing: I'm Making America Great Again. We have a country that was failing... We had a leader that was grossly incompetent... Our country suffered greatly. And now, our country is coming back like nobody can believe." pic.twitter.com/qZu0DK9iv9
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
ABC: “It is an undeniable fact that illegal crossings at the southern border have plummeted, a staggering decline, but there are questions about your methods…”@POTUS: “Well, they seem to work.” 🔥 pic.twitter.com/G7YoAIKnBJ
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS on revoking security clearances for proven liars and fraudsters: "It's not anger — these are people that I think are very dishonest. I don't think they're worthy of being able to go into top secret information." pic.twitter.com/fq0aW3lnUU
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS on revoking Biden's clearances: "That's not a man that should be allowed to be looking at things that are very confidential. Here's a man that used an AUTOPEN to sign very important documents!" pic.twitter.com/kdPMnZyppO
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
ABC: Are you using your powers as president to get personal revenge?@POTUS: "No. I'll tell you what... there has never been a president in this country... that was persecuted like I was persecuted... When you say I'm treating people rough, I'm not treating people rough." pic.twitter.com/tvB31oTlnU
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS on the measles vaccine: "I recommend it. Do I mandate it? No." pic.twitter.com/Ig6wKo0b2d
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS on DOGE: "Look, we saved $150 billion — BILLION. That's a lot of money... there are things that I'm considering right now putting back, but overall, we saved hundreds of billions of dollars... We also found tremendous waste, fraud and abuse." pic.twitter.com/WISHZaEBva
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS: “I think Putin wanted all of Ukraine. I think if I didn’t win the election, he would have gotten all of Ukraine… Never with me, he would have never gone in. With this group of losers, he went in. He saw what happened in Afghanistan. He said ‘wow this is my chance.’” pic.twitter.com/728d0an8tp
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS on his meeting with President Zelenskyy at the Vatican: "The moment was a moment of solace in a sense because tremendous numbers of people are dying... and I feel very badly about it. That's a war that would've never happened if I were president." pic.twitter.com/93fP558ULt
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
"This is an MS-13 gang member ... Beat the hell out of his wife ... This is not an innocent, wonderful gentleman from Maryland," says @POTUS on deported criminal illegal Kilmar Abrego Garcia.
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
"He came into our country ILLEGALLY!" pic.twitter.com/obsXcYMB1c
.@POTUS: "This is what I campaigned on. I said that we've been abused by other countries at levels that nobody's ever seen before... I could've left it that way and at some point, there would've been an implosion... but I said, 'No. We have to fix it.'" pic.twitter.com/U8UzXJGWV6
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
.@POTUS: "I've been here for 3 months. I've taken a trade deficit down to a number that's... starting to get really good. I just got here. We had a country that — it was not sustainable what Biden did to this country." pic.twitter.com/mG0Tb95nVv
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
ABC: “Don’t tariffs cut against that promise you made to bring prices down?”@POTUS: “No, because I had massive tariffs on China, if you remember in my first term, and we had essentially no inflation.” pic.twitter.com/yQFjEZWPeA
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 30, 2025
Trump brushes off authoritarian concerns
The president dismissed concerns that he is acting like an authoritarian leader.
“No, I would hate them to think that,” he said of people who hold such concerns. “I’m doing one thing: I’m making America great again.”
He continued: “We had a country that was failing, we have a country that was laughed at all over the world, we had a leader that was grossly incompetent.”
Trump said, “our country’s coming back, and we’re respected again.”
Trump won’t say he’ll commit to giving people in the US illegally hearings before deporting them
Trump said in the ABC interview, “I can’t have a major trial for every person that came in illegally.”
Asked whether he would commit to giving people due process, Trump said, “They get whatever my lawyers say.”
Trump insisted that his administration is “careful” in how it is going about deportations, despite the well-publicized case in which El Salvador native Kilmar Abrego Garcia was deported there even though a federal judge had ordered he not be returned to the Central America country over concerns for his safety — an error acknowledged by Trump’s own attorneys.
“I’m not the one making this decision,” Trump said, adding that he relies on his lawyers.
Trump tells ABC he has confidence in Hegseth but won’t say he has 100% confidence
Trump, in an interview taped Tuesday morning that was aired later on ABC, called Hegseth “a talented guy” who is going to be “a very good defense — hopefully a great defense secretary.”
But when anchor Terry Moran asked him if he had 100% confidence in Hegseth, the president said, “I don’t have — a hundred percent confidence in anything, OK? Anything,” Trump said. “Do I have a hundred percent? It’s a stupid question.”
President Trump on his first 100 days in office: "We've just gotten started. You haven't' seen anything yet...What the world has witnessed in the past 14 weeks is a revolution of common sense." pic.twitter.com/0IiSgqVBxo
— CSPAN (@cspan) April 29, 2025
Trump wrapped up his rally after about 90 minutes
The Republican president hit a lot of the same points he made during his typically 90-minute campaign gatherings, lobbing insults at former President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris and shouting out all loyal supporters who journey to his rallies — including a man who wears a brick suit to symbolize Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall.
He gave shoutouts to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and CNN commentator Scott Jennings, inviting the Republican consultant up on stage.
Trump ended as he always did on the campaign trail, proclaiming he will “fight, fight, fight” and “win, win, win.”
The Village People’s “YMCA,” then began blaring, and as he did as a candidate, the president began dancing, doing some fist pumps and rocking his hips to the music.