2025 10 23 Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt Briefs Members of the Media, Oct. 23, 2025 part002 (14 28min)

Can he demolish this building or say the Jefferson Memorial? So it's not the President who came up with that legal opinion himself. That's a legal opinion that's been held by the NCPC for many years. It's written. So we can get you that background and that research, if you wish, to include it in your reporting because it is very important. They have ruled consistently their General Counsel has said when it comes to phase one of this project, the tearing down of the current East Wing structure, a submission is not required legally for that. Only for vertical construction will a submission be required. And that's a legal opinion from them, and we are following that legal opinion. And again, I would just add, can any President do such a thing to the White House grounds? There have been many presidents in the past who have made their mark on this beautiful White House complex. This briefing room, as you all know, was not once a briefing room. It was a swimming pool. There have been presidents who have completely torn down the executive mansion, if you look at what President Truman did, as some of the photos of the construction project that took place in those years. I think sitting here today, we're all grateful for those efforts and the modifications that happen at that time. And again, in due time, the East Wing is going to be more beautiful and modern than ever before. And in addition, there will be a big, beautiful ballroom that can hold big parties and state visits for generations to come. So it sounds like the answer is, yes, he can tear down whatever he wants. And then secondly, I mean, we do that's not what we're saying. That's a legal opinion that's been held for many years. And it's interpreting it. No, it's something that presidents have done for years and years. In fact, I have some photos here. Thank you, Pat, to show you the construction that's taken place on the White House grounds. This is the construction of the West Wing in 1902. Look at this, the construction of the West Terrace in 1902. These images look quite similar to what you and the American people are seeing today, the construction of the East Terrace as well. You look at the construction of the West Wing expansion in 1934. So look, this is a legal opinion that's been held for many years. Look at, this is 1950. It looks a lot like what you're seeing today. Can he demolish anything he wants? What do you think that rubble is? How did that rubble get there? Right, so I'm asking. And then back to the job. Go ahead, really. Many of them are breaking going on immigration and I don't know about Venezuela. It's being reported that the semi truck driver suspected of killing three people on the DUI crash is an illegal immigrant who came in under the vibe of administration. Do you know if California gave him a commercial driver's license? And then it also appears that California largely has not been cooperating with English proficiency standards. I'm wondering if the administration has any further plans to punish the state? Yes, I can confirm that California gave this individual license. And it is something that the Department of Transportation has already looked into. I know Secretary Duffy, who's doing a phenomenal job, has spoken on this many times in the crackdown that the Department of Transportation is taking on these licenses that are wrongfully being issued to people who clearly do not deserve to uphold these positions. As for this case in California, on October 22nd, ICE lodged an immigration detainer for this individual following his arrest by local authorities in California on charges, as you know, of manslaughter while intoxicated in driving under the influence he killed three people. And he first entered the United States in 2022 through the southern border and he was released into our country by the previous administration. So now ICE has lodged a separate detainer for this individual and these tragedies are following a disturbing pattern of these criminal legal aliens being issued commercial vehicle licenses. And so yes, the Department of Transportation is absolutely cracking down on that. I defer you to them for any specifics. Venezuela, President Trump said Maduro doesn't want to mess with the United States and this administration is continuing to decision more military assets towards Venezuela. I'm wondering if the end goal of this narcoteric war is to implement a regime change in Venezuela. The President has spoken on that Reagan and I certainly won't get ahead of him. What we've made very clear is that this administration is not going to tolerate international narcotericist organizations from trafficking drugs into the United States. And these car towels over time have grown more armed, well-organized and violent. They have financial means, sophistication, and capabilities needed to operate in the way this administration has. And they have illegally caused the deaths of tens of thousands of American citizens each year. So that's where we are right now with respect to Venezuela, but also any country that is sending purposefully illegal narcotericists to the United States of America to bring illegal drugs. Why don't we go in the back? The U.S. and Colombian relationship right now is at one of its slowest points in decades. We heard what President Usal Petro had to say about President Trump. We heard yesterday the response from President Trump. Is there any kind of compromises or gestures from the Colombian President that President Trump would like to see in order to de-escalate the tensions? Is it possible at de-escalation? I don't think we're seeing de-escalation from the unhinged leader of Colombia right now. And I don't think the President, frankly, is interested in that at this point. He spoke on this yesterday, and I don't have anything to add to his comments. Go ahead. Thank you, Caroline. Thank you. In addition to the ballroom and the Rose Garden patio. I'm going into the back. Sorry. In addition to the ballroom and the Rose Garden patio, is the President looking at any other renovations or significant kind of projects here at the White House? Not to my knowledge. No, but he's a builder at heart, clearly. And so his heart and his mind is always churning about how to improve things here on the White House grounds. But at this moment in time, of course, the ballroom is really the President's main priority. Yeah. Kristen. Last week, President Trump announced that he had a productive call with Vladimir Putin. They scheduled a meeting in Hungary. Since then, he has canceled the meeting. And he had them both sanctions on Russia by the time it came. Can you talk about what changed that led to this dramatic shift, or even just what occurred in the last week that got us from point A to point B? Sure. Look, the President has always maintained that he would implement sanctions on Russia when he felt it was appropriate and necessary. And yesterday was that day. I think the President has also long expressed his frustration with Vladimir Putin and, frankly, both sides of this war. And he's always said, in order to negotiate a good peace deal, both sides need to be interested in a good peace deal. And he feels, as though, unfortunately, from the Russian side as of late, he has not seen enough interest and enough action in terms of moving the ball forward towards peace. And so a meeting between these two leaders is not completely off the table. I think the President and the entire administration hopes that one day that can happen again. But we want to make sure that there's a tangible positive outcome out of that meeting, in that it's a good use of the President's time. Of course, he's traveling to Asia next week. He has a number of events coming up here on the home front as well. He's been incredibly busy, as you all know. You're all tired from covering him and his movements every day. And so we want to make sure it's a good use of the President's time. And the President doesn't want to waste his time, and he said that. But all between the Secretary of State and Lavrov that led President Trump to believe that President Putin or the Russians did not want a peace deal. That was not the sole reason, no. I think the Secretary Rubio felt that was actually a productive call. But again, the President wants to make sure that a meeting between himself and President Putin will be a good use of his time. But what exactly led to President Trump not believing after his call on Thursday, whatever he said, he did think he wanted peace and wanted a peace deal to be believed that Russia's were not. Again, the President wants to see action, not just talk. And I think the President is extremely motivated by the success of his peace deal in the Middle East to get things done. And he wants this war to come to an end. He's been saying it now for nine months being in office, and he's grown increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress from both sides of this war. You two put construction questions if I can't. You mentioned any construction project comes with changes. The President had initially said that this project wouldn't interfere with or touch the current structure. Now he says to do this properly, he realized that the East Wing had to be demolished. This is the People's House. Why not inform the public of that change? And when it was decided that the East Wing would have to be demolished? Look, again, with any construction project changes come. And we have informed all of you. We've been keeping you apprised of this project. We've shown you the renderings. And if you look at the renderings, it's very clear the East Wing was going to be modernized. Instead, in fact, I said that in the briefing when we initially introduced this plan to all of you and to the public. The East is here again. Well, again, the President, the plans changed when the President heard counsel from the architects and the construction companies who said that in order for this East Wing to be modern and beautiful for many, many years to come for it to be a truly strong and stable structure. This phase one that we're now in was necessary. And the President wants to do right by the People's House. And so that's exactly what he's doing. It's going to be, again, like I said, much more stable, strong, secure, and more beautiful than ever once it's complete. And moreover, where will those be? Firstly, these offices, the Social Secretary's office, and the East Wing. They will be back with their work. Yes, here we are. Thank you. How are the ranchers who supported the President's election and raised some concerns about the plans to future work for our East Wing? How would the administration support those farmers? Look, the President hears those concerns. He addressed them yesterday himself. President loves our ranchers, and our ranchers love our President. And in fact, the President did a lot for them in his first term here. They are struggling because of the many horrible policies of the previous administration. President loves our ranchers, and he also loves American consumers, and he wants to do right by both. So the immediate solution to the problem of the rising cost of beef. President wants to bring that down as we have to increase our supply. And so that's what he's doing with respect to these imports. The President also is looking out for our ranchers with a long-term plan that was released by the Secretary of Agriculture yesterday. It's a three-part plan. It's very extensive and detailed. I would encourage all of you to read through it. But there's really three points to this plan that the President has agreed upon and has entrusted Secretary Rollins to implement. Number one, strengthening U.S. cattle production through increased grazing access, endangered species reforms, enhanced disaster relief, increased access to capital, and reducing costs for new and younger answers. We want to incentivize more Americans to get into this noble profession, lowering long-term costs by cutting inspection costs, increasing market options for consumers with product of U.S.A. labeling and ensuring consumers know that they are eating American beef. It's a good incentive for the American consumer. And lastly, growing the domestic herd while boosting long-term demand to reduce prices for consumers while growing the markets for our ranchers. So President hears them. He has to address both of these problems for the ranchers, but also for the American consumer. He promised to lower costs, and that's what he's committed to doing. Caroline, thank you. Two questions not on the ballroom. The first is, there's a Democrat in Texas who's actually running for Congress, who said last night during an interview when talking about fighting Republicans and this administration, quote, if you hit me in my face, I'm not going to punch you back in your face. I'm going to go across your neck. This is obviously really upset those folks over at Turning Point U.S.A. after the Charlie Kirk assassination. You just your response to that kind of rhetoric. Very jarring rhetoric. And I think it's very unacceptable. I hope the people of Texas will do the right thing and reject this person's candidacy. It should have no place in American politics. Just a quick second question on oversight Democrats that are saying that they're creating this master ice tracker, basically tracking all ice activity. We've seen the protests in New York just yesterday. Homeland security is saying that this sounds like obstruction of justice. What do you say? Again, this is actively putting the lives of our ice agents at risk. We've seen media outlets in fact in this room also write stories about ice tracker apps that Democrats and other left-wing activists have created to track the location of ice agents on the ground in our communities. Again, I've said this repeatedly and I will continue to say it. The men and women of ice are outstanding people. I wish a Democrat on Capitol Hill would actually have the courage or the guts to stand up to their party and sit down with some of these men and women who are doing this incredibly difficult job of enforcing our federal immigration laws. They are, again, simply trying to enforce the law and do their jobs. And if Democrats spend a little bit more time understanding that and also focusing on the people who they are trying to get out of our country every single day. As I spoke about earlier, three innocent people in California are dead because an illegal alien who Democrats led into this country was wrongfully issued a trucker's driving license and clearly was not fit for the job because he was driving intoxicated and killed three innocent people. Democrats should focus a little bit more on that. Stop trying to fight this President and his administration on every turn and restore law and order. That's all that we and these brave men and women of ice are trying to do. Mary. Thanks, Caroline. I have two questions. One on San Francisco and one on the No Kings protesters. On San Francisco, the President said that he had a call with the mayor and he was planning on surging there, but now because the mayor really wants to fix it up himself, they're going to do that. Is this what Trump hopes happens in pretty much every city? The President hopes, and I've said this so many times, and I think the President's conversation with the San Francisco mayor last night and his statement today proved the President is willing to work with anyone across the aisle, across the country, to do the right thing and clean up America's cities. He is genuinely interested in this effort to make our streets safer, to make our cities safe and clean again. And he heard from the mayor last night who told him that he is going to earnestly try to make his city better on his own. The President heard him out. He said, okay, I'll give you.