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Trump Takes Questions As He Leaves WH To Head To Florida; Trump Doubles Down On Defending GOP Candidate's Attack Ad; Trump Admin Sues Alaska Over Senate Race With 2 Dan Sullivans. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired October 23, 2026 - 11:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[11:00:00]

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And make it look better. The mother said really bad things about a person that wants to be the Democrat governor of Ohio. The mother said terrible things. Anybody seeing that would say, no way I'm voting for her. There's nothing to it. It's very simple. The press is trying so hard to nullify. You know, they called me up about it. I said, wait a minute. The mother said these things. The mother looks like she's totally lucid. She looks very smart, actually. And she felt she had an obligation to Ohio voters to tell them that her daughter is a liar.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Zelenskyy says the Starlink is still not working for Ukraine as of today.

TRUMP: I haven't heard that but I'll look at it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you speak with the British Prime Minister today?

TRUMP: I did.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you tell us what you discussed. And why that --

TRUMP: We discussed the fact that they're opening up the North Sea oil and that's going to make the U.K. a very rich country. They're opening up the North Sea oil, we discussed. I've been after them to do that for two years. The other prime minister, the previous man, Starmer, he's a very nice man, but he never got it done. And this one is getting it. Andy is getting it done. And I guess it's against the Liberal principle, but he knows what's right. It's going to make U.K. a very wealthy country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You just got Iran or Ukraine.

TRUMP: We did very, very lightly. We mostly discuss Aberdeen and the North Sea.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And can you talk about the trade talks with Mexico? President Sheinbaum hope there might be a deal before the midterm.

TRUMP: We're very close to a deal with Mexico. It'll be a very good deal for hopefully them, but it's to be a good deal for us or we won't make it. The same thing with Canada. Canada is working very hard to make a deal with us. And I hate to say this, but we have all the cards in both of them. We have all the cards. Just like I told Zelenskyy. We have all the cards.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sir, Republicans like Ashley Hinson, who you were with last night in Iowa, are denouncing the ads.

TRUMP: I heard that. But they don't know the facts. Look, this is a mother that went on the to say that her daughter, who's running for governor of the great state of Ohio, that I won in a record all three times. I got the record vote, the highest vote ever. So I know it well. I love the people. A mother is saying, don't put my daughter there because she's a terrible person and she's a liar. Why shouldn't somebody use that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But do the sexual abuse allegations --

TRUMP: Let me ask you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- mean nothing to you, sir?

TRUMP: If my mother, said Steve.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But do the sexual abuse allegations --

TRUMP: Wait, if my -- wait, wait, wait, wait. Slow down. Who are you with? Who are you with?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm with NBC, sir.

TRUMP: What are the worst networks you have?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But there are very serious sexual abuse allegations.

TRUMP: Quiet.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They make --

TRUMP: Isn't she a fresh person? You're a horrible little reporter, aren't you? If my mother said bad things about me, do you think the Democrats would put it up? I think so, but my mother thought I was wonderful. Thank you, Mom. My mother would never. Even if she thought them, she would never say, this is a person, a mother, a smart woman. I watched. Smart woman. She said her daughter is a disaster. Her daughter is a liar. And she felt that she had an obligation.

And she also said her daughter lied about her opponent, which is Vivek Ramaswamy. If I had that ad, I should be so lucky to have an ad like that. Why wouldn't you listen to a mother that says that? Why? Why would you Miss NBC? Why wouldn't you listen. Wait a minute. Quiet. You have -- I don't know anything about a stepfather. All you have -- this one just keeps talking. You just keep talking.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm answering you, sir.

TRUMP: Have a -- I don't know anything about stepfathers. From many, many years ago. I know that recently a mother got on television and said that her daughter should not be governor of Ohio. And she said, I love my daughter, but my daughter lies all the time and lied about her opponent, and I can't watch it. And the mother got up. This has nothing to do with the stepfather or anything else.

This has to do with the fact that a woman got out, the mother of a person running for governor of one of the greatest states where I set records and said that she's a liar. Her daughter is a liar. She said her daughter lied about Vivek, and the mother couldn't take it anymore. She basically said her daughter should not. That's what she said. Her daughter should not be the governor of Ohio. To me, that's something that's very much fair game.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President's, could you preview your trip to Michigan on Sunday?

TRUMP: My trip to Michigan is going to be very exciting. Every one of my trips is exciting. I think we did fantastically in Iowa. I think that you're going to have. Everybody I talked about last night is going to be elected. You're going to have a great governor, great senator. We're going to have a very big one right now.

They're saying the line is 2 miles long or 4 miles or 5 miles long. We're sold out at every single place I go. And every single place I go, people that are down are now winning. Thank you very much.

[11:05:11]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, how does the U.S. Military prevent these attacks that are happening on cargo ships and oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz?

TRUMP: Incompetence. They're really good. The Navy has done a great job. We have more. You just saw it in the front page of "The Wall Street Journal." There's more oil coming out right now through the Strait of Hormuz than it was even before the war. We have done a hell of a job. I hope someday we're recognized.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible).

TRUMP: Saving babies and bringing babies back home to their parents. And she's been able to do something that's great. She's been working very hard on it. She wants to see babies come back to their families. And that's between Russia and Ukraine. And they worked a ceasefire in a very rough place, by the way. And babies are being exchanged. She's done a great job.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On politics, Kamala Harris was in Mississippi last night. Mississippi is a state that nobody really thought would be at play. What does that have to tell you about the midterm?

TRUMP: Well, I won it by 32 points. They've asked me to go. I'm going there, I think, on Monday.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir. TRUMP: And I look forward to it. And Cindy Hyde-Smith, you know, Cindy Hyde is fantastic. She's -- and she's very popular, and she's up in the poll. She's not losing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You've been doing so many rallies. I'm just curious, do you feel like the strategy is working? I know he's not your favorite, but Karl Rove had an article the other day in "The Journal," and he said that there's a chance of backlash. Do you think the rallies is the best strategy so close to the midterms?

TRUMP: Look, you have Karl Rove. He's a loser. He's a proven. He's been a loser all his life. Karl Rove doesn't know what he's talking about. Look, every single place I've gone to, every single place, whether people were losing that were expected to win when I'm leaving, look at Ohio, how much better he's doing. Look at -- everyone, look at Iowa last night with Ashley.

She's -- they just came out with numbers right now. Every place I'm going to, every place is full, loaded with people. Lines outside trying to get in. I'm going to Fort Myers right now. They say there's a line of people that's 5 miles long. Every place I've gone to, I've helped, and every place wants me. The one problem is I'm one person. This is a lot of work.

Let me tell you. Let me tell you. This is a lot of work.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So how do you feel like, though? Is it the juice worth the squeeze? Do you feel like, you say you feel like you're the only one doing it, do you feel like other Republicans should be more forceful?

TRUMP: Well, I'm the only one that can get 25,000 people to show up. That's, you know, whether it's Democrat or Republican. That's a proven fact. That's been proven for 10 years. I'm the only one that can get the crowds. And I don't know why. You know, you'll have to tell me someday you'll write a book about it. But like in Fort Myers, they have thousands and thousands of people that were there yesterday.

They were lined up yesterday. So that seems to be a trait or an ability, I can -- and I want to use it for good purpose. And if I don't think somebody is really worthy or good job, I don't go. But Mississippi, I'm going. Today, I'm going for a man who's going to be a great governor. I think he's going to be a great governor. So, Byron, we're going to see him in a little while.

We have -- but we have a tremendous crowd of people. I don't know if you're going and you're doing a -

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mississippi?

TRUMP: -- and you're doing a very good job, by the way.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, can I ask you about Michigan, sir, Michigan.

TRUMP: I'm going to be going to Michigan, I don't know. Is it Saturday? Sunday?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's Sunday. But sir, you're on --

TRUMP: And I look forward to Michigan. I can talk about a man who's a Muslim Brotherhood person, who's a jihadist and who can't be in our Senate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is there any chance to tariffs?

TRUMP: Let me tell you, he's a fake guy. All you have to do is look at his statements from two years ago. I'm looking forward to going to Michigan. And by the way, Mike Rogers will be a great senator. But I'm looking at a man who is with, I call him Mohamed. But Abdul is Abdul. It's actually his middle name is actually Mohamed. I don't know if you know that or not. His name is Abdul Mohamed.

He's a fake. He's a total fake. And we can't have fakes. And you can't. Can you imagine this guy? He was a member, probably still is, of the Muslim Brotherhood. We can't have him in Congress. We can't have him in the United States. We can't have him in the United States Senate. And I look forward to -- I'll tell you what I look so forward to Michigan. And I think it's going to be wild. But I look so far, because he's a total phony.

He's a little phony, and everything about him is fake and he's a liar, and he talks about all these things about, like, he's a moderate. He's not a rider. He's a jihadist. He's a vicious, violent jihadist, and he has no place in our government.

[11:10:08]

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Inaudible).

TRUMP: I understand they've done. I didn't know about that, but I -- somebody told me they did that. But it's very nice.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you still looking into whether their travel was appropriate or any --

TRUMP: No, I'm not. No, no. They took the money and they gave it to essentially a charity. No, that was. I just heard that. I think it's very nice thing to do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible).

TRUMP: Oh, you're much better looking than your son. Look at all that hair he's got, huh. He's a good looking. He got a good father. Now he's going to ask me a nice question. Tell him, dad. Ask me a nice question.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to ask you about Elon Musk, sir. So if the Democrats win control of Congress, how concerned are you that they'll go after Elon Musk?

TRUMP: Well, look, Elon's a brilliant guy and I have an expression. We have to protect our brilliant people because we don't have too many of them. There aren't too many of them in the world. And Elon's done nothing wrong. Elon is very good guy. He's a very different kind of a guy. But I think people have an obligation to protect our geniuses.

You know, there aren't that many of them. We're leading in everything right now. We're leading in S.I., we're leading in everything. It's amazing how we're doing, but we are leading super intelligence. We're leading in every single category. We have more things being built in our country right now than any country has ever had in history.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you, like, the richest man in the world have so much power over what goes on in the war between Russia and Ukraine?

TRUMP: Well, I don't think he does. I think he -- first of all, he's a very good person. He's not going to do anything wrong. He's a very brilliant person or Starlink wouldn't exist and other things, right? But Elon will never do anything wrong. I know him very well. He's a fair person. And, you know, it's an unusual situation where you're talking to private -- a private company, but he's not going to do anything that's wrong.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can I ask you about Canada tariffs. You're going to Michigan tomorrow. Mike Rogers has said that the new Canada tariff war has to end. Are you worried it'll --

TRUMP: Well, Canada wants very much to make a deal because of tariffs. They want to make a deal and as you know, they've been making 90 billion a year for many years with us. They're making anywhere from 80 to $100 million. And I said, nope, I'm not doing that. And Canada now is very much prepared to make a deal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible) -- the other day, sir?

TRUMP: Really good. I finally had a nice group of people in my office. The Catholic representatives, bishops and others. It was a great meeting. Well, they prayed. They mostly prayed. It actually a very nice meeting. They're great. They were great people.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And can you talk about the NFL playing in France this weekend?

TRUMP: Why don't you worry about it? I think maybe looking like tomorrow is going to be a bad day in France. So you worry about it. I would have said the NFL could have probably postponed that match because France is really in trouble. That's what happens when you go left. That's what happens when you allow unlimited numbers of people into your country from very unfriendly countries. That's what you're going to have.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, so there's the President of the United states spending about 15 minutes or so answering reporters questions as he's getting ready to board Marine One right now over the new helipad at the White House, getting ready to head down to Fort Myers in Florida. Then he's going to be going to several other states, including Michigan, where he still calls Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic candidate for senator, a jihadist and a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, he said he was a vicious, violent jihadist and as you said, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. He has den that, Abdul El-Sayed. And he also really quadrupled down on this highly controversial ad from the Vivek Ramaswamy campaign about Amy Acton showcasing her mother calling her a liar. And as we know, Amy Acton's mother lost custody of her daughter at 12 years old because her stepfather was indicted for rape of Amy Acton and then fled the state and became a fugitive, but her mother stayed with her.

But you're hearing there from the President that he wants Republicans to own it. He wants to keep the ad up. And he's really dismissing everything about the stepfather sexually abusing Amy Acton and the charges around that and saying that, you know, it's a good ad and it should stay up. So I want to bring in CNN Washington bureau chief and political director David Chalian to make more sense of what we just heard from the President.

[11:14:59]

I want to start with that because this is really dividing, this ad is dividing Republicans just before the midterms. Even Ashley Hinson, who was just campaigning with in Iowa last night, put on her X before that ad should be taken down. You're hearing from other Republicans that same sentiment. But the President right now is putting pressure on Republicans to actually support this ad.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Including Republican Jon Husted, who is on the ballot in Ohio for Senate in a state that in a race that could determine control of the United States Senate. And he has said he wouldn't have run that ad, obviously the governor there also called for it to come down, which is we are finding ourselves an interesting moment watching President Trump answer those questions today about it on the rope line there before getting on the helicopter.

Pam, he is employing a classic Trump strategy here which is like engage the fight, embrace the controversy and keep it up and drive through it. That's the way to the other side of a controversy. No retreat, no surrender. That -- we've seen this from Trump for 10 years and by the way, he's had some success with it as well as a strategy. What is different right now is the divide among Republicans that you're talking about.

Usually if Donald Trump puts out this is the playbook for how we're going to do this. Republicans sing like or use that playbook or mixed metaphors sing from that song.

BROWN: Yes.

CHALIAN: And that is not happening now. We are seeing a lot of Republicans in the state of Ohio, as you noted, Ashley Hinson in Iowa, and elsewhere, not going along with the President and the Vice President and Vivek Ramaswamy on this. And that's new and different.

BLITZER: We're showing our viewers some live pictures of Vivek Ramaswamy in Ohio right now. You know, you've been taking a very close look as our political director, Washington bureau chief of all the major polls out there, including the so called poll of polls, the averages of all the polls. The President, you heard President Trump just say I think Republicans are going to win. He said he is seeing great enthusiasm for Republicans whenever he goes out to a speech in one of these states. He thinks the Republicans are going to win. The polls don't suggest that.

CHALIAN: They don't. Well, they don't suggest the enthusiasm piece. You know, polls aren't going to predict here the outcome of the race. But obviously the polls are indicating a very advantageous environment for the Democrats. Our recent poll this week on the generic congressional ballot for the battle for the House was a 10 point advantage for Democrats, 49 percent to 39 percent. Now, I have no doubt that Donald Trump, when he shows up at a rally that is full of his supporters, he senses some enthusiasm from them.

But if you look, not just in polling where we see, ask people, you know, those that are most enthusiastic extremely vote overwhelmingly, that's an advantage to the Democrats. But if you look at what's happening in the early vote right now of people who have participated in early voting, Democrats are significantly outperforming Republicans in many of the critical states in the early vote.

Now we have to see who shows up on Election Day. That's not determinative, but it is a sign of this enthusiasm piece of just where Republicans are not anywhere as close to where they were two years ago in the early vote when Donald Trump won that presidential election in terms of banking a bunch of vote early. And so they're going to have a taller task to get their Election Day vote out if they're going to make some of these states more competitive.

BROWN: I also want to just take a moment to highlight what he said about the election, the upcoming election, and saying that there was corrupt, there would be corrupt voting in California, Minnesota, some of these Democratic states. He is already setting the stage, David, and I want us all to be aware of this, to say that the election was rigged if a Republican loses.

CHALIAN: You know, I have to remind everyone, 10 years ago when he won the presidency in 2016, he complained about a rigged election in California because you remember, he didn't win the popular vote and he didn't like that he didn't win the popular vote. And he was saying, so this has been something that Donald Trump has been harping on for 10 years now. We know there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud that would change the outcome of elections.

To date, we have not found that election experts on both sides of the aisle who dig into this have not found that kind of widespread systemic evidence of fraud. This -- there is no doubt in my mind just the way Donald Trump has talked about mail voting a lot this year, the way he has talked about what he sees as corruption in these states. He is no doubt laying a groundwork for a post-election argument, but I would say even if it goes his way, we might hear this post-election argument because he has not shied away from.

BROWN: He has, I mean, even after he won the last election, he -- the states that he didn't win.

CHALIAN: Exactly.

BROWN: So that there was. All right, really quick, one last thing. I thought it was really interesting too that he's sort of giving us a preview if Democrats take control of Congress, how it would be and the kind of friction and how he would handle that. He said he would just veto whatever would pass through Congress and then they would make it -- he would make a deal with the Democratic majority.

CHALIAN: I mean, you know, deal making is something Donald Trump talks about all the time, right?

BROWN: Yes.

CHALIAN: It would not be uncommon to see if there is a split Democratic controlled House and Senate, let's say, and bills get to the President's desk of the other party, that we may see an uptick in the vetoes of that. That is Washington gridlock at the way we've come to understand it. But I would not be surprised if Donald Trump in his final two years of office didn't just put up a wall to, let's say, Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker of the House, if that comes to be, I would imagine he is going to try to find some areas where they can strike deals. We saw him try to do that in the past.

[11:20:30]

The question is, you know, even if Democrats were to take control of the Senate, Pam, they're like -- they're not going to have 60 votes. So it's not even clear how much legislation is going to get to the President's desk if Democrats control just the House, not the Senate or both. But without 60 votes in the Senate, it's still going to be an uphill climb for Democrats to get legislation to the President's desk.

BROWN: That's a really good point. All right, David Chalian, thank you. Great to have you on.

BLITZER: Yes. It was good that the President answered reporters questions for what, about 15 minutes? That's always important indeed.

All right. And one thing I noticed, David, let me get your quick thought. He was asked, what are you going to name a new White House press secretary? And he said, "No rush," no rush.

CHALIAN: Which is when Karoline Leavitt first left at the end of the summer that was the statement from the White House, which is why the surprise of Katie Zacharia sort of like came about with even some people in the White House not even knowing that there was going to be a press secretary appointed because he had said there is no rush. I am sure after that five-day stint for Katie Zacharia as press secretary, Trump feels a little burned. And he has always said, and this is true, that people say this around him, Wolf.

He is his best spokesperson. He is constantly going to direct what the message is. And he talks all the time publicly to try and shape that. And so I could imagine that he is in no rush in this final period before the midterm election to have anyone else take that spotlight. He thinks he probably delivers the message better than anyone.

BLITZER: Yes, Iran. He also said that the U.S. is a position right now to take all of the oil from the Strait of Hormuz if wants to do so and destroy basically Iran in the process of a renewal -- a renewed U.S. military strike. We'll see what happens on that front as well. All right. Everybody stand by. We have a lot more news coming in to The Situation Room right now, including some breaking news. The Trump administration is suing Alaska, Alaska over its Senate race, which has two candidates with the same name.

I want to show our viewers what voters see when they go into the booth. You can see both of their names highlighted. There they are right there. CNN's Gabe Cohen is here with me in The Situation Room. Tell us what's going on over here.

GABE COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, a wolf. This is a pretty remarkable update in a story that has been fascinating to watch play out here in recent months. So what has just happened is the Justice Department is suing to preemptively block the state of Alaska from certifying the results of that Senate race if the Democratic candidate, Mary Peltola, beats the Republican, Trump backed incumbent, Dan S. Sullivan. And it is because of that other Dan Sullivan, Dan J. Sullivan, this retired teacher who is also running in the race.

And this claim that it's sort of a fraudulent campaign that's been designed to confuse voters. And the administration is saying that if Peltola wins, the state cannot certify this until an investigation is done to figure out if voters who cast ballots for Dan J. Sullivan really meant to cast ballots for the Trump back instead. There are a couple issues at play here. One, of course, is that the executive branch of the federal government, the President, does not have authority over executive election administration.

That is done on the state and local level with some authority given to Congress. But beyond that, when it comes to this story, this has been litigated already at the state level. The state of Alaska and election leaders months ago tried to get Dan J. Sullivan removed from the ballot. And, and then in June, it ended up at the Alaska Supreme Court, and they ruled that the state really couldn't do that, that they could not prove beyond what they believed, that this campaign was fraudulent and designed to confuse voters.

And what they essentially said was that Dan J. Sullivan had to be allowed to stay on the ballot and that the state instead could differentiate the two candidates on the ballot, as you showed in that image, where the incumbent, Dan S. Sullivan, is clearly labeled as the incumbent as a Republican, whereas Dan J. Sullivan is listed there just by his full name. And it speaks to some of the concerns that we have heard for months now across the country that the President and his allies and this administration have been sowing doubts in election results ahead of the midterms, and that there are concerns that Democratic winners may not be seated, that there would be efforts not to certify those races.

I will say this is a very unique case. But even our team talking to election experts and voting rights experts in the couple hours, they're really saying this is somewhat of an unprecedented lawsuit. And it's really not clear what an investigation would look like to try to figure out if voters who cast a ballot for one candidate really meant to vote for another. I don't know how that would play out. There are a lot of questions there.

[11:25:16]

BLITZER: Because the other Dan Sullivan has registered Republican incumbent right next to his name. So if you want to vote for the registered Republican incumbent, you know who to vote for.

COHEN: Right.

BLITZER: Even though there's somebody else with a Dan Sullivan name.

COHEN: Yes, that's the idea that they've been labeled very clearly. And look, there is a lot of concern about voter confusion in the race. But again, the Alaska Supreme Court ruled on this. Now the Justice Department trying to jump in.

BLITZER: Gabe Cohn with excellent new reporting. Thank you very, very much.

Let's discuss what's going on with former federal prosecutor Berit Berger. Berit, what's your reaction to this? Does the Department of Justice have a real case here?

BERIT BERGER, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: They don't. I agree with Gabe. I think there are some real factual and legal issues with this case. I mean, first, just looking at this factually, this case isn't ripe yet. We don't actually have a victory by any party. So this is kind of a placeholder litigation by the DOJ, but really gave identified the right issue here. How would courts determine voter intent in a case like this?

So the DOJ has said this should be not be certified, pending an investigation. But what does this investigation look like? Are they going and interviewing every voter to see which Sullivan they intended to vote for? There are real practical hurdles to that and real privacy issues that go along with that too. This is entirely the reason that these kind of lawsuits, this type of litigation usually happens before the ballots are created, not after.

This is the kind of complaint that should have been filed months ago. But even aside from sort of the practical issues, the legal grounds are very shaky as well. So there are very limited circumstances where a federal judge could stop the certification of a state election like this if there is a need to remedy sort of a gen, like a real, genuine violation of federal law. But you can't just have federal courts jumping in and stopping elections.

Those are typically run by the state. And DOJ has identified very shaky legal grounds here, this National Voter Registration Act as the basis for its cause of action, which is really intended to deal with, you know, voter registration lists, list maintenance. It is really not intended for this kind of a purpose. And I really cannot imagine a federal judge using this as the basis to not certify this election.

BLITZER: Berit Berger with excellent legal analysis as she always provides us. Thanks very, very much. Pamela?

BROWN: All right. Wolf, I want to go back to the White House and go to CNN's Alayna Treene, because as you pointed out, we hear the President for around 15 minutes and he touched on several topics when he spoke with the press just before he left for Florida. What stood out to you the most, Alayna?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: He answered a lot of topics and some different answers, actually, from things he has said in the past. Pamela, I was out there with him asking him a number of questions, and you're right, he did stop to talk for a while. But one of the things that press him on was startling. This has been a huge issue, of course, with Ukraine, Ukraine really saying that they are continuing to see restricted access to Starlink and Starshield, both of which have prevented them from moving forward with some of their operations and strike attacks and things like that.

Now, the President said one, I asked him, do you know, you must know now, who was the person from the Trump administration that Elon Musk had referred to who had put that restrictive access on Ukraine? He said, he argued that he didn't know, but even if he did, he wouldn't tell the media. He also said, you know, I asked him about what Zelenskyy just said moments ago, where Zelenskyy said they're still seeing issues, even though the president said that he had spoke with Elon Musk, who, of course, of course runs Starshield and Starlink and told him to continue their access.

I told him Ukraine says they're still having problems. He said if that's the case, he will speak with President Zelenskyy. Another issue I think that was important to note here is there's been a lot of talk, of course, today about that very controversial ad that Vivek Ramaswamy's campaign, Vivek Ramaswamy, running for governor in Ohio, has put out about his opponent, Amy Acton.

Now, the President has said that ad yesterday, he was saying, you know, he believes -- he defended it, he believed that it should still run. We had pointed out some of the other press out there, I did this as well, pointed out exactly why people are upset about it, essentially that the mother featured in that ad was someone who stayed with a man who had sexually abused Amy Acton. That is what Amy Acton said. And that her stepfather had faced charges on this.

The President continued to argue, well, you don't know that, and defend the ad despite being informed of that and saying he does now know why people are so upset about this. So a lot of different points there. He also talked a lot about the campaign and about where he's heading, trying to project confidence in the midterms. Pamela?

[11:30:07]