PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — In a casual news conference at his Mar-a-Lago club Monday, President-elect Donald Trump said he would consider a pardon for embattled New York Mayor Eric Adams and declared the country “won’t lose.” “The polio vaccine and the spate of drone sightings over New Jersey contributed to this.
Holding court with reporters for the first time since his election victory and second term, Trump also called on the Biden administration to stop selling unused portions of the southern border wall and threatened legal action.
“We will spend hundreds of millions of dollars more building the same wall we already have,” he complained. “It’s almost a criminal offense.”
Trump’s appearance on Monday underscored how he has forced his return to the center of the national political discussion weeks before his return to the Oval Office. The session was significantly less combative than some of the more heated discussions he had with reporters during the campaign. Trump looked relaxed at the lectern, joking with those he knew and talking about how much easier the transition was than after his first election.
“The first time everyone fought me,” he said. “This time everyone wants to be my friend.”
After spending the last few weeks mostly behind closed doors at Mar-a-Lago, Trump used the session to test policy ideas, attack his enemies and issue warnings about what’s to come.
That included threatening to sue famed Iowa pollster Ann Selzer, whose last pre-election poll significantly underestimated Trump’s support in the state he won.
“In my opinion it was fraud and election interference,” Trump claimed of the poll. Selzer, who declined to comment, announced last month that she would shut down her polling places, but said she had already decided to do so before the election.
ABC News announced over the weekend that it had agreed to pay $15 million to Trump’s presidential library to settle a defamation lawsuit he filed over anchor George Stephanopoulos’ incorrect claim on the show that the president-elect was held civilly liable for the rape of a writer.
Continuing his threats of legal action, Trump railed against the Biden administration on Monday over border wall material sales. He said he had spoken with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and other Texas officials about a possible injunction.
Congress last year required the Biden administration to dispose of the unused pieces of border wall. The measure, included in the wide-ranging National Defense Authorization Act, allows the items to be sold or donated to states on the southern border as long as they are used to rehabilitate existing barriers rather than install fresh ones. Congress also directed the Pentagon to consider storage costs for the border wall material while it is not in apply.
“I’m asking you today, Joe Biden, to please stop selling the wall,” Trump said.
However, the Defense Department said further sales could not be blocked because all excess border wall material had already been distributed. The majority was made available to other federal agencies and state governments as required by the defense law signed on December 22, 2023. The rest was sold to GovPlanet, which buys and auctions government surpluses.
While Trump called the handover between Biden and his fresh team an “amicable transition,” he also criticized efforts to allow some members of the federal workforce to continue working from home. Trump said government workers would be fired if they did not return to office.
Trump also commented on Adams, who faces federal fraud and corruption charges. Asked if he would consider pardoning Adam, Trump replied: “Yes, I would.”
“I think he was treated pretty unfairly,” Trump said, while acknowledging that he “doesn’t know the facts.”
Adams was accused of accepting $100,000 in flight upgrades and other luxury travel perks as well as illegal campaign contributions from a Turkish official and other foreigners seeking to buy his influence. He has pleaded not guilty. Several members of his government were also under investigation.
Adams, who insists he did nothing wrong, told reporters Monday that his lawyer will “explore all options to make sure I get justice.”
Trump has been repeatedly pressed about the future of vaccines amid concerns over his decision to appoint anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to head the Department of Health and Human Services, which regulates the shots.
Trump again declined to dismiss the long-debunked theory that vaccines cause autism, saying Kennedy would investigate this already well-studied question.
But he also assured the public that his government would not ban one of the most successful vaccines.
“You’re not going to lose the polio vaccine,” he said, calling himself “a big advocate of it.”
“That won’t happen,” he said.
Outgoing Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who had polio as a child, said Friday that Trump’s nominees seeking Senate confirmation should “steer clear of attempts” to discredit the polio vaccine, calling them not just uninformed, but “dangerous.”
Trump also commented on mysterious drone sightings over parts of New Jersey and the eastern United States, which have sparked speculation and concern about where they are coming from.
Trump struck a conspiratorial tone, insisting without providing evidence: “The government knows what’s happening.”
“Our military knows it and our president knows it and for some reason they want to keep people on edge,” he said, dwindling to say whether he had been informed of the sightings.
White House spokesman John Kirby said later Monday that there was no indication the drones posed a threat to public safety or national security and that he would say so if they did not. While he admitted it was frustrating, he stressed that there were more than a million legal drones in the country.
“After examining the data closely,” he said, “we conclude that the sightings to date include a combination of legal commercial drones, hobby drones and law enforcement drones, as well as manned fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters and even stars that have been incorrectly reported as drones. “
Trump has spent the weeks since his victory building his fresh administration and speaking to, he said, well over 100 spokespeople.
But he again expressed caution when asked whether Russian President Vladimir Putin was on that list.
“I will not comment on the Putin issue,” he said.
Amid escalating tensions in the Middle East, Trump said he would consider withdrawing U.S. troops from Syria after the country’s ousted leader Bashar al-Assad was overthrown by rebels.
“I don’t think I want our soldiers killed,” Trump said of the 900 men and women deployed there to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State group.
In addition to meetings with foreign leaders, Trump also discussed a recent dinner with Apple CEO Tim Cook and the heads of major pharmaceutical companies, which Kennedy attended. The publicity, he said, made this transition feel markedly different than 2016, when his victory shocked the Washington establishment.
Trump was joined at the appearance by SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son, who announced that the Japanese company plans to invest $100 billion in U.S. projects over the next four years.
It was a victory for Trump, who has used the weeks since the election to advance his policies, negotiate with foreign leaders and try to strike deals.
In a post on his website Truth Social last week, Trump had said that anyone making a $1 billion investment in the United States “will receive fully expedited approvals and approvals, including, but by no means constrained to, of all environmental permits.”
“GET READY TO ROCK!!!” he wrote.
Trump has repeatedly boasted that he accomplished more in his miniature transition period than his predecessor did in all four years.
“There is a whole light over the whole world,” he said Monday. “There is a light that shines over the world.”
___ Colvin reported from New York. Associated Press writers Zeke Miller, Lolita Baldor, Darlene Superville and Chris Megerian in Washington contributed to this report.
