Administration of Donald J. Trump, 2025
January 20, 2025
The President. Thank you very much everybody. Appreciate it. Thank you.
So now the work begins. We won. We won, but now the work begins. We have to bring them home.
And you know, tonight, I'm going to be signing, on the J6 hostages, pardons. We'll get them out. And as soon as I leave, I'm going to the Oval Office, and we'll be signing pardons for a lot of people—a lot of people.
And thank you to Steve Witkoff. He's a great guy. He's a friend of mine. He's been a very successful man. He's a great negotiator. He's a wonderful guy. People love him, and he's got a tremendous power of persuasion. And that's what we need. We don't need stiffs. We don't need stiffs. We've got a lot of stiffs. You just had a whole load of them. [Laughter]
And to the former hostages with us today, welcome and welcome home. Some of the folks are former hostages. Not a good situation.
The three young ladies that came home yesterday, you saw that—and more coming home every day now. They're coming home. But they were hurt. They were hurt. They were hurt.
One had her hair—head blown off, fingers on her hand, and her hand indeed was blown off. She was trying to defend herself from a bullet being fired. Do you believe this? A bullet knocked off her hand. I don't know. It's—you look at it, it's a disgrace.
We never stopped praying for you, and we're so glad that you're reunited with your friends and families. And God bless you all.
And some of them are just saying, "No, my son is gone, but please just bring home his body." Right, Steve? Many of you have told me that, that your son is gone, but bring home his body.
It should have never happened. Three years—it's ridiculous. Should have never happened.
Wouldn't have happened.
I also want to express my tremendous gratitude to the hundreds of thousands of proud American patriots who came from all across the country to join us in this celebration. It's a celebration of a big win.
And you're witnessing the dawn of the golden age of America. That's what it's going to be. We're bringing it back. We're going to bring it back fast. We're going to bring it back fast too.
Let us also thank the incredible servicemembers, National Guardsmen, police, Secret Service, and law enforcement personnel who are keeping us all safe, even though—and they are great people.
New York's finest—I grew up with New York's finest, and we've got to give them their authority back. We won't have any crime. There'll be no crime. You give them a little authority back. The whole way they run things in this country now, it's disgraceful, but it's going to change rapidly. We're going to make our cities safe again too.
Even though we're indoors, we've had a magnificent Inaugural parade, and let's give a big round of applause—they were great—to all of the incredible performers and hard-working men and women who made it possible. Those people—really talented, amazing people.
I also want to thank my wonderful family for being here, especially my beautiful wife, our First Lady, Melania. They love our First Lady.
And also, J.D.—how—how good has J.D. been? And his beautiful wife Usha. How good is J.B.? J.D. has been great. He's another good negotiator, Steve. [Laughter] He's a great negotiator too. We need negotiators in this country.
But so many of the people on the stage behind, not only family members—as an example, Lara Trump, the wife of Eric. She was the head of the Republican Party, along with my friend Michael. Stand up, the two of you. What a job. What a job they did.
They worked so hard. They knew there'd be rigging, but they said, "We're going to make it too big to rig." And we did. We made it too big to rig. We won every swing State by a lot. We won the popular vote by millions and millions of votes. We won the whole ball of wax.
And now we're going to go and drill, baby, drill, and do all the things that we've wanted to do and bring your costs down, your prices down, and make our country safe.
So thank you very much, Michael. Thank you very much. What a job you've done, Michael. I'm never moving you. You know, he was thinking about getting a nice job in the administration. I said: "No, I'm leaving you right where you are. You've done a very good job." We're not moving you, Michael. I'm sorry.
Anyway, thank you very much. Appreciate it. Appreciate it very much.
Right here with us also in the arena—I'm about to sign some very important Executive orders of our new administration.
Hey, Don, will you stand up, please? Don is another one. How about Don? This guy. He's a popular one. He goes out and speaks, he gets a big crowd. He's a little on the rough side sometimes, but that's—[laughter]—that's what you want.
He's done a fantastic job, and he loves our country. Thanks, Don. Great job. You've done a great job.
And Ivanka.
And you know, Jared negotiated the Abraham Accords, which are the biggest—it's the biggest deal made in the Middle East in many, many years. And it's really something. Jared— stand up, Jared. The Abraham Accords. Good.
And Tiffany is going to have a little baby. And Michael.
And then I have a very tall son named Barron. Has anyone ever heard of him? Thank you.
Audience members. Barron! Barron! Barron!
The President. He knew the youth vote. You know, we won the youth vote by 36 points.
And he was saying, "Dad, I—you've got to go out and do this one or that one." And we did a lot of them, and he respects them all. He understood them very well. And he said, "Dad, you've got to go out—do Joe Rogan, do all these guys." And we did. We did. And Joe Rogan was great.
They were all great. Right, Barron? They were all good? He understood the market.
Another famous one. How about Kai? Stand up, Kai.
Is that Byron Donalds back there? Stand up, Byron? Ah, stand up. What a future this one has. What a future. That's great, Byron. Thank you very much.
And how about Lutnick? Secretary of Commerce, he's going to take in more money than any country has ever even thought about. He's going to take in some money.
And we have many others.
Look, I'm not going to go through it, but we—we're going to sign some orders right now, and I'm—that's really what I want to do. So we're going to sign the Executive orders.
First, I'll revoke nearly 80 destructive and radical executive actions of the previous administration, one of the worst administrations in history—maybe the—not the—one of them— the worst. Anybody that would allow millions of people to pour through our borders from jails, prisons, mental institutions, insane asylums, gang members to be taken off the streets of Venezuelan and deposit in our country, and many—not just Venezuela.
You know, crime in Venezuela is down 74 percent because they took their criminals and gave them to us through an open-border policy of the previous administration.
Audience members. Boo!
The President. All over the world, they're emptying their prisons into our country. They're emptying their mental institutions into our country. It stops as of 1 o'clock this afternoon. Okay? It stops.
So I'm revoking nearly 80 destructive, radical executive actions of the previous administration. They'll all be null and void within about—what?—5 minutes? Is that them over there? Five minutes.
And next, to gain immediate control of the vast Federal, out-of-control bureaucracy, I will implement an immediate regulation freeze, which will stop Biden bureaucrats from continuing to regulate. Most of those bureaucrats are being fired. They're gone. Should be all of them, but some sneak through, but we have to live with a couple, I guess.
I'll also issue a temporary hiring freeze to ensure that we're only hiring competent people who are faithful to the American public, and we will pause the hiring of any new IRS agents. We will also require that Federal workers must return to the office in person.
And we're going to take the 88,000 people that they hired to go after you with guns—by the way, they're allowed to use guns and harass you like they were, and so many other people.
Remember this—okay, remember, we're going to—do you remember a little statement about tips? Does anybody remember that little statement? I think we won Nevada because of that statement.
But they went out and harassed you over the tips. In other words, we are restoring control of our Government to the people. We're going to take those 88,000—let's see if they'd like to work on the border, because that's where we want them, really, on the—[inaudible].
So we're going to have no tax on tips, right? No tax on tips.
And we may have—we like the Speaker of the House. Is he here? He's done such a good job.
Is Mike here? He's around here someplace. I saw him just a little while ago.
Hello, fellas. Look at you guys.
Audience members. [Inaudible]
The President. Yes, he's—I know it. He's great. He's doing great. They're all doing good.
The Republican Party has never been unified like it is right now. They want to save our country, and we're going to more than save it. We're going to make it greater than it's ever been before by a lot.
Next, I'm going to sign a Presidential memorandum directory—directing every member of my Cabinet to marshal every power at their disposal to defeat inflation and rapidly bring down the cost of daily life, because your costs have gone through the roof in the last 4 years.
Perhaps you didn't notice. Does anyone notice their costs are like double, triple, quadruple? You can't buy bacon. Apples have doubled in price. You want an apple, anybody? Pay twice what you did 2 years ago.
We'll put more money in your pocket, and we'll bring back the American dream.
And to reduce energy costs and liberate our economy—so we have more oil and gas than any country in the world, and we're going to use it. We're not going to do the wind thing. Wind— ooh.
Big, ugly windmills. They ruin your neighborhood. They ruin your—if you have a house that's near a windmill, guess what? Your house is worth less than half.
And did you see up in New England with the whales? You see what's happening? So they had two whales killed in about 14 years. Last year and the year before, total, they had 28. So, if you're into whales, you don't want windmills either. [Laughter]
And they're the most expensive form of energy that you can have by far, and they're all made in China, by the way—practically all of them.
Audience members. Boo!
The President. And they kill your birds, and they ruin your beautiful landscapes.
But other than that, I think they're quite good, right? [Laughter] No, remember when we used to joke and kid—when we were kidding, but we don't kid anymore—they want to watch the debates on television. They want to watch your favorite President on television. "But the wind isn't blowing, so we can't watch television at night, Gladys." Remember? [Laughter] "Gladys, I'm sorry. The wind is just not blowing. We're not watching Trump tonight." [Laughter]
But I'm immediately withdrawing from the unfair, one-sided Paris climate accord rip-off.
The United States will not sabotage our own industries while China pollutes with impunity.
You know, China, I—and look, they use a lot of dirty energy, but they produce a lot of energy. And when that stuff goes up in the air, you know, it doesn't stay there. It's not like you've got a wall. We love walls, don't we? [Laughter] Not like you have a wall around and it just—it doesn't. It floats into the United States of America after 3½ to 5½ days. It floats across the oceans, and it comes right over your neighborhood, and it falls into your neighborhood.
So they all say, "We have to fight for cleaner air." But the other dirty air is dropping all over us, so what the hell are they talking about? [Laughter] Unless everybody does it, it just doesn't work.
You know, we had the cleanest air and the cleanest water that this country has ever had under the Trump administration, and we didn't do anything to stop jobs and stop production.
Believe me, you're going to see a lot of companies come pouring back because tariffs. I always say "tariffs" is the most beautiful word to me in the dictionary. Then I was reprimanded by the fake news. They said, "What about 'love,' 'religion,' and 'God'?" I said: "I agree. Let's put 'God' number one. Let's put 'religion' number two." Huh. "Love," I don't know, we've got to put
that number three, I guess? Right? And then it's "tariff"—[laughter]—because tariffs are going to make us rich as hell. It's going to bring our country's businesses back that left us.
And I'll also sign an Executive order to immediately end Federal Government censorship of the American people. In America, we believe in free speech, and we're bringing it back, starting today, to stop the weaponization.
Oh, ho, ho, do I know about that. These creeps. [Laughter] Deranged Jack Smith. Did you ever hear of him? Deranged. He's a deranged prosecutor. He's sick. They suck him on me. He's now been reduced to getting on an airplane, going back to the Hague or wherever the hell he came from. We've got to get rid of that guy.
Hey, was he one of the many people that barred—that got a pardon today? Did they pardon Jack Smith?
You know, did you know that Biden, while I was making my speech, pardoned his whole family?
Audience members. Boo!
The President. The brother, the whole deal was pardoned. Can you imagine that? While I was making my speech.
Did everybody hear my speech? Did you like my speech? [Applause]Thank you.
I mean, the only thing wrong with it is, I had a lot of tough things to say. And I have some great people that work for me: "Sir, this is such a great speech. It's so unifying. Don't talk about Biden with his pardons of his family. We want a unified country." They said, "Don't talk about the J6 hostages that you're going to be releasing today." "Sir, don't put that in your speech, please."
I said, but I—really, I want to put it in my speech. They said: "Sir, it won't be unified like it is. It's so beautiful the way it is." And it is getting great reviews.
You know, if I put things like that in, I get terrible reviews. One little paragraph that's a little bit wrong, the fake news goes crazy, right?
Audience members. Boo!
The President. So I said, "All right. I won't put it in my speech, but you know what? I'm speaking in front of a hell of a lot of people at a place called Capital One Arena, and I'll talk about it there."
So we're going to—we're going to be going over to that beautiful Oval Office, one of the great offices in history. Even if it wasn't beautiful, it's the Oval Office. But it is beautiful, and we love the Oval Office. It all starts with the Oval—every—the wars start and end there. Everything starts and ends at the Oval Office. We love it.
But we're going to go to the Oval Office. We're going to sign—we're going to release our great hostages that didn't do—for the most part, they didn't do stuff wrong. You see—you take a look at what went on.
And look what happens in other parts of the country. In Portland, where they kill people, they destroy the city, nothing happens to them. In Seattle, where they took over a big chunk of the city, nothing happened. Minneapolis, where they burned down the city, nothing happened— essentially, nothing happened.
All they want to do is go after the J6 hostages. A 76-year-old grandmother was arrested the other day because she was looking—I think because she was looking at the Capitol or something like that. No, we're not going to put up with that crap anymore.
And to stop the weaponization of law enforcement—I've been investigated more than any human being in the world. [Laughter] I believe I have the alltime record. Every day, a subpoena, subpoena. Every single day, we'd get subpoenas.
I was—more than any person—Alphonse Capone—remember, I used to talk about it him? Now, Alphonse Capone, "Scarface," he was a pretty rough guy. He was investigated about one one-hundredth of what Trump was—my father is looking down on me, my mother that—"How the hell did this happen?" [Laughter]
You know what it is? They investigated their political opponent, the opponent of Biden and then, ultimately, Kamala. Has anyone ever heard of Kamala?
Audience members. Boo!
The President. We had to beat two opponents, you know? We had to beat Biden, and we beat him. Now he goes and talks—the guy was, like, 39 points down—"I think I could have beaten Trump." [Laughter] "They should have left me in. I would have beat him." [Laughter]
No, his debate performance wasn't the best, right? [Laughter] That's what killed him. And then they had a change, and they—that's like you get into a fight—the great Dana White spoke last night. We love Dana White, right? UFC. That's like he puts in two fighters. One of them is getting creamed, getting really beaten, and they say: "All right. Take him out, and let's put somebody else in to finish up the fight." That's what they did to us. They gave us somebody new, but we took care of both of them. So we beat, actually, two. We beat, actually, two opponents.
But to stop the weaponization of law enforcement in our Government, I will also sign an order directing every Federal agency to preserve all records pertaining to political persecutions under the last administration, of which there were many, and beginning the process of exposing any and all abuses of power, even though he's pardoned many of these people. Can you believe it? He's pardoned them.
You know why he did it while I was speaking? Because that way I couldn't speak about it. I was speaking. I didn't know he did it. I finished my speech, and they said, "Sir, he pardoned his whole family." I said, "Ooh, can I go back out there and talk about it?" [Laughter]
Somehow, that wouldn't be very elegant. Our First Lady would say, "Please don't do that." [Laughter] But we have plenty of time to talk about it, and we will.
We're doing all of this on our very first day in office. You know, don't forget, we've been in this position, really, where we won the primaries in record time. We—the fastest win of a primary ever in political history, which is a very nice thing. It's nice to know.
Well, the second election was rigged, so we knew we were doing well. And if it wasn't—you know what?—if it wasn't, I would have never run. But this third one was just a monster. Boy, was that a big one, huh? That was a big one.
On the second one, we got, like, 10 or 12 million votes more than the first one. How about that? We did great in the first one. We did much better on the second one. But, man, did we do well on the third one. So we're going to have some fun.
It's very simple. We're going to make our country great—we're going to make our country great again. We're going to make America great again.
How good a name is MAGA, though, right? You know?
I was going to say, "Keep America Great," but unfortunately, it wasn't great. Can't say "Keep It Great." It will be great again. But KAG—Keep America Great—KAG, I don't think it's ever going to replace MAGA. Does anybody like KAG? [Laughter] I don't think so.
It's never replacing MAGA. Nothing will ever replace MAGA. MAGA was the most successful political operation, political movement in the history of our country, maybe in the history of the world. Let's see what happens, because we're not finished yet. We're not finished yet. We got a long way to go.
But we're doing this in the very first day in office, and in just a few moments, I'm not only signing the release of the J6 hostages, I'm signing other things that you're going to love. Ooh, you're going to be happy reading newspapers tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day.
So I just want to thank—I mean, look at this place. It's full to the rafters. You don't have any—look at those people up there. We don't have any empty seats.
And by the way, the Capital One owners, they are so good. We got to root for their teams, because they have been so great to MAGA, to us. And I just want to thank Ted and everybody. You guys have been fantastic. And their—the ice hockey team is doing great. Ovechkin— Ovechkin is pretty good, right? They're doing great.
So I want to thank them, Capital One Arena owners. They have been absolutely fantastic.
And thank you, once again, to everyone. And I can only tell you, you're going to be very happy. You're going to watch a lot of good things happen. We've got to stop some wars that are happening and going on. Some stupid things are happening.
The war with Ukraine would have never happened, and it has.
As you know, Israel would have never been hit on October 7, and—you would—none of you would be up here, none of you would even know anything about this tragedy that you are going through right now.
But Iran was broke. Anybody that bought oil from Iran, they couldn't do any business with us. You're not going to do business with America. China passed. Everybody passed. They were broke. They didn't have money for Hamas. They didn't have money for Hizballah.
And your sons would be alive, and they certainly wouldn't be incarcerated like they are. It's a shame, but we're getting a lot of people out in a short period of time.
So I'm going to go right over to here, and I'm going to sign in front of you. Is that okay?
Good.
The President. Steve and J.D., why don't you come down here.
White House Staff Secretary William O. Scharf. Good evening, Mr. President.
The President. Thank you. Thank you. Do you have that other one to sign?
Staff Secretary Scharf. I'm sorry—what, sir?
The President. Do you have the other one to sign?
Staff Secretary Scharf. We don't—we don't have it over here yet, sir. We'll have it for you back at the Oval.
The first is the rescissions of 78 Biden-era EO's and Presidential memoranda.
The President. You want to call it out? Do you want to say it? Do you want to say it?
Staff Secretary Scharf. Oh, do—if you want me to, sir.
The President. Yes, why don't you say what I'm signing.
Staff Secretary Scharf. Sure. The first item that President Trump is signing is the rescission of 78 Biden-era executive actions, Executive orders, Presidential memoranda, and others.
[At this point, the President signed an Executive order titled, "Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions."]
Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you, sir. Thank you.
The second item, President Trump, is a regulatory freeze, as you announced in your speech, preventing bureaucrats from issuing any more regulations until we have full control of this—the Government in this administration.
[The President signed a memorandum titled, "Regulatory Freeze Pending Review."] Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you, sir.
Audience member. Can I have the pen, Mr. President?
Audience member. President Trump, give me the pen! [Laughter]
Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you, sir.
Audience member. Sir, can I have a pen?
Staff Secretary Scharf. The next item, sir, is a freeze on all Federal hiring, excepting the military and a number of other excluded categories, again, until full control of the Government is achieved and we understand the objectives of Government going forward.
[The President signed a memorandum titled, "Hiring Freeze."] Audience members. Louder!
The President. Let me have that for a second?
Could you imagine Biden doing this? I don't think so. [Laughter] I don't think so.
Staff Secretary Scharf. Sir, the next item, as you announced in your speech, is a requirement that Federal workers return to full-time in-person work immediately.
[The President signed a memorandum titled, "Return to In-Person Work."] Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you, sir.
Next, we have a directive to every department and agency in the Federal Government to address the cost-of-living crisis that has cost Americans so dearly.
[The President signed a memorandum titled, "Delivering Emergency Price Relief for American Families and Defeating the Cost-of-Living Crisis."]
Audience member. We love you, President Trump!
Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you, sir.
The next item here is the withdrawal from the Paris climate treaty. The President. That will save about a trillion dollars—[inaudible]. Staff Secretary Scharf. I'm sorry, what did you say?
The President. This is going to save over a trillion dollars by—[inaudible].
Staff Secretary Scharf. Yes, sir.
[The President signed an Executive order titled, "Putting America First in International Environmental Agreements."]
The President. Over a trillion—we're going to save over a trillion.
Staff Secretary Scharf. We're going to save over a trillion dollars by withdrawing from that treaty.
And the next item, sir, is a letter that will be transmitted to the United Nations explaining that we are withdrawing from the Paris climate treaty.
[The President signed a letter to U.N. Secretary-General António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres headed, "Notification of Withdrawal on Behalf of the United States of America."]
Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you, sir.
This next item is a directive to the Federal Government ordering the restoration of freedom of speech and preventing Government censorship of free speech going forward.
[The President signed an Executive order titled, "Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship."]
Staff Secretary Scharf. And lastly, sir, before we go back to the Oval Office to sign a large number of other items, is a directive to the Federal Government ending the weaponization of Government against the political adversaries of the previous administration, as we've seen.
[The President signed an Executive order titled, "Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government."]
Staff Secretary Scharf. Thank you very much, sir.
The President. Thank you.
Staff Secretary Scharf. Appreciate it.
The President. Thank you. [Inaudible]
Staff Secretary Scharf. Mr. Vice President.
Vice President James D. "J.D." Vance. That's a pretty fun job. [Laughter]
Staff Secretary Scharf. That's one way to put it.
[The President began throwing signing pens to the crowd.] Audience members. U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
NOTE: The President spoke at 6:19 p.m. In his remarks, he referred to U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East Steven C. Witkoff; Israeli hostages Emily Damari and Doron Steinbrecher, who were abducted from their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, and Romi Gonen, who was abducted from the Nova music festival near Kibbutz Re'im, during the Hamas attacks on October 7, 2023; Usha Chilukuri Vance, wife of Vice President Vance; Michael Whatley, chairman, Republican National Committee; comedian and podcaster Joseph J. Rogan; Rep. Byron Donalds; Secretary of Commerce–designate Howard W. Lutnick; Speaker of the House of Representatives J. Michael Johnson; former Department of Justice Special Counsel John L. Smith; James B. and Francis W. Biden, brothers of former President Joseph R. Biden, Jr.; former Vice President Kamal D. Harris; Dana F. White, chief executive officer, Ultimate Fighting Championship; Theodore J. Leonsis, majority owner of Capitol One Arena and founder of Monumental Sports and Entertainment; and Alexander Ovechkin, left winger and captain, National Hockey League's Washington Capitals.
He also referred to his son-in-law Jared C. Kushner, in his former capacity as White House Senior Adviser; his son-in-law Michael Boulos; and his granddaughter Kai M. Trump. The transcript was released by the Office of the Press Secretary on January 21.
Categories: Addresses and Remarks : Capital One Arena, remarks and document signing ceremony following Inaugural Parade.
Locations: Washington, DC.
Names: Biden, Francis W.; Biden, James B.; Biden, Joseph R., Jr.; Boulos, Michael; Damari, Emily; Donalds, Byron; Gonen, Romi; Harris, Kamala D.; Johnson, J. Michael; Kushner, Jared C.; Leonsis, Theodore J.; Lutnick, Howard W.; Ovechkin, Alexander; Rogan, Joseph J.; Scharf, William O.; Smith, John L.; Steinbrecher, Doron; Trump, Barron; Trump, Donald J., Jr.; Trump, Eric F.; Trump, Ivanka M.; Trump, Kai M.; Trump, Lara J.; Trump, Melania; Trump, Tiffany A.; Vance, James D. "J.D."; Vance, Usha Chilukuri; Whatley, Michael; White, Dana F.; Witkoff, Steve.
Subjects: 2021 civil unrest and violence at U.S. Capitol; 2024 Presidential election; Border security; District of Columbia, Capitol One Arena; Federal civilian employees, hiring freeze; Federal Government, investigation and prosecution authorities; Food markets and prices; Freedom of speech; Gaza, hostages held by Hamas; Hamas political-paramilitary organization; Inaugural Parade and document signing ceremony; Inflation; Internal Revenue Service; Israel, attacks by Hamas of October 7, 2023; Law enforcement officers, service and dedication; Lebanon, Hizballah political-paramilitary organization; Middle East, regional integration and security; National Guard; Oil and natural gas, domestic production; Pardons and commutations; Paris Agreement on climate change; Regulatory freeze pending review; Republican National Committee; Russia, conflict in Ukraine; Solar and wind energy; Speaker of the House of Representatives; U.S. Secret Service; U.S. servicemembers, service and dedication; U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East; Ukraine, Russian invasion and airstrikes; Vice President; White House Staff Secretary.
DCPD Number: DCPD202500152.