Q “We have no doubt that your latest story is (inaudible). But for those who believe that there is something to it, is there anything that you have learned over these last few weeks that you might be able to reveal that might ease their concerns that this isn’t fake news? And secondly — ”
THE PRESIDENT: “I think they don’t believe it. I don’t think the public would. That’s why the Rasmussen poll just has me through the roof. I don’t think they believe it. Well, I guess one of the reasons I’m here today is to tell you the whole Russian thing — that’s a ruse. That’s a ruse. And, by the way, it would be great if we could get along with Russia, just so you understand that. Now, tomorrow you’ll say, Donald Trump wants to get along with Russia, this is terrible. It’s not terrible — it’s good.
“We had Hillary Clinton try and do a reset. We had Hillary Clinton give Russia 20 percent of the uranium in our country. You know what uranium is, right? It’s this thing called nuclear weapons and other things. Like, lots of things are done with uranium, including some bad things. Nobody talks about that. I didn’t do anything for Russia. I’ve done nothing for Russia. Hillary Clinton gave them 20 percent of our uranium. Hillary Clinton did a reset, remember, with the stupid plastic button that made us all look like a bunch of jerks? Here, take a look. He looked at her like, what the hell is she doing with that cheap plastic button? Hillary Clinton — that was a reset. Remember? It said ‘reset.’
“Now, if I do that, oh, I’m a bad guy. If we could get along with Russia, that’s a positive thing. We have a very talented man, Rex Tillerson, who is going to be meeting with them shortly. And I told him, I said, I know politically it’s probably not good for me. Hey, the greatest thing I could do is shoot that ship that’s 30 miles offshore right out of the water. Everyone in this country is going to say, oh, it’s so great. That’s not great. That’s not great. I would love to be able to get along with Russia.”
— Press conference with Pres. Donald J. Trump, Feb. 17, 2017