Donald Trump’s 199 wildest lines of 2019 – CNN

Over the past year, President Donald Trump has talked and talked and talked. He has talked at photo ops at the White House. He has talked at impromptu press conferences while abroad. He has talked at campaign event after campaign event.

And I have watched or read it all -- poring over the transcripts to find the most, um, notable quotes. Below, we've gathered the best of the best -- or worst of the worst, depending on your point of view -- lines of 2019.

The President celebrated the new year with a 90+ minute Cabinet meeting -- and cameras were rolling the entire time. He answered question after question as his Cabinet sat silently.

The President of the United States offers his thoughts on Syria.

This is so revealing. All of life is a casting call for Trump. These generals were good because they were good looking and strong. Even more than Tom Cruise!

"Computer boards."

"Computer boards."

Is that how that goes? The buck stops with everybody? (Remember: Trump hardly ever takes the blame for anything -- especially the things that are his fault.)

11. "I was obviously a good candidate. I won every debate. I won everything I did, and I won, and I won easily."

When Trump said this, the 2016 election had ended 797 days ago.

Trump's response here to a question on Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg following her illness was -- dare I say it -- presidential.

Trump on the global situation: America 🙂 Rest of world 🙁

"The Pocahontas Trap?" Is that a Disney flick?

In this quote from Trump's interview on CBS News before this year's Super Bowl, Trump questioned his intelligence community's assessment of Iran. Worth nothing: His "intelligence people" didn't say Iran was a kindergarten, they simply said they believed the country to be in compliance with the nuclear deal Trump pulled out of in May 2018.

The Mueller report hadn't come out yet.

Donald Trump on North Korea. Yup!

Donald Trump and Texas sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g. First comes love then comes ... ah, you know the rest.

There's so much here. First, Trump was comparing his rally to the Academy Awards because of the amount of press that was covering it. (But I thought he hated the media?) Then he's saying that the Oscars, like everything else, aren't as good as they used to be. And finally, he is attributing the decline of the Oscars to the fact that some of the actors have taken shots at him. He truly contains multitudes.

This an unedited "sentence" from the President of the United States. Someday.

When a protester interrupts a speech, that's when Trump's real bullying tendencies emerge.

Remember: Trump views himself as an entertainer first and everything else second. So his measure of success is whether people are having fun.

Oh, that is rich. Important note: Donald Trump made over 8,000 false or misleading claims in his first two years in office, according to The Washington Post's Fact Checker. By October 2019, that number had risen to 13,435.

Trump has already said, repeatedly, that "Keep America Great" is his preferred 2020 slogan. Also, he's been running for a second term since the day he won in 2016.

In which Donald Trump claims to have invented the word "caravan."

Yup. He said this.

Words fail.

This is not edited. He really said these sentences back-to-back.

So, the President was declaring a national emergency on the southern US border because "we have to do it," not because he said we had to do it on the campaign trail. But ask yourself this: If it was such an emergency, why did Trump wait more than two years into his term to declare it one?

Important thing to always remember about Trump: Nothing is ever his fault. He is always the undeserving victim of other peoples' malice, incompetence or both.

(Trump while taking questions). ABC > NBC. But, IT'S CLOSE!

"Now I do politics." -- The President of the United States

Wait, so former President Barack Obama told Trump he was planning a "big" war against North Korea? Interesting! I am sure that conversation happened exactly as Trump said it did!

Ah, those rich -- and dusty -- days. Man, they were great. Tough on the allergies. But great.

It IS true. Voters seemed to believe that Trump's often rambling, hard-to-understand speeches.

"When the wind stop blowing, that's the end of your electric." -- The President of the United States. (Also, Trump is mocking the "Green New Deal" here.)

Trump has even turned his infamous love for cursing into some sort of anti-elites mantra. Amazing.

I assume Trump is referring to then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions recusing himself from the Russia probe. Or maybe former FBI Director James Comey for launching the probe. Or deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein for forming a special counsel to look into it. Maybe all of the above. Either way: It's total bullshit!

Agreed. How else does anyone watch "Succession?" (Also, Trump may have gotten a *little* off-topic during his CPAC speech.)

Trump is talking about why he is speaking for so long and so far off-script. It's because of love, obviously.

From good to great in two sentences: The life of Donald Trump.

Trump was in Iraq to meet with generals. His first thought? Bring in the cameras. Let's make a movie.

So, Trump is saying he deserves credit for the 2018 midterm election! The same 2018 election in which Republicans suffered a near-total loss: Democrats made a net gain of 39 seats in the House, picked up 7 governor's mansions and hundreds of seats in state legislatures across the country.

Republicans DID win the Senate, and those 32 "big, fat rallies" probably helped -- but with 26 Democratic seats up for reelection and only nine for Republicans, the 2018 Senate map was one that Republicans should have capitalized on -- not just survived.

He is totally and completely obsessed with crowds. And crowds staying. And loving him. This feels like a good place to end the CPAC portion of our tour.

So, if Trump wasn't president, we would be running on wind power right now? Also, he's right -- the wind does "only blow sometimes."

So, if Hillary Clinton was president right now, we'd have no oil or gas. Just wind. And you know the wind "only blows sometimes."

Why did Trump suddenly out of nowhere start talking about his potential 2020 opponents? Oh, I have no idea. But the crowd LOVED it.

It's fascinating that Trump understands the job of being president as getting lots of people to show up to rallies.

Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States! Whether on "The Apprentice" or pushing his NAFTA replacement, you have to admit Trump has a flair for salesmanship.

Honestly, same.

You got hammered with a hurricane. But that's over now. And I am here now. Like, that's literally what he is saying here.

"That's Puerto Rico and they don't like me." -- Donald Trump, literally 10 seconds before he said this.

This is a classic Trump pitch -- and it's at the core of his appeal: Trump and other "regular" people are in a cultural war against "elites" in government, media and everywhere else.

What's that? You're right! It is strange that a billionaire who never lived outside of New York City before he moved to the White House has successfully become the voice of the common man.

The super elite: The elite, but with bigger houses. And boats.

Remember that Trump's natural state is as a bully. it's where he's best and most comfortable.

Trump is referring to the surveillance of a former aide -- Carter Page -- as part of the FBI's counterintelligence probe into possible Russian interference in the 2016 election. And this "spying" was totally lawful -- approved by a FISA court and re-approved three times. Just saying.

Wait, being president is hard? I had never thought of that!

Totally responsible rhetoric here from the President of the United States! Very normal! (Side note: I couldn't find the article Trump read that said "everybody's being stabbed.")

A real, unedited sentence from the President of the United States.

... said the President of the United States about the speaker of the US House while in a foreign country -- and with thousands of grave markers in the background of his TV shot.

"If I made any statement about anybody it would be like a big headline, why would he do that when he's overseas?" -- Donald Trump, literally two minutes before saying this.

In which Trump suggests that the Queen of England has never had a better time -- ever -- than she did hanging out with him over the past few days.

In sum: Tariffs are beautiful. But only when you are a piggy bank. And have "all the money."

Trump 2020 slogan: Won't get fooled again!

French wine is great.

Wait, people walk around in $2 billion undershirts? Or they don't? Either way -- our geniuses are better than China's geniuses, I guess?

Be best.

In any normal presidency, this would be a news story for a week. The President of the United States accusing the opposition party of committing "many crimes"!??! Without evidence, to boot! But because Trump says things like this -- again, with zero evidence -- all the time, it barely causes a ripple.

Me in 8th grade: "I DO SO have a girlfriend. She's a model and she totally loves me. You can't meet her. She lives in Montana. She writes me every day. But the letters are private."

Melania T. has a nice ring to it! Trump was talking, by the way, about his decision to redo Air Force One because he didn't like the "baby blue" color picked by First Lady Jackie Kennedy.

OK. So, Point 1: Trump doesn't believe in pollsters. Point 2: He just met with a pollster and he is "winning everywhere." THIS ALL MAKES SENSE TO ME!!!!

Truly stunning stuff here. What Trump, who is, reminder, the President of the United States, seems to fail to grasp is that a foreign county would almost certainly have a motive for passing along negative information about Trump's opponent.

This explanation is the best one I've seen about why Trump uses Twitter so much. He loves to be able to drive news cycles -- even if the news cycle is unfavorable to him. The power to do it is intoxicating to him -- someone who spent his whole life trying to get coverage for himself from what he believed to be a biased media. Now, he can make the news with a single tweet. And he loves it.

Nobody? Ever? [Consults first page of any history book ever.]

This is accurate -- especially if your definition of "treated supposedly very badly" is "was assassinated."

This seems to suggest that Trump doesn't believe Kim is a bad guy -- and that many of the reports of the atrocities by Kim are, uh, "fake news?"

My college jazz fusion band was named "Instantaneously Wealthy Behemoth."

First, Trump is saying his record of appointing federal judges is behind only that of America's first president. Second: "Your favorite president, Donald Trump."

If you are looking for an encapsulation of why Trump won in 2016 -- and why he could win again in 2020 -- this is it. This is Trump at his anti-elite, populist best -- railing against a system that he argues hates and disdains the average person.

Pretty low-stakes then, right?

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un is no dummy. He knows that the way to Trump's heart is through flattery and obsequiousness. Hence, a "beautiful" birthday card.

Zero subtlety from Trump here when it comes to suggesting that Biden has something wrong with him.

Japan: It's nonstop. It's big. It's beautiful. And clean! This is the stuff of travel brochures (do those even exist anymore?)

"Canada: Not happy like the US is happy" has potential as a future slogan for our neighbors to the north. Trump said this during a press conference in Osaka, Japan, on Canada Day.

Same.

Donald Trump on his election night: "One of the most extraordinary and exciting evenings in the history of television and the history of anything." The history of anything!!

Uh, OK. (Trump is talking about MS-13 here.)

The President of the United States would like you to know he has "poor" friends, ladies and gentlemen.

These were two sentences that the President said back-to-back. And, no, I have no idea what he believed the connection to be -- or if he believed there to be one.

I laughed out loud when I read this quote about former special counsel Robert Mueller's testimony on Capitol Hill. Not kidding.

Crowd size has long been Trump's stand-in for popularity. If 8,000 people in North Carolina turn out to see his rally, how can he be unpopular in all of these "fake" polls? The logic flaw here, of course, is large enough to fly a 747 through.

Yes, of course, the crowd began chanting "Lock her up!" after Trump said this. On a related note, the 2016 election ended 997 days before he said this.

Well, this is good news!

I don't really have much to add here.

Information for life!

"Big beautiful hands of yours." -- The President of the United States.

This was supposedly an official White House event. Which means taxpayers were paying for the costs of it, not Trump's 2020 campaign. Which is weird because, well, the speech was totally and completely political.

The best winning. So much product.

The President of the United States on guns.

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Donald Trump's 199 wildest lines of 2019 - CNN