Trump Predicted The Summit With North Korea 19 Years Ago
When Trump was considering running for the White House in 2000, during an interview on Meet The Press he told then-host Tim Russert that he would “negotiate like crazy” with North Korea. In 1999, when Kim Jong-un’s father Kim Jong-il was leader of the hermit nation, Trump said during an interview “Now, if that negotiation doesn’t work, you’d better solve the problem now than solve it later.”
Flashback: Trump says he would 'negotiate like crazy' with North Korea on Meet the Press in 1999 pic.twitter.com/oSXyC70AMG
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) August 9, 2017
Trump even referred to North Korea as “sort of wacko” and that the weren’t “a bunch of dummies, and they are going out and they are developing nuclear weapons.” After making this comment during the interview, Russert, who sadly died 10 years ago, said that U.S. military leaders had warned about the nuclear fallout from a first strike.
“I’m not talking about us using nuclear weapons. I’m saying that they have areas where they’re developing missiles,” Trump said, adding that those areas could be attacked by conventional weapons. “Do you want to do it in five years when they have nuclear warheads all over the place, every one of them pointed to New York City, to Washington, and every one of us?”
Just landed – a long trip, but everybody can now feel much safer than the day I took office. There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea. Meeting with Kim Jong Un was an interesting and very positive experience. North Korea has great potential for the future!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 13, 2018
Despite these comments, and even nineteen years ago, Trump said his first preference would be to sit down with North Korea’s leader to negotiate. And this is exactly what happened three days ago in Singapore. “If they think you’re serious, they’ll negotiate.”
