Editor’s Note: On Oct. 17, 2024, just ahead of the Al Smith Dinner in New York City, Republican nominee for president Donald Trump spoke with Raymond Arroyo on EWTN’s The World Over. Please find the full transcript of the interview below. 

Mr. President, I’m delighted, first of all, that you made the Downton Abbey auditions. I think we’re going to fit in nicely. We’re at the Al Smith Dinner, of course. Tell me, why did you decide it was important to be here? And what message is Kamala Harris sending by not being here to Catholic voters?

Well, I think you’re honoring the Catholic Church. And, you know, I’ve been a longtime supporter, and I’m surprised she’s not here. I think she’s the first one in many, many decades, actually, to miss it as a candidate. It has always been a tradition. So I’m happy only that the Catholics are going to vote for Trump now. But no, look, I have a special relationship with the Catholic Church, and I think it was very important to be here.

 

I’ve been noticing on your social-media posts, at your rallies, you’re playing Ave Maria, you’re posting “Happy birthday, Mary”; a St. Michael prayer to ward off evil. Is that telling voters something about your spiritual journey? What is that?

No, I don’t think so. It’s just beautiful to me. I mean, I look at the whole thing, the words and the pictures. The pictures are so beautiful. And yeah, I put up some stuff. Somebody else asked me that same question. And it’s really that. I think it’s really very beautiful.

Okay. In 2020, you told me, “I am a pro-life candidate.” In the interim, you got rid of Roe v. Wade, and you’ve said, “I’ve returned it to the states, and people have to follow their heart.” Some of your supporters are saying, “Well, Trump is pro-choice now.” What would you say to them?

No, no. I am like Ronald Reagan before me. The exceptions are very important to me, and that’s the life of the mother, rape and incest. 

Not at all. I’m very proud of what we did. Everybody wanted it to be back in the states where it belongs. The states are voting, and, frankly, some of the votes are very liberal by comparison to what people may have thought. But it’s now back in the states. It’s an issue that’s torn the country apart for 52 years. And now, everybody wanted it: Democrats, Republicans, conservatives, liberals, all legal scholars wanted it back in the states. And now we did that. And I have to tell you, I give great credit to brilliant Supreme Court justices. We had six brilliant Supreme Court justices, and they had great courage. Our country will now come together.

 

Will you reinstate the Mexico City Policy, which forbids international spending on abortion?

Well, I was the only one that did that. As you know, no other president did that. And we’re going to be giving that a very good, serious look: in other words, how that compares and competes with the states. But we’ll be giving that a very serious look.

 

The other day you said, “I’m the father of IVF.” As you know, some Catholics feel and the Catholic Church believes when you implement this technology, you’re killing embryos. Will you have a religious exemption to your IVF mandate for religious organizations and businesses that feel this violates my religious principles?

Well, you know, I haven’t been asked that, but it sounds to me like a pretty good idea, frankly. But even Catholics, a lot of them, they want IVF. It’s fertilization, basically. And, you know, they view that as helping a family, helping parents have a child. And it’s a very popular thing. But certainly if there’s a religious problem, I think people should go with that. I really think they should be able to do that. But we will look at that. 

 

Kamala Harris is changing her tactic against you. She said to Bret Baier, my colleague, the other night, you, President Trump, are targeting Americans; you’re calling them the enemy within and you’re turning the military on the American people. Your reaction to that? And what did you mean when you said “the enemy within”?

Well, it’s ridiculous that she says that, in turning the military; these are the real  threats to democracy: people actually like her, with her language. You know, she’s the most liberal senator in the Senate, not as smart as most of them, but she’s certainly more liberal. And she likes to say that: turning the military — how ridiculous is it? I will say this: The enemy from within, we do have an enemy from within. We have people that are, I think, more danger to our country when you see the radical left, programs that they are espousing. And we have a true enemy from within. They hate when I say that, but whether we like it, and I think in many ways, it’s more dangerous from the outside enemies that we have.

 

I want to talk about immigration for a moment. The Church teaches: Welcome the immigrant. It also teaches that a nation has a right to protect its borders for the common good. How do you, President Trump, balance welcoming the immigrant with locking down the border and the deportation promise you made?

Well, as you know, we had the strongest borders we’ve ever had. Just four years ago, we had the most powerful, the strongest. We let people in, but they have to come in legally. And I don’t think that’s changed. We want people to come into our country, but they have to come — and legally. As you know, they allowed people to come in from prisons and, frankly, murderers; the 13,099 murderers, where they were let out of prison, convicted murderers. And some killed more than one person; some killed more than five people. And they’re now free in our country. And we’re going to have to get them out, and we’re going to get them out fast. Nobody wants that. No. I want to have people come into our country legally, but we have to have strong borders and good elections.

 

Did you see this lip reader when Joe Biden and Barack Obama were on the side of Ethel Kennedy’s funeral? This lip reader, who’s a forensic expert, claims Joe Biden said,  “She’s not as strong as I am.” Was it a mistake to trade Kamala Harris for Joe Biden, in your opinion?

Well, we seem to be winning, and we were way up on Joe. We had the debate and the numbers were very strong. And I just see numbers that are very similar right now. They’re very similar. So we’ll see what happens. I hope we win because we want to make America great again. 

 

And your record of religious liberty, how important is that to you? Religious liberty?

It’s a stance that I’ve taken from the beginning, and I’ll keep it. I wouldn’t change it for anything.

 

Okay, final question: The Pope was asked about your candidacy and Kamala Harris, and he instructed Catholic voters to “vote for the lesser of two evils.” Who do you think he means, and why?

Well, I think he wants them to vote for me. And I stand for really everything that you stand for and that the Church stands for. And she doesn’t. She’s a very different kind of a person. She’s a Marxist. Her father was a Marxist and still is a Marxist. And they are not big into religion, I will tell you. And I’m not just talking about the Catholic religion; I’m talking about any religion. The whole Democratic Party has gone really radical left, and I’m the opposite. I am totally in favor of religion, and I also like the Catholic Church a lot.

 

Thank you, Mr. President, what a pleasure. We’ll see you soon. Thank you.