US president-elect Donald Trump said on Monday that people who were his enemy in his first term, now want to be his friend.
In his first press conference since his election as the United States’s 47th president one and a half months ago, Trump noted the differences between the first time he took office eight years back and today, saying executives now want to meet with him.
“The first term, everybody was fighting me. In this term, everybody wants to be my friend. I don’t know — my personality changed or something,” he said.
The president-elect held forth for over an hour, harkening back to his long-winding news conferences from his first term. He spoke on a wide range of issues including polio vaccines, mysterious drones flying over New Jersey, and the TikTok ban, among others.
On polio vaccine
Trump defended his choice for health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr, who is known as a vaccine skeptic. Kennedy has long advanced the debunked idea that vaccines cause autism. A recent report also disclosed that one of Kennedy’s advisers filed a petition to revoke approval for the polio vaccine in 2022.
Trump said he is a “big believer” of the polio vaccine. “You’re not going to lose the polio vaccine,” he added.
Costly pharmaceutical drugs
Donald Trump spoke about Dr Mehmet Oz he has tapped to run the Centers for medicare and medicaid services; and top pharmaceutical executives in which they discussed drug prices. He said that the high cost of drugs was the focus of the dinner.
“What came out of that meeting is that we’re paying far too much,” he said. He also blamed middlemen for the high costs of pharmaceutical drugs.
On Lara Trump
Asked whether he expected his daughter-in-law Lara Trump to be named by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis a Florida senator, Trump said “I probably don’t, but I don’t know.”
Trump’s allies have been pushing DeSantis to nominate Lara Trump, who is married to Trump’s third child, Eric.
TikTok ban
Trump who tried to ban TikTok during his first term, has changed his mind. “We’ll take a look at TikTok. You know, I have a warm spot in my heart for TikTok,” he said.
According to a recent federal government ban, the popular social media platform must cut ties with its China-based parent company or be banned by mid-January.
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