>> i am going to be the greatest jobs president that god ever created. remember that. if i get elected president, we will make america great again. the weakest person on this stage by far is jeb bush. >> you want to talk about weakness? it's weak to disparage women. it's weak to disparage hispanics. >> donald has this weird pattern, when you point to his own record, he screams liar, liar, liar. >> this guy will say anything. this guy lied about ben carson when he took votes away from ben carson in iowa. >> building a hotel overseas is not foreign policy experience. >> every guy that attacks me so far, they have all gone down. we have to keep it that way, right? >> msnbc presents an exclusive town hall with donald trump. here now are joe scarborough and mika brzezinski. >> good evening and welcome to

an exclusive msnbc town hall event. we are here in charleston, south carolina, where in just three days the voters of this state and the first in the south primary will choose who they want to be the republican nominee for president. >> mika, this is about as big as it gets. >> it is. >> new hampshire was big, this is going to determine so much. >> tonight we sit with the front-runner in that republican race who despite a debate performance that some analysts, including us, called disastrous -- >> i thought it was terrible. i thought it was terrible. >> i thought his head was going to explode. seriously, i thought it was horrible. >> i was surprised. >> but he's a favorite here in the palmetto state. joining us now, the republican presidential candidate, donald trump. [ applause ] >> thank you. >> all right. >> great to see you, donald.

>> good to have you. >> i thought i did great in that debate. >> i just didn't think it was good. i was like what is going on? >> no, that was -- i thought it was good. i was being hit from every side. it was tough. you said i was too tough, but i thought i had to be tough. i thought i did well. >> let's start with this question now that as we said this morning on the show, if you look at a lot of the polls, a lot of people are starting to say you could be the republican nominee. so we need to step back and ask a lot of questions. a lot of questions about your general philosophy. why is it that you feel it's necessary to attack jeb bush, to attack john mccain, to attack all these people? >> i don't attack john mccain actually. i do attack people when i'm attacked. i don't care too much about jeb except he spent $22 million on negative ads. every time i turn on the television, i see a negative ad. he's got money from all of the different donors and special interests and lobbyists and they put a lot of negative ads are and that's jeb.

more so than anybody else. so i hit jeb because he's sort of easy to hit, to be honest with you. if he weren't doing the negative ads, i wouldn't be talking about jeb, to be honest with you. now, ted, we go back and forth. but ted, what he did to ben carson i thought was disgraceful in iowa where he said he was out of the race essentially. he said he was out of the race and this race is over, come with me, come with me. i thought that was bad. i thought the voter violation fraud document that he did, i thought it was horrendous and he's told lies. i mean he tells lies. in fact rubio, he came out and accused ted of being a liar and he said oh, good, that's good, now i can do it also. >> let's go over some polls and follow up. there's a brand new monmouth university poll out that finds you with a 16-point lead in south carolina, 35% to cruz's 19% to marco at 17%. a new bloomberg politics south carolina poll that was just released puts you ahead of ted cruz 36 to 17% with rubio in

third place at 15%. however, a new nbc news/wall street journal poll that was taken after saturday night's debate -- >> national poll. >> it's a national poll showing ted cruz with a slim two-point margin, 28% to 26% with marco rube in third at 17%. >> are things closing in here in south carolina? >> well, i think most of these polls were taken after the debate and, you know, the debate worked out good for me and it was taken after the debate. i have never done well in the wall street journal poll. i think somebody at the wall street journal doesn't like me but i never do well with the wall street journal poll. they do these small samples and i don't know exactly what it represents. but i am really honored by those poll results. those are great poll results overall. >> today ted cruz came out and attacked you and said you were the king of frivolous lawsuits. mika, what exactly did he say? >> i have to say, mr. trump, you have been threatening frivolous lawsuits your entire live. even in the annals of frivolous

lawsuits, this takes the cake. >> i've had great success in business, great success in lawsuits, great success in things i do. i don't know that we're going to have a lawsuit but we certainly want to keep somebody honest. when he makes statements like, for example, i'm pro-life and he said he's not pro life. >> but it's safe to say you haven't always been pro life. >> that's true. ronald reagan likewise. >> what happened? when did that change come? >> it changed years ago. and what happened is i saw things with people and people that i know and people that i respect that made me change. ronald reagan changed. he said he evolved, he used that expression. >> right. >> ronald reagan actually used to be a fairly liberal democrat and he became a fairly conservative conservative. i mean fairly. >> but ted cruz says we can't count on donald trump in the future, especially in picking supreme court justices, if he's changed in the past.

so how do you convince a republican like me that if you were nominated you're not going to nominate the type of supreme court justice that always seems to flip? >> okay. so if you look at me as a conservative, okay, and i'm not sure that that's necessarily the most important word, but i say i'm a common sense conservative, i'm the most conservative on the border. nobody tougher than me on the border. in fact sheriff joe just endorsed me from arizona. when he endorses you, you're pretty conservative and pretty good on the border. i think i'm the strongest on the military, most conservative on the military. strongest on the military. the best with the vets. i have more veteran support than anybody else by far. we're going to get rid of common core. i'm very conservative on that issue. common core is going. we're going to have local education. it's going to be much better, much less expensive. on the second amendment, i am absolutely the strongest in the group -- >> so let me stop you there. the second amendment, very important in this state. heller, the decision that the

supreme court passed that -- or decided on actually found out the second amendment -- ruled that the second amendmentme mea what people believed it meant, that americans have the right to keep and bear arms. will you make upholding the heller decision a litmus test in supreme court nominees that you send? >> yes, i would. and i talk about it all the time. >> so you won't nominate somebody to the supreme court unless they agree with scalia on the heller decision. >> correct. >> that the second amendment means americans have the right to bear arms. >> i give that commitment right now. i'm a member of the nra. my sons are members of the nra for a long time. they're hunters and great members of the nra. you know, if in -- if you take california, if in california we had somebody having guns on the other side where you had the two radicalized people, if we had guns on the other side, bullets coming the other way, you wouldn't have had the 14 people

killed. the best example is paris has the toughest gun laws in the world they say. france has the toughest gun laws as a country they say. if you take france and all the bad guys have the guns, nobody had guns in the room, they sent into the various rooms of people, 130 people killed, it was like come on over here, boom. come on over here, boom. if people on the other side had guns, joe, it wouldn't have been that way. people really seriously wounded. you're going to lose many more people in paris. you look at it, if they had guns on the other side with the bullets flying the other way and i have this argument with people all the time from new york. they can't argue and beat me in the argument. it's impossible to beat. then the next thyime i say did convince you? they always say no. >> we're going to get deeper into your policy positions but we want to get a state of the race as we move on here. president obama even talked about you saying i continue to believe mr. trump will not be president. and the reason is i have a lot of faith in the american people.

and i think they recognize that being president is a serious job. it's not hosting a talk show or reality show. it's not promotion. it's not marketing. it's hard. the sitting president, mr. trump, thinks your candidacy is an aberration or a joke. >> i don't think he does at all. i tell you what, if i would have run four years ago, he wouldn't be president right now. i don't think he thinks that at all. it's very interesting, it's very interesting with president obama. he's going to go down as one of the worst presidents in the history of this country. he has been a disaster on the military. you look at what -- we can't beat isis. he's been a disaster on health care because obama has got to be repealed and replaced. i'm not talking about from my standpoint, rates are going up, your premiums are going up, 25, 35, 45, 55%. >> so you're going to repeal obamacare? what do you replace it with? >> health care savings accounts

one way. i have thousands of employees. i've employed tens of thousands of people. i built an unbelievable business. one thing that has come out when i filed the documents with the fec in terms of my business, i built an unbelievable business so i have tremendous tons of people. we have to get rid of the lines. >> you're talking about letting people shop from one state to the other for insurance. >> we have to. >> there is a guarantee now that all americans get health care. this has been -- well, in new hampshire it was supposed to be a big problem for you. are you going to guarantee all americans health care? >> joe, americans aren't getting health care right now. >> no, but that's what i'm asking you. just like you guaranteed -- what you've guaranteed on the second amendment. this has been a fight within the republican party and what it means to be conservative. but you have constantly said even in new hampshire, the live free or die state that every american should get health care. that is power snyour position?

>> we're going to have great plans, because the obama plan is a disaster. it's going to die unless the republicans continue to fund money. it's not affordable by the country and not affordable by people. we're going to have great plans. but there will be a group of people that is not doing well and has no money, we cannot let them die in the streets and we'll work out through medicare, which we'll save or something. we will work out a plan where instead of having people dying in the streets, and i say that to republicans all the time. by the way, i get standing ovations from republicans, from republican groups. i got one yesterday. i said we can't let people die in the streets. we've got to work out a deal with a hospital or with somebody in that community where if somebody is sick and really sick and they don't have housing and they don't have all -- we can't let them die. >> so all americans will get health care of some sort. >> we're going to take care of them. we have to take care of them. now, that's not single payer. that's just human decency. and i'll tell you what, every single time i say that, i say to

people in the audience, so what do you think? they all stand up and give me a standing ovation, okay? so some people will take that and they'll say, oh, that's terrible, that's terrible. what we're going to have is wee going to have private plans. maybe the health care savings plans which are very good. you know what happens when you get rid of the lines? you have tremendous competition and the price goes way down. the reason the lines are there is because the insurance companies are making a fortune having monopolies in the various states. >> okay. so we're going to get back to that and ask how you pay for that and a lot of other things but we need to go to break. >> we're just getting started here in charleston. when we come back, we'll be asking donald trump about how he would handle the fbi's request to break into one of the san bernardino shooter's iphones. you're watching an exclusive town hall with donald trump here on msnbc.

welcome back to the

exclusive town hall with donald trump. we're going to focus on foreign policy, harkening back to that debate performance, though. jeb bush was attacking you and you were attacking back. you sort of talking about faulty intelligence and 9/11 and then the war in iraq and i thought, my god, he's speaking to me. i don't disagree with this. >> that's not a good thing in a republican primary. that's a very bad thing in the republican primary. >> jeb brought his brother in to help him. he brought his mom in and his brother in. he needs help. he brought his brother in. once he brought -- like four weeks ago hillary brought in bill. and i hit them because i thought it was appropriate to hit them. once they're in. now the brother came in. so when jeb at the reagan museum came out and he said very strongly my brother protected us, heme meant he protected us after the world trade center came down. they forgot one thing. what about during when the world trade center came down.

>> so i guess this is the republican in me, but how can you blame george w. bush for the 9/11 attacks. >> i'm not blaming anybody but if you go back and you'll see the cia and nsa and all the oar groups, they were not getting together, joe, they hated each other, the top people hated each other, they weren't talking. they had a lot of intelligence, they knew something bad was going to happen. i'm not blaming anybody. you were the one that pointed out two years before the world trade center came down i in my book was talking about osama bin laden and i'm not a politician, i wasn't a politician. so if i know about osama bin laden, why didn't the government know about him? >> that sounds like an approach a democrat would take against a republican in south carolina. >> i will have more crossover votes if i get the nomination, i will have more crossover votes than anybody that's ever run for office. i will have democrat votes, i will have independent votes, i will do tremendously with crossover. one other thing, i will have states that nobody ever thought of getting in terms of a republican. >> name one. >> new york.

i think i have a great chance of michigan. states that are not in your six states that we always talk about with the ohio, that sort of, you know, you can get. i'll definitely get pennsylvania. i'll get ohio. i think i'm going to win florida. you see how i'm doing in florida. i'll get states like a michigan and new york. >> but "usa today" this morning, the headline was 38% of americans are scared of you getting the presidency. of course something like 33%, 34% were scared of hillary so that's high. >> all of the top candidates had the highest numbers. >> so how do you bring that number down? >> you saw me bring it down. i brought it down -- remember how high that number was six or seven months ago and i brought it back down. that just comes down. >> i need to follow up on the 9/11 comment, though, because i don't know if it's the same book, but we talked about it this morning on the show. in 2000, you also said that you thought that saddam hussein had weapons of mass destruction. what happened between 2000 when you wrote that -- >> we were told they had weapons of mass destruction but he

didn't have weapons of mass destruction. now, the only question is did the government know he didn't? why did they go in? look, iraq did not knock down -- the iraqis did not knock down the world trade center, all right? so we attacked iraq, but they didn't knock down the world trade center. we attacked them for a reason. they didn't knock down the world trade center. >> did you believe in 2003 in march when we went to war that saddam hussein had weapons of mass destruction? >> i didn't know. if you would have watched you probably would have thought they did but i didn't know but the government should have known and they didn't have. we attacked a country and destabilized the entire middle east. >> so a lot of people are trying to sort through this. help us sort through this. you said there are comments you've made before we went to war, nobody can find those. i've seen two comments right after we went to war. >> joe, joe, i'm a real estate person, i'm a businessperson. nobody cared about my comments. in 2003 you saw comments, i was against the war. >> hold on, this is what i want to talk about. in 2003 you said two things.

i believe a couple of days after you were quoted saying it was going to be a disaster. but you also said in another quote right after we went in that it would be great for the stock market. are those -- >> i'm not saying great for the stock market doesn't mean do it. look, i said the war is a disaster because you're going to destabilize the middle east. i said it long before 2003, but i'm not a politician. i'm not saying -- now i say things, i guess i'm a politician i hate to say. >> so what does that mean going forward? >> it means the following. somebody had vision. i'm the only one that said don't go in. i said it 2003, i said it 2004. a couple of people in your world said, you know what, we don't have any evidence and he said it before but i said it to people. it doesn't mean they're going to put it in the newspapers as a businessperson. but they said he really said it after the war started, and there's plenty of proof of that. there's headlines and magazine, don't go into the war. and i said iran will take over, iran will get the oil. i said all of these things.

nobody knew about isis but on top of it i said the worst, meanest group of people and the people that hate us the most, they're going to do the best. that turns out to be isis. >> so when did you say this? >> i said it all over the place. it's written all over the place, joe, 2003, 2004, headlines on articles. nobody is questioning about my being against the war. what they are saying is he was a little bit after the war. a couple of people in your world said that's okay. because he was early on, very early on -- >> before everybody else. >> can you share with us three people who you would consult with or want to hear from on foreign policy? >> i would say that i'd rather not because i'm going to be announcing a team in about a week that is really a good team and a team that was recommended highly to me and a team that i've seen both and read about fwhoet pap both in papers and on your show but we're announcing a team in a week and i'm going to keep it a little bit secret. >> so we want to go to questions in the audience but before we get off of national security,

i've just got to ask you this question. >> go ahead. >> nobody around our table understood this morning why apple would not help the government in cracking into the phone, the iphone of one of the two terrorists in san bernardino. first of all, do you think appear 'apple is in the wrong? >> yes. >> and if you are president, donald trump, what do you do as far as changing laws to make technology -- >> or to deal with this situation. >> technology companies comply with the government. >> i think it is disgraceful apple is not helping on that. i think security first and i always felt security first. apple should absolutely we should force them to do it. we should do whatever we have to do. i guess he wants to be a good liberal and doesn't want to give the information. but on that -- as an example, those two people killed 14 people. there were other people that saw the bombs laying all over the floor. there was bombs laying all over

the floor, all sorts of ammunition, all sorts of everything in that apartment. people knew that. i'd like to know who else knew it because they're almost as guilty and maybe just as guilty. i think you have to crack that and i think apple is absolutely in the wrong. >> okay. we're going to take questions from the audience. the first one is from munique. she's a democrat but democrats can vote in the south carolina primary. monique. >> mr. trump, my husband and i, we are democrats. we are also successful food entrepreneurs. a lot of the principles we use are directly from your teachings, the books we've read. so in the current administration, african-americans have felt as though they can do anything, be anything. if you're elected, how will you relate to the african-american community minority business owners, small businesses, do you have a plan? >> yes, i do indeed. so i have to say we have right now an african-american president. if you look at unemployment with african-american youth, monique,

it's 58%, 59%, probably even higher than that. if you take african-americans who i have friends that are having a hard time getting a job in prime age, 30, 40, 45, even 50, their numbers are not comparable to what white men or women in business are. it's not good. you understand that. >> yes. >> we have had an african-american president now for seven years going on eight years. he has done so little in terms of economics and in terms of really getting youth taken care of because i see all the riots, i see all the problems, you see nothing but problems. barack obama has done nothing, absolutely in my opinion nothing economically for african-americans. especially youth, but for african-americans. >> what would you do? >> we're going bring back our jobs. we're bringing them back from china, from all over asia, from

mexico. >> but what would you do? but what about entrepreneurs? what are you going to do specifically to help the small business owners like monique? >> number one, we have to get rid of rules and regulations. you have regulations that are so bad now, i have friends that have small businesses and this is whether it's african-american or not, and you know exactly what i'm talking about. the rules and regulations, the regulations of companies today are so outrageous that they cannot compete with companies, similar companies in china, asia, other places. they can't compete. so the regulations are going to be gone. we're going to give incentives. we're also doing major tax cuts because small businesses are paying taxes that are far too much and you're paying a lot of tax. i guess you're making money. you read my book so you should be making money i would hope. >> here we go. >> no, no. >> we're going to go to commercial. >> oh, my lord. but we are going to get more of your questions coming up. when we come back, we'll take some more questions from donald

trump and from the audience. the questions were gathered here in south carolina. you're watching an exclusive town hall with donald trump right here on msnbc.

back at our town hall with donald trump. we are taking questions from the audience. we're going to go to barbara, who is an independent. barbara. >> hi, mr. trump. >> hello, barbara. >> i wanted to ask you, when will we ask our allies to help

fund the u.s. troops stationed in their country for protection? >> i talk about it all the time, barbara. we have so many countries, south korea, i order thousands of television sets every year for projects and they're all made in south korea except for sony which is japan, lg, samsung, it's such a great question because these countries are making a fortune and we take care of saudi arabia, we take care of japan, we take care of germany. you know, when you look at our budget for military, it's ten times higher, so much bigger than anybody else in the world. what do we do? we take care of all these other countries. the question is such a great question. i talk about it and i just can't even understand. saudi arabia was making a billion dollars a day prior to the oil collapse so now they are making half. they're making plenty. and yet we take care of them. they pay us peanuts. >> so should we force germany and japan to start carrying their load, build up their own

military and start funding their own defense instead of the united states? >> joe, at a minimum i think it's fine what we're doing but they have to at least pay us for it. they have to pay us so we don't lose tremendous amounts of money. >> if you go in and have our country lead the war against isis, as you said you're going to do, will you do what bush 41 did and force countries like japan to write checks? >> i would do that and i would want other countries -- you know, the gulf states, if you look, the gulf states aren't doing anything and they're big beneficiaries and have more money than anybody else. we have $19 trillion in debt, it's going to be $21 trillion because of the horrible budget which was just passed four weeks ago. so we're going to have $21 trillion in debt. we can't keep doing this. if we're taking care of saudi arabia, they're going to have to pay us. if we're taking care of south korea, which makes a fortune and we have had madman right next to them and 28,000 soldiers on the line, we've got to do something. >> i know we've got to go to the

studio audience. i wish we had three hours, we don't. i've got to dig into a couple of things you've said really quickly. you talk about the $19 trillion national debt. if i listen to the people i've been listening to for years on these issues, they tell us that your policies would add another $10, $11 trillion to the national debt. >> they're wrong. >> how are they wrong? >> the taxes will bring jobs back and we'll bring jobs back big league and have a dynamic economy again. last quarter, we have no growth. >> are you going to cut spending? >> i'm going to cut spending big league. >> where? >> so many -- department of education. we're going to cut department of education. we spend more money per pupil than any country in the world by far and we're ranked number 30 in the world. you have all of these countries, whether it's -- >> bless you. >> i thought she -- she sneezed. >> it wasn't a protester. >> you're so used to protesters,

somebody sneezed and you're ready to throw them out. >> that was a healthy sneeze. she's a healthy person. but you look at -- we're number 30 in the world, department of education. that's because i said we're going to -- >> but back to balance the budget. you've got to look at entitlements too, do you not? >> what we're going to do more than anybody else, we're going to cut. we're going to cut tremendous amounts of money. let me give you an example. drug companies. now, you take somebody like woody johnson, good guy, johnson & johnson. these people are in charge of, meaning woody, is in charge of jeb bush's campaign finance, okay? he's the head of campaign financing. jeb bush raised $148 million, total waste of money. he might as well throw it out the window. wouldn't it be nice instead of running a failed campaign he gave it to the wounded warriors or gave it to somebody. but the problem is we don't negotiate -- we're the largest drug producer -- largest drug buyer in the world. we don't negotiate. we don't negotiate. you pay practically the same for

the country as if you go into a drugstore and buy the drugs. if we negotiated the price of drugs, joe, we'd save $300 billion a year. now these candidates, i self-fund, i'm going to do it. these candidates are all controlled by the drug companies, the lumber companies, they're never going to do that. they're never going to do it. there's tremendous fat -- joe, there's tremendous fat in our budgets. beyond belief. but the candidates are all controlled by the people that make money off the fat. >> really quickly and i know i've got to go to the audience, but entitlement reform, social security, medicare and medicaid. >> right. >> combined are going to consume every dime that goes to washington, d.c. >> waste, fraud and abuse. >> well, that's not going to take care of it. >> it's a huge number. waste, fraud -- >> what about raising the retirement age. >> i'm not going to do that. >> people are living older than they ever have. >> i'm not doing that. waste, fraud and abuse is massive in social security,

medicare and medicaid. >> why wouldn't you raise the retirement age if people are getting older and living longer and longer. >> i don't want to do it. i don't want to do it. number one, i don't want to do it and number two, the democrats aren't going to do it. the republicans do have to get elected, you know that. if you watch bernie and if you watch hillary, they not only want to not cut, they want to increase social security. i'm not doing it for that reason, i'm just saying we don't have to do it. we're going to make you are economy strong, we're going to make our economy rich. >> i know why we have a three-hour program. >> yeah, the two of you. >> this is kevin mccarthy. not that kevin mccarthy, but kevin mccarthy. >> republican. >> mr. trump, jobs are a big issue you talk about a lot of the some of these trade agreements like nafta and others have been very destructive for the working class. my question is what specific steps would you take to help renegotiate those deals or help protect american jobs? >> our trade agreements are a disaster. partially because, again, contributions to the various people that run things, like the

senators, et cetera. tpp, transpacific partnership, is a disaster because they don't talk about monetary manipulation and devaluation. they don't talk about it. the number one way the countries are killing us is with devaluations of their currencies, and our companies can't compete. you take a look at what's happening in japan with the devaluation of the yen, just look at this. caterpillar is having such a hard time competing with kamatsu, a big tractor maker in japan. a big contractor his whole life bought cater pill are a. now he's buying kumatsu. he said he devalued the yen so much it's impossible to compete. he's very unhappy about it. the transpacific partnership is a disaster and shouldn't be signed. the nafta agreements and trade agreements will be fully renegotiated by me. we have right now a deficit with

mexico, a trade deficit of $58 billion with mexico. we have a $500 billion deficit with china. can't have this. we will renegotiate. carl icahn came out, endorsed me and said trump is the one that knows what the hell is going on. we have corporate inversions where companies are leaving our country and that's a big problem. >> it is a big problem. let's talk about china for a second. you've talked before about slapping tariffs, 40%, 45% on china if that's what it took. but wouldn't -- >> that's not actually what i said. "the new york times" said i said that but honestly i was at a meeting and didn't say that. i said it is a threat that i would use against china. >> okay. but do you understand, though, that if we get into a trade war with china, that that could hurt a lot of working class americans who depend on cheap products from china to be able to get by. >> it's going to hurt china more than it's going to hurt anybody. we have all the keys, we have all the power. china has absolutely -- it's been one of the great thefts of

all time what they have done to the united states. and i have great relationships. i sell condos for tens of millions of dollars to chinese, i have the largest bank in the world that is a tenant in one of my buildings in manhattan. i have a building through china, the bank of america building in san francisco. i do a lot of business with china. >> they're pulling me to break. before we go to break -- >> we can't let china continue to get away with what they're doing to our country. >> so are you talking about with china, are you talking about more threats? >> it's a threat. >> than action? >> no, no, it's a threat but you have to be able to put it in place. what china has done to us with devaluation of their currency is unbelievable. nobody thought they were going to do it again and then four months ago they had the largest devaluation they have had in 20 years. the largest in 20 years. now they're going to do it again. our companies can't compete. they are devaluing their currencies. our company can't compete. >> all right. we're going to take a break. they are just days away from heading to the polls here in south carolina. nearly half of voters have yet

to make up their minds. when we return, we'll hear more questions from the audience and we'll dig into donald trump's economic plan to see if the numbers add up. you're watching our exclusive town hall with donald trump right here on msnbc.

and we're back here in beautiful charleston, south carolina, we're taking questions

from voters ahead of saturday's primary here. so, donald trump, we have collin baldwin, who is joining us, an independent. correct, collin? >> yes, ma'am. >> okay, collin, take it away. >> multiple past presidents have attempted to establish a peace agreement between both sides of the israeli-palestinian conflict and the one common theme is they have all been unsuccessful. what specific steps would you take to establish an agreement between both sides? >> i think it's probably the toughest agreement of any kind to make. it has been going on for many years. many friends of mine have been involved. they're very, very good businessmen, very good negotiators. a lot of people say an agreement can't be made, which is okay. sometimes agreements can't be made. not good. but you have both sides really but you have one side in particular growing up and learning that these are the worst people -- these people are the worst people, et cetera, et cetera. it is a very, very tough agreement to make. i was with a very prominent israeli the other day who said it's impossible because the other side has been trained from the time they're children to hate jewish people.

but i will give it one hell of a shot. but of all agreements. if you can do that deal, you can do any deal. but that's probably the toughest deal in the world right now to make. and it's possible it's not makeable because don't forget it has to last. it's wonderful to make it and it doesn't work, but it has to last. to make lasting peace there, probably the toughest deal of all, but i'm going to give it a shot. >> whose fault do you think it is, the israelis or the palestinians? >> i don't want to get into it for different reasons, joe. because if i do win, there has to be a certain amount of surprise, unpredictability. our country has no unpredictability. if i win, i don't want to be in a position where i'm saying to you and the other side now saying we don't want trump involved. let me be sort of a neutral guy. i'm going to give it a shot. it would be so great. i would be so proud if i could do that. i don't know if it's doable. i have friends of mine that are tremendous business people that are really great negotiators. they say it's not doable.

you understand a lot of people have gone down in many flames trying to make that deal. so i don't want to say whose fault is it. i don't think it helps. >> we're going to take a question from stephanie brummet, an independent. >> hi, mr. trump. thank you for being here. >> thank you. >> my question is in regard to political civility. we have -- i think you've been really successful in tapping into the kind of voter who wants a politician to tell it like it is, wants politicians to be honest. and so i think you've done a successful job of tapping into that passion. my question is, where do you think the line is between boldness and honesty and disrespect and rudeness and does that line change -- >> you know, a lot of -- i'll give you an example. one of the speeches we were having a great time. i never said the word. i opened my mouth and they go -- all of your networks go beep and they thought i said this terrible word.

i didn't say the word. >> but you whispered it, donald. >> i didn't never whispered it. >> you whispered the word. the other one you can give me a negative credit on this one, i actually repeated a word. i said i didn't say this word and then i repeated it. >> you called that a retweet. >> but hold on a second. let's talk about civility towards other people because you like hammering other people. >> yeah. >> as a politician, i always had a rule, you couldn't be at war with more than one person at a time. your rule seems to be you have to be at war with at least a dozen people at a time. what happens if you're president of the united states and you look at barack obama, one of his problems, biggest problems people on the hill, democrats and riepublicans will say he doesn't have friends on the hill. are you going to have friends on the hill? >> i started out, i was one of 17 people. we're not including the democrats. it was coming at me from every which way. i was very strong and very bold and i hit a lot of people.

i knocked out lindsey graham, i knocked out perry, a lot of people, walker. >> you're still hammering people. >> i have to because i have six left. >> but if you knock everybody else out and you're president of the united states, then you have to deal with 535 people that are going to be hammering you every day. >> i have a great temperament. i think my biggest strength -- >> jeb bush would disagree. >> jeb bush -- >> lindsey graham would disagree. >> jeb is a sad case, okay. it's sad. >> see, there you go again. >> donald! >> there you go again! >> i'm just saying it's a very sad thing. i said he's a low energy person. look -- >> he walked right into that. >> in a year from now people will respect what i did. i had lindsey graham, he was at 7%. after i hit him he was at nothing and he left the race. now he's an angry person. i see him on television and he's like an insane person. >> again, are you -- you're proving the point.

>> you're so worried about being nice and politically correct. would you rather have me be nice to everybody and now all those people are still hammering me. >> it's not what i want, it's not what she wants. the question is do you have the temperament to deal -- >> yes. >> day in and day out with 535 people -- >> finger on the button. >> finger on the button. >> during the debate i'm thinking should this guy have his finger on the button. >> during the debate i was being hit by the announcers, john dickerson, everybody was really being sort of cold to go after trump. >> they were asking -- your brother was told to do this and this by donald trump and they have to respond. i was being hit by everybody. finger on the button. i'm the one, the only one that said don't go into iraq so don't tell me about finger on the button. i want to build our military so strong, so powerful that nobody will mess with us. >> so is that more money too? >> it's more money but it's cheap compared to what we're doing right now. nobody respects us right now. >> but are you talking about bigger defense budgets? because right now we're already

spending over $500 billion. >> i'm talking about negotiated defense budgets. we're buying equipment that the generals and the colonels and the people in the field don't want because these companies have political contacts. so much of it has to do with the fact that i'm self-funding my campaign i can do whatever i want. we're buying equipment we don't even want because certain companies have better political skills. you see it all the time. they're getting a plane, they don't want it. they want the other one or could have gotten it cheaper but they're getting this one. we're going to have a better, stronger military. we will save so much money. joe, there is so much corruption, there is so much waste and abuse in the military and elsewhere. but we're going to build our military strong. it's the cheapest thing we can do. >> all right. when we come back, our final questions and thoughts here. you're watching a special edition, an exclusive msnbc town hall with donald trump from charleston, south carolina. man 1: [ gasps ]

man 1: he just got fired. man 2: why? man 1: network breach. man 2: since when do they fire ceos for computer problems? man 1: they got in through a vendor. man 1: do you know how many vendors have access to our systems? man 2: no. man 1: hundreds, if you don't count the freelancers. man 2: should i be worried? man 1: you are the ceo. it's not just security. it's defense. bae systems.

welcome back to our town hall event with donald trump in charleston, south carolina. we have a few final moments with mr. trump. i wanted to describe a candidate to you. the candidate is considered a political outsider by all the pundits. he's tapping into the anger of the voters, delivers a populist message. he believes everyone in the country should have health care. he advocates for hedge fund

managers to pay higher taxes. he's drawing thousands of people at his rallies and bringing in a lot of new voters to the political process and he's not beholden to any super pac. who am i describing? >> or any special interests or any donors. you're describing donald trump. >> actually i was describing bernie sanders. >> well, that's good. >> isn't it something, there are some similarities. >> there's one thing that we're very similar on. he knows that our country is being ripped off big league, big league on trade. the problem is he can't do anything about it. he's not going to be able to do -- >> why not? >> because he doesn't understand it. he doesn't understand what's happening. he does know china and these other companies are ripping us off. mexico. you see carrier is moving down to mexico, nabisco is moving. the whole thing is crazy what's going on with mexico. he does understand that much more so than many people but he'll never be able to do anything about it. >> would you rather run against bernie sanders or hillary clinton? >> i think i'd rather run against hillary just because i'd love to beat hillary.

i think i can beat hillary, honestly. i don't -- i don't know. i'm pretty good with the legal stuff and i don't know how she gets out of that quagmire of the e-mails. >> do you think she'll be indicted? >> i think maybe she will, but i think if she isn't indicted, the only reason is, is because the democrats are protecting her, she's being protected 100%. you look at general petraeus and all the other people -- >> speaking of general petraeus, would you ever consider general petraeus as a vice presidential candidate? >> we can't because he's been so badly hurt. >> what about a general? >> he did a nice job but he had bad judgment. but she has much worse judgment than he had and she's getting away with it. it's unfair to him. by the way, i came out, they wanted to take away further rank and i was for the last month and a half, i was saying leave general petraeus alone, he's suffered enough. i said go get isis, don't get general pa ray us. >> you said you're going to build a beautiful wall and

mexico is going to pay for it. you never say how. you say believe me they are. believe me is not an answer. >> believe me. >> how? >> can i tell you -- you have to stop and i'll tell you. $58 billion. the wall is going to cost a fraction of that, maybe 10 or $12 billion. it's going to be a real wall, a high wall, a beautiful wall. >> how do you get mexico to pay for it? >> very simple. five different ways. here's the key. they are making if you look at a company $58 billion. the wall is a -- a year. we have a trade deficit with mexico of $58 billion. all i have to do is start playing with that trade deficit and they'll pay for the wall. >> a trade war with mexico? >> i'm talking about negotiating. i'm talking about japan. we have all the cards, joe. if we -- i was in los angeles. i see these massive ships coming in with cars. we have all the cards. we don't play. we don't have the politicians that know how to play them. we're negotiating against great

negotiators. china, mexico, japan, believe me, we're going to start doing great with that trade and that's the thing. bernie sanders can't do it. bottom line is i think he would be easier to beat than hillary because i always wanted to run against a socialist in this country. i can't imagine it but i think it would be easy. >> let's get some final questions from our audience. rebecca is a republican. take it away. >> hi, mr. trump. i was just -- i'm a college student so education is really important to me and i was just wondering since there is so much going on right now in the rest of the campaign, i was just wondering how you are going to -- like what are your thoughts on bernie's higher education plan and how he's going to reduce the cost. >> thank you, that's a very good question. the problem is everyone is going to pay 95% taxes. you have that and all the other things he wants to do. >> let's talk about cost then. >> you're going to have a tax rate of 95%. >> so how do we reduce the costs

for colleges? it's insane, the inflation. >> you're right. >> for higher education is absolutely insane. >> the students are a condue it to get all this money to the colleges. the colleges have gone crazy. you look at the fees that they're paying. colleges have gone up practically more than anyone because the students, they're the real losers in this thing. they go borrow the money from the government and the colleges charge more and more and more. disproportionately more. they have to bring down their costs. we have to help the students, joe, because what the colleges have done, their costs have gone up more than anything because the government basically gives them the money to do that through the students. but the students have to pay back the money. it's not fair to the students. >> all right. >> okay. we got -- we got harold now who has a question. he's a democrat. take it away. >> hello there, mr. trump. thank you for being here. my question is you are facing stiff competition from ted cruz and marco rubio. how do you think you will set yourself apart from those two

candidates and how are you going to go and win the general election against, say, bernie sanders or hillary clinton? >> well, i think i will set myself apart because my policies are better. i'm a much better businessperson tl than they are. they have never employed anybody ever. i think i'm a better leader. i'm going to bring the country together far better than they are going to do. you look at ted cruz and he's a n nasty guy. he doesn't have one endorsement from the senate. not one senator has endorsed him and he's a senator. it's fine to stand on the floor of the senate and have everybody else in the senate laughing at you and you do nothing. he accomplished nothing with that. he went out and he talked and talked for two days. he filibustered for two days and got nothing out of it. i will bring the country together. i will take care of our country. i'm going to make our country rich again and then i'm going to make our country great again. but we have to become saul venting and we have to become rich before we become great.

we owe $19 trillion, we've got to start paying it down and balancing budgets. >> our final question is from brena. take it away. >> hello, mr. trump. my question for you is why did you decide to run for president? >> my theme is make america great again. i want to make america great again. >> why? >> because i love the country. i didn't need this, joe, believe me. i have a wonderful life, i have a wonderful company, i have a wonderful family. >> is it worth it? >> well, look, it's been certainly interesting. it's not easy. it's a lot of work. i mean i'm here, i could be someplace else to be honest with you. i'm being grilled by the two of you. i could be someplace else. but so far i think it's really been worth it. it's been one of the most interesting experiences -- probably the most interesting experience of my life. i've enjoyed it. i think i've done well. and we'll see what happens. >> all right. >> that does it for us here in charleston. >> thank you, donald. >> thank you to the audience. thank you so much. >> we appreciate it. a great audience.

>> thank you very much. we're going to be back with you live starting at 6:00 eastern tomorrow live from charleston here. the rachel maddow show starts right now. [ applause ] good evening, happy wednesday. thanks for joining us this evening. when jeb bush first announced that he was running for president of the united states, there was an unexpected moment right after he said he was running when he ended up making an exciting and i'm pretty sure unscripted animal noise. >> i'm a candidate for president of the united states of america. [ cheers and applause ]