Donald Trump unleashed a furious tirade at reporters on the White House lawn before leaving for his monumental summit in China.
As the President boasted about the grandeur of his new ballroom, a female reporter pressed him on what it would cost American taxpayers.
‘I doubled the size of it, you dumb person!’ Trump snapped. ‘You are not a smart person!’
Before the President’s shocking outburst, another female reporter asked Trump whether his ‘policies are not working’ after a report found inflation is at its highest level in three years.
‘My policies are working incredibly,’ Trump shouted back. ‘If you go back to just before the war, for the last three months inflation was at 1.7 percent.
‘Now, we had a choice, let these lunatics have a nuclear weapon, if you want to do that then you’re a stupid person, and you happen to be. I know you very well.’
The Bureau of Labor Statistics said on Tuesday that consumer prices rose 3.8 percent in April from a year earlier, the sharpest annual jump since May 2023.
Rising energy costs from the war with Iran are driving roughly 40 percent of the recent increase.
Donald Trump unleashed a furious tirade at reporters on the White House lawn before leaving for his monumental summit in China
Trump will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Thursday
Tankers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz off the coast of Qeshm Island in Iran in April
Global tensions are running high after Trump imposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports in mid-April, a move Beijing branded ‘dangerous and irresponsible.’
China is the biggest buyer of Iranian fossil fuels and has refused Trump’s repeated calls to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, which is responsible for one-fifth of global oil trade.
Trump said he was ‘excited’ to meet with President Xi and that ‘a lot of good things’ were going to emerge from their upcoming summit.
‘He’s been a friend of mine. He’s been somebody that we get along with,’ Trump told reporters. ‘He’s been relatively good to me.’
‘This is going to be a very exciting trip. A lot of good things are going to happen.’
Although Iran is facing mounting economic pressure from the closure, energy costs in the US have skyrocketed since the start of the war.
A barrel of Brent crude is now selling for more than $100, and the average price of a gallon of US gas has climbed to $4.50, up from $2.90 before the conflict.
Trump initially intended to use the blockade to force Tehran back to the negotiating table.
Trump departed from Washington DC on Tuesday on Air Force One
Rising energy costs from the Iran war are driving roughly 40 per cent of the recent increase
Should the US continue escalating pressure on Iran?
However, peace talks have stalled after the President rejected the regime’s latest proposal to end the war.
Trump was accompanied by some of his top loyalists as he boarded Air Force One for China, including Marco Rubio, Eric and Lara Trump, Natalie Harp and Walt Nauta.
