At his rally during a time of a global pandemic, demonstrations against police brutality and racial tensions, he spent quarter of an hour rambling about the media and how good he is at walking down ramps and drinking water:
“You know, it was interesting. To show you how fake they are. You might have seen it. So last week they called me, and they say, ‘Sir, West Point. West Point. We’re ready.’ I said, ‘Oh that’s right, I have to make a commencement speech at West Point.’ You know they delayed it for six weeks because of COVID. So they delayed it.
“And I went there, 1106 cadets were graduating, and beautiful. Beautiful cadets. So, just to show you how bad the fake news is. So, they say to me, ‘Sir! We’re ready to go.’ I say, ‘Let’s go!’ This is after saying hello to a lot of cadets; inspecting little areas of a building. That was very exciting, actually, it’s beautiful, very old. Studied a lot of our great generals, some of our presidents that went there. West Point is beautiful. Right on the Hudson River.
“But after an hour – the general that runs it is a fantastic guy – after an hour, we land, we do some more inspections and they say, ‘Sir are you ready?’ ‘Yes, I am.’ So we walk like, the equivalent of about three blocks, which was fine. We go on stage, which is fine. They make some speeches, then I make a speech. It lasted a long time, I don’t know, maybe 45 minutes, maybe longer, I don’t know, but a long time.
“The sun is pouring down on me. OK? But they said to me before the speech, ‘Sir! Would you like to salute each cadet, each single cadet? Or maybe they’ll be in groups of two. Would you like to salute? Like this, yes. Like this.
“Almost six hundred times. Do you know what that is? Six hundred times. Thank god they were in twos. Cause let me tell you, you do that six hundred times, you go home and you say – it’s like doing a workout without a weight, right? Six hundred times.
“So I did that. Then the incredible helicopters, brand new, gorgeous helicopters, the Apaches and the other new ones that we just bought, so they fly over. And the kids throw the hats in the air, it’s beautiful, it really is, and it was a beautiful day. And we’re all finished. I was on the stage for hours. Hours! Sun – I came home, I had a nice tan. Meaning I had a nice sunburn. The sun’s going right, like that.
“But I make the speech. Right? I salute for, probably an hour-and-a-half. Maybe more, but around that. Watch, if I’m off by two minutes, they’ll say, ‘He exaggerated! It was only an hour and 25 minutes. He exaggerated, he lied. He lied, he’s a liar.’ These people are sick, the fake news.
“So then, I finish saluting my final salute, I said, ‘Thank goodness, thank you very much.’ But think of it. So, essentially, almost six hundred times. Now, the general says, ‘Sir, are you ready?’ I said, ‘I’m ready general. Where are we going now?’ You have to understand, I left early in the morning to get there. Now it’s sort of late in the afternoon.
“A lot of these fakers were with us, so they know. He said, ‘Sir! We can now leave the stage.’ I said, ‘That’s great general, let’s go, I’ll follow you.’
“And he goes like this, ‘Right here, sir.’ And I walk off.
“And the stage was higher than this one. And the ramp was probably 10 yards long. I say, ‘General!’ Now you’ve got to understand, I’ve got the whole corps of cadets looking at me. And I want them to love their President; I did this big thing. I love them, I love them, they’re incredible, and they do.
“I said, ‘General! I’ve got myself a problem, general. Because I’m wearing leather-bottomed shoes.’ Which is good if you’re walking on flat surfaces. It’s not good for ramps. And if I fall down – look at all those press back there, look at that.
“And this was a steel ramp. You all saw it, because everybody saw it. This was a steel ramp, it had no handrail. It was like an ice-skating rink. And I said, ‘General, I have a problem.’ And he didn’t understand that at first.
“I said, ‘There’s no way!’ You understand, I just saluted almost six hundred times, I just made a big speech. I sat for other speeches. I’m being baked. I’m being baked like a cake! I said, ‘General, there’s no way I can make it down that ramp without falling on my ass, general. I have no railing.’ True. It’s true!
“So I said, ‘Is there like something else around?’ ‘Sir, the ramp is ready to go! Grab me, sir! Grab me.’ I didn’t really want to grab him. You know why? Because I said, ‘That’ll be a story too.’ So now I have a choice, I can stay up there for another couple of hours and wait till I’m rescued, or I can go down this really steep, really, really really – it’s an ice-skating rink, it’s brutal.
“So I said, ‘General, get ready, because I may grab you so fast.’ Because I can’t fall with the fake news watching. If I fall – I remember when President Ford fell out of the plane. You remember? I remember when another president, nice man, threw up in Japan. And they did slow motion replays. True! Right? It’s true. ‘I don’t want that, general.’
“Now he’s standing, big strong guy, and he’s got these shoes. But they’re loaded with rubber on the bottom. Cause I looked. The first thing I did, I looked at his shoes. Then I looked at mine. Very, very slippery.
“So I end up saying, ‘OK general, let’s go, I will only grab you if I need you.’ That’s not a good story; falling would be a disaster. It turned out to be worse than anything. I would have been better off if I fell and slid down the damn ramp. Right?
“So what happens, is I start the journey! Inch by inch, right? And I was really bent over too, you know, I didn’t like that. I didn’t like this picture. This picture I’m sure will be an ad by the fakers. So I was bent over, right?
“And then we finally reached almost the end! And the fake news, the most dishonest human beings, they cut it off. You know why? Because when I was 10 feet short, I said, ‘General, I’m sorry, I’m -,’ and then I ran down the rest, right? I looked very handsome. That was the only good part.
“I wouldn’t want to run down the whole thing, because a fall there would definitely be bad. So I took these little steps, I ran down the last 10. And by the way, their tape – take a look. In almost every instance, it ends just before I run. And they said, it was the number one trending story.
“I call my wife. I said, ‘How good was that speech? I thought it was a-’, hey look, I’ll tell you when I make good ones and bad ones. Like, so far, tonight I’m average. But we’re having fun. We’re having fun. So far tonight.