At a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Sec. Scott Bessent spoke about the Ukraine mineral deal.
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00:00Is it true that the Ukraine minerals deal is about to be signed in the next 24 hours or so?
00:09There's some reports saying that.
00:10And if it's true, has the deal changed at all from the last time we heard about it?
00:14Well, I'll ask Scott to answer the question because he's responsible for it.
00:17Yeah, our side is ready to sign the Ukrainians beside him last night to make some last-minute changes.
00:23We're sure that they will reconsider that, and we are ready to sign this afternoon, if they are.
00:28Can you talk about those last-minute changes, what was removed or put in its place?
00:32Nothing's been removed.
00:33It's the same agreement that we agreed to on the weekend.
00:36No changes on our side.
00:37Just to put that in perspective, though, when I came here, I said, how much money have we given to Ukraine?
00:44The real number is about $350 billion.
00:49That's unthinkable.
00:51And we had no security.
00:53We had no nothing.
00:53We were just pouring money there, unsecured money, putting it in banks, and anybody could
01:00have taken it out.
01:01You know, anybody over there.
01:02It was their decision.
01:03I've never said they like it.
01:05Europe, on the other hand, which it's obviously that whole situation is much more important
01:10to Europe because we have an ocean in between.
01:12But Europe gave about $100 billion.
01:15It's a lot of money.
01:17It's a big sacrifice they made also.
01:19But they gave much less than we did.
01:22And their money is secured, totally secured, by deposits in banks.
01:27The deposits are largely Russian deposits.
01:30That's what Europe did.
01:31But their money is secured.
01:32So they gave $100 billion totally secured.
01:35We gave money like it's throwing it out the window.
01:38And it was done by Biden.
01:41And this is Biden's war.
01:43This isn't Trump's war.
01:44I'm trying to get out.
01:45And more than the money, they're losing about 5,000 young Russian and Ukrainian soldiers
01:51a week, mostly.
01:51There's some people also being killed in towns where missiles should not have been shot,
01:57small cities and towns.
01:59But we are trying to save the lives of about 5,000 young, mostly soldiers, that are losing
02:08their lives a week.
02:09I see satellite photos, probably off one of his satellites come to think of it.
02:15But I see satellite photos every week of fields with arms and heads and legs scattered all over.
02:22It's a violent, violent, horrible situation.
02:26And more important than the money, I want to save the lives of people from other countries
02:30that are dying so stupidly, so needlessly.
02:33And they're dying.
02:34But I said, what are we doing?
02:39How did we get into this war?
02:41Would have never happened if I were president.
02:43Everybody knows.
02:43And it didn't happen for four years.
02:45Wasn't even thought of.
02:47I discussed it with President Putin a lot.
02:50He created it.
02:50It was the apple of his eye.
02:51But there was no way he was going to do anything.
02:53Zero chance.
02:55And I said, you know, we feel foolish.
02:58The Europeans are putting up money.
03:00It's totally secure.
03:00They get the money back.
03:01We're putting up much more money.
03:05We have absolutely nothing.
03:07And I didn't want to make a complicated deal.
03:10I didn't want to make a deal that couldn't be made because Ukraine doesn't have very much money.
03:15They're going through a very bad period of time.
03:18It's been brutal.
03:19But I felt very foolish at being a judge.
03:23So I said, well, we want something for our efforts beyond what you would think would be acceptable.
03:30And we said rare earth.
03:32They have very good rare earth.
03:34As you know, we're looking for rare earth all the time.
03:37It's rare earth is called rare for a reason.
03:40And they have a lot.
03:43And we made a deal where our money is secure, where we can start digging and doing what we have to do.
03:51It's also good for them because you'll have an American presence at the site, Chris.
03:55And the American presence will, I think, keep a lot of bad actors out of the country or certainly out of the area where we're doing the digging.
04:03So we made a deal.
04:05And I assume they're going to honor the deal.
04:07I put Scott in charge and Scott's done it beautifully.
04:11But we haven't really seen the fruits of that deal yet.
04:15I suspect we will.
04:16I suspect we will.