Trump: Why Are We Really in Libya?

This is a rush transcript from "On the Record," March 28, 2011. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: Donald Trump sure is fired up about 2012. He seems to have his eye on the White House. But will he run? Right now he's not backing down from a firestorm. He is revved up over President Obama's birth certificate. Earlier today, we asked Donald Trump what's got him all fired up.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VAN SUSTEREN: Donald, nice to have you join us.

DONALD TRUMP, REAL ESTATE MOGUL: Thank you, Greta.

VAN SUSTEREN: You are stirring up so much trouble. Every time I turn on the TV on "The View" or places you are demanding a birth certificate the president. Why aren't you satisfied he was born in the United States?

TRUMP: The fact is they asked me the question. I said I want to see his birth certificate. It's very simple. Somebody asked today can I see your birth certificate. I had it in my hands in less than an hour. People that are born in this country have birth certificates. So I wanted to see his birth certificate.

I mentioned that on "The View." Whoopi, who is a friend of mine, I did a movie cameo for her. Whoopi said if that were a white man you wouldn't be asking that question. I said what does this have to do with race? It has absolutely nothing to do with race.

The fact is if you look at what has happened, with respect to this birth certificate issue, he doesn't have it. He spent millions of dollars on lawyers trying to get out of the issue. They get what is called a certificate of live birth which doesn't have a signature on it and anybody can get a certificate of live birth. It has nothing to do with a birth certificate. And they are really reeling.

Now, they talk all sorts of things. You don't have a doctor or a nurse. Here's the president of the United States, and no doctor, no nurse, nobody has come forward saying I delivered that beautiful baby. There are so many things.

Even if you look at the newspaper, the so call newspaper article in Hawaii, that was days after he was born. So that wasn't like when he was born. And if you think about a couple of things, whoever took a newspaper advertisement? These were poor people. These aren't rich people. Whoever took a newspaper advertisement to announce the birth of your baby? I don't think you know of anybody. I know of nobody. I know poor people and rich people, but I've never heard of taking a newspaper ad to advertise that you have a baby. So that's one.

And then you have this beautiful governor, a Democratic governor that says 50 years ago he remembers, OK, he remembers when Obama was born. I'll bet he didn't even know the parents 50 years ago. I think it is absolutely insane. What he's doing is taking a bullet for the party by making a statement that I remember.

So I've been into this issue for a couple of weeks and I'm starting to get very concerned. The fact is if you are not born in this country you cannot run for president. If Arnold Schwarzenegger wanted to run for a president -- he's a friend of mine, a good man. If we wanted to run for president he can't because he wasn't born in this country.

VAN SUSTEREN: Here's my thought. First of all, I don't know about the article, whether he had to pay for the article or not. As for the birth certificate, frankly, I haven't seen mine in years. I have a passport and the president has a passport having traveled at one time, I had to surrender a birth. And so I suspect that when he got his passport he had to provide a valid birth certificate.

And the other thing too, this is the most incredible -- this doesn't hurt the Democratic Party. This is how they are raising funds. Using all this controversy to say please money because the Republican are going after him about his birth certificate.

TRUMP: I don't think it is. I disagree with you 100 percent. I see what is going on over the Internet. I see the questions asked. People have never -- you have to understand, terrible term the word birther. A birther is a person that wants -- these are great Americans in many cases, in most cases. They want to see the president was born in this country. They want to see the president actually has a birth certificate.

And I don't think it is helping him at all. And I wish it did help him. To be honest with you I want him to have a birth certificate because that would mean his presidency is illegal. You have to be born in the United States.

I hope he was born in the United States. I hope that he -- I want to get rid of the word "hope." I want to know for sure. I hope that he was born in the United States. And I hope this doesn't become a big issue. But I will tell you, if you look at the Internet and the kind of questions, this is not an issue that is popular for them, believe me.

VAN SUSTEREN: Now let's turn to your quest for the White House. You haven't said you are in or out, but you haven't denied you have some interest. Last time I spoke to you, since the last time has your interest grown greater? Is the likelihood greater that you are going to run for president or less?

TRUMP: I don't want to classify it as greater or less. I have an amazing interest, a very strong interest in running. I hate what shopping to this country. I hate what OPEC is doing to us. Your oil and gasoline are going to be costing so much. Oil is going up to $150 a barrel. It is already way over $100.

By the way, oil at these levels, we cannot sustain ourselves as a great country, we can't do it, because that's the blood, that's the blood of the country. We cannot sustain ourselves as a great country. OPEC is whipping us and we have nobody to tell them what to do.

China is taking all of our jobs. They are making all of our products. And then loaning us money and we are paying interest to them. It cannot happen. We could stop that very easily if we had the right people in office.

VAN SUSTEREN: I guess it reminds me what one of the co-chairmen of the debt commission said we have a promise treaty to protect Taiwan from China and we have to borrow money from China in order to do it.

TRUMP: How about our new war that we have with Libya? The Arab League, you know that is, Saudi Arabia and a couple of other of the richest nations in the world. They want us to fight. So they said get he's an enemy, fight, fight, fight. They said we'll be with you. Guess what, nobody has seen them.

We've now spent $1 billion on Libya. And why isn't Saudi Arabia paying us? They have so much money it is coming out of their ears. Why isn't Saudi Arabia paying us for the kind of -- what we've done is unbelievable in a short period of time.

Now, if he was going to do it, he's two weeks too late because it could have been over quickly. But he waited too long. But forgetting about that, why isn't Saudi Arabia paying us? Why aren't they reimbursing us for $1 billion in costs so far?

You have to ask yourself, who are we fighting for? They talk about the rebels. I hear on fairly good information that the rebels are closely associated with Iran and they are closely associated with Al Qaeda. Now, what are we going to do, put Iran into Libya? We are spending $1 billion and nobody is paying us back? Nobody is reimbursing us?

One final point, China, is the big user of oil from Libya. So why isn't China involved? Why are we doing this?

VAN SUSTEREN: What is your theory as to why we picked Libya? We could have picked any of the other countries where there was turmoil, Tunisia, Yemen, Egypt, Syria. I realize there are other reasons not to pick those countries, why Libya?

TRUMP: I guess they felt Qaddafi was an easy target, he was the most unpopular. The fact is he's nice compared to what they are doing in some of these other countries. He's treated them nicely compared to what I'm seeing is happening in some of the other countries. And on those countries we are not doing anything. So they figured he's unpopular, let's go after him.

And frankly, his oil from the standpoint of oil and even the standpoint of importance isn't as important, as you very well know, as some of the other countries that you are talking about. But ask yourself, China gets its oil from Libya. They are the largest customer. Why aren't they involved? Why is the United States footing a bill over a billion dollars so far and China is not involved? Why isn't Saudi Arabia and the so-called Arab league who is now gone, we don't hear from them anymore, why isn't the Arab League paying us for this?

VAN SUSTEREN: What is your theory we tricked into doing this by those other entities? What is your theory as to why we ended up there?

TRUMP: I think the all-time classic is where France, the great French military power, that France led us into war and they wanted to be first. And it was interesting -- their planes went over first and hit first, but they haven't been too involved since then. In other words, they are getting some of the credit, if you call it credit, and we are footing the bill.

And we are the only ones that can really do the job because we truly have a great military and we should make it even greater because we need a great military with the world imploding as it is. Why isn't China paying? Why isn't Saudi Arabia paying? This is what's wrong with our country because we have people that truly have no clue as to what they are doing leading our country.

VAN SUSTEREN: Donald, thank you, always nice to talk to you.

TRUMP: Thank you very much.

(END VIDEOTAPE)