President-elect Donald Trump's comment to a morning talk show host about allowing an arms race were a "private conversation," but his tweets and such statements are made as a way to put other countries on notice, incoming Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Friday.
"That was a private conversation," Spicer told CNN's "New Day" host Alisyn Camerota. "I was not privy to that. He is someone who gets things done. In the case of Carrier, he saved jobs. Air Force One, Boeing says they're going to get it under a billion dollars. People are taking him literally and he's getting results."
Earlier on Friday, President-elect Donald Trump took off the gloves when asked for clarification on his Twitter call for expansion of U.S. nuclear capabilities with a short, off-the air declaration: "Let it be an arms race."
"We will outmatch them at every pass and outlast them all," Trump also told MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski when she got on the phone with the president-elect, who had called to speak with newly named Press Secretary Sean Spicer following his interview with the "Morning Joe" program.
Brzezinski reported that Trump had told her the statement when she asked him to comment on a tweet the president-elect made on Thursday that shocked nuclear non-proliferation experts, who said boosting the U.S. arsenal could help fuel already-tense global relations.
Many of Trump's often-controversial statements and tweets are taken literally, Spicer told Camerota, and he "gets results." Further, he told Camerota the tweet means the United States would not sit back while other countries increase their nuclear powers.
"Countries around the globe right now that are talking about increasing their nuclear capacity, and the United States is not going to sit back and allow that to happen without acting in kind," said Spicer, and that does not include only Russia.
"The president is going to put our nation's security and safety first, and he's not going to worry about how it's — he's going to do it," said Spicer. "That's what every American should understand that he's not going to be a passive president. He's going to be active and make sure that our safety is number one."
Earlier on Friday, Spicer told NBC's "Today" show anchor Matt Lauer that there "is not going to be" an arms race, even though Trump reportedly told Brzezinski that "we will match them at every turn."
"He is going to ensure other countries get the message he is not going to sit back and allow that," said Spicer. "What's going to happen is they will all come to their senses and we will all be just fine. He will get action, Matt."
Spicer appeared on Fox News before the "Morning Joe" comments were made, and told that program that Trump plans to stand strong for the United States, and that he'd made his initial tweet in response to other countries' positions.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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