Trump addresses House Republicans at Florida retreat: 5 takeaways

DORAL, Fla. — President Trump floated running for a third term, commented on a new Chinese artificial intelligence app, and urged House Republicans to unify and quickly advance his legislative priorities in a speech to the lawmakers at their annual policy retreat.

House Republicans are gathering for their issues conference at Trump’s Doral, Fla., resort, where they are set to hash out their legislative strategy over the coming days.

Here are five takeaways from Trump’s speech:

Floats running for a third term

In what was interpreted by some to be a joke, Trump floated seeking a third term.

"I've raised a lot of money for the next race that I assume I can't use for myself, but I'm not 100 percent sure, because I don't know. I think I'm not allowed to run again, I'm not sure,” Trump said.

Trump then turned to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who was sitting on stage while Trump spoke.

“Am I allowed to run again, Mike?” Trump said, before adding: “I better not get you involved in that.”

It is not the first time that Trump has joked to Republicans about seeking a third term. In November, Trump said in another speech to House Republicans: “I suspect I won’t be running again, unless you do something.”

Last week, Rep. Andy Ogles (R-Tenn.) released a proposed constitutional amendment that would clear the way for Trump to seek a third term — but would bar former President Obama from doing so due to a provision about consecutive terms. The amendment has virtually zero chance of clearing the two-thirds threshold in Congress.

Urges unity for legislative agenda but neutral on strategy

Trump urged House Republicans to unify around his legislative agenda, recognizing that they have a razor-thin majority that will require near unanimity in the House to pass his legislative agenda.

“The Republican Party has to stick together,” Trump said, adding that Republicans can’t lose one, two, or three votes. “Everything is so hard — always have two or three or five or something people that just don't want to do it. And you just gotta do it. You just gotta do it. Make life easy.”

And while Trump has previously called for “one big beautiful bill” to move his legislative priorities, he said that he had no preference on whether Republicans attempt one bill or two. Republicans have a limited number of cracks at passing Trump’s agenda while bypassing the 60-vote threshold in the Senate and the need for Democratic support, and have been fiercely debating strategy for weeks.

“We don't want to get hung up on the budget process,” Trump said. “Whether it's one bill, two bills, I don't care.”

Trump did, however, list a number of policy priorities that he wants to see Congress take action on, particularly on border and tax promises from his 2024 campaign.

Trump said Congress should “include full funding for a record increase in border security personnel and retention bonuses for ICE and border patrol,” and called for “a massive increase in the number of beds and funding for all border security infrastructure barriers, including the completion of the border wall.”

“Let's make a record investment in interior enforcement including deportation flights and aircraft, as well as funding for our new task force to eradicate the presence of foreign gangs,” Trump said.

Trump also called to permanently extend the tax cuts that he signed into law during his first term, which are set to expire without congressional action.

And he said Congress should include the tax promises he made on the campaign trail in the tax package: no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security, and no tax on overtime pay.

Digs in on birthright citizenship

Trump dug in on his executive order ending birthright citizenship, which has already been challenged in court and temporarily blocked by a federal judge.

The president asserted that the Fourth Amendment, which was adopted in 1868, was intended to be applied to the children of slaves, not the children of immigrants.

“If you look, it was really meant for children of slaves,” Trump said. “It was not meant for everyone to come into our country by airplane, or charging across the borders from all over the world and think they're going to become citizens. It’s not meant for that. And hopefully at some point the courts will understand that without having to go through a whole big deal."

Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas) introduced a bill last week to “restore the 14th Amendment to its original purpose” by granting automatic citizenship only to individuals with at least one parent who is a U.S. citizen, a lawful permanent resident in the U.S. or an immigrant who is actively serving in the Armed Services. But the birthright citizenship move also has some GOP critics.

Sees DeepSeek AI as a "positive" but a "wake-up call"

Trump told lawmakers that DeepSeek, a Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup, was a “wake-up call” but could be a “positive.” The release of DeepSeek's AI model, which could rival U.S. AI for a fraction of the cost, sent U.S. stocks plunging over the weekend in after-hours trading.

“The release of DeepSeek AI from a Chinese company should be a wake-up call for our industries that we need to be laser-focused on competing to win,” Trump said.

He added: “When you hear somebody come up with something, we always have the ideas. We’re always first. So, I would say that’s a positive. That could be very much a positive development. So instead of spending billions and billions, you’ll spend less and you’ll come up with, hopefully, the same solution.”

Trump also said he had become “jaded” toward another Chinese app, TikTok, while talking about the executive order he signed last week delaying enforcement of a Congress-passed TikTok ban for 75 days.

“I became a little bit jaded towards TikTok, but lets see what happens,” Trump said. “You don’t want China involved, but let’s see what happens.”

He added that there’s going to be “a lot of people” bidding on the app.

Criticizes chip funding

Trump appeared to criticize the CHIPS and Science Act, a $280 billion measure intended to boost domestic semiconductor and chip manufacturing that former President Biden signed into law in 2022.

“We don’t want to give them billions of dollars like this ridiculous program Biden has. Give everybody billions of dollars. They already have billions of dollars. They’ve got nothing but money, Joe. They didn’t need money, they needed an incentive. And the incentive is going to be they’re not going to pay a 25, 50 or even 100 percent tax,” Trump said.

Johnson got into hot water during the 2024 campaign when he told a reporter that he would “probably” try to move to repeal the CHIPS and Science Act. Johnson at the time was campaigning in a district that had benefited from CHIPS Act funding and had to walk back the comment, saying that “the CHIPS Act is not on the agenda for repeal.”

Alex Gangitano and Brett Samuels contributed.

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