Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) President Dana White (left) and U.S. President Donald Trump during a press conference in the James S. Brady Press Conference Room at the White House on Monday, November 9, 2026 in Washington, DC, USA. Trump said the FBI is investigating the relationship between Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and a woman suspected of being a Chinese agent. Photographer: Tierney L. Cross/Washington Post/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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President Donald Trump made unexpected remarks Monday on C-SPAN’s evening broadcast, extending a series of surprise appearances in the wake of the Republican Party’s midterm election defeats.
When President Trump made his debut on “Washington Journal Prime Time,” host Mimi Georges told viewers, “It looks like the White House called.”
President Trump congratulated Georges on the launch before answering questions about immigration, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the Iran war.
Asked what he was watching on C-SPAN, Trump said he follows viewers’ calls to gauge public sentiment.
“I like watching call-ins because it gives you a little bit of an idea of where we are,” he said.
The unannounced eight-minute call came after President Trump made another unexpected appearance early Monday morning when he entered the White House briefing room with UFC CEO Dana White. Reuters reported that reporters were summoned so quickly that aides did not have time to stamp the president’s seal on the podium.
It was the first time in 198 days that Trump appeared in the briefing room, according to a White House pool report. With the press secretary position vacant, President Trump joked that he would offer White the job, but the UFC president declined.
Trump said he was having a “very bad press day” as he nominated White to be his next press secretary.
Last Wednesday, a day after the Republican Party suffered significant midterm losses, President Trump also unexpectedly invited reporters to the construction site of the White House ballroom for his first public event since the election.
Trump spent more than 20 minutes discussing White House construction and renovation projects, including the ballroom’s Corinthian columns, marble flooring and helipad, before taking questions from reporters and turning the topic to the election results.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks while looking at the signature steel beam at the East Wing Ballroom construction site at the White House on November 4, 2026 in Washington, DC.
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Asked if he regretted the way his campaign ended, Trump distanced himself from the Republican loss.
“If I had voted, we would have won,” he said.
Democrats won a majority in both houses of Congress in the November 3 election, handing President Trump a major political setback and creating a divided government when the new Congress takes office in January.
President Trump has long been a proponent of direct telephone contact with the media, including live calls to Fox News programs such as “Fox & Friends” during his first term.
CBS News previously reported that President Trump personally arranged such television appearances, while the Associated Press has documented Trump’s habit of contacting journalists directly by cell phone to pitch stories or respond to live coverage.
— CNBC’s Daniel Mangan contributed to this article.
