One of the more unhinged parts of President Trump’s Oct. 31 interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes was when he doubled down on his claim that both Russia and China are secretly testing nuclear bombs, and that the U.S. must resume testing itself. Here is an excerpt of the exchange between Trump and CBS’s Norah O’Donnell:
O’DONNELL: Are you saying that after more than 30 years, the United States is going to start detonating nuclear weapons for testing?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: I’m saying that we’re going to test nuclear weapons like other countries do, yes.
O’DONNELL: But the only country that’s testing nuclear weapons is North Korea. China and Russia are not—
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, Russia’s testing nuclear weapons. And China’s testing ‘em, too. You just don’t know about it.
O’DONNELL: That would be certainly very newsworthy. My understanding is, what Russia did recently was test essentially the delivery systems for nuclear weapons, essentially missiles, which, we can do that but not with nuclear warheads—
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Russia’s testing, and China’s testing, but they don’t talk about it.… No, we’re gonna test, because they test and others test. And certainly North Korea’s been testing. Pakistan’s been testing.
