Top Story with Tom Llamas - “Here’s the Scoop”: Behind the Scenes of Tom Llamas' Trump Interview

Episode Date: February 5, 2026

"NBC Nightly News" anchor Tom Llamas joins Yasmin Vossoughian on “Here’s the Scoop” from NBC News to share the takeaways from his exclusive interview with President Donald Trump, from the economy to the administration’s immigration enforcement operations and much more. "Here’s the Scoop" is a daily news podcast that brings you the latest from newsmakers, analysts and correspondents all over the world. New episodes drop weekdays at 5 p.m. ET. Subscribe wherever you listen so you never miss an update: swap.fm/l/htts Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hi, everybody. Yasmin Vasugian here, host of Here's the Scoop from NBC News. We are a daily news podcast that brings you the top stories and headlines from NBC News, as well as news making interviews and analysis from our team of correspondence all over the world. I'm dropping into your feed with a recent episode I think you're going to love. First, my colleague in Nightly News anchor Tom Yamis was on the podcast to talk about his takeaways from his exclusive interview with President Trump earlier this week. And then, NBC sports, Rebecca Lowe, breaks down the athletes to watch at the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics, which are just about to get underway. Have a listen. And if you like what you hear, search for Here's the Scoop and subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. That way, you're going to have new episodes in your feed every weekday at 5. I'll see you there.

Hey, everybody. Welcome to Here's the Scoop from NBC News. I'm Yasmin Vesugin. We have a packed show for you today. including your guide to the Olympic Games ahead of tomorrow's opening ceremony in Italy. Plus, we have the latest on the search for Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of today's show co-anchor, Savannah Guthrie. Up first, though, NBC news anchor Tom Yamas sat down with President Trump yesterday for a wide-ranging interview about the economy, immigration, and a lot more. And he's joining us now.

Hey, Tom. Hey, Yas, Yas, ma' you doing. I'm good. How are you? Good. It was quite the interview, to say the least. interviewing the president is a major undertaking. How do you prepare for something like that? It starts with a lot of prep.

We've been prepping probably for the last month or so. And then over the past few weeks. And as we got closer and closer, the prep gets more intense. And it's, you know, it's all the issues. It's making sure how you want to build out your sheets for your facts and also your questions. The biggest challenge, one of the biggest challenges with the interview is the timing, right? We were told it'd be this long. And then the day before we're told it's actually going to be this long.

And then when we got there, it's like it's going to be this long. So you got to slash stuff. And then when we're in there, it changed again. And so if you notice, you know, we're sitting down and there was an interview is about 30 minutes. And then we get up and he starts giving me a tour. And then I had a lot more questions to ask because half my interview was still on the table. So I still had a lot to get through it. So I went through Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, his health, his legacy, the assassination attempts, the things he's building in D.C.

that was all the back part of the interview, and that was, and that was just, I had to do it when we were standing up because the time ran, you know, they cut it. You got a self-ed-ed-it on the fly. Yeah. It's just a lot of research. When we prepare to moderate for debates, we often do kind of mock moderation and mock debating. Do you have mock interviews and preparing for the president? I did too. Did you tell us who played the president?

I had two different Trumps. I'm not going to do it because I didn't ask them. But it's people we work with. And they did very, they did very good Trump impersonations. Not like not impersonating him, but his answers were very on. And what was so interesting, the questions that sort of stump them, because there are people that listen to Trump speeches all the time and are out there all the time, like hearing him every day, were the questions that Trump really sort of like got really keen on. So that was kind of interesting as well. Let's talk about some of the issues that you guys covered.

And I want to talk first about economy, right, top of mind for a lot of Americans, specifically inflation as well. Let's play what the president said to you about inflation. We have low inflation and we have tremendous growth. You haven't had these numbers like this. We have, think of it, low inflation, great growth. Now all I have to do is one thing. Easy. Get down the interest rate.

Do you think the- Nonetheless, he goes on to say the economy is doing quite well. Yeah, and I just want to be very clear. We fact-checked him and we went back at him. And, you know, he was using a number for inflation that I was not familiar with. the 2.7 is where inflation is at. He was using a different number. He said for the last three months. So, I mean, there was some back and forth there. I just want to make that very clear.

And we also told him that the polls on the economy weren't good as well. He thinks they were good and they were not good. So I'm glad you brought that up because there are a number of polls in which over half Americans are not happy with the economy and not happy with the handling of the economy by this president, by President Trump. Fox News poll has him down 14 points. But he didn't believe them. He says those polls are fake. So what do you make of his response on that? I mean, look, there's, it's a delicate dance. right? Because, I mean, you push back, you have to pick and choose your spots because if you don't, you're not going to have an interview because you're going back and forth every second and you got to hear him out and hear where he's going sometimes. When he says something that is not true, you try to correct him. You try to keep the interview on pace and you get to your next question. I'm not there to get into an argument. I'm not there to have a fight with the president. I know people want that to happen. That's not my role. My role is to get information for our viewers. We made a lot of news in that interview. And there's been. a hundred stories written because we went over so much stuff, we covered so much ground, and you do that by sort of picking and choosing your moments. No one's ever going to be satisfied after a Trump interview in the sense of like,

you were too tough or you were tough enough because the country's 50-50, right? Yeah. But our job is to be down the middle. And it is a challenge. You have to really be listening to what he's saying. And sometimes he says things that I didn't understand. And that, you know, you'd stop him and you'd talk. And, but, you know, everything that I could get out of my mouth,

to ask him. He acknowledged it. Maybe he didn't answer it. He sidestepped it, but I was able to ask it. He didn't stop any questions. You know or refused to answer any questions. When you mentioned that you said there was a moment that you didn't understand, it was certainly about the PR moment, which we're going to play in a second. But I want to talk about immigration because that was also a breakout moment where you really kind of made some news. And I kind of wondered if this was a change in strategy or if it was rhetoric because this was after Borders R. Tom Homan announced that 700 federal agents would withdraw from Minneapolis. The president told him. told you that was his decision.

And then you asked him, right, what he learned. Mr. President, speaking of Minneapolis, what did you learn? I learned that maybe we can use a little bit of a softer touch, but you still have to be tough. These are criminals. We're dealing with really hard criminals. But look, I've called the people. I've called the governor. I've called the mayor, spoke to them, had great conversations with them. And then I see them ranting and raving out there. Immigration reform was central to the president's campaign, right, in this go-round. You have people on both sides of the out, Republicans and Democrats, that are not happy with what has been happening in the streets, especially of Minneapolis.

Do you think what you heard yesterday from the president was a change in policy going softer, or do you think it was rhetoric? We had a handful of headlines on immigration. The president's saying that he directed the 700 officers to come out, right? That was his call. Yeah. That he's going to go softer. He wants that softer touch on immigration. He also said that they are not going to go to cities where they're not wanted.

So he's only going to go to cities where the mayor and the governor want them to be there. That's a big admission because he was in a lot of blue cities like Minneapolis, like Los Angeles, like Chicago, where things weren't working out the way ICE wanted things to work out. Now, that being said, he is saying something right now. We'll see what happens. We'll see if there truly is a change. I mean, we're going to have to see what happens over the next few weeks. he also told me that he's going to just go after the people that are here and are undocumented that have committed crimes. That's who he's focused on, the murderers, the drug dealers, because there's been a big question mark because our analysis has 65% of the people that they've deported are people who came in here illegally and also committed to crime.

So it's not 100%. People that came in here and undocumented, but that's not his focus, he says right now. We're going to have to wait and see. We don't know. But I got there was a clear shift in his tone and what immigration. enforcement is going to be because I explained to him the polls say people are okay with deportations. What they're not okay with is with this immigration enforcement. And your poll numbers show that. Of course he's going to dispute the polls. But we did have that conversation. But lastly, he said they're still looking at five cities. He wouldn't he wouldn't say which five cities.

He mentioned San Francisco. He mentioned Chicago. Those are blue cities. Yeah. Those are cities he's talked about before. Yeah. And if he's not going to go to, if he's not going to places where the mayor and the governor don't want him, I think it's tough for him to go there. Let's get to that PR conversation that I mentioned earlier. He's been on what we could call a media tour, to say the least, right, especially with legacy media, CBS News, New York Times. He did this interview, obviously, with you. He spoke with our colleague Kristen Welker on the phone as well, not that long ago.

And he said one of the issues that he feels as if they are having, despite the fact they're doing a good job, is a public relations problem, right? And you actually said, what do you mean by that? I think we do a phenomenal job, but I don't think we're good at public relations. What does that mean? You've said that a couple times now. What do you mean by that? We don't sell the great job that we're doing. This is curious me because this is a guy who is not shy, right? I mean, he has his cabinet meetings where they go around in a circle and they all tout how well the presidency, the administration is doing. They constantly have these scrums in which they talk with one another about how well they are doing. He speaks to the media a lot.

What do you think he meant by having this public relations problem? And do you think he's trying to change the narrative now in speaking with NBC News and others? I think it's twofold. I think – not twofold. I think there's two issues. One is the economy and the other is immigration enforcement. The poll show he is underwater on the economy. Poll after poll shows that the real clear politics, which is not a left-leaning polling site by any means, their average has them down.

And he doesn't understand that because he keeps saying it's the red hot economy. It's the greatest economy ever in the history of the United States. Not exactly true. And he believes that what he's seen, prices are coming down. A lot of prices are coming down. But like we pointed out in the interview, natural gas, coffee, beef, they're not coming down. And so if they're not coming down. And here's the other thing that, and I was trying to get to this.

But again, it's a back and forth. And Americans still find America very expensive because it is. Because we remember what it was five years ago. Yes, there was a pandemic. Yes, there was record inflation under President Biden. We understand that. But we also remember what it was to buy a hamburger, to take your family out to dinner, to go to a movie, and what it is now. Well, you said, is it too expensive to live in this country now?

Yeah, exactly. And then the other thing is immigration. He doesn't get this, right? Because immigration was his core issue. And the border, on the border, they've had huge success on the border. The border's quiet. We've sent Julia Ainsley over there. I mean, people are not coming through here like they were in the last administration.

That being said, people don't like what happened with ICE in Minneapolis. Yeah. Two Americans died, right? It was horrific. It was terrible to see that. It was caught on video. And so you have these events that are affecting the way Americans look. So they don't like the immigration enforcement, according to the polls.

They're fine with the deportations, but it's the enforcement. And so when he talks about PR, that's where the disconnect is. He says it's a PR problem, but it's not exactly a PR problem. It's deeper than that. And by the way, you're going to have a special coming out ahead of the Super Bowl an additional interview with the president, right? We are. We have this whole part of the interview that has not aired yet, which is about the Super Bowl. and about the economy, too, and about some other issues.

Got it. And so that's going to air on Super Bowl Sunday in the pregame show. Tom Yamas, thank you. Yasman, thank you. It's been a pleasure. If you want to hear Tom's interview with President Trump, you can listen to it in our feed. And while you're there, go ahead and subscribe. That way, you'll have the latest episodes in your feed as soon as they drop.

We're going to take a very quick break. And when we come back, your essential guide to the Milan Cortina, 2026 Olympic Games. And we are back with, here's the scoop from NBC News. Cue the music. The Olympic torch is about to blaze again this time in Italy. Tomorrow's opening ceremonies officially launched the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, returning the games to Italy for the first time since Turin in 2006. Events span multiple sites with Milan hosting hockey, figure skating, and speed skating.

Cortina, which is just five hours northeast, will be home to events like skiing, the bobsled, luge, and curling. So consider this your primer for the games ahead, what to watch, and who to watch. I'm going to be watching. So I want to bring in NBC Sports Rebecca Lowe. She is the daytime host for the games the best job in the business.

Here, Rebecca. Hi, Yasmin. Thank you so much for having me. It is definitely the best job in the business. I've been in Milan for a few days. I'm getting Olympics fever. The storylines are flying in. And there is so much to look forward to.

And now I'm in that situation where I'm like, right, let's go. Let's start. Come on. There are so many events, Rebecca, to talk about, and we need to get into what athletes to watch as well. But first, I want to talk about a theme that we are already seeing emerge, and that is the theme of comebacks. And I think you know who I want to start with here. Lindsay Vaughn, she had this major comeback, and then she got injured. What can we expect from her during these games? So you're right, comebacks is definitely the theme. And like you sort of insinuated, you can definitely attribute that to a number of different athletes going into the

games. But Lindsay Vaughn was already the headline act. And now she's triple that, if not more, because to rupture your ACL is an injury that is very common in lots of sports, whether you play soccer, whether you play lacrosse, whatever you do, everybody knows that an ruptured ACL is a serious injury. in soccer, which is my speciality normally, that is a nine-month layoff from the game. To imagine that you did it, what, 10, 11 days ago, and then to say that you're still going to race... I know. It's insane.

It blows my mind. Apparently she's going to wear a brace and she's going to ski at 80 miles an hour, and she has to do one training run. She has to, either Thursday, Friday or Saturday, in order to do the downhill, which is Monday. So I'm a bit nervous about, about that. Was she going to be in contention for a medal before? Possibly. Is she now? Possibly not.

But can she, will she still do it? Yeah. Because this woman is the epitome of doesn't know she's down. She never knows when to die. She will come back over and over again. This is one of the greatest comebacks of all time in sports. Another big comeback is Michaela Schiffrin. She didn't have a great Olympics in Beijing in 2022, didn't finish three events, right? But she is far away, the winningest skier of all time, female skier, I should say, of all time. And a lot of folks are going to be watching her as well. And I think she has learned a lot about herself from failure. And I think that's something that we've all been told a lot more about, I feel, like in recent years, Yasmin, that failure doesn't have to be a negative. That's where you grow. That's where you learn.

It's like, that's life, isn't it? You can be at the absolute top of your game. And then the world can just punch you in the guts. And it's not about being punched in the guts and that moment of failure. It's about how you react. And then we've got the events, right? Ice skating, always a marquee event at the Winter Games. Is this the year that U.S. skating could take gold? Oh, I think, well, certainly I think in women singles, there's a good chance. It's going to be hard that Japan have got a great team too, but it's not since Sarah Hughes in 2002, I think. that a female figure skater has taken goal for Team USA. And before that, of course, Tara Lipinski, he'll be part of our coverage.

But we've got Amber Glenn, we've got Alyssa Lou, and we've got Isob Levito. And all three of them are really close, genuinely really close, and all three of them are really good. So I'm very excited about the women's side. And then the men's side, we have got a whole new world coming to people who have never heard of Ilya Malanin. Ilya Malanin is on another planet. He calls himself the quad god. He does things no one has ever done before.

And from what I hear from the likes of Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir, we may never see again. This guy does he do the quad axle? Not only does he do the quad axle, he can perform up to seven quad jumps in one free skate. Come on. And then he does a backflip and lands on one foot on the ice. There's also always the Cinderella story, right? The person we didn't know about the athlete that we weren't looking at who comes through, wins gold becomes a huge superstar, not even gold, by the way.

Medals, right, becomes a huge superstar coming out of these games. Who could those people be this year? Gosh, I'm not saying that this chap is going to meddle because I think it's going to be a long shot, but there's a new sport called ski mountaineering, and it's called Schemo for short. And America are a small fry in this sport because like so many winter sports, it's huge in Norway and in Sweden and in Finland and in Italy and France where the mountains are essentially where all those mountains are

and in America it's not so big but Cam Smith is a name who's on the Schimo team for Team USA and he's got bright red hair and he's got this lovely nature about him when he talks about his passion for this sport every single waking moment is all about getting to the Olympics now he's got to the Olympics

let's see how he does because you know what when you've got a new sport sometimes it throws a spanner in the works and this particular sport is a little crazy as well. What is it? Explain it to us. Okay, so ski mountaineering is when athletes ski uphill, and on their skis, they have these skins in order to give them grip. It's just a few minutes uphill,

then they take the skins off, put them in their suits, ski back down the hill, and do it all over again a number of times, depending on what each in competition is. It's a brand new sport. No one really knows who's going to win gold, but I just think Cam Smith might just be somebody to keep an eye on in that team. Let's talk about hockey because it, of course, is not new to the games, but there has been a 12-year hiatus when it comes to the NHL allowing players to compete.

Now they can. Could that mean a medal for the United States? I mean, you have to think, yes. I mean, I remember my first Winter Olympics was Sochi when they were last allowed to play the NHL players. And I actually look back now at Sochi at Pyongchang and at Beijing. And it really was, there really was a big difference. It actually not just performance-wise, but also in buzz and vibe around the Olympic hockey tournament, now it's back. And Team USA are, they look good, and they're also trying to win gold for the first time since Miracle on Ice, which was in 1980. There's always a little bit of politics involved in the Olympics, Rebecca, and I want to talk about Russia because they have been a powerhouse in the Winter Olympics. This country, though, still banned because of the ongoing war with Ukraine. There are 13, I believe, Russian athletes that are competing under the, quote, individual, neutral athlete flag.

How could Russia now not being a part of the Winter Olympics leave a void that others could fill medal-wise? Well, in my experience, having done a Winter Olympics in Russia, they're such a huge player on the sporting landscape, summer or winter. I mean, I grew up watching the Olympics, and it was just, it seemed to me either the United States or, as Soviet Union, as they were called then, being the most successful countries. I'm used to that sporting prowess being at the forefront of Olympic Games. So to answer your question, it's very simple, there are going to be massive opportunities that other athletes are going to take. And who knows when they will be allowed back? Yes, that certainly opens a very large door. Quick lightning round before I let you go. Your favorite event? I'm going to give two. I like half-pipe

and I love the aurels. The aerials to me, amazing. Favorite female Olympian. Jesse Diggins, cost-crunchy skier. Favorite male Olympian. Oh, well, it has to be Sean White. Luge, bobsled, or curling. You know what? I don't think there are many better things, Yasmin, than getting yourself a cup of tea, sitting on the sofa and watching a game of curling.

You know, if you want to chill out for the evening, and you actually, you'll get into it. Even if you don't know the rules, you'll pick them up like that. So I'm going curling on that one. I'm more apt to get a glass of wine, but, you know. Yeah, I'm working over here, so I just used tea. Rebecca Lowe, it has been a huge pleasure. We are all incredibly jealous of your next two weeks ahead. We will all be watching the Winter Olympics this year in Milan-Cortino.

Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Jasmine. No problem at all. We are going to take a very short break. And when we are back, are we about to head into a new nuclear arms race? Stay with us. the headlines. And we are back with, here's the scoop from NBC News. Let's get to some headlines. The last major arms control treaty between the U.S. and Russia, known as New Star, that expires today,

it had capped off the number of nuclear warheads at 1,550 on both sides. There are now no limits on the arsenals of the world's two largest nuclear powers and no discussions between Washington and Moscow about what comes next. According to the Stockholm International, Peace Research Institute's most recent assessment. The U.S. and Russia now own nearly 90% of all nuclear weapons, more than 10,500 combined. China has also been growing its nuclear arsenal, adding nearly 100 new warheads a year since 2023. President Trump's deployment of the National Guard to Washington, D.C. has cost taxpayers more than $330 million, and it's on track to exceed $600 million. by the one-year mark in August.

That is according to a new report from Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security Committee. More than 2,300 National Guard troops from D.C. and eight states arrived in the district within a month of the president's executive order last August. At the time, the president called D.C., quote, one of the most dangerous cities in the world. Even though, according to DOJ, the crime rate fell to a 30-year low in 2024. The FBI is now offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to the recovery of Today's show co-anchor Savannah Guthrie's mom, Nancy Guthrie. Arizona authorities said today that there is still no suspect or person of interest in the investigation. Savannah and her siblings posted a heart-wrenching video to Instagram on Wednesday night, addressing their mother's possible kidnapper directly. In prepared remarks, she said her family was aware of reports of a ransom letter in the media.

Savannah also asked for proof that her mother was still alive. If you have information about Nancy Guthrie, please call the FBI tip line at 1-800 call FBI or the Pima County Sheriff's Department at 520-351-490. Anonymous tips can also be submitted online at 88crime.org. The lights are back on in eastern Cuba after an electricity grid failure left hundreds of thousands of people in the dark, without power. But Cubans are likely going to see more outages and scheduled power cuts are still in place to deal with a supply shortage. An analysis by Agenz France Press showed that Cuba produced only half the electricity it needed last year. Cuban officials blame U.S. sanctions for the crisis. But poor economic management and a post-COVID tourism collapse also play a role.

And soccer fans everywhere are crossing their fingers today, hoping for the chance to cheer on their favorite teams at this summer's FIFA World Cup. 500 million fans who put their names into the random selection draw ticket lottery are waiting to see if they're going to get lucky and we'll be able to buy tickets at a bargain. NBC News correspondent Jesse Kirsch was among the hopefuls. I have not gotten in an email yet, so there's still a chance, but it's not a very good one. FIFA says it's gotten more than 500 million ticket requests for the World Cup, which, by the way, is only 104 matches. This random selection draw phase let fans request tickets after we mostly knew which teams were playing each other and where and when those matches would be played.

And here's why fans care so much. FIFA's prices have faced a lot of scrutiny. We're talking sometimes hundreds or even thousands of dollars for a single ticket. And the expectation is that many tickets will be way more expensive on resale markets. So bottom line, if you do not get a face value ticket during this draw phase, seeing the World Cup in person could cost you a lot more. Good luck, Jessie. All right, that is going to do it for us. Here's this group from NBC News.

I'm Yasmin Vesugan. We'll be back tomorrow with whatever the day may bring. And if you like what you heard, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We'll see you tomorrow.