11:46 A.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.  Our Cabinet meeting.  And we’ll start with a prayer, please.  Rick Perry.

SECRETARY PERRY:  Yes, sir.  Mr. President, thank you.  Just as a—to put this all in perspective: On the 4th of July, I had a prayer that came true, which is a good thing—to pray and for the good Lord to agree that your prayer is a good one.

So, Griffin James Perry came into the world on the 4th of July, at about 8:10 in the morning.  So, I have a grandson.

THE PRESIDENT:  Good.

SECRETARY PERRY:  And we had prayed about that for many years.  And I think the reminder for all of us is that prayer is an incredible and powerful thing.  It’s a great tonic.  And as we interact with each other, to keep all of us—our friends, our families, this country—in our prayers.

Every Wednesday morning, there’s a Cabinet member Bible study, and it’s been one of the great privileges for me, in this administration, to pray with the Cabinet members.  So, this is an extension of that.

So. If you would bow your heads and join with me in asking the Lord to continue to bless this country:

Father, thank You for this table of men and women, of individuals who selflessly serve this country.  And, Lord, we ask You to continue to give them courage, to give them wisdom, to be with this President as he deals with the challenges of the day; to continue to comfort him in the knowledge that You are in charge and in control.  

We thank You for Your blessings both in the personal way and the larger issues of this world that we live in, that we’ve been given the privilege to serve.  We ask You to continue to keep our young men and women who defend our freedom safe and to bring them home soon.   

And, Father, we ask You again to keep this President safe and to give him wisdom.   

In Your most holy name, we pray.  Amen.

THE PRESIDENT:  That was very good.  Thank you very much, Rick.  Well done.  Well done.

Thank you all for being here in the Cabinet meeting.  We have them quite often, and they really produce results.  We’re producing results I don’t think any administration ever, in two and a half years—the first two and a half years certainly—has produced the results that we’ve produced.  We have the strongest stock market in the history of our country.  By the way, just in walking in, we just set a new record.  Just went up today.  We had—a new record was set.  The Dow Jones went over 27,000 for the first time ever …And, to me, that’s not just a record; that means jobs.  It’s all about jobs.  It’s jobs for this country.

Our unemployment numbers are historic, in the sense that we’ve never had better numbers.  African Americans have the best numbers in the history of our country.  Hispanic Americans—the best unemployment numbers in the history of our country.  Women—75 years.  Asian Americans—best in the history of our country.  We have the best overall unemployment, the best in 51 years.  And, very soon, that will be historic—meaning the history of our country—if we keep going the way we’re going, and it should be fairly soon.

So, things are happening that we wouldn’t have believed happening, or could happen…

Ben Carson is going to say a few words about HUD.  And then I think Jared is going to talk a little bit about immigration and some of our plans for immigration.  And then we’re going to go around the table.

And if the press wants to stay, you can.  If you’d like to leave—it’s like I said the other day: I don’t mind.  If you want to leave, that’s your option.  You can leave anytime you want, okay?

Please, Ben.

SECRETARY CARSON:  Thank you, Mr. President.  And just before I talk a little bit about what’s going on at HUD, I just want to thank you for your incredible courage—

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.

SECRETARY CARSON:  —and stamina and resilience with withering criticism, unfair criticism, all the time.

And I would just, sort of, sum it up by saying: Would you rather have a non-politician whose speech is unfiltered, who gets a lot of stuff done?  Or somebody with a silver tongue who gets nothing done?

THE PRESIDENT:  But I thought I had a silver tongue.  (Laughter.)  I heard that so often.  I always thought I had a silver tongue.  (Laughter.)  But I agree with you.

SECRETARY CARSON:  But, you know, as I told you before, I think God is using you.

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.

SECRETARY CARSON:  I really appreciate that.

THE PRESIDENT:  And you have said that, and I appreciate it.  Thank you, Ben.

SECRETARY CARSON:  Now, once again, you know, promises made are promises kept.  You said in the inaugural address that the forgotten men and women of this country would be forgotten no longer.

And last December, you took the extraordinary act of establishing a White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council.  And I’m privileged to chair that…

And what really is opportunity?  Opportunity has no color, but it colors everything.  Opportunity has no creed, but it gives people strength to believe.  Opportunity has no religion, yet it gives us each faith.  And I want to thank you for the faith that you’ve shown to the Revitalization Council as we have championed this incredible initiative across the country.  This is a game changer.  Major game changer in this country.  And we look forward to building on this exciting momentum.

You know, I’m very excited.  I may not look excited; this is about as excited as I ever look.  (Laughter.)  But I am very excited about being able to participate in something that’s going to have such a positive effect on so many people in our country.  And I want to thank you for pushing this … We’re getting an incredible amount done.

And one of the things that really encourages me about this is, you know, I go to places, and the governor is a Republican, the mayor is Democrat, the congressman is a Dem, and they’re all working together.  We can tamp down all this hatred that exists in our country—

THE PRESIDENT:  Right.

SECRETARY CARSON:  —because our country is extraordinarily strong.  Nobody can bring us down from the outside.  We can only do it from the inside.  And Jesus said it: “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”  These are the kind of efforts that I hope will be able to bring people together.

So, thank you for this.

THE PRESIDENT:  Fantastic job.  Beautiful words.  We appreciate it.  Thank you, Ben.  Really good job. Subscribe for free to Breaking Christian News here

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