[Adrienne] I guess my first question is
you know your history.
You're endlessly briefed.
But on a day like today,
I would imagine that there's still a moment where there's something
that happened that surprises even you.
What was that for you?
[Trudeau] Um, well one of the moments
Well, today was about the veterans.
And seeing and hearing them and their stories
watching one of them roll up his pants and step into the water.
The impact and the human cost of this is always in your mind
and as someone said, you think of what these families
and what the world would be like if these young men had stayed home
and continued to grow their families and contributed
but the flip side of that, what would the world be like had we not had D-Day,
had we not vanquished Fascism in 1944.
How much longer would the war have lasted?
So there's a sense of one of those focal points in history
that we are remembering
that we are recommitting ourselves to today.
[Arsenault] Well, we heard some of that in your speech certainly today.
And you know that there will be people who got up early
who are listening to what you said,
who are parsing every word
who are wondering that at the point in the speech
when you talk about finding commonalities despite differences —
how much of that was intended was for President Trump?
[Trudeau] I think today is about Canadians.
Today is about remembering that we are stronger when we stand together.
When Canadians of all different backgrounds took this beach 75 years ago
when we continue to stand together to face down whatever challenges
the world comes at us
to remember that we can't take anything for granted
but we can't either allow ourselves to be frightened
into one side or the other, cowering.
We need to continue to be strong and confident and know what these
19-year-old heroes were able to accomplish 75 years ago
is not out of the grasp of our 19-year-old heroes today
out of grasp of all of us.
As we work together to overcome the challenges we're facing.
[Arsenault] And what happens for you when you're here
and you're paying such enormous respect to people who deserve every ounce of it, obviously.
And yet, you know that at home there are people
who are critical of your government for the way veterans are handled.
How do you deal with that?
[Trudeau] There is always more to do.
What we owe to those who step up to serve their country and their families with them
is a debt that can never be repaid.
But what we've done as a government over the past three years
is put ten billion dollars more to follow through on our commitment for pension for life.
That is making sure that our wounded
veterans are better off than they were under the old system.
We've done a lot.
We've re-opened the Veterans Affairs offices that were closed under the previous government.
But this is politics.
There's always going to be people saying you need to do more, you need to do more.
We are hearing that and we're working on that.
[Arsenault] Are they right when they say that?
[Trudeau] They are right when they say we always need to do more for our veterans.
Yes.
But they're also right all the people who recognize this government has done far more
than any previous government for our veterans.
[Arsenault] My last question.
When you were down on the beach with the veterans
and it was sort of that lovely chaotic scene.
I think all of us watching sort of wanted to lean in and get a microphone a little closer.
What were they saying to you?
[Trudeau] Um, it was a tremendous sense of pride for most of them
to be able to be here on this day,
to be able to represent their comrades-in-arms who either fell that day
or have fallen since.
But that sense of accomplishment,
that sense of having worked hard to create a better world
and that sense of passing the torch along to the next generations
to keep up the fight they led so valorously.
[Arsenault[ Is that what they were saying to you?
Because their arms -- there was a lot of animated talk going on.
[Trudeau] Some of them remember me as a child and
remembered meeting my father and there was a lot of personal connections there as well.
But the message was really one of being grateful to be here
and grateful for all that we've been able to build as a country
and hopeful about the future.
[Arsenault] Well, this is certainly a place and a country that is grateful for Canada.
Thank you very much.