This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," February 17, 2015. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "CELEBRITY APPRENTICE"/NBC)

DONALD TRUMP, HOST: The winner of the "Celebrity Apprentice" is -- Leeza Gibbons.

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: All right, he made it to the final two. But Geraldo did not take the grand prize in "Celebrity Apprentice" at the finale last night. Geraldo did manage to raise more than $725,000 for his charity work, his life's work.

Joining us, the man himself, Geraldo Rivera.

GERALDO RIVERA, FOX NEWS SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: I want a recount. I want a recount.

(LAUGHTER)

HANNITY: Is this going to impact -- if Donald Trump runs for president, is this going to impact any potential support for him?

RIVERA: I admire him so. He's one of the great chief executives. He has far more experience in management than the current occupant of the White House, the 44th president, Barack Obama. I think he'd be an excellent president. But Donald has to do it this. He can't just flirt with it. This time he has to do it.

TRUMP: First of all, I have to start by saying he did a fantastic job.

HANNITY: He did a good job.

TRUMP: He was so amazing, and everybody loved him. It's been great for him. And he had a lot of people that really weren't so in love with you.

RIVERA: Boy, you noticed?

TRUMP: But he was spectacular. And we had a lot of fun.

HANNITY: You made a mistake, because at the end of the show -- now, I have a video where, you called me, you said come down. I said, can I bring a check? No. Could I bring a credit card? No. Alright, I have to open up my safe and bring down cash. You said I can't go back to the well. I would have been there. Everybody here at Fox would have been there. Why didn't you call us?

RIVERA: After you gave me the 10 grand cash that you took out of the hole in in your backyard, Sean, because you don't believe in the Federal Reserve -- that's another topic -- I felt rude going back to the same people twice. But we had a lot of donors from all over.

HANNITY: We're a family here. I would have been there. Everybody --

RIVERA: It wasn't that obvious. Even the Donald was impressed how the Fox News family rallied around.

TRUMP: They really did.

HANNITY: I would have had one condition. Did you see when he kissed me?

TRUMP: I did. That was not a pleasant experience.

(LAUGHTER)

HANNITY: This was a moment on the show.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RIVERA: The first donation, $10,000!

(APPLAUSE)

RIVERA: From Bill O'Reilly, $10,000 in cash.

We're spinning, we're roaring. We're off to a great start.

Wait a second, wait a second -- $20,000!

GILBERT GOTTFRIED, CONTESTANT: He doesn't look like someone who eats pies.

RIVERA: Sean Hannity gives $10,000!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: The kiss was cut. Thank goodness. That was going to be my only condition. You had fun on the show.

RIVERA: I had fun. It was great. It was a great learning experience. This is one of the masters, the consummate master of the capitalist system. I admire him so. And, you know, it had its double dealing, it had its backstabbing, it had its double-crossing, but it's a life experience. I had never done it. It was on my bucket list.

HANNITY: I was surprised that Geraldo didn't win more money in the last contest with Leeza, so that surprised me.

TRUMP: That to me would have been the biggest surprise, that she actually won that. It wasn't only based on money but that she won that, and that was a tough one. And am I allowed to say what you said afterwards? Because Geraldo came up and said, you know, I was a little bit worried you might pick me, because we would have been killed by all the women.

RIVERA: They would have been picketing outside Fox News. Your office, too.

HANNITY: I'm one for two because I did lobby for John Rich and I did lobby for you as a friend. And you listened. But obviously --

TRUMP: John Rich was a much different type of player. People liked him. People respected him tremendously, but not everybody liked him. But everybody respected Geraldo, I'll say that, and the energy and the drive and the condition. In the shorts, he took a little heat. I think he looked pretty good.

RIVERA: Do you think?

TRUMP: I think he looked damn good.

HANNITY: All right, I've got some of the highlights. Not everybody - - a lot of people talked about how tough it was to work with Geraldo. And we've got a little montage of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE JONAS, CONTESTANT: Geraldo was like a freaking steamroller.

LORENZO LAMAS, CONTESTANT: Why don't we just call this team "Geraldo."

(LAUGHTER)

RIVERA: You try to get Revolutionary War re-enactors.

KATE GOSSELIN, CONTESTANT: We know that when Geraldo starts rolling, it's like a snowball. It gets bigger and bigger. And you could ignore it when it's this big but not when it's six feet tall.

JONAS: You look at the photo, it just says the word "celebrity" and a big picture of Geraldo.

RIVERA: All right, let's go. Come on, we've got to keep it going.

JONAS: Geraldo was in the center of the slow traffic telling me to hurry up. That's not how to motivate your team.

RIVERA: No schmooze, no schmooze. Get the money, get the money!

JONAS: Geraldo believes that he's the center of the room and we're all revolving around him. He's going to have a hard time with me if he's going to continue to feel that way through this task.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: All right, so you've done this for 14 years. I want to ask you this question. When all these famous people that have all hit highs and lows in their career and they come on "Celebrity Apprentice," how quickly do you assess how good they're going to do?

TRUMP: It's sort of interesting. It's actually 10 years, 14 seasons, and which is sort of amazing. That's a long time. Don't forget when it first went on, everybody said, no way. Who's going to want to watch Trump on television? It's not going to work. And, you know, it worked. And they want to renew me as long as I live, I guess. I don't know. It just does very well.

You never know what's going to happen. But I will say, careers have been -- you're going see it from this guy right here. He does great. As well as he does, it's going to be even better. And I'm sure you see recognition that even you didn't have. It's amazing.

HANNITY: Arsenio Hall got a show out of it.

TRUMP: Arsenio got a show. And you also have to, once you get it, you have to take advantage of it. I think he didn't take advantage of it. Joan Rivers was amazing because she won. Her career was not doing well, and she became the hottest and highest paid comedian anywhere in the world. And she wrote a book. They did a documentary on Joan, and in it she showed an empty book that was pre-"Apprentice" and a book that was packed, and that was afterwards. And she was amazing. And by the way, I saw her a day before the doctors made a mistake --

HANNITY: I thought it was nice what you did last night.

TRUMP: I love the tribute. And so many people loved the tribute. But she was a terrific woman.

HANNITY: All right, now, at the end of the show last night, I'm watching. I saw my friend lose. I was a little disappointed. More importantly then you announced there's going to be another season. That became a problem the last time when you were thinking about running for president. I think Geraldo asked the right question. Are you really serious about running for president?

TRUMP: First of all, NBC wants very much to have another season. They said, please announce it. Please announce it on the air. The executives of NBC, there were plenty of them there. Please announce it. I said, I'll announce it, but I'm going to say I have to take my time because I am doing something else. They didn't care about that. They just wanted me to announce there's another season.

So I announced it. But I also said I am going to take my time. I think you heard that. And a lot of people said, what does that mean? The people that know and the smart people understand what it means. I'm looking at something very seriously.

HANNITY: But you've done this before. Geraldo brought that point up.

TRUMP: Well, I did it once. I only did it once. And the last time I did have a problem. First of all, I had a signed contract. I was building jobs all over the world. Now I am, but my children are older and really doing great as executives, which I think you can attest to.

RIVERA: Amazing family. It was the most impressive thing.

TRUMP: Thank you.

HANNITY: And the best thing, they're not spoiled kids. They all work hard. Good character.

TRUMP: Well, they do. We're building a building, the old post office on Pennsylvania Avenue. We're just finishing up --

HANNITY: And so here's the big question. On a scale of one to 10, how close are you mentally, emotionally, spiritually to the idea of running for president?

TRUMP: Much more than five, much more than five on the scale.

HANNITY: Would you vote for him for president?

RIVERA: I would. But he has to commit to it. And he has to articulate the conservative philosophy that he does in the boardroom on and off camera. He is the consummate entrepreneur. Now he can make America the most successful capitalist entity in the history of the planet.

HANNITY: Isn't it sad that Jordan and Egypt are tougher on ISIS than America is? There's a sense that I do believe one thing that you would be very successful at in making America feel like we should be number one. We lost that status. And you would want to gain that back. That would be a powerful platform.

TRUMP: We have people who, number one, don't know what they're doing. That's where it all starts. And number two, they can't negotiate. You look at what's going on with Iran where they take the sanctions off in the middle of the negotiations. You should make the sanctions tougher. So many different problems. And ISIS is one of the big ones, and we just are not doing it right.

HANNITY: OK. And you're in. If he announces, you're in, I heard it.

RIVERA: Someone said I could be the press secretary. That would be a hell of a job, wouldn't it?

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: I would love that.

HANNITY: Be careful. He has a history of throwing chairs and having brawls.

TRUMP: He's fantastic.

HANNITY: Congratulations. Another great season. Great job. Proud of you.

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