The president said he approved the legislation to fund the government through September for national security reasons, as it authorizes a major increase in military spending that he supports. But he stressed that he did so reluctantly.

Trump slammed the rushed process to pass the more than 2,200-page bill released only Wednesday. Standing near the pile of documents, the president said he was "disappointed" in the legislation and would "never sign another bill like this again."

"We're very proud of many of the items that we've been able to get. We're very disappointed that in order to fund the military, we had to give up things where we consider in many cases them to be bad or them to be a waste of money. But that's the way unfortunately right now the system works," Trump said at the White House. He added that he "looked very seriously" at a veto, but his support for the military spending levels "overrode" his concerns about the bill.