Remarks by President Trump on Supporting the Passage of the U.S-Mexico-Canada Agreement | Milwaukee, WI | Eastern North Carolina Now

    And I have to tell you: It's not just the previous administration. It's been many administrations, in all fairness to President Obama. It's been many, many administrations. They allowed it to happen. They allowed our factories to close, our workers, really, to go - to not have jobs. We created jobs for other places, for other nations. And we sacrificed so many - 60,000 plants. Millions and millions of jobs were lost during, I call them, "the stupid years." But now we're back into the really smart years.

    We had "the smart years"; now we're "the really smart years." (Laughter.) They were "the stupid years." What they were doing was incredible. NAFTA - one of the world's worst trade deals ever. I know a couple of others - we've been involved in them, too. World Trade Organization - that's a beauty. You don't know as much about that. But NAFTA was a disaster for this country, and we're going to be replacing that very soon, hopefully with the USMCA. And that's going to be something really, really special. It's going to keep jobs.

    One of the things I said, to start off: I don't want people leaving this country, meaning companies. I don't want to incentivize companies to leave, fire their people, build product, sell the product over in our country - no tax whatsoever - so we end up with no jobs, no factories, no taxes, no nothing. It's not going to happen anymore and it can't happen under our new agreement. (Applause.)

    And I've been talking about this subject for 20 years. Prob- - I think it's possibly one of the reasons I ran. I used to look at Michigan, where they'd lose their car companies one after another. You lost so many companies in Wisconsin. Everybody lost, Ron. Everybody lost companies. They were losing companies left and right. And we're not going to have that anymore.

    We have an incentive now to stay in this country. We have an incentive to build and manufacture in this country. And that's the way we want it. That's the way it's going to be. It's going to be America first. (Applause.)

    After years of rebuilding foreign nations, we are finally rebuilding our nation. It's as simple as that. We've built other nations. We've focused on other people's borders. We'd fight for other borders, but we don't fight for our own border. We have open borders and they had our military men protecting their borders. Figure that one out.

    But it's all changing and it's changing very rapidly, and we're doing really well right now. Mexico has 21,000 troops on the border, guarding our border. Our laws are so bad, our military can't do a damn thing. We have the greatest military in the world. But between catch-and-release - we catch them and we release them. Think of it. We catch them, take a little number - "Come back in three, four years." (Laughter.) These are the Democrats. And they should change them, Sean. They should change them so easily. But they don't want to do it. It's politics. They want open borders. I really think they want open borders. Even though four or five years ago, they all wanted strong borders and they wanted walls and everything else. That was when they were sane, but they're no longer sane.

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    For years, politicians let China take the crown jewels out of our country. My administration has taken the toughest-ever stance to stop these incredible abuses.

    As a candidate for President, I also promised to replace the disaster known as NAFTA. Since NAFTA's adoption, the United States was losing jobs and losing plants like nobody has ever lost before. Almost one in five auto jobs were lost during NAFTA, and I think that's a wrong number; I think it's worse than that. But now, we're demanding that you get - as people working here, and as companies, and as great, great strength - I want you to have strength, but I want you to have a level playing field. Because when you have a level playing field, nobody can beat you. You didn't have a level playing field. You had a playing field that was like this, and you had to go uphill.

    That's why we're replacing NAFTA with the brand new U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement. The USMCA will be the most modern, cutting-edge trade agreement in history, with the strongest protections for the American worker ever put in any trade agreement. And that was the single-most important thing to me.

    The USMCA will close the biggest loopholes that caused the mass exodus of manufa- - you had an exodus of manufacturing under NAFTA.

    By ratifying the USMCA, Mexico has now committed to be the toughest and have the toughest labor provisions, the highest environmental standards, and the most comprehensive enforcement provisions ever implemented in a trade agreement - ever.

    For years, labor unions and lawmakers urged past administrations to secure these types of trade provisions. They did absolutely nothing. No administration did anything except lose jobs. We were laughed at by the rest of the world. We were patsies.

    And I didn't blame China. I didn't blame all of these countries - Mexico. Mexico, they took 30 percent of our automobile business. I don't know if you know that or not. They have plants the likes of which you've never seen before. They took 30 percent - probably more than that - of our automobile - I don't blame them. I don't blame anybody. I blame our past leaders. I blame the people and administrations that allowed this to happen.

    It's not China's fault that we were stupid. It's not China's fault that we allowed it to happen. We lose $500 billion a year. It's now turning. We're taking in billions and billions of dollars in tariffs. I'm giving billions of dollars back to the farmers because they pinpointed the farmers. They said, "We're not going to buy here. We're not going to buy there because then Trump will stop doing to us what he's doing." Except the farmers said, "We don't care because he's right." Because for 15 years, the farmer - if you look, 15 years, it's been like this. It's a one-way street and it was a street downward.

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    But it's been incredible. And I'll never forget, I had a meeting, Marillyn, with farmers a year ago. And I told them what is going to happen. And I said, "You're going to be the single-biggest beneficiaries, ultimately. And I said, "We're going to get you subsidies, we're going to get..." And farmers looked at me like - all at one time. I had probably 30 in a big, beautiful room - the Cabinet Room at the White House. Beautiful. For the Cabinet - but I wanted the farmers in the Cabinet Room because I like the farmers.

    And they said, "Sir, we don't want subsidies." I said, "What do you mean?" "We don't want subsidies. We want a level playing field." I said, "How can you tell me - nobody has ever said that. Everybody is coming in here looking for whatever they can get. They're..." "We don't want subsidy." It was - to this day, it's never happened before. They didn't want that. They just wanted a level playing field. They said, "Give us a level playing field and nobody can beat us at what we do." I thought it was one of the most beautiful thing.

    But, in the meantime, they were targeted by China. I went to Sonny Perdue, and I said, "Sonny, how much has China spent, let's say, in the - in just about the biggest year?" He said, "Sixteen billion dollars, sir." I said, "Here's what I'm doing. I'm giving our farmers $16 billion out of the tariffs, which frankly, are much more than that." I shouldn't say that, because they'll ask for more. (Laughter.) But they are. The tariffs are far more than that.

    And a lot of companies are leaving China now because they want to go to a non-tariffed country, and some of those companies are coming here. It's been incredible.

    We're taking in billions and billions of dollars, and I'm giving our farmers a chunk because they were targeted. These are great American patriots. And I'll tell you, I didn't see anybody - you know, they go and they do these focus groups on television. Even on the real fakers on television, where you think it would be - the farmers were all, "No. It's not like things are perfect, but we are with our President."

    But now things are pretty good because we are doing $16 billion and that was the most that China ever purchased. And some of the farmers are really doing well. I think they're really starting - we're over the hump. We're doing really well.

    And, in the meantime, our government has billions of dollars of money pouring in, and that money is paid for by China through reducing - if you take a look, what they're doing is they're playing around with their monetary policy to a level like nobody has ever seen before. We're not paying. And they're also pumping out cash into their system. And China is paying; our people are not paying.

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    Now, other countries, it's a little bit different. China is China. But they're doing things in order to make sure that they keep those jobs in China. But they're losing a lot of companies, and some of those companies are coming here because we get it done. We know how to get it done. I know how to win.

    We win - Marillyn knows how to win. This company knows how to win. The job you've done is incredible at this company. And that's why I'm glad I'm here.

    The USMCA is vital to the future of the American automobile industry. Under NAFTA, foreign companies could manufacture thousands of their parts overseas, ship them to Mexico and Canada for assembly, and send their foreign-made cars right into the United States, tax free. You knew about that, Mr. Manager, right? Tax free. That doesn't work too well, right? Wouldn't you say they should have ended that about 20 years ago?

    With the USMCA, we have declared: No more of that nonsense. We're not letting it happen. Seventy-five percent of every automobile under the deal must be made in North America. And we are requiring a large portion to be made by high-wage labor - which means American labor - because you were competing against people that, frankly, were slightly - they were getting slightly less money than you do. Am I trying to be nice when I say that? Does anybody object to hearing that? They were getting slightly less - like about 20 percent - 20 percent of what you get.

    The USMCA is - but it was unfair to our country. It was unfair to our people. It was unfair to our workers.

    The USMCA is estimated to create 76,000 brand new American auto jobs, and very quickly. That means more cars, more trucks, and auto parts will be stamped with those beautiful words, "Made in the USA." Remember we used to see that all the time? "Made in the USA." (Applause.) Maybe we could start stamping here. We'll start right here. "Made in the USA." People love it. People love it. I remember I used to see it all over - "Made in the USA" or "Made in America."

    But maybe we should, you know - it would take you about, with your geniuses here, they could have that stamped on parts in about two seconds, right? He's looking - he said, "I wonder if that's going to cost us any money to do that?" (Laughter.) Not much. Not much. It's all part of the whole deal. But "Made in the USA."

    The USMCA is also a - a tremendous victory for, in particular, farmers because we have had such support. To help dairy farmers right here in Wisconsin, the USMCA stops unfair trade barriers from Canada. People love Canada. I love Canada, but there were few countries that took advantage of us more than Canada. They were charging us tariffs of 297 percent. They want to keep it under 300 because it sounded better - 297 percent. Nobody knew that.
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