Donald Trump said Tuesday that the U.S. has lost its standing as the No. 1 trading nation not just to China, but to every other country.
“We’re losing all over the world with trade deals,” the Republican presidential hopeful said from his Manhattan skyscraper.
“We are going to take the $400 billion a year we’re losing with China, that’s going to be turned around … The $75 billion a year that we’re short on with Japan, the $50 million we’re losing to Mexico,” he said, describing how he would change things as president.
“It doesn’t matter which country, you can just pick a name out of a hat — they’re beating us in trade. Every country,” he reiterated. “No matter what country you talk about.”
Trump debuted a tax plan in late September that included a proposed 35 percent tariff on American-owned corporations who relocate their manufacturing operations to Mexico or overseas. On the campaign trail, he frequently assures supporters he would quash trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership that “hurt American industries.”
“We’re the home team and we should come first,” Trump wrote in his latest book, “Crippled America,” which he discussed at Trump Tower Tuesday.
“In too many ways we’re giving away the greatest market in the world — the American consumer,” he adds.
Trump, who’s fourth in the latest Washington Examiner presidential power rankings, fell to second place nationally behind Ben Carson in an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released hours before his presser Tuesday. The New York businessman earned 23 percent support in the survey of Republican voters compared to Carson’s 29 percent.
