President Trump boasted Thursday that he is bending the leadership of organized labor his way by driving a wedge between them and rank-and-file union members, saying that he has a special bond with the people in building and construction trades.

“I have been in construction and building all of my life and I love it. I love the smell of a construction site, right? There is something about it. We didn’t always get the union leadership of the big unions, but we got the workers. We got the workers. And some of the those leaders had big problems because the workers were with Trump. Because they know I hired the Teamsters, thousands of Teamsters. And I hired all of the carpenters and the electricians and all of the people that built a lot of buildings in Manhattan and all over the place. And they got it. The workers got it, and now I think the leadership is actually getting it. I really believe that. I think the leadership is getting it,” Trump said to roaring applause from union workers during a speech about infrastructure in Richfield, Ohio.