OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Former President Donald Trump has made a promise to his supporters that has shaken the election and the global landscape.
He told a captive audience during a speech in Detroit that in order to protect the American automobile industry, which has its roots in the Motor City, that he would tax Chinese car imports by as much as “a thousand percent.”
“We will implement further protections for critical industries that are fundamental to our national interests And those include, above all, steel and the car industry. The car industry is critical to us,” the former president said during his speech at the Detroit Economic Club.
“We can’t fight a war if we can’t make cars and trucks and engines and transmissions and drive trains. Surrendering our car industry is not an option. We have to make our car industry brilliant again. We have to make it bigger, I’m going to make it bigger than it was ever before,” he said.
“We’re going to make this country so strong. And it’s going to be so much easier to run. And I think we’re going to end up actually having a lot of support from the other party, I really believe that,” the former president said before going back to his promise to impose massive tariffs.
“So as I said, China is currently building gigantic auto plants in Mexico. And they think that they’re going to sell all of these cars into the United States, which would destroy Michigan, totally destroy your state. But it’s not going to happen. Not gonna happen, not even close. They might as well stop building the damn plants,” the Republican presidential nominee said.
“They are giants. ‘Sir, you really have to see them.’ I said, ‘I don’t wanna see’em.’ I will impose whatever tariffs are required — 100%, 200%, a thousand percent! They’re not going to sell any cars into the United States with those plants. They’re building them close to our border so that they can have easy shipping because they’re used to having stupid people to deal with. We’re not going to let it happen, those jobs are coming back to Michigan, and they’re coming back to other states, and they’re coming back to our country and, they’re going to make America great again. That’s it,” he said.
In June the former president and Republican lawmakers said that they have an “all tariff policy” that would replace income tax if implemented, CNBC reported.
“He does want to look at lowering the income tax, and that could be offset and paid for by some type of tariffs, particularly on adversarial nations,” New York Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis said.
“President Trump says ‘this is an idea, but I’d love to raise tariffs’ and then he said, ‘and maybe even no income taxes on Americans.’ Everyone was clapping in the room,” Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said. “I think that’s a fantastic idea.”
“Republicans who are free trade realize there has to be a balance,” Texas Republican Rep. Jodey Arrington said. “Trump’s message on tariffs has been embraced.”
And in September he shredded those who opposed his tariff plan.
“Under Biden-Harris or Harris-Biden, however you wanna figure it, we’re losing $2 trillion a year. With the tariffs, we can get that number down to a very manageable number, even, ultimately, we can break it even,” Trump told KTNV-TV.
“And it’s gonna generate tremendous growth because, rather than paying the tariffs, there is no tariff if you build your plant in the United States, like the autoworkers. The autoworkers are gonna be out of business. We‘re not gonna have any autoworkers anymore, it’s gonna all go through China and other countries, including Mexico, by the way,” he continued.
“And we charge tariffs, we put tariffs on those cars, they’re not gonna be able to sell them and therefore they’re wasting their time in building the plant. But we will say, ‘Build the plant over here. If you build that plant over here, there’s no tariff.’ And they’re gonna end up building the plants over here. We’re gonna bring back the autoworkers, were gonna bring back business, we’re gonna bring back manufacturing. And we were doing it, and then when we got hit with the COVID, we had to focus on the COVID. But we were just starting to do it. We had everything fixed. We made the USMCA deal, which people love, one of the best trade deals we ever made. But we’re gonna be doing it and we’re gonna bring back manufacturing and a big part of that is gonna be the automobile manufacturing,” he said.
