Donald Trump ‘Latinos for Trump’ Roundtable Event Transcript September 25

Donald Trump: (00:00)
Where is Jorge? Where is Jorge? I don’t want to fight with him. Where is he? Where is he? Stand up, Jorge. Stand up. There he is. That’s how fast his knock out. He was fighting this young superstar who was going to be great. Right? They would tell me how great he is. Man, I mean, I don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings, but he was supposed to be the future of the UFC, but he had to go through this guy right here. Didn’t work out too well, did it, Jorge? What a champion you are. Thank you.

That was the fastest … What was it, about a second, two seconds? You ran across the ring, and the guy was gone, and that was the end of it. Did they have to pay you for that evening or not? Because one second is not … That’s a good return. Great. Great to have you a big fan. Thank you, man.

Thanks. Great. So I’m thrilled to be back at [Doral 00:00:01:01]. I never knew I was going to even see it again. This is nice. I bought it before I became president, and I had no intention of being president. I was enjoying my life. I had a great life, like Jorge has. Just keep winning though, Jorge. It’s important.

Crowd: (01:18)
President Trump, you are a hero.

But I will say, I will say, and then I said, “Let’s do this.” And I said, “I have all these great places. I don’t know if I’ll ever see him again,” but we have these beautiful ballrooms, and it works out well. It can even hold all of that media back there.

That’s a lot of people this early in the morning, but it’s about Hispanics and the relationship that we have. We have an incredible relationship, and you’ve seen the polls. The polls are having me up over a Democrat, which is, I think, unheard of, and I don’t think it’s going to be unheard of anymore.

Crowd: (01:57)
Four more years. Four more years. Four more years. Four more years. Four more years.

Thank you. Thank you.

Crowd: (02:05)
Four more years.

And we recently were in Arizona. We got a reception. It was incredible, but literally, I mean, we are doing better than the opposition. Now, the opposition has not been good to Hispanics at all.

He’s been very bad to Hispanics, and we’ll go into that, and we’ll do some questions later. We’ll have a little fun, but I’m very happy to be back at Doral. It’s great. It’s a good location, right?

Speaker 1: (02:30)
Yes, sir. [crosstalk 00:02:31].

Very good location. And at least I see my properties, even if for just a short period of time, but I really appreciate you all being here, and you’re all champions. They’re all champions, Jorge. These are great people. In Arizona, I was with a man … you know him … the owner of the Los Angeles Angels, and he’s done such a fantastic job. He’s been so nice, and I didn’t recognize him.

And then I said, “Haven’t I seen you in sports?” “Oh, on the Angels?” And he stood up. He made just a very inspiring speech, and he’s done such a great job for … And I guess from Mexico, right? He’s from Mexico. What a job is done with the team, and he signed Albert Pujols. He’s got a Trout, I guess, who’s considered …

I don’t get to watch too much baseball anymore, unfortunately, but he’s considered the best player in baseball, and so it’s really the success of the Hispanics. They call them Latinos sometimes, Hispanic sometimes, and sometimes you can call them both. They don’t really care, I figure.

Crowd Member 1: (03:38)
We don’t care.

After about five years, I figured out that they don’t really care. Just call us one of those two, and we’re okay. But the success has been incredible, great business people, but I’m thrilled to be back at Doral with so many patriotic Americans who are part of a extraordinary national movement, and that’s Latinos for Trump.

And we’re joined by Republican Party Chair, Joe Gruters. Where’s Joe, Joe, Joe? Joe, thank you, Joe. Great, Joe. Great job. How are we doing?

Joe Gruters: (04:12)
We’re going to win big.

Well, they had a poll that I never did well in. It’s the ABC Washington Post poll. They had me down four years ago 12 points with a week and a half to go, and we complained. And then by the election, they had me almost even, and I said, “That was quick.” We complained very loudly, right? But I’ve never done well on that poll, and they have us up four in Florida.

But it seems to be going well from what I hear. That’s great. Yeah, it should be going well. If you don’t do a good job, you will be fired so fast, your head will spin. Yeah, I think we’re going to win it big. It just feels really good, but Hispanic Americans have been incredible. We have one right here that he gave a very inspiring speech. Where’s Max, Max Alvarez?

He really took the house down at the Republican National Convention but really at the round-table a few weeks ago. You were at the round table, right? We were there with all those great people, but I want to thank you. He’s a tremendous success. In fact, they used to say he’s the richest Hispanic in Florida. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but he started off with $2, and I know he’s rich as hell, so that’s okay, but Max Alvarez, thank you very much, Max. We appreciate it. Appreciate it.

Hispanic Americans enrich our nation beyond measure. Look at them. What a job. Hispanic Americans enrich our nation beyond measure. They champion our shared values and embody the American dream. That’s what it is. I mean, this guy was a fighter on the street. He used to beat up people. Your route is much different. I know your story. Actually, for what you do, it’s sort of cool. For other people, it wouldn’t be so good, but he used to beat up people, and somebody said, “Hey, come on to the gym. Let’s see if you’re so good.”

And then he goes into the gym, and guys who are fighting for a long time, he beat the hell out of him. They said, “I think he’s going to be a good fighter,” and they were right. But these are all different stories, right? All different stories. Whatever it takes, Jorge, right? Whatever it takes. But Joe Biden has spent 47 years selling out to the different interests in Washington. It’s really sad. He sold out the Hispanic American community, sending your jobs to China, making your communities less safe, attacking your religious values and trapping countless children in failing government schools.

He doesn’t like charter schools. He doesn’t like choice, and choice is a very important thing for education, but he can’t do that. It’s just against the radical left. The radical left can’t have it, and you know about the radical left. Almost more than any people, you know about the radical left. You’ve gotten some pretty big examples, and you’re not going to be there, and I think that’s one of the reasons we’re doing so well with Hispanics. Joe Biden betrayed Hispanic Americans, and I’m fighting for you, and we’re fighting like never before. We can’t let anything happen. I think this will go down, and I think right now, people are saying, it’s the most important election in the history of our country because they are stone cold crazy, what they’ll do to our country. You see it on the streets. You see it with the riots all the time, and we don’t have that in Republican states and cities. You don’t have that. This is endemic to the Democrats, and no bail, no this, no that, weakness all over the place, and they take advantage. And that’s the way it is, and it’s a very sad thing. We go in. We went into Minneapolis. We saved it. We went in. They knew we were coming into Seattle. We were going in the next day, and they just raised up their hand, and they left.

But this is after weeks and weeks. We have to be asked by the governors, which in all cases are Democrats, in all cases. Top 10 cities, Democrat, for danger. You look at what’s gone on in Chicago. You look at what’s happened in New York now in a short period of time. I love New York, and you look at what they’ve done, the Democrats and what they’ve done, to destroy it. They have some categories of crime up 160 percent. One was up 300 percent. This all happened in a short period of time. We want to draft Rudy Giuliani. Let’s draft Rudy.

Yes.

But he betrayed the Hispanic Americans. Prior to the China virus, the plague that came in from China, we achieved the lowest Hispanic American unemployment rate in the history of our country [crosstalk 00:09:03]. It was six months ago. We’re building it up again. Make America great again. We say now, make America great again again. Make America great again again, because we did it. Now I have to do it again.

I thought that was done. I thought this was going to be easy. This was going to be a very easy election. I still think it is. I think there’s a spirit out there that I’ve never seen, even far beyond what it was four years ago. It’s incredible. I [crosstalk 00:00:09:32]. More than 1.5 million Hispanic Americans were lifted out of poverty during this short period of time. Think of that: 1.5 million lifted out of poverty. That’s a record. Hispanic American home ownership and household income reached all time highs, records, all records.

Everything was a record. And if you look at the numbers, if you look at what’s happening, it’s happening again. We’re in a V. It’s going to be very big. Third quarter numbers will be announced before the election, and I think they’re going to be great. They’re going to be great. I think that GDP is going to … I mean, estimates are from … I heard one from 23 percent to 35 percent, and any one of them would be an all time record worldwide, but that’s what the predictions are. Let’s see what it is, but it’ll come out two days, three days, before the election, which I’m very happy about.

We built the greatest economy in history, and now we’re doing it again. In the past four months, we added 3.3 million Hispanic American jobs. That’s a record also, another record. Joe Biden would terminate our recovery with a crippling nationwide shutdown and a $4 trillion tax hike. He’s looking to raise your taxes very substantially. Max, I’m not sure if you like that. You’ll have to close a few of the gas stations maybe.

You’ll only have 200 instead of 204, but you don’t want to hear about tax hikes, because it’ll crush everything that we’ve built. You can’t do it, and they’re looking for the biggest text in the history of our country. He’ll lay waste to Florida’s economy, just like he ruined Puerto Rico’s economy. In the Senate in 1996, Biden voted for a tax bill that obliterated Puerto Rico’s thriving pharmaceutical industry-

Crowd: (11:24)
Boo.

That was Joe Biden that did that. I didn’t do it. Joe Biden did that. Sleepy Joe. He’s a sleepy guy and sent thousands of jobs to China. A lot of those jobs went to China. That’s what happened. They ended the tax bill. You’re nodding, and you understand exactly. They just cut it, and that was Biden and his friends. I will reverse Biden’s catastrophic decision, and we’ll bring those jobs back to Puerto Rico. That’s going to be happening.

I mean, honestly, Puerto Rico … Because you’ve seen what happens. It’s a little bit like habit. They vote for Democrats, but it’s a mistake, and it’s changed with most Hispanics. I just got the Bay of Pigs award, and I’ve gotten it twice now, twice, and I got the total endorsement of the Cuban population, as you know. They were up two days ago in the White House, and they gave us the endorsement, so we’re doing great with that. But we also announced for Puerto Rico $13 billion in historic disaster relief fund, so this is done by Trump. This is not done by the Democrats, but you have to explain that. And especially to those in the Puerto Rican community living in Florida, we have to explain that to them, because if I don’t get elected, you’re not doing anything with the pharmaceuticals again.

They haven’t even talked about it. They haven’t thought about it, so you’ll explain that. Biden opposes school choice. He vows to ban charter schools, and he opposes Florida’s tax credit scholarship program, which is a big deal. In a second term, I’ll provide school choice to every family in America. We’ll have unlimited school choice. It’s already happening.

Many Latino and Hispanic Americans came here to pursue the American dream, having left countries that they just felt was very, very unsafe. And it’s a very similar ideology. If you look at Venezuela, you look at what’s going on there, and you’ll see some interesting things happening there. You look at that, and you look at what’s going on in other countries … some of you are from those other countries, and you got lucky to get out … but it’s the same kind of thing that you’d see happen here if …

I’ll tell you what. I’m like a wall. You know we’re building the wall on the southern border. It’s almost complete, but I’m like a wall between the American dream … I’ll say this, because it sounds nice, but it’s true. I think Max would agree with it … Between the American dream, I’m a wall, between the American dream and chaos and a horror show, a horror show.

Thank you.

It would be very bad. It would be very bad. Many Latino and Hispanic Americans came here to pursue the American dream, having left countries that, really, had a very, very unruly group of people. We’re throwing out MS-13 all the time. The only ones not afraid is that guy right there. He wouldn’t be afraid of MS-13. He’s the only guy in the room, but they’re rough. They’re bad, and they’re bad people. He’s a great person. They’re bad people, and we throw thousands and thousands out of our country.

And if we didn’t have ICE on these people, we would be living in real fear and real problems. And the funny thing about the southern border, the wall, safety, the people that understand the border better than anybody are the Hispanics. I have had more support when we built the wall, because they don’t want bad people coming into our country. They don’t want people coming into the country that are going to take their jobs, and they understand it better, and I always thought it would be the opposite in a way. They understand what we’ve done on the border. We have stopped it, and you can come into the country, but you have to come in legally. It’s an incredible thing that’s taken place over the last couple of years.

So Biden’s a weak guy, I think. We have a debate coming up. It’ll be interesting. It’s like going into a match, same kind of thing, a little bit less physical, slightly, but to win matches, you need that up here. I don’t care how tough you are. He has guys that are so strong, you can’t even believe it, but this wins probably … It’s 50 percent of it, but I don’t know. What percentage would you … Well, you got to have this too, but the head is what?

Speaker 2: (16:00)
[inaudible 00:15: 59].

What’s the percent?

Speaker 2: (16:03)
80.

80? Okay, I’ll go with 80. That’s a lot. It’s a lot, but it’s true. I’ve seen it. You have guys that you know that if they had the right up here, they would be unbeatable. Is that right? Unbeatable. But it’s great that it’s that way, isn’t it? It’s really great. When he was vice president, he met with Venezuelan dictator Maduro and showered him … Well, that seemed to hit the right …

But Biden met with Maduro. He showered with compliments, imposed the toughest ever sanctions, and just, really, what he’s done to us is just incredible. He’s taken everything. I put sanctions on the likes of which they’ve never seen, and I’ll tell you what. Whether it’s Iran, or whether it’s Venezuela … And they already want to talk. Everybody wants to talk, but I want to wait until after the election, because I say, “Wait.” And a year ago, I said, “You have a choice. We can talk now, or we can talk after the election, but after the election, it’s going to be a – ”

Now or we can talk after the election, but after the election it’s going to be a much tougher deal. And Cuba’s doing very, very badly. Cuba’s doing very badly. That island is, they want to do something, but I’m not doing anything unless I speak with my friends who came up to the White House because they know exactly what they want to do. You have to have freedom. You have to have freedom and we’re going to do that. We’re in a very good position. But Biden met with Madero, and it was all just lovey-dovey and nothing happened, and I imposed the toughest sanctions ever imposed in Latin America. As Senator Biden voted five times to cut funding to freedom fighters in Nicaragua. Anybody here involved with Nicaragua? Yes. He protected the Ortega regime, and we’ve sanctioned them and it’s done a real, I’ll tell you what, we’ve done a real job. All of these countries are going to come, we’re going to make wonderful deals, but we have to wait till after the election.

I told him, I said, ” I want to win.” Now their dream, whether it’s China, Russia, you see the stuff that just came out on Russia? So, we caught them cold [inaudible 00:01:24] we caught them cold. It was a whole conspiracy, and it was the worst thing anyone’s ever seen. It was a take down, and we caught them cold. It was all the opposite. They were the ones conspired. They got caught. Let’s see what happens. Let’s see what happens. We went through three years of crap. Let’s see what happens now. They got caught. Did you see where they were buying insurance policies because they were afraid they were going to get caught? So they were buying insurance policies, FBI agents buying insurance policies for themselves, because they were starting to think, ” This is really bad. We’re going to get caught.”

I mean, it’s not even believable, and there’s more coming out. There’s more coming out. It’s getting deeper and worse and worse. And it was spying on the campaign, but that was the beginning. Then it was a coup, and you never think of this country as a coup. You think of certain South American countries as a coup, but we have them cold. And then it’s an amazing thing that happened. And if the fake news would actually report it properly, it would be incredible.

But they don’t even have to report although I have to tell you CBS did an incredible piece last night. That was an incredible piece. But we got them, we caught them. And it’s a terrible thing for our country. And it was so dishonest and it was exactly the opposite, it was the exact opposite. And they did deal with Russia, in fact, if you look at it, Joe Biden’s son, where’s Hunter? His official name is where’s Hunter? He got three and a half million dollars from the wife of the mayor of Moscow, think of that, three and a half million. His son got three and a half million dollars. And he had nothing until Joe became vice-president. He goes, why? Why? We’re still trying to figure that one out. We’ll figure… You must be from Cuba. Why? But we’ll figure it out. We’re going to get him. But no, it’s a big story, it’s a tremendous story. And on the internet it’s the biggest thing, it’s taken over the internet. Nobody can even believe it. It would be great if the main stream media would do something about it, but they tend not to. But again, I want to commend Katherine Harris of CBS, she did an incredible piece on this.

Can’t believe it. The last administration also surrendered to the Narco terrorists of Columbia. Anybody from Columbia? Well, you know what’s going on there, right? You know what’s going on there. Joe Biden even received the endorsement of Columbian socialist, Gustavo Pedro. Not good, right? Not a good endorsement. A former member of M-19 guerrilla organization, right? No good, right? Good, he knows. Under my administration we work with our Colombian partners to stabilize the regions, which we’ve largely done and launched a historic naval operation against the drug traffickers. And have taken in tons and tons of really bad stuff. The Obama, Biden administrations horrendous Cuba policy betrayed the Cuban people. And enriched Castro’s regime. I ended that and as you know, we ended it very strongly. We ended it.

And we stand with every citizen of Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela in their fight for freedom. This location is called, Little Venezuela, did you know that? There’s so many Venezuelans and they love me because I did a great job with this place. They liked me before already. This is Little Venezuela, it has a tremendous Venezuelan population in the Dural section of Miami. And if you put up a house for sale, they say that if it takes more than two days to sell, you’re doing something wrong. No, it’s true. It’s just a great location and incredible neighbors, incredible people. And I’ve gotten to know them really well because of this and they’re great. And it’s going to work out very well. So we’ve achieved more, I’ve achieved more for the Hispanic Americans. And think of it, I’ve achieved more for Hispanic Americans in 47 months, than Joe Biden has achieved in 47 years. I’ve been here for 47 months.

It’s amazing, 47, 47 but he’s been doing it for 47 years. I always get a kick, I see him, “Well, we should do this. And we should do that.” I said, “You’ve been doing this for 47 years, and now you’re going to do it?” And he’s not exactly primetime, little like a fighter. Someday I’m going to say, “You know, you got to take it easy now, little guy.” Right now he’s prime time but there’ll be a time, it happens. This is not prime time for Joe. He never had too much of a prime time. But I will say this 47 months and 47 years, it’s true, we’ve done more. So what we’re going to do now, we’re going to go around the table a little bit to say a few words. Maybe we can take some questions from the audience if we can, we’ll do it fast. If we go fast, we can take a couple of questions from them. And it’s really great to be here with you. And I appreciate your support. Great to be with you. Okay. Why don’t we start right there? Go ahead, we’ll go fast and we’ll take a couple of questions.

Santiago: (23:56)
Mr President. Good morning Mr President.

Good morning, hi.

Santiago: (24:14)
I’m usually a construction guy, you never see me wearing a suit like this.

I know that, that’s true.

Santiago: (24:18)
Actually true story, I just bought it two days ago, so I hope it looks good. My name is Santiago Solleta, I own a small construction firm in central Florida. We do concrete work, sidewalks, walls for highways, bridges, County work, City work. And really having a company has always been the dream of my life, especially given my background. So I was born in Columbia, in the early 80s, where the violence, it was a terrible… A terrible time, I actually lost my father at the age of seven to the violence. And my mother was a single mother at the time with a five-year old and a seven year old to support us. She did an amazing job. Luckily, we had the great opportunity to come to the United States when I was 15. My brother was 13 years old. We moved to the United States. And out of all the places in the United States that a Latino family, not speaking English, not knowing the culture could have land, we ended up in Mobile, Alabama. Talk about a culture shock, but what a blessing that was, that place, some beautiful people. We ran across some amazing people that supported us along the way. And then from there, I went to the university of Florida and graduated. Graduated with a degree of civil engineering. And then I started working for one of the largest contractors in the US, building roads, light rails highways, but I always had that dream in the back of my mind, of owning my own company. And a few years ago, with my wife, we decided to make the jump and go for it. It was pretty scary, but the economy was so strong that it was the right time. And it’s really rewarding, but it has some tough days. And a lot of times you hear politicians and people talk about, what they do for the small businesses and small businesses are the core of the economy. But in my opinion, Mr. President, what you’ve done with this mold, with the tax cuts for the small businesses, have been the greatest achievement done in years.

Santiago: (26:47)
I tell you why because a lot of people talk but there hasn’t really been tangible change. But the tax cut is real dollars. Real dollars that go into businesses to reinvest. For me, it means having a little extra cash in the bank at the end of the day to give bonuses to my guys, because they deserve it, they deserve more than that, God knows that. So it’s amazing, the tax cuts, it’s amazing for small businesses. So thank you for that, Mr. President, and giving me the ability to grow my business, to take larger projects, to invest in equipment and the people. So thank you for that. And I hope people understand the importance of continuity. We have to keep this fight, we have to keep the tax reform and the help to the small businesses for years to come.

Right. So those tax cuts that help so many businesses, including small businesses, they will be gone if Biden gets it, you know they’re going to wipe you out. So just remember that. And it won’t be the same. You’ll be losing a lot of jobs. So, that’s the way it works, it’s unfortunate. Thank you. Great job, appreciate it. Please.

Erica: (28:11)
Thank you Mr. President. And the opportunity from you and your staff to share during national small business week, my story. My name is Erica Benfield and I’m a Puerto Rican moved state side at just six years old. Like many of us on this panel, we came here for the American dream. That’s not the only start to my story. It goes back one generation back. My grandfather was a prisoner of war in Korea for two years, [inaudible 00:11:47]. And when I saw what you and your administration did in returning the bodies to his comrades and others who couldn’t make it back on their own, it meant a lot to me. We thank them for their service.

Erica: (29:11)
Like my grandfather, my family also taught me great work ethic. And with the moral support of my husband, back in 2008, I started my first brick and mortar business. 2008, you know that year, the crash.

That’s right.

Erica: (29:29)
During the Obama administration, there were hardly any loans for a business like mine. I didn’t qualify, but it was tough, but we did it. I had an intern and myself, and we started in less than 500 square feet. 12 years later, Florida living quarters, FLQ interiors, thanks to you and your administration, qualified for our first SBA loan. That 500 square foot store is now 5,000 square feet. 10 times the size in 12 years.

Wow.

Erica: (30:18)
It doesn’t end there. I signed an exclusivity to sell only American made blinds, shades and shutters. I said no to China. I will not sell Chinese products in my store. Lat year, in one year, we saw 300% growth. When COVID-19 hit, we were the second quarter into our newly expanded showroom, and we had to make tough choices. I still remember the words from Congressman Waltz, keep pushing, the second wave of PPP is coming. And thanks to you and your administration, we qualified not only for the PPP loan, but also for the SBA loan forgiveness for six months.

Erica: (31:27)
True story. It saved every job, even our intern from the local college. Mr. President, I want to thank you personally because I feel that you’ve done more than what you promised. You say promises made, promises kept, but you did more than that for a business like mine. But it doesn’t end there. Like you, in 2016, I ran for office for the first time and was elected as the first Latina, Hispanic elected official in the city of De Berry.

Erica: (32:21)
Not one business has permanently closed in our city. And I believe that because we have kept taxes low, we have the lowest crime rate in the state of Florida and our people help each other. Under the leadership of governor DeSantis, we are investing and bringing more people to Florida. I’m not a polished politician, I’m probably more nervous than anyone up here on this panel, because it’s only been four years, but you do a really good job, Mr. President. I invite you to visit De Berry and Volusia County again, the home of NASCAR. And let me tell you, the beast makes one hell of a pace car. Because I was there, I don’t like heights and I strapped in my seat and it was there for that beautiful patriotic moment, high up in the bleachers, bringing you into our County.

Erica: (33:20)
I hope you can remember me and my story, because I will never forget this day. And the opportunity to thank you in person. And by the way, today is my 16 year old son’s birthday, Connor. And I asked you to wish him a happy birthday because he’s sharing his mom in an effort like you, to keep America great again.

Great job, thank you. Great job, thank you very much. Please.

Great job. Thank you very much. Please.

Juan: (34:04)
Good morning, Mr. President. It’s a great pleasure to see you here in sunny Florida. My name is Juan [Vere 00:00:12], I am electrical engineer. I run a company here in this beautiful state. We work worldwide, actually, worked on 45 countries from here. We also have operations in Chile, Colombia, and Mexico. I have to say first, that our company really, received a wonderful help you see, from the central government. It was not promises, it was true. Actually the PPP program, the SBA program is helped us a lot to keep our employees. And actually, we keep all our employees and we’ll keep them if you are staying up, let me say that.

Juan: (34:59)
I have to say also that as Colombian, I am American Columbian citizen, I was deputy secretary of energy in Colombia, and I had the privilege to work directly with the president [foreign language 00:35:14], that he’s unfairly under house arrest. Actually, I want to mention that, because Colombia’s a beautiful country, you already mentioned that, and we need you to help the country, to avoid being taken into communism. I want to say also, that I am the president of the Colombian-American Chamber of Commerce, here in Miami. And all the companies that we support, which are established here, have been also helped a lot by the government. The government that you are presiding and thanks to your help, thanks to your determination here, with the small businesses. Really all of them are doing, I would say, pretty well. I haven’t seen none of them really going crashed.

Juan: (36:07)
And finally, I want to say, that I cooperate with the Department of Commerce, in particular with the DEC, which is the District Expert Council. I’m a member of the director board there, and I can see, and I kind of say both, that actually, they are helping a lot, American companies to survive. So, Mr. President, we are extremely grateful, because thanks to your administration, we are doing fine.

Juan: (36:39)
Now, we need you to be four more years here. And not only for America, for the beautiful country, for our country, but also, because you are the wall against the communism, perhaps in the rest of Latin America. Mr. President, thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

Juan: (37:02)
And please, win this win again. [inaudible 00:00:37:06].

Thank you very much. I used to say, and I meant it, but I didn’t know it had such meaning, that we could be a Venezuela too. Venezuela 15 years ago, was a very wealthy country and a very, very wealthy country, prosperous, talked about all over the world, one of the wealthiest and just looked like it had a tremendous future. And then all of a sudden, they went with a different ideology and right, now we send water, we send food, they don’t have anything. They don’t have medicine, they don’t have … they literally don’t have water and they have oil, so it’s not just the oil. I mean, they haven’t done anything right with the oil. They don’t know what is happening in that country. That country is a total disaster. It could happen. It could happen, because if you look at some of these people that you see with the storefronts and breaking down and the riots and everything that’s going on, it’s the same ideology.

That’s what happened with the Venezuela. One day it was gone, it was just gone. And so, it could happen here. This would be a Venezuela on a major steroid. Okay, this would be a Venezuela, that would be a very large version of it, but it could happen. And a year ago, I started saying that two years ago, it could happen because I’d see the thinking. I’d see some of this thinking and I say, “That could actually happen. That could actually happen.” But we’re not going to let it happen. Doesn’t happen, with me it doesn’t happen. You put the wrong people in office, it could happen. It could happen rapidly. Okay, let’s go. Claudia.

Claudia: (38:45)
Thank you, Mr. President, it’s a real pleasure to be here with you today and this wonderful panel. My name is Claudia [Riga 00:00:38:53], I’m from Honduras.

Good.

Claudia: (38:56)
I moved to this country, the land of the free, as you call it, 18 years ago, 2002. And I married a wonderful man, have two wonderful kids and we both had a background in manufacturing. So we decided to start a business here in the United States and also in Honduras. We did both. But in 2015, when you started running for president, and you started promoting the Made in USA and Made in USA was like, this is the moment, it’s coming. So we decided to start … take the risk and do some investment here and buying some equipment and taking advantage of that [inaudible 00:39:44] that we had in buying equipment. That helped us a lot, because we thought it was the right moment to move and start investing, like in high equipment, because what we’re doing is printing fabrics and in clothing. Our business name is, [the Signers 00:06:02] manufacturer, we created that business back in 2016.

Claudia: (40:07)
So we started bringing more equipment, getting ready for what is coming. And now, after your three years, almost four years of residency, we noticed how everything is coming back right now, how businesses were booming, even right now, with all these problems that we have with the COVID. We noticed how many factories and business are calling us, that they want to bring their business back to America. They said, “We don’t want to made in China, we want to …” Yes. This was something that we were serious, not every day, but every week Mr. President, we received calls from different companies that they want to say, “We want our products made in USA. We don’t care if we have to pay more, but we want to manufacture here.”

Claudia: (40:55)
So, that’s why we took the chance. And we said, “Okay, let’s add manufacturing. Let’s add sewing, let’s add cutting.” So we added more to our businesses, and now, it’s so much business that we’re be getting from overseas and also local business that we don’t have enough … We have more demand than we can to hire people, like we’re lack of personnel right now. We need more people, because in this business that we have right now which is manufacturing, this business was gone long ago. In the eighties, when all this CAFTA and NAFTA, and all these agreements. All these business were lost. Everything left, and so the people that we need right now, need the training because nobody knows how to do this. Nobody knows how to do the sewing, the cutting, all the integral part that we need. So, we’re trying to train people now, but we’re willing to do it because some of demand that we have right now, that we’re willing to do that and Made in America is excellent. Thank you very much Mr. President.

Well, a very big thing, because you mentioned it, but we terminated one of the worst trade deals ever made anywhere, I guess, NAFTA. And we now have USMCA, Mexico, Canada. And it’s a fantastic deal, you’ll see that. It just kicked in and everyone said that couldn’t be done, there’s no way to get rid of the NAFTA deal. It was a terrible deal. We lost so much business to Mexico and so much business to Canada. And I was able to get that done. We got it actually passed and it’s, USMCA is now the deal and it’s great for our country and it’s going to keep our businesses in our country. And it was a great achievement. Please go ahead.

Carla Salvatiras: (42:40)
Is it on? Can you hear me? Yeah, okay. First I want to say it this, an incredible honor to here today and thank you for listening to my story. I want to thank also Latinos for Trump, for what they’re doing in the state of Florida. There’s a big movement in Florida. We’re all for you. And we’re working hard to bring the Latino vote, and to win Latino vote in the state of Florida. So I want to thank you for listening to my story. My name is Carla [Salvatiras 00:43:32] . I came from Nicaragua in 1987, I was 16 years old. I came with two sisters, no parents, with nothing other than the dream, to build an American dream and to escape communism and the fear of everything we lost. I saw my country change in a few years. When people say it’s not going to happen, or it would take forever to change, that’s not the reality. It happens quick. I saw it coming, I am very involved in, and I volunteer for Latinos for Trump because I see it, I lived it. Nobody can tell me the story, I lived the experience.

When I came to United States, I didn’t speak the language. I started from the bottom, I worked at Burger King, Winn-Dixie. I lived in Miami for about seven years, then I relocated to Orlando, Florida, where I obtained my real estate license in 1995. I went into the timeshare industry and I worked in the industry for 15 years. I held different positions, from sales to trainer to director. And in 2009, I decided to join my husband’s company, a tax and accounting tax, [Taxom Inc. 00:45:10]. And at the same time, started doing general real estate. And personally, this year, I’m building, I’m developing homes and I’m still accounting for it.

Two years ago, we decided to go into a partnership in a restaurant, a small family-owned Italian restaurant in Orlando. The restaurant was thriving, economy was amazing. A lot of our business things from the tourism industry, timeshare hotels. And in the last few years, since you’ve been the president, has been the best few years in our business. And when COVID hit, our restaurant suffered, we were forced to shut down. But thanks to your brilliant idea, to help small businesses with the PPP program, we were able to keep all our employees and find ways to make our business grow locally, without depending on the tourism industry, and we were able to keep all our employees. Our business is doing well today.

Great.

And we are, hopefully we know that with you as our precedent for the next four years, we’re going to do 10 times better than we did before.

Thank you. That’s great.

I have four children. One is a veteran in the Navy. One’s a veteran from the air force. One is active duty in the Navy, stationed in Virginia. And I have, my youngest is a school teacher. She teaches US history and civics. I want to thank you for what you do for our military. I [inaudible 00:47:21]

Thank you.

Our teachers, our police officers, our first respondents. You care, and it means a lot to me.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

I also want to thank you for what you’ve done for Israel. I converted to Judaism six years ago. Israel means the world to me, and you’ve done more for Israel than any other president. And I can’t think of anyone better than you to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. For Latin community.

Thank you very much. Congratulations. It’s a beautiful job and the restaurant will be open and you’ll be very successful with it, very soon. It’s coming back very rapidly. Thank you very much.

Thank you Mr. President.

Okay, please.

Hiram Turil: (48:43)
[foreign language 00:48:47]. Good morning Mr. President.

Nice to see you.

Thank you for hosting this round table. My name is Hiram [Turil 00:48:53]. I’m a former banker from San Juan, Puerto Rico. I’ve been living in central Florida for the last 20 years. I have five children, I have four grandkids. I run a family business, which is [El Sian Trio 00:00:49:08] restaurant. That I opened it with my wife Diane, that is just, on the audience today. El Sian Trio, was created out of a [inaudible 00:49:18]. When I was in corporate America, I used to go out to lunch and I couldn’t find the great taste from my country, from Puerto Rico. So we decided through open in 2017, our first location, in Kissimmee, Florida. And with the success of our first location that we opened in the heart of Orlando, our second location, three miles from the airport. So, we have 60 employees and have been able to keep them because of the PPP program. Thank you very much, Mr. President.

Once we arrived to open, we quickly to pivot to create family meals and create a partnership with delivery companies like Uber eats and DoorDash, and happy to share that. That part of our business has grown by 50%. So the Care Act is critical for keeping our economy afloat. Thank you, Mr. President, for keeping our small business top of mind.

Last but not least, Mr. President, my heart is with my beloved island of Puerto Rico. Although I don’t reside there, but my parents, my dad is a Navy veteran, he was a coast guard veteran too. I wanted to thank you for providing billions of aid and strong support to help Puerto Rico recover from devastating natural disasters and to review the infrastructure. So thank you, from the bottom of my heart.

Thank you. Great job.

Also, Mr. President for bringing back pharmaceutical manufacturing in Puerto Rico. That meant a lot to us. I-

That meant a lot to us. I remember when I was in banking, I used to be on that department manufacturing and that hurts a lot the economy. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. President.

We’ll take care of it. Thank you very much. Great job.

Carolina Ferreiro: (51:27)
Thank you, Mr. President. My name is Carolina Ferreiro, and I came from Havana, Cuba, 36 years ago. I came at the age of six with my parents and my little sister fleeing, obviously, the horrible Castro regime. This country is where that gave us the freedom that we wanted to thrive. It’s where our family grew our faith and we dreamed of a better generation to come. Our family business is Pharma Natural. We make the best vitamins in America here in Miami Lakes, Florida. And this year, with the Care Act… I mean, with the acts… Sorry, with the tax cuts and the job acts, we were able to expand, give back to our employees, add jobs, but then COVID came, and everything was uncertain. But with your quick actions and your awesome leadership, Mr. President, we were able to get PPP and saved many, many jobs. As a result, we answered your call when you said to the private sector, “Help.” So we stopped making some vitamins, and we started making some hand sanitizers for our first responders.

Carolina Ferreiro: (52:48)
Although we manufacture here in the USA and made in USA, we still, for the last 18 years, our company has depended on China for the components and for soft gels and gummies. This year, we’re taking the leap and we’re expanding operations, and we’re bringing gummies and soft gels to our manufacturing facilities so we no longer can depend on China. Thank you, Mr. President.

Thank you. Thank you. Great job.

Fabio Andretti: (53:25)
Good morning, Mr. President. I am honored and humbled to be a part of this very distinguished table, especially with all our guests. I know Cubans told Venezuelans, “Be careful with Maduro” Venezuelans and now Cuban Americans are telling Colombians, “Be careful with Pedro.” We hear you. We hear you. My name is Fabio Andretti. I’m a Colombian American, and I’m a [Ulista 00:53:50], a true believer like many Columbian Americans in Florida of former President Libe who is the wall in Columbia to start [inaudible 00:54:01]. That has been trying to take over our country and is moving to the United States.

We appreciate and want to thank Vice President Pence for his support to Libe by tweeting that he should be able to defend himself in freedom. There is a real threat in Columbia with the leftist senators and terrorists that are in Congress, especially Pedro, an ally of Maduro. Not only is he supporting Biden, but he also has people in Miami that are participating in demonstrations asking for votes for Biden and he’s constantly attacking those who try to support your reelection, Mr. President, for four more years. In addition, former President Juan Manuel Santos [inaudible 00:54:51]. In the so called peace process that was supported by Obama-Biden administration, is calling for the demonstrations and unrest to weaken President Tuke’s government. Santos has a US Visa. He lives here. Now for the business matter at hand, I have… Many others have Visas here but should not be here, but anyway, now the business matter at hand.

I’ve been in the commercial airline business for 30 years and I’ve been able to have my dream to work in the aviation industry in New York, California, and now here in Florida. I was assisted by the PPP program, not only to save my job, but many others in our community. I have a not-for-profit organization, America’s Business Network, that we were able to assist 107 companies and many more people received that assistance, Mr. President. When they knew I was coming for this meeting, they wanted to say thank you, and I’m the voice for them to say thank you because you really are surviving small businesses in our community and thank you very much.

Talking about latino interpretation, Hispanic interpretation, there’s two men in this forum that have acquired a home-based airline that filed for chapter 7, Miami Air, that services is the Department of Defense and have laid off 350 people here in Miami. We’re working in due diligence with the Department of Transportation, with the FAA, and the Treasury to get the 350 employees back to work. We already hired 30, our first plane come in at the end of this month and six more to come very quickly after that. Mr. President, the airline CARES Act as an aviation person is key to the industry, but it’s key here in South Florida for Miami to bring those employees back to work and continue to serve as the Department of Defense.

Mr. President, Colombian Americans in Florida have been working closely with the county census chairman commissioner [inaudible 00:06:07]. To count the estimated 1 million Colombians in Florida, of which, Mr. President, 50% are US citizens in an issue based borders who do not want the leftist socialist government in the United States. Our business people that are here with us today also are very grateful and very optimistic, Mr. President, with the reassuring program in the Americas Crisis program to support the companies here in Florida as well and our allies like Panama and Colombia. It’s an excellent program and let me congratulate you sir. We are looking forward to see implementation and partner up to assist those projects of the reassuring program.

Those tricky issues about Colombians, Mr. President, Colombian American, is key to mobilize the community and they are out there working and we are going to get you reelected for four more years, Mr. President, no doubt. This is a hat made by Colombian artisans. As you see, it’s Trump 2020. This is a symbol out there that we’re working for you in the campaign in getting you reelected. This is made by hand. It can be folded. You can put it in your pocket. It folds back again. We would be honored if you accept it, Mr. President, and Trump four more years. Four more years.

So four years ago, we were elected. I didn’t think it was a surprise because I saw the crowds. I saw the spirit. We had tremendous spirit, incredible spirit, actually. And it was something special. That was the most exciting night, that beautiful November evening, right? And I actually think now, and I used to say, “Well, that was really important,” but this one’s going to be equal. It’s really not. This is going to be a more important election. And I think it’s going to be an even bigger victory. And when we’re talking about bringing the country together and we were doing that because people were calling, we were so successful. I mean, even now you have all these records for Hispanic Americans, Latinos, all records.

We have tremendous records, but just before the plague came in from China, they should have stopped it. They should have stopped it, but just before it came in, people were calling me. Democrats were calling. They wanted to get together. It was happening because we had the best job numbers. We had the best businesses. We had the best everything. We’ve rebuilt our military. By the way, our vets are in great shape. Now our vets are fantastic. So we did things that nobody ever thought were possible. And dd it pretty quickly over a period of three years and nobody’s done what we’ve done in three years, three and a half years. But then the plague came in and we had to close it up and we had to rebuild it and we saved millions of lives by closing it, but now we’re rebuilding it. It’s going much faster than before, but I can tell you, it was all coming together.

Donald Trump: (01:00:32)
People say, “How do you get them together?” I said, “Success.” We were there. It was all happening. And then China’s sent us the plague, but it was all happening. And now it’s happening again. And that’s exactly what we’re doing, but I just want to thank this community. I want to thank so many of the champions. You have some great, great people out in the audience, friends of mine, a lot of friends of mine. And somebody I have great respect for, because I respect when somebody is the best at what they do. I want to thank Jorge Masvidal [crosstalk 01:01:06]. When is your next fight Jorge? Your next fight is a biggie, when is that?

Jorge Masvidal: (01:01:02)
December or January, we’re working on it.

Donald Trump: (01:01:15)
We’re working. Get plenty of money. Okay, get plenty of money, but definitely have it because I want to watch it, okay. We’ll be watching, we’ll be rooting for you. But thank you for being here Jorge. You’re really a great champ. You’re great at what you do and it’s right up here too. Don’t let anyone ever think it isn’t. But I want to thank everybody for being here, and Max, thank you very much. Great job you’ve done. Great job. We will go on. We’re going to win. We’re going to have four great years. I think it’s going to be. I think next year is going to be one of the best years we’ve ever had. And I will never forget our Hispanic American community. It’s just been with me even even four years ago it was. We did very well and with the Cubans, we were in 90%. I don’t know, is it possible to be at 100%? But we’ve always done well, but now it’s really reached a new level. I will never forget you. And I want to thank you all for being here. Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you.

Donald Trump ‘Latinos for Trump’ Roundtable Event Transcript September 25

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