Donald Trump Speaks During UAW Strike Transcript

(singing)

(01:30)
Thank you. Thank you very much. This is great. We’re in this room where we wanted to keep it small. Outside we have thousands and thousands of people. Have you seen what’s going on out there? But I’m thrilled to be back with the workers, UAW members, and proud patriots of the great state of Michigan. Great state, great people. Here in Michigan, across the country tonight, there are countless thousands of auto workers and skilled tradesmen worried about the future and what the future holds for themselves and for their incredible families.

(02:09)
I want to begin this evening by saluting these truly great Americans who do not get the credit they deserve. They don’t get the credit they deserve. Now they want to go all electric and put you all out of business. You know that, right? To the welders, assembly line workers, machine operators, forklift drivers, pipe fitters, tool and die makers, mechanics, electricians, technicians, and journeymen, we love being with you, and we love being with you right in your environment. You built this country. You love this country, and you are the ones that make our country run. You know that, right?

(02:52)
Before I stepped into the political arena seven years ago, I spent my whole life working alongside of Americans just like you, spent a lot of time with you. You just don’t know that, but I spent a lot of time with you and people just like you. Now I put everything on the line to fight for you. I’ve risked it all to defend working class from the corrupt political class that has spent decades sucking the life, wealth, and blood out of this country.

(03:25)
That’s why I’m here tonight to lay out a vision for a revival of economic nationalism and our automobile manufacturing lifeblood, which they’re sucking out of our country. I want a future that protects American labor, not foreign labor, a future that puts American dreams over foreign profits, and a future that raises American wages, that strengthens American industry, that builds national pride, and that defends this country’s dignity, not squanders it all to build up foreign countries that hate us.

(04:08)
You know where they are. They’re located all over the world, but they’re mostly on the other side of the world. We don’t want that. Under crooked Joe Biden, you have none of this. You have none of the things we want. Instead of economic nationalism, you have ultra left-wing globalism. They hate our country, and the workers of America are getting, to put it very nicely, screwed. You’re getting screwed.

(04:36)
Yesterday, Joe Biden came to Michigan to pose for photos at the picket line, but it’s his policies that send Michigan auto workers to the unemployment line. He only came after I announced that I would be here. He announced quite a bit later. Spoke for a few seconds. Did you notice he spoke for what? A few seconds. He had absolutely no idea what he was saying. He didn’t know where he was.

(05:07)
He didn’t know where he was. He didn’t know what he was saying. “Where am I?” He’s saying, “Where am I?” “Oh, you’re in Michigan.” “Oh, that’s great. What do they do in Michigan? They grow wheat in Michigan,” he said. “Don’t they grow wheat?” No, that’s Iowa and other places.

(05:24)
Biden’s cruel and ridiculous electrical … Think of this. He wants electric vehicle mandates that will spell the death of the US auto industry. It doesn’t matter. I watch it. You’re negotiating a contract. You’re all on picket lines and everything, but it doesn’t make a damn bit of difference what you get because in two years you’re all going to be out of business. You’re not getting anything.

(05:48)
What they’re doing to the auto industry in Michigan and throughout the country is absolutely horrible and ridiculous. Hundreds of thousands of American jobs, your jobs, will be gone forever because crooked Joe Biden is selling out, but I don’t think it’s him. I don’t think he actually knows what the hell he’s doing. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. It’s not his fault. Let’s not blame him. But he’s surrounded with radical left Marxists and crazy people, fascists, bad people.

(06:19)
He’s selling you out to China. He’s selling you out to the environmental extremists on the radical left. People have no idea how bad this is going to be also for the environment. Those batteries, when they get rid of them and lots of bad things happen. When they’re digging it out of the ground to make those batteries, it’s going to be very bad for the environment. You can be loyal to American labor or you can be loyal to the environmental lunatics, but you can’t really be loyal to both. It’s one or the other, and they understand that.

(06:50)
The Democrat Party has no idea what they’re doing right now. They have no idea what to do. Crooked Joe is siding with the left-wing crazies who will destroy automobile manufacturing and will destroy our country itself. They’re destroying our country. You look at that at the border. We had the safest border in history. Now you look at what’s happening. It’s just a horror show. I side with the Auto Workers of America and with those who want to make America great again, and I always will.

(07:25)
I don’t get one thing. I don’t get why Ford and GM, why these car makers aren’t fighting for to make cars that are going to sell, to make cars that are going to be able to go on long distances. They immediately give up. I see it with the oil companies, too. They’re promoting windmills, which don’t work, by the way. They don’t work. They want windmills all over the place. It’s like they’re told what to do, and they go against their industry. They’re either stupid or they’re gutless. But why do they concede so fast?

(07:54)
This plant, we just walked through this plant, and the electric vehicles are going to put them out of business. They don’t need any of this. The things that you make in Michigan, they don’t need any of it. Why is it that these big powerful car companies with guys that are making 35 million a year immediately quit? They say, “You want electric vehicles. We’ll give it to you,” when the damn things don’t go far enough, and they’re too expensive.

(08:20)
I’m not in that business, but I know a lot about it. They don’t go far enough, and they’re too expensive. A vote for crooked Joe means the future of the auto industry will be made in China. That’s what it’s going to be. That’s where they’re made. My pledge to every auto maker is this. A vote for President Trump means the future of the automobile will be made in America where it should be. Made in America.

USA. USA. USA. USA. USA. USA. USA. USA.

It will be fueled by American energy. It will be sourced by American suppliers. It will be sculpted from American iron, aluminum, and steel, and it will be built by highly skilled American hands and high-wage American labor. That’s what’s going to happen. It’s going to happen. We’ll do it first day in office. First day in office. It’ll be signed out first day in office. What they’re doing to our country is horrible. What they’re doing to the auto workers of this country just doesn’t make sense.

(09:35)
I saved American auto manufacturing, you know that, in my first term, and I’ll save it again. We did great. We did everything to keep those jobs going. We’ll save it again in our second term. Unfortunately, that’s what we had to do because things happened during the election that you know about, happened right here in this state, also. We will make it bigger, better, and stronger than ever before. That’s what we’re going to do.

(10:00)
But we want to talk about it. But we talk and we keep talking, but we don’t want to talk too much. But before we do talk about the current UAW strike that we’ve been hearing about, and I see people really with mixed emotions because you’re striking for wages, but you know your job’s only going to be here for two years or three years, if you’re lucky. How will we rescue the auto manufacturing in the United States?

(10:31)
Let’s remember. You got to remember how we got here. For decades and decades, and I’ve been talking about this subject for 12 years long before I ever thought of becoming a politician. How good was that? That’s a lot of fun. I could have the easiest, nicest life, Al. I would have had the nicest, softest life. Instead, I have to beat these lunatics up all day long, every day, every day, lunatics.

(10:59)
I never heard of the word, indictment. Now I get indicted like every three days. “He spoke badly about the election. He must be indicted.” “He said something bad about Joe Biden.” Joe Biden is the most corrupt president and most incompetent president we’ve ever had. Oh, no, no, I shouldn’t have said that. I’m going to get indicted again for saying that. For decades, you’ve watched rotten and crooked politicians, like Biden, treat American jobs as disposable and American workers as expendable.

(11:33)
They sat back and got rich by taking bribes to let other countries rape and pillage our jobs and our wealth. That’s what happened. Joe Biden claims to be the most pro-union president in history. Nonsense. Think of it. His entire career, just think of it. His entire career has been an act of economic treason and union destruction. He’s destroyed unions, shipping millions of American jobs overseas while personally taking money from foreign nations hand over fist.

(12:06)
Look at the money he got from China. Look at what’s coming out, China. Crooked Joe backed NAFTA. He backed China’s entry into the World Trade Organization. He backed the horrendous Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would have destroyed the American auto industry had I not stopped it. Do you remember when I stopped it? You guys were gone. You were gone. That was a done deal. In fact, during the debate, I got beautiful Hillary Clinton … I don’t call her crooked because I only use that name for Biden now, so I call her beautiful.

(12:38)
She’s a beautiful woman. Beautiful Hillary Clinton, to change her position on TPP. They were trying to pull a fast one on you, so she actually changed her position during the campaign, but she would have changed it back had that been a different result. But, thank goodness, it wasn’t because we made things and did things that nobody believed possible, nobody believed possible.

(13:02)
Biden also backed a gentleman, name is Barack Hussein Obama. Have you ever heard of him and his atrocious Korean trade deal? You’ve heard of him. Crooked Joe backed every single blood-sucking, globalist attack on US auto workers. You’ve been attacked for a long time. Those attacks all stopped for four years with us. They were getting so strong, and you were getting so strong. They were building plants here again. Now the plants are going back to Mexico, and they’re going back to China.

(13:35)
He’s coming back. They’re coming back for more. I don’t know that he’s going to make it to the starting gate, but let’s assume he does. If it’s not him, it’ll be somebody else with the same ideas because that’s the ideas they have. They’re very destructive for our country. But we will stop him. Hopefully, your leaders at United Auto Workers will endorse Donald Trump because standard history for years and decades and years and years and years, they always endorse a Democrat.

(14:09)
It’s almost like an automatic reflex. There’s no reason for it, but it’s a habit. It’s a bad habit. It hasn’t worked because, look, you’ve lost 38% of your industry over the period of 25 years. Much of it’s gone to Mexico. We don’t talk about Mexico. Much of it’s gone to Mexico. They make plants in Mexico. A friend of mine, a great supporter, but a great gentleman who builds plants, that’s what he builds, auto plants, he said to me the other day, “You got to see the plants we’re building in Mexico.”

(14:38)
I said, “Well, how do they compare to the US?” He said, “Not even a contest.” And I said, “Isn’t that a shame?” You remember what I did? I said, “You don’t give us protection at our border, I’m going to charge you a tariff for 25%. We want 28,000 soldiers on our border.” We had the safest border in the history of our country. Now we have the worst border in the history of the world, by the way.

(15:02)
After NAFTA, the United States lost nearly four million manufacturing jobs and almost one in three auto jobs. Joe Biden voted on that. He gave you that. Nearly a quarter of a million jobs were destroyed here in Michigan alone, including 40% of all auto jobs. Think of that. In fact, I had to check this number because it’s inconceivable, you would think. 60,000 factories closed and went overseas. Can you imagine 60,000? Now, who would think that?

(15:35)
When I first saw that number, I said, “Oh, somebody made a typographical error. Maybe it was 600 factories.” Could have been 6,000, but that sounded too high. 60,000. The good news is if the number is wrong, the fake news will be checking it out. I mean I have to give you the right numbers. Otherwise, the fake news is out there.

(15:56)
Crooked Joe and his payday with the Biden family, they raked in millions and millions of dollars. You see what’s going on. The news doesn’t really report it. Very little news reports it. But it was the men and women who got … Every single day, they got up and came back home with grease in their hands, and they were the ones that paid the price. They paid a big, big price.

(16:19)
The only time Joe Biden has ever gotten his hands dirty is when he’s taking cash from foreign countries, which is quite often, actually. It’s quite often. Based on what we’re seeing, it’s much more often than anyone would have thought. But can you imagine an unannounced raid on his many homes? He would have made Senator Menendez look like a baby, just like a baby. Can you imagine?

(16:41)
They gave him three weeks’ notice. They said, “We’re going to raid your home over documents.” They gave him three weeks. Would three weeks be enough? I can imagine. I’d like to see what he cleaned out of there. Joe Biden only cares about enriching his own family. I care about enriching your family. That’s why I did this. That’s why I did it. I’m working for you, not for me. That is for sure. I always will. I will always have your back. I promise you that. I will always have your back.

(17:12)
When I came into office, the auto industry was on its knees, gasping its last breaths after eight long years of Obama and Biden. But you finally got a president who stood up to the … You got to understand, I stood up to people that hate you. They hate you or they maybe hate our country. But I stood up for you. I stood up for the auto workers and stood up for the great state of Michigan like nobody’s ever stood up before.

(17:46)
Just as I promised, I withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership my very first week. Do you remember 2016 when we won Michigan? Michigan hadn’t been won in decades, and everybody said, “Aw.”

And then, we did much better in 2020. I mean, I hate to tell you, we did much better. But we’re going to swamp them. We’re going to swamp them. We actually did much better, including in Michigan. I ended Obama’s war on American energy, he had a war on American energy, gasoline prices plummeted and soon reached $1 and 87 cents a gallon. How does that sound? Now you know it’s over 5 and 6 and even $7 a gallon in some places, and it’s going up higher and higher and higher. And I think they want that. That way you go all electric so you can drive for 15 minutes before you have to get a charge.

(18:40)
The economy boomed. The household incomes rose by more than $6,000 a year, which was a record, 6,000 a year during my term, a year. I ended the disaster known as NAFTA, the worst trade deal ever made and replaced it with the brand new USMCA, Mexico, Canada. That’s the best trade deal ever made, they say, in our country’s history. I think the deal we made with China is even better. But unfortunately with COVID, I don’t even talk about that one. But we made a lot of good deals with Japan, with South Korea, with many, many countries. We took bad deals and made them good deals. It was so bad, I used to ask my people, “Who made these deals? Why did they do it? Who made them?” They were so bad just on their face.

(19:21)
With the USMCA 75% of every car under that deal must be made in North America. In other words, they have to make 75% of the car in North America, whoever heard of that? And a massive portion must be made by high-wage labor, which means American labor, you’re high wage. Back in 2008, Biden and Obama promised you that they’d renegotiate NAFTA, but in eight years they never lifted a finger. They never changed a thing.

(19:49)
NAFTA was so bad that when it was negotiated long time ago, decades ago, they made typographical errors like in numbers, and they were bad typographic. They were bad for us. Nobody went back to change them. They were typographical errors and we lived with it for decades with these errors. Can you imagine that? Normally that happens, you do that in deals too, and you go back the following day, say, “They made a mistake. We’re renegotiating this deal. I don’t care if it’s signed or not.” And people have to do that, legally they have to do that, if there’s an error.

(20:21)
They made typographical errors. They made errors. Maybe they weren’t so typographical, probably the other side made them imperfect, actually they probably made them. But they made these errors and they never corrected them for years, for decades. But I corrected them. You know how I did it? By terminating it, terminating the whole damn deal.

(20:40)
And I know how good the USMCA deal is because Canada, as you know, and Mexico, are trying like hell to renegotiate it. They want to renegotiate that deal. But in less than two years, I got that done, the USMCA and many other deals. I also renegotiated Obama’s Korea trade deal to fully restore your protective tariff on foreign pickup trucks. They wanted to change it. The Democrats wanted it to expire and so did South Korea, badly. They didn’t want it. And without that, you wouldn’t even have a truck industry. Right now, it’s probably the strongest part of your industry. Without that, you wouldn’t have an industry. So, it’s something I was very proud to do. It was not easy, but we got it done and we got it done properly.

(21:23)
Michigan jobs would’ve been exported while millions and millions of foreign cars would’ve flooded American streets. That’s what would’ve happened. Obama and Biden didn’t care one bit, but I did and I stopped it and I stopped it cold. I took on communist China like no administration in history. No administration in history did what I’ve done, bringing in hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into our treasury when no other president had gotten literally 10 cents.

(21:56)
And I also got $28 billion for our great farmers. You know that, right? Our farmers. That’s why I say, you think I’m going to do badly in Iowa or Nebraska, Wisconsin, any of our farm areas? I say, I don’t want to be too cocky, I just got very good polls from all those places.

Be cocky. [inaudible 00:22:13].

From everywhere. She says, “Be cocky. That’s okay.” But who else would’ve done that? $28 billion. I said to the Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Perdue, I said, “Sonny, how bad have they treated us?” “28 billion over a period of about five years.” I said, “They’re going to pay it back.” And they paid it back. They paid it back.

(22:36)
And then perhaps my greatest unsung achievement, I kept Chinese cars the hell out of America. Is that okay with you? Is that okay? UAW, is that okay? And a lot of people don’t know this, but I imposed a whopping 27.5% tariff and tax on all Chinese automobiles coming into our country. And this magnificent tariff, they can’t get it off because they make so much money with it. And by the way, if they took it off, you’d be out of business right away. They want to take it off. They’re trying to take it off. But it’s so good, it’s so powerful, it’s so strong. But they would take over your industry totally. But it remains in place to this day. Not because they wanted to, but because they have no choice.

(23:24)
And it’s no exaggeration to state that the Trump presidency and the deftly used and applied Trump tariffs and taxes saved the American auto industry from extinction time and time again. And we’re going to do a version of it that’s going to make you bigger and better and stronger. It’s not even going to be a contest with where you are right now. But crooked Joe Biden is back like a wretched old vulture trying to finish off his prey. Can you believe it?

[inaudible 00:24:00].

I don’t know. I just don’t know. I see some of these things that are happening. I say, I wonder if he has any idea that this stuff is happening? Biden’s job killing EV mandate has dictated that nearly 70% of all cars sold in the United States must be fully electric less than 10 years from now. Do you believe that? These are built specifically for people that want to take very short trips, okay? Hop in the car, “Darling, let’s drive down to the store and let’s drive back.” Oh, it’s crazy. It’s crazy.

(24:33)
They say the happiest day when you buy an electric car is the first 10 minutes you’re driving it and then after that, panic sets in because you’re worried, “Where the hell am I going to get a charge to keep this thing going?” Now, panic. They get panicked. Despite colossal government subsidies Ford alone is projecting to lose an astonishing $4.5 billion on electric vehicles. Why are they agreeing to this? This is what I don’t understand. Why are they agreeing to it? Why does Ford and … Why are they all agreeing to this? The cars aren’t selling. They got them all over the place. You can buy them for peanuts. Why are they not fighting and saying, “It doesn’t work.”?

(25:12)
How about the trucks? The trucks go for one fifth of a … You take a power belt or one of the good brands, they go for just a small amount of time compared to a diesel-fired truck. Diesel-fired. You’re not even allowed to say the word, “Diesel-fire, oh, that’s bad for the environment.” No, bad for the environment is having trucks all over the place that don’t go.

(25:36)
But on the electric vehicles this year to comply with the mandate is 60,000 loss. They’re going to lose $60,000 for every car produced. That sounds like a great deal. But honestly, for UAW and for auto workers and for everybody and for the country, it’s not sustainable. So, they may try and do it and I don’t know, they’re trying to do something for the environment. By the way, that’s worse for the environment than what we’re talking about. Much worse.

(26:02)
Think of it. They’re going to lose $60,000 a car. So, when are they going to come to you and say, “Listen, we can’t do this anymore.”? They’re going to come to your head man, Shawn, I’ve been watching him on television. He’s a good man. I think he’s a good man, but actually, he’s got to endorse Trump.

(26:19)
The one thing I say about a politician, I’ve known politicians over my life, and then if you would’ve told me I was going to be a politician someday, I would’ve said, “No way, I don’t want to be a politician.” But the one thing I know is when you go out and you come out with an idea early and then in an election then you lose that idea, you always come back to that idea. So, these people are into the electric thing. They may soften it up a little bit during the election. They’re coming back and they’re coming back stronger than ever.

(26:50)
It’s like Ron DeSanctimonious. He tried to destroy social security. Now he’s trying to backpedal it a little bit. He wanted to bring the minimum age to 70. He wanted to destroy it. He also put a heavy hit on Medicare. What happens is now they back up a little bit, but they always go back to it as soon as the election’s over. So, you can’t go for that. And in the case of Biden, he’s coming back to electric vehicles and he hasn’t even left yet.

(27:16)
But yeah, maybe someday soon he’s going to leave because he wants to get more votes, but just remember he’s coming back. They always go back to their original thought. That’s where they are. I don’t know why, but that’s where they are. Biden’s mandate isn’t a government regulation. It’s a government assassination of your jobs and of your industry. The auto industry is being assassinated. And it makes no difference what you get, I don’t care what you get in the next two weeks or three weeks or five weeks, they’re going to be closing up and they’re going to be building those cars in China and other places. It’s a hit job on Michigan and on Detroit.

(27:53)
And that’s not sustainable. These numbers are not sustainable. No company can afford to lose $60,000 a car, and it’s going to be more than that. All of these cars will be manufactured in foreign lands that you couldn’t care less about. I want choice in schools and in the purchase of an automobile, an SUV or a truck. I want choice for my automobile, for my truck, for my SUV. And I also happen to want choice for schools. Do we agree with that choice?

(28:25)
This is about auto workers and automobiles and workers, period, but I think we can say that everybody wants to see choice in schools also. If you want to buy an electric car, that’s absolutely fine. I’m all for it. But we should not be forcing consumers to buy electric vehicles. Now they want to make all trucks electric. You know that, right? You talk about supply chain. They’re going to destroy the supply chain. They’re forcing the truckers to go all electric. All electric trucks.

(29:02)
Now the trucks probably don’t have the power. They only go about 300 miles, whereas a diesel fuel truck goes 2,000 miles. That’s a big difference, would you say?

Yeah.

Also, the battery takes up so much room, there’s practically no room left for what you happen to be shipping. The whole thing is crazy. They want to do it with boats too. I was with a boating manufacturer in a great state, South Carolina, with a great governor, by the way, Henry McMaster. And we were there two days ago, and I asked him that question, I said, “Do they want…” He said, “Yeah, they want us to go all electric.” I said, “How does that work for a boat?” He said, “The entire boat would be like one big battery. We’d have no room for anything else.” I said, “What happens if the boat has an accident and starts sinking. Do you get electrocuted if the boat sinks?” The guy said, “I’ve never thought of that actually.” But I think I gave him an idea actually. Now, can you imagine the boat goes down and you’re sitting on top of a battery. I don’t feel good about that, right?

(30:02)
In other words, you have to stop approximately for a truck six times for the same trip. How are they going to stop six times? And yet, it’s not stopping these lunatics in Washington. These are lunatics. These are deranged people.

Amen.

And I’m not saying you can’t buy an electric car. If you want to buy an electric car or a hybrid or an all gasoline car or a truck, that has to be your choice. You should have that choice. It’s great, right? I could see electric cars working great for certain uses. Short term, short distance uses. We have unlimited gasoline, remember that, we have unlimited. China doesn’t. We have unlimited gasoline. For 500 years we have gasoline, more than any other country in the world.

(30:49)
Can you imagine, a few years ago, we were energy independent, now we’re begging countries to give us gasoline? Can you imagine? Now, can you even imagine? And we had the best, the lightest, the sweetest. We have the best stuff. Now we’re taking tar … Tar. You know what tar is? It’s like tar that they have to refine. You know where they refine it? In Houston, Texas. We take tar now from Venezuela. Venezuela was supposed to be the bad guys. Venezuela’s getting rich. We’re refining their tar and we’re not taking our beautiful, beautiful stuff. We have the best stuff, but we have most, we have more than Saudi Arabia, more than Russia.

(31:25)
We were energy independent and we were going to make a fortune and we were going to sell it to Europe. We were going to pay off our debt. We were going to lower taxes still further. It’s amazing. And then these people came in and they have no clue, or they have a clue, which is even more dangerous in a certain way. Right now, electric cars don’t go far enough and they’re just far, far too expensive, and people aren’t going to be able to afford them. And the cost of operation is also much more. This is their option though. If they want them, it’s their option and it’s an option that some people will take, and I am all for them. But I will not allow under any circumstances, the American automobile industry to die. I want it to thrive and to thrive like never before.

(32:11)
So, we are here today at Drake Enterprises, a family-owned, beautiful place. They gave me a tour. They gave me a tour. I said, “This place is beautiful.” I said, “Come on, let’s go. I got to go fast. I got to make a speech.” It’s all over television this speech. We’re competing with the job candidates. They’re all running for a job. No, they’re all job candidates. They’ll do anything. Secretary of something. They even say VP. I don’t know. Does anybody see any VP in the group? I don’t think so.

[inaudible 00:32:50].

No. No. That’s right. Can you imagine? Can you imagine? They don’t have a crowd like we have. When you look at the thousands of people outside that couldn’t get in, why didn’t you build a bigger plant? I’d like to … But we’re here today at Drake Enterprises, a family-owned and operated Michigan auto parts supplier that has been manufacturing in America for over 70 years, right?

(33:18)
Drake was founded by a great man in 1952. Benny Stemple, right? Benny. We loved Benny. Your father, your grandfather, an American man. Deceased. American man with a big American dream. He had a big, big, beautiful dream. Benny started with just four people and soon came to dominate the production of gear shift levers for trucks. Today, the company produces transmission components, drive line components, engine components, and car parts for every one of the Detroit big three. So, I won’t tell them I’ve said bad things about them in your place, okay? I just want them to fight for what’s right. It’s common sense. But tonight, I was honored to meet Benny’s son, Lee and Lee’s children, Nate and Heather. Thank you very much. That’s great. Beautiful family. Nate and Heather say their vision for this company is to prove that the American dream is still alive for their employees, like it was just for their granddad who was so wonderful.

(34:20)
So, Lee, Nate, and Heather, we are going to help you get that job done. Okay? And I want to congratulate you on three generations of American auto parts proudly made in Michigan. We love Michigan. Great feelings for Michigan. Bad things are happening in Michigan. Your crime rate’s through the roof. You got a lot of businesses moving out now. It’s not even believable. Today, nearly 100% of Drake’s business is producing components that go into vehicles with internal combustion engines, the very product that Joe Biden and the radical left Democrats and fascists, Marxists, now they want to make them, for whatever reason, illegal. Figure that one out.

(35:07)
And yes, it’s true, today’s radical Democrat party wants to legalize drugs, shoplifting, and sexual mutilation of your children. But they want to allow your gas-powered suburban Silverados and Ford F-150s to die. They can die. Under a Trump administration gasoline engines will be allowed, and sex changes for children will be banned. Is that okay? I think we [inaudible 00:35:42]. Can you believe it? Mutilization. If you said 10 years ago, 15 years ago, “We will stop the mutilization of children.” Somebody will say, “What the hell is he talking about?” Today, you have to say it because that’s what they’re doing.

… mutilization of children without parent consent. The whole thing is insane. The country has gone insane. You know, a lot of it, they say, “You’re very conservative.” I say, “No, I’m a person of common sense.” It’s not conservative, it’s common sense.

(36:16)
We want to have a border. We want to have good voting. We want have same-day voting with all paper ballots, and we want to have a thing called voter ID. Why do the Democrats not want voter ID? Because they want to cheat. We want to have voter ID. But if crooked Joe Biden gets his way, Drake employees and countless other auto workers and suppliers will really be decimated. I don’t know. I hate to tell you what’s going to happen, but you know what’s going to happen. We’re going to stop it.

(36:44)
By most estimates, under Biden’s electric vehicle mandate, 40% of all US auto jobs will disappear. Think of this: In one or two years. Think one or two years, that’s what you have to be talking about, not you’re going to get X dollars an hour. It doesn’t matter what the hell you’re getting an hour. Do me a favor, just get your union guys, your leaders to endorse me and I’ll take care of the rest. Because in looking over the statistics now, they’re saying, but the real number will be 100%, because under Biden’s mandate, the entire car industry will be packed up and shipped to China, which controls over 80% of the supply chain for electric vehicle batteries. They control the whole thing. So they think close to a hundred percent of the business will be gone.

(37:42)
Every time Joe Biden and the UAWs political leadership talk about a fair transition to all electric cars, American labor will be under siege. It’s not going to work for you. It can’t work. And I learned a lot today with this great family. I tell you, they said it just won’t work. They don’t need anything that you have right here in Michigan, and they have beautiful product.

(38:06)
There’s no such thing as a fair transition to the end of your way of life. You’re going to lose your beautiful way of life. For auto workers, Biden’s forced transition is a transition to hell. It’s a transition to hell. It’s a transition to unemployment and to inflation without end. The inflation that you have now, we didn’t have inflation. We had the greatest economy in the history of our country. You know that because you went four years like you’ve never had in your history, in the history of Michigan.

(38:42)
To the striking workers, I support you in your goal of fair wages and greater stability, and I truly hope you get a fair deal for yourselves and your families. But if your union leaders will not demand that crooked Joe repeal his electric vehicle mandate immediately, then it doesn’t matter what hourly word you get, it just doesn’t make a damn bit of difference because in two to three years, you will not have one job in this state. And you’ve seen it happen before.

(39:09)
You’ve seen what happened where massive percentages of your industry went to other countries like Mexico, like China, like South Korea, like Japan. In other words, your current negotiations don’t mean as much as you think. I watch you out there with the pickets, but I don’t think you’re picketing for the right thing. But if they endorse me, your leadership, you can tell them I said it, although I have a feeling they may be watching tonight.

(39:36)
When Biden came here yesterday, they only had 11 people. I’ll bet you we have 10,000 people standing outside. I think we do. In fact, for a little while, we’re driving through and people are going crazy. I said, “Is this a rally tonight?” No, but I said, “Is this a rally?” We’re driving through thousands and thousands of people. We just put it online. Incredible.

(40:16)
The great Dan Scavino put it online. Where’s Dan Scavino? The great Dan Scavino. He gets everything. He sees what’s going on. Thank you, Dan. We have… Where is he? One of the greats of all time, most powerful men in politics. He controls the internet. The great Dan Scavino. Get over here for the cameras, Dan. Get over here.

(40:45)
Stephen Cheung has done incredible. Jason Miller, a legend.

Yay, Jason.

Oh, somebody likes you over here, Jason. No, I have a great group of people. They all want to come. I said, “You guys don’t have to come.” They said, “No, we want to come.” They want to come. And they don’t want to come to keep me from falling either, they want to come for… You see that when now they have a new plan, how to keep this guy from standing up. We have to get him to stand up. How to keep him standing up and getting down a flight… It’s so unelegant. I love 747s, Air Force One.

(41:22)
I got new Air Force One, I saved $1.7 billion. They came to me, they said, “Sir, would you sign this?” First day I was in office, I said, “What is it?” “It’s a new Air Force One. It’s 5.7 billion. I said, “That sounds like a lot of money for a plane.” It’s actually two planes, by the way, but they call it Air Force One. They’re identical. Even the wood grain, you can’t tell the difference. I could tell because there was a little nick in one desk that wasn’t on the other. So I could say that’s one and the other one’s two. No, it’s incredible actually. But those planes are like 32 years old and nobody wanted to make the move and do it because they think, oh, it’ll look luxury.

(42:02)
In the meantime, they come in from Saudi Arabia and these other countries brand new, they’re like three months old and they blow it away and our country should have the latest and the greatest. So they wanted me to do it. It was 5.7 billion. I said, “Nope, it’s too high.” They said, “Why do you see that? Why are you saying that?” Because Obama agreed to the deal. If they agreed to it, it’s too high. So the head of Boeing came in and he said, “Sir, we have to get 5.7.” I said, “Nope, I’m not doing it.” I was supposed to sign it. I said, “I’m not doing it, not for 5.7. Has to have a three on it.” I didn’t know what that meant, except I knew it was a hell of a cut. Right, right? Right, Al?

(42:42)
So they said, “Sir, we’re not going to do it. We’re not going to do it. We’ll take off $400 million.” That was pretty good. I said, “I’ve been doing this for about three minutes and I got 400 million.” Can you imagine the money these people make doing these plans? So I said, “No, no deal.” I said, “No deal.” And it’s got to have a three. Got to have a three. And I held out and they called up two weeks later. I said, “What do they want?” They were calling. They said, “Sir, we’re going to take another 300 million. That’s 700 million off.” And I haven’t done anything. I’d probably worked for about two and a half minutes and I got 700. And I just said, “No,” and I sort of forgot about it. A month and a half later, they called me up, “Sir, we’ll do it for 3 billion, 999 million, nine hundred, nine, nine, nine, nine, and 99 cents. And they said, “You have yourself a deal.”

(43:39)
So I saved $1.7 billion on that plane. I was very [inaudible 00:43:44]. Does anybody give me credit for that? No. Does the fake news call me and say, “What a wonderful thing you did?” No. That’s okay. That’s okay. But your leadership should endorse me and I will not say a bad thing about them again. And they will have done their job. They will have done a proper job. In fact, if they endorse me, they will have the easiest labor leadership job anywhere in the country. They just have to sit back and watch as our auto industry reignites and booms. They don’t even have to… How could they go with this guy? He can’t find his way off a stage.

(44:34)
I’m looking at these. I always sort of look at stages now, I get a little… Because I say, “How the hell do you not find your way?” So every once in a while, I’ll be in the middle of the speech, I’ll look stairs there, stairs there. And I say, “How the hell does it work that you can’t find your way off a stage? How does that work?” But he can’t.

(44:51)
Joe Biden is surrendering our auto industry to China, just like he surrendered our borders to the cartels, and he surrendered Afghanistan in the most embarrassing week, day, time period in the history of our country. He surrendered to the Taliban. Took the military out first. You take the military out last. So tell your UAW leadership, no problems with them, but they have to endorse Trump because if they don’t, all they’re doing is committing suicide. And honestly, you don’t want that to happen because they’re committing suicide on the back of your jobs and you can’t let that happen.

(45:34)
The Democrats, as they wave the white flag of surrender over your future to other foreign countries, you can’t have it done. So if you could speak to Shawn, he’s listening right now, I’m sure. Shawn, endorse Trump, and you can take a nice two-month vacation, come back and you guys are going to be better than you ever were. You don’t even have to worry. Because the other way, you won’t have a vacation, Shawn. And in a short period of time, you’re not going to have a union, you’re not going to have jobs, you’re not going to have anything. You’ll have the strongest you’ve ever had. You’re going to do great. You’re going to do great. And it’s so easy. It’s common sense. Again, it’s common sense.

(46:16)
But unlike them, I will never surrender. I’ll never surrender for you. And the American worker never surrenders either. Never. But you need leadership. It’s nice to say you’d never surrender, but you need direction and you need leadership. Crooked Joe puts China first, Mexico first, Ukraine first, Europe first, Asia first, illegal aliens first, environmental lunatics first, puts everyone else first, but he puts America last. He puts our workers last. He puts the UAW last. He puts our industries last. He puts your families last. He puts everything… He does put your children last, yeah. When you think of it, probably they should be at the top of your list. Thank you very much. I’m going to use that. Do you mind if I use that from now on? Who said that? That was very good. He puts your children last. That’s going at the top of my list. He puts everything that’s good last.

(47:25)
Mine is slightly different, I put America first every single time. So let me say to every UAW member and skilled workers all across our nation: Joe Biden, the Democrat Party and their political cronies cease to serve your interest a long time ago. They don’t care about you. He came here yesterday. What did he have, nine people, right? Nine. We have 9,000 people outside. He had nine people. And that’s because they didn’t know we were coming. They didn’t even know we were coming, they just found out.

(48:07)
In reality, they don’t represent you, they represent deep state bureaucracy, a global financial class and a political class that have taken control of this country for their own enrichment and self purposes. Stealing your wealth and stealing your labor while shipping off our best and brightest to die in expensive, exotic foreign wars in countries that you’ve never even heard of. And just like you are fighting for your rights and your American dream, I’m fighting for my rights and fighting for my freedom against the coordinated, corrupt, very politicized forces of evil.

(48:45)
I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s weaponized justice. We have a weaponized justice system. I want to indict. Think of this: “I want to indict my political opponent. He’s beating me. We got to indict him.” I think that works two ways because when the next one gets in, let’s hope that’s me, and I’m sure I’d never do a thing like that. I would not do it. But you have an opponent and you say, “Let’s indict him.” And because people know me so well, we know each other very well, my ratings and my approval numbers went up. I’m the only person that ever got indicted when my numbers went up. It’s a weird… That’s because you know me.

(49:25)
I didn’t take a salary, I worked my ass off and we did a phenomenal job. We did a phenomenal job for this country. But for the first time ever, I never thought they indict their political opponent. And what that does is it sets off a chain of events that’s very dangerous in future years. It could happen to them very easily. The reason crooked Joe and his thugs are trying so hard to stop me is that in my first term, I disrupted all of it. Oh, did I disrupt. That was called major disruption.

(50:01)
And in my second term, which we’re sort of having now, but I don’t want the results, right? I don’t want the results of this second term. This second term is a disaster for this country. Worst president. Think of it. There’s never been a president like this. I say that you could take the five worst presidents in history, add them up, and he’s done a worse job than all of them added up. But now I’m changing it. I think I can make it to 10 because nobody, you look at our border, you look at everything, you look at our woke military. I defeated ISIS. Our military was so great, I rebuilt it. But you look at what’s happening in this country, it’s horrible.

(50:40)
But in my second term, we’ll finish the job and we’ll get rid of the cheaters, the liars, the scammers, and the criminals. They’ll lose their grip on power once and for all. So if you want to save your livelihoods and your way of life, then you need to send a message and join the ultimate strike against the globalist class by casting your vote for a gentleman known as Donald J. Trump, in the most important election of our lifetime. I believe this will be the most important election in our lifetime.

(51:15)
I used to say that in 2016, and I totally meant it. This blows it away. We’re going to lose our country. We’re going to lose… We’ve got probably 15 to 18 million people, the real number, pouring into our country. We have a disaster in Ukraine that would’ve never happened. We have a potential disaster with Taiwan, China that would’ve never happened if it happens, but boy, they are circling. I’ll tell you, they want it so badly. And they saw what happened in Afghanistan. They saw what happened with the Taliban, and they say the people they have there now are grossly incompetent.

(51:48)
Putin would’ve never done it. President Xi would’ve never done it with me. We talked about things, a lot of things. They would’ve never done it. They wouldn’t have done it for another reason also. In the case of Russia, the oil prices would’ve been so low that they wouldn’t have been able to afford it, because you would’ve had $40 a barrel oil. And at $40, he could not have prosecuted the war. But at $115, he made a fortune and makes a fortune with the war. It’s up there again now. I don’t know if you’ve been watching. It’s getting up there again now.

(52:20)
So give me four more years and I will give you the end to this horrible globalism that’s killing our country. I’ll give you the return of the United States of America as the greatest and strongest industrial nation in the history of the world. Together we will dismantle the corrupt power structure that has feasted on the suffering of the American auto worker and the workers of any kind, not just auto workers, workers of any kind.

(52:53)
We will cast from power, the financial forces that have turned American cities into ghost towns to build skyscrapers in Beijing, China. We will wield every lever of government to defend you and to hold accountable those who have profited from the betrayal and suffering of the American factory worker. So sad to see.

(53:16)
As your 47th President of the United States, I will be your protector, I will be your advocate, and I will be your greatest champion, the greatest champion that you’ve ever had. On day one, I will terminate Joe Biden’s electric vehicle mandate, and I will cancel every job-killing regulation that is crushing American auto workers. I will unleash a thing called American Energy, stop the ban on the internal combustion engine and we will drill, baby, drill and we will make zero environmental

Environmental difference. It will have zero environmental difference, zero. In fact, if anything, it’s probably cleaner than what they’re doing. But it’ll save your family a yearly fortune and give you a much better way of life. You’re losing your way of life. I will then go to every foreign country where we’re paying billions and billions of dollars for their military defense as I was doing before, and tell them that if they do not massively increase their purchases of Ford, Chevys, GMs, and Jeeps, our troops are packing up and we’re coming home. You got to buy our products. You got to buy our products. That’s going to be the least of it. And if we can afford to send hundreds of billions of dollars to Ukraine, then we can afford to have an auto industry that pays our workers a good living wage and keeps our workers working.

(54:57)
Having a vibrant car industry is far more important than almost anything we can do for a very important thing called national security. We need a rebirth of loyalty in this country. To that end, we will bring back a very beautiful word, protection, financial protection. You’re going to be protected financially while we still have the power to do it. There’s a run on our currency. They want to take away our currency standards. If that happens, that’s the worst thing to happen maybe in our country’s history, it’ll put us in a much different position, but take a look at what’s happening. Countries are leaving our standard. In reality, protectionism never truly went out of fashion. Our corrupt politicians just stopped protecting American jobs and workers, and they started protecting the jobs and workers in China and Mexico, Germany, South Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam. Many other countries too.

(55:59)
Under the Trump presidency, patriotic protectionism will be the new American way. We want to be protected. That’s what we have our government for. We want protection in many ways, and we’re going to stop the crime in our cities and we’re going to stop the crime in our country, and we’re not going to be nice about it. We’re not going to be nice about it. That means protecting our workers, protecting our wages, protecting our jobs, protecting our industries, protecting our communities, and protecting our great, something you don’t hear about very much anymore, a great American Dream. We had an American Dream. You don’t hear about that with this guy. This guy walks up yesterday, looks like he’s going to fall over standing in front of some people. Looks like he’s going to fall over. This is not a leader. The whole world is laughing at us. They respected your leader. Whether you like your leader or not, they respected your leader. They said, “We’re not going to mess. We’re not going to mess.”

(56:56)
Upon taking office, I will impose an across the board tariff on foreign made goods. I will also pass the Trump Reciprocal Trade Act. That means that if China or any other country makes us pay a 100 or 200 or 300% tariff or tax, we will make them pay a reciprocal tariff of 100, 200 or 300%. What could be more fair, right? What could be more fair? I will revoke China’s most favored nation. Can you believe they have a most favored nation status, because they say, “We are a developing nation.” Well, we’re a developing nation, too. When you look at our cities, we’re developing. We’re developing in the wrong way. They are doing the worst job, Democrat mayors, Democrat governors. And we will impose stiff penalties on China and other trade abusers. Foreign auto parts manufacturing will be among our first targets. We’re going to bring it home from China and other foreign countries on a very grand scale. That’s you, McGee. All right, that’s you.

(58:03)
And because we want all Americans to win and win big from these policies, we’ll insist that as tariffs on foreign countries go up because they tariff us crazily, and then we have these stupid people, some congressmen, some senators that say, “No sir, we shouldn’t tariff them.” But they’re taring us. “Doesn’t matter, sir. It’s free trade.” I say, “Is this guy okay?” But when those foreign countries tariff us, taxes on American workers, which is really what it is, small businesses and middle class families, we will be doing the same to them. And you’ll watch things happen that you won’t even believe. For one thing, you’re going to bring back jobs at levels… You know China, they put a big tax on us when we sell a car, a truck or anything, and they say to the American companies, “We don’t want your trucks from America. Come over and build a plant over here.” So they’re building plants all over China. How stupid is it? We should do the same thing. And we started doing the same thing and we were doing the same thing.

(59:06)
I gave you the largest tax cut in the history of our country, larger than the Reagan tax cut, and we’ll do it again. We’ll deliver tax cuts, the likes of which you’ve never seen before. You will do better, make more money and have a more secure job than you’ve ever had before. Best of all, they will be fully paid for by outsourcers and foreign producers who will be paying trillions and trillions of dollars into our treasury for the privilege of doing business in the United States of America. Isn’t that nice? Going to get rid of a big portion of our deficit, too. We’re going to tariff and tax them and you, the American worker, will be the primary beneficiary. And in conclusion, I don’t need to tell anyone in this room what the globalist and trade abusers did to the people of Michigan. You’ve seen the lives wrecked. You’ve seen your family destroyed. In many cases, the families have been shattered and the communities battered, brutalized, destroyed economically and by crime.

(01:00:10)
But my message to you tonight is that Michigan’s abuse under Joe Biden will end and I will take you to new heights, never dreamed of before, never even dreamed of. The Wall Street predators, the Chinese cheaters and the corrupt politicians have hurt you. I will make you better. Very simple, I will make you better. For years, foreign nations have looted and plundered your hopes, your dreams, and your heritage. And now they’re going to pay for what they have stolen and what they have done to you, my friends, we’re going to do it together. We’re going to take their money. We’re going to take their factories. We’re going to rebuild the industrial bedrock of this country like it used to be many, many decades ago. By the time this battle is over, the rusted out factories will not be here in Michigan, they’ll be in Beijing, Shanghai, and other parts of the world. Taking it back. We’re taking it back and it won’t be hard. The gleaming new buildings and roaring production lines will be built in Lansing and Flint and Sterling Heights and Grand Rapids and Pontiac, Dearborn and Detroit.

(01:01:25)
Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve been preparing my entire life for this battle. We did such a great job four years ago, we were unfairly interrupted. Let’s be nice about it. We were very unfairly interrupted. But in many ways this is better because we’ve seen what a bad job, they have shown us what a horrible job they do, and we’ll be able to do things that nobody would’ve thought possible and people won’t be complaining even a little bit because between crime and all of the jobs that have been stolen from us and all of the factories that have been closing, all of the bad things that have been happening with Afghanistan and with Ukraine and with everything, people will say, “Wow, we want these changes to be made. We want these changes to be made very, very quickly.” Just three years ago, we had a great economy and the strongest borders in our country’s history.

(01:02:20)
We had the best, strongest in our history. We were energy independent, soon to be dominant. We had no inflation. We had a rebuilt… I rebuilt the entire military, United States military. We gave $80 billion. Think of it. Brand new tanks and planes and goggles and 700,000 guns and rifles, 70,000 [inaudible 01:02:45] cars. Who has a used car lot with 70,000 and these are… Nobody. If you have 500 cars, they tell me that’s a lot. You have 70,000, and these are armor plated in many cases, these cost millions of dollars a piece in many cases. We gave them 70,000. Do you know that Afghanistan is one of the largest sellers of weapons in the world right now? Can you believe it? They’re selling all of this stuff that these guys just gave them. How stupid are we? How stupid are we to allow that? We were getting out. I was the one that got it down.

(01:03:21)
We were going to keep Bagram, the air base, because it’s right next to where China, forget about Afghanistan, where China makes their missiles, nuclear missiles. It’s one hour away. We were going to keep that. They ran from it. They ran from it. They left it. They left the lights on. They left the dogs by the way, for those people that liked the dogs, it’s a big question. They left the dogs. But we were going to keep that. We were going to do a job and we were going to be out. We were getting out with real dignity and strength. We weren’t going to lose those 13 incredible souls that I met the parents and family the other night. They’re incredible people. They’re so devastated. They don’t talk about the 38 people that were literally no arms, no legs. The faces blown to pieces, and the hundreds of other people that died, all unnecessarily, wouldn’t have happened.

(01:04:11)
I spoke to Abdul, the head of the Taliban. We had a rough conversation. I said, “Listen, Abdul, don’t kill any of our people anymore. You kill any of our people, we’re going to hit you harder than anybody’s ever been hit.” And he said, “But why do you send me a picture of my home?” I said, “You’ll have to figure that out. You’ll have to figure that one out. You’re going to have to figure that one out.” But you know what? After that, for 18 months, not one soldier was killed in our country. They were sniping him and killing him. And he’s still there. He’s in charge. Can you imagine the feeling where they said, “Abdul, Abdul, the Americans have left, the soldiers are gone.” He said, “No, no, no. They would never do that. Only stupid people would do that.” “No, no. The soldiers have gone.” Before we took the equipment, before we took our people out. We have hundreds of people, maybe thousands, but we have hundreds of people that are American citizens that are still there. We took the soldiers out first. That was the problem. And they should have used Bagram as their place because you had tremendous area. It wouldn’t have been that disaster that you witnessed with the planes going up. Remember when Biden said, “We’ll never have a Vietnam with the helicopters going up.” Well, this was worse. This was a plane going up with people hanging all over the plane and falling from 3000 feet in the sky. That’s three times the height of the Empire State Building by the way. Russia was not going into Ukraine. China was not going into Taiwan. We had our enemies in full retreat. They respected us all over the world. We were respected. Now we’re left out as a country and now we’re coming back to do it all over again.

(01:05:50)
And I promise you this with me as your president, our opponents will lose and our American workers will be the biggest winner of them all. So with your help and with your vote, we will expel the globalists from our government. We will evict crooked Joe Biden from the White House. We will put America and our workers first, we’re going to put them first, and we will do something that’s very, very special that I’ve been saying for a long time. And we had it going at a level that nobody ever thought possible. We will make America great again. So, thank you. God bless you, Michigan, and God bless you auto workers. And God bless America. God bless everybody in this room. Thank you all very much. So nice. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.