President Donald Trump revealed at a Saturday night rally in Wisconsin that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told him earlier that Japanese auto manufacturers are investing $40 billion in U.S. manufacturing facilities.
“Prime Minister [Shinzo] Abe, we’re negotiating trade deals because every country has been ripping us off for years, and I really like the prime minister, he’s a friend of mine, but I said, ‘Mr. prime minister, we gotta do something’,” the president told the crowd of thousands. “For so many decades we’ve been losing tens of billions of dollars to China, and Japan, and Indiana, and name any country and we lost, but we’re not losing anymore.”
Abe has been meeting with President Trump this Friday and Saturday.
Trump recounted the conversation with Abe, “I said listen, we gotta do something. $68 billion in trade losses over the last four or five years, a year. So we’re renegotiating and I think he’ll be fair. I think he’ll be fair.”
“By the way, he started by saying he’s putting $40 billion into the United States for new car factories,” President Trump said, summarizing Abe’s commitment. “Toyota is coming in with $14 billion dollars. Many, many companies are coming in. And they’re coming in, frankly, to Michigan. They’re coming back, they want to be back, to Ohio, to Pennsylvania, to North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, and what’s the name of this special place – it’s called Wisconsin.”
“So they’ll be investing shortly and it’s started already, $40 billion with a b, $40 billion dollars, and it’ll be a lot more than that,” Trump said. He added, “The poverty rate for Wisconsin families has reached the lowest rate in 22 years. The unemployment rate for Wisconsin workers has reached historic lows, has never been this low before, ever, ever, ever. Think of that.”
“We’re now the number one economy in the world and it’s not even close.”
The crowd began chanting, “USA, USA, USA.”
The president then asked the crowd if there is any place more fun on a Saturday night than a Trump rally.
Trump later revisited the issue of trade, reiterating previous comments that America has rebuilt China.
“Prime Minister Abe said to me today, ‘Nobody’s ever talked to me this way’ from our country, it’s true. No, he said it friendly,” said Trump, repeating that Abe is a friend of his.
The president commented that in all fairness, the bad trade deals go back further than Barack Obama’s presidency. He said America is the piggy bank that everyone else is robbing from and taking advantage of.
Trump promised that at the end of the next six years, Americans will be left with the strongest country they’ve ever had.
Michelle Moons is a White House Correspondent for Breitbart News — follow on Twitter @MichelleDiana and Facebook
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