Former President Donald Trump said in an economic speech on Thursday that the US has allowed “big corporations” to “come in and rob and rape our country.”
”Oh, he used the word ‘rape.’ That’s right. I used the word ‘rape,'” Trump said at the Detroit Economic Club after his comments were met with gasps from the audience. “They raped our country,” he repeated.
Trump did not specify which companies he was referring to, but indicated he was talking about companies that export goods to the US that are made abroad.
“So here’s the deal I’m going to offer to the world, to companies outside our world, big companies, powerful companies, that became powerful because we were stupid, we were stupid. We let them come in and plunder and rape our country. That’s what they did,” he said.
Trump went on to tout his plan to encourage companies in other countries to open factories here, saying that “the United States will give you the lowest taxes, the lowest energy costs” and the “lowest regulatory burden.”
The breaks would only be available “if you make your products here in America,” he said, “and you have to hire American workers.”
Trump added that his administration would impose a “tax or tariff” on companies that do not produce their goods in the US
When asked for more details and which companies Trump was referring to, his campaign said that “weak and inept career politicians like Kamala Harris have sold out our country with bad deals.”
“If President Trump is back in office, he will institute a 15% corporate tax rate on companies that make products here in America and ensure that foreign companies doing business in the United States don’t defraud us,” campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said. a statement.
Trump, who waged a trade war with China while in office, has made the tax break, or tariff plan, the centerpiece of his economic plan.
Trump and his company have a long history of making Trump-branded products in countries such as China, Indonesia, Turkey and Canada.
Trump used similarly charged language during his 2016 presidential campaign when he slammed China. He said at the time that devaluing America’s currency would “suck the blood out of the country” and then told rallygoers in Indiana: “We cannot continue to allow China to rape our country.”
‘That’s what they do. It is the biggest theft in the history of the world,” he said.
Trump himself was charged with rape in civil court when he was sued by writer E. Jean Carroll in 2022. Carroll claimed he raped her during an encounter in a New York City department store in the mid-1990s, and she was able to file the lawsuit because of a New York law passed in 2022 that allows civil actions in such cases allowed, even though the limitation period had long since expired.
Trump denied Carroll’s “disgusting” allegations but waived his right to testify at the trial. The jury found that Trump is not liable for rape, but is liable for sexually abusing and defaming Carroll.
Trump is appealing the $5 million judgment, as well as a subsequent $83 million defamation stemming from comments he made about Carroll while he was president.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
