Former President Donald Trump criticized President Biden, Democrats and the Big Three automakers over electric cars in comments in suburban Detroit on Wednesday night as his Republican opponents prepared to take the stage in California. The second GOP presidential debate.
The president spoke at Drake Enterprises, a non-unionized auto parts manufacturer and supplier in Clinton Charter Township, Michigan, but members of the United Auto Workers union, which is on strike in 20 states, spent considerable time in an audience that was not in the room.
The former president praised the work of auto workers, saying some onlookers didn’t get the credit they deserved because they waved “unions for Trump” signs.
“You’re going to build this country,” Trump cheered his audience. He said he’s on the side of America’s auto workers who want to make America great again and build cars that “go the extra mile.”
And he complained that automakers were “stupid or gutless” to invest in developing electric cars, saying, “The damn things don’t go far enough, and they’re too expensive.”
Trump blasted President Biden’s record on auto manufacturing and workers a day later Mr. Biden visited the picket line.
“Biden’s order is not a government regulation, it’s a government assassination of your jobs and your industry,” Trump said. “The auto industry is being slaughtered. And it doesn’t make any 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 shut down, they’re going to. They have to build those cars in China and other places. It’s in Michigan and Detroit. Successful work is not sustainable.”
Mr. Trump announced his visit to the Detroit area before Biden did.
“He came right after I announced I was going to be here,” Trump said on Wednesday night, adding that Mr Biden only spoke for “a few seconds”.
Trump told the non-union crowd that “hopefully,” UAW and other union leaders are backing Democrats. Throughout the speech, he addressed UAW workers and their leaders who were not in the room. “Shawn, endorse Trump,” he directed at UAW President Sean Fine. The UAW has yet to endorse the presidential election. CNN He suggested that he was not a fan of the former president.
“It would be of no use to me to meet with him, because I don’t think the man cares a whit about what our workers stand for, what the working class stands for,” said Mr. Fine said. “He’s serving a billionaire class, and that’s what’s wrong with this country.”
Mr. UAW on the picket line in Michigan. When Biden visited, Fine was the first to greet Biden After he arrived.
The Democratic National Committee erected anti-Trump billboards in Detroit ahead of the former president’s visit. On Wednesday, the Biden campaign announced a new ad in Michigan.
“He says he stands with auto workers, but as president, Donald Trump has given tax breaks to his wealthy friends, while automakers have closed their plants and Michigan has lost manufacturing jobs,” the ad says. “Joe Biden said he stood up for workers, and he delivers.”
The Trump campaign dismissed the president’s visit to Michigan as a “PR stunt.”
“This is nothing more than a PR stunt by crooked Joe Biden to distract and gaslight the American people from his disastrous bidenomics policies that have led to so much economic misery across the country,” the Trump campaign said in a statement.
Regarding support for electric vehicles, Mr. Trump has been criticizing Biden for days. The president has taken steps to move the country away from fossil fuel-powered cars and toward EVs, dramatically reduce tailpipe pollution, fund charging stations, and encourage the conversion of auto manufacturing facilities to EV or battery plants. .
Meanwhile, Governor Ron DeSantis, former Governor Nikki Haley, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, former Vice President Mike Pence, former Governor Chris Christie and Sen. Tim Scott is making his second appearance at the Reagan Library. So far, Trump’s decision to sit out the debates hasn’t affected his poll numbers. He Still trouncing All of his Republican rivals. DeSantis said Trump has an obligation to show and debate voters.
Trump, in his remarks, referred to the second GOP debate as a “jobs” debate, joking that the candidates were vying to be in his cabinet. He asked if anyone was looking at a potential vice president on the board. “I don’t think so,” he answered his own question.
DeSantis said on Fox News Tuesday, “I think he owes it to all the voters to make sure that he’s going to protect his record going forward and reveal what he’s going to do going forward and what he’s going to do differently. And he’s not willing to do that. I think the voters have a right to hear from all the candidates.”
Kathryn Watson
Kathryn Watson is a political correspondent for CBS News Digital in Washington, DC.