Remarks by President Trump in Working Lunch with Governors on Workforce Freedom and Mobility | Eastern North Carolina Now

    THE PRESIDENT: Great. Thank you very much. Thanks, Chris. Say hello to your father. Everything good? He's some guy.

    GOVERNOR SUNUNU: I got to put with him every day, Mr. President. (Laughter.)

    THE PRESIDENT: He's some guy. There was nobody tougher than him on me, and now there's nobody that's better. He's a great guy, actually.

    GOVERNOR SUNUNU: He's doing well. Thank you, sir.

    THE PRESIDENT: Give him my regards, okay?

    GOVERNOR SUNUNU: You bet.

    THE PRESIDENT: Tom? Please.

    GOVERNOR WOLF: Tom Wolf. Thank you, Mr. President. As Governor of Pennsylvania, before I was - I've been in politics now for four and a half years. And before that, I was a business owner. And I understood that it was really important to be able to get access to good people.

    In my business, the best people were people who grew up on dairy farms and people who were in prison, who were looking for a second chance.

    THE PRESIDENT: Wow.

    GOVERNOR WOLF: (Inaudible.) And you made that point just a moment ago. If you wonder why we didn't do it earlier than that - these are people who really want to - want to work and want to succeed.

    So we have done a lot of things with clean slate legislation, criminal justice reform - what you were talking about - bringing people from the sidelines and get them into the job market.

    In fact, we called our clean slate bill the "jobs bill." The first in the nation; I think it's still the only one in the nation. But we are really working hard to get people back into the workforce.

    We're focusing on licensing reform, getting workforce development. Brought the chairman of the - president of the Pennsylvania State Chamber Business and Industry with the president of the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO together to co-chair an effort to actually bring people back into the workforce. And they're working marvelously. They've got a command center. They're doing great work.


    We passed a unique GI bill to deal with problems of licensing, so that when a military family moves from state to state, they don't have to give up their teacher's certification; they don't have to give up their - whatever license they have from the other state. We had a good idea, calling it "universal recognition," but it really helps military families, the people who are mobile.

    We're also on our way to implementing our first significant licensing reform that has 13 points to it, including limiting some licenses altogether, but making it a lot easier in reducing the barriers to entry to a lot of professions.

    I'm really looking forward to this session because I think we can learn a lot in Pennsylvania as what we can do, what more we can do, and how we can partner with each other and the federal government and with the private sector to actually make things better for the people of Pennsylvania. That's what we're about.

    So thank you for having this meeting.

    THE PRESIDENT: Well, you made a great statement. I've never heard it before. The best people: people in prison and people that work on farms. (Laughter.) That one I've never heard before. But that's okay with me. You're making tremendous program, so that's great. Thank you very much, Tom.

    Brian Kemp, Georgia.

    GOVERNOR KEMP: Mr. President, as you know, we're doing a lot on workforce in our state. Like a lot of other governors, this is one of our top issues. Just had the lowest unemployment we've had in 18 years. Had a great visit with Ivanka at UPS to see, really, what David Abney there - to see state-of-the-art training.

    Obviously, our colleges, universities, our technical college system is very engaged in supplying the workforce. But we got a unique program. Our QuickStart program, which has been ranked the number-one job training program in many regards, in the country, which we're proud of.

    But it will train qualified, existing businesses and new businesses coming into the state, and those that want to expand. So it makes us very mobile to be able to do job training.

    And then we also have specialized training centers for certain industries that we're targeting in Georgia that our companies need workers in. And we're doing that in manufacturing, aviation, bioscience, cybersecurity, film - the film industry is very big in Georgia right now - and also in (inaudible) tech. And that's one reason we continue to have an A-plus rating when it comes to our workforce. So we're doing a lot.


    We know that's a huge issue on the occupational licensing front. A couple of years ago, we passed a compact for nurses so they can join a compact so you don't have the multi-state licensing issue. Those licenses will reciprocate. We did that this year with medical doctors. That's very important, especially when you think of telemedicine and rural healthcare.

    And then something that's probably not on many people's radar: We did some legislation this year that our community bankers - our smaller banks - are very excited about. We're letting them have better access to capital, which is going to help our areas outside that are struggling in rural Georgia to be able to lend more money to the businesspeople there to expand and hire in parts of our state that we don't have as much going on.

    So, you know, those are the things that we're focused on. But also, the disaster relief money going into the south and southwest Georgia is going to be big for our economy in the next year or two -

    THE PRESIDENT: Right.

    GOVERNOR KEMP: - as we continue to recover. So, thank you.

    THE PRESIDENT: That was a big deal.

    GOVERNOR KEMP: Well, it was. I know you were frustrated, like I was, that it took so long. But we're very grateful you've signed it quick.

    And been meeting today, talking about - hopefully there's going to be flexibility with the money in the form of block grants or other thigs so we could - our agriculture commissioner -

    THE PRESIDENT: There is going to be action. Yeah.

    GOVERNOR KEMP: We can get that money out very quickly with transparency and put it to work. And they need it.

    THE PRESIDENT: Sonny is going to do a job on it, but it's going to go very quickly. And I think nobody else but this group would have been able to get it. That was a tough thing to get, and we got it for our farmers and for a lot of people.

    GOVERNOR KEMP: Well, we appreciate the administration's steadfast support through all of that. And all the folks - the Secretary-level folks and budget folks that have worked with us. And we look forward to working you in the future to get that money out.


    THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, Brian. Thank you very much.

    Kim?

    GOVERNOR REYNOLDS: Well, thank you, Mr. President. In Iowa, we have a diverse and growing economy, even with some significant challenges with agriculture and the flooding. But we have the lowest unemployment rate - 2.4 percent. We have more Iowans working than any other time in our state history.

    And here's the other part of the narrative, I think, that nobody has mentioned yet: We've had seven straight quarters of wage growth in the state of Iowa -

    THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.

    GOVERNOR REYNOLDS: - and a lot of blue-collar workers are experiencing that. So, Ivanka, not only are we bringing people off the sidelines, but we're seeing wages increase too, and that is just a win-win.

    So as I travel the state, here's the other good news: Because of the politics that you've put in place, every job creator that I talk to, they are projecting significant growth moving forward. They're very optimistic about the future. And what an opportunity for Iowans.

    So, workforce, housing, and childcare are three big barriers that we're addressing every single day. We've got a Future Ready Iowa program that has a goal of having 70 percent of Iowans in the workforce, (inaudible) either education of training beyond high school by the year 2025. We have a robust registered apprenticeship program that we're bringing into our high schools.

    As we try to empower and grow rural Iowa, the more connectivity and relationships that we can build with our young people and our job creators right in our communities, that's a win-win.

    We have kids that are coming out of high school that have participated in a welding apprenticeship program where they're actually earning forty and fifty thousand dollars the last two years of high school and going right into a job, right in that community. So that's keeping our communities vibrant and growing. So we're really excited about the opportunities that we see there.

    I'm so proud to be a part of your Workforce Advisory Council to really create a national brand about the opportunities that exist in states all across this country to put some accountability in place and look for opportunity to really scale best practices that are working.

    The other thing that we did - and it's been mentioned: Mental health is a big piece of that.