Remarks by President Trump in Press Conference | September 7, 2020 | Eastern North Carolina Now

    If you look at NATO, with the exception of eight countries - we're one of them - every country is way behind. They're delinquent, especially Germany, in paying their NATO bills. That means we end up paying it, and we're not doing it. I told them; we're not doing it. And they've increased their spending now $130 billion, going up to $400 billion a year. It's all because of me. Then you hear the country doesn't like me. I mean, I can understand that, because President Obama and other presidents, in all fairness, would go in there and they'd make a speech and they'd leave. I went in there, I looked, and I said, "This is unfair. We're paying for NATO." We're paying for NATO. Almost all of it.

    So they rip us off on the military and then they rip us off, with the European Union, on trade. And Biden doesn't have a clue. You know he doesn't have a clue. Everybody knows he doesn't have a clue. In primetime, he wasn't good. And now it's not primetime.

    He spent 47 years sending American jobs to China, to Mexico, and to other countries, while collecting millions of dollars in campaign and super PAC contributions from global corporations that got rich by making American workers poor.

    His son, "Where is Hunter?" - Where is Hunter? - I call him "Where is Hunter?" - walked away with one and a half billion dollars to manage, even though he never did that before. He walked away with a fortune from Ukraine, from China, and from other countries. Between his son and his brother, you ought to read the statements. And the press doesn't pick that up. If I ever did that, it would be - it would be hell, even worse than it's been. Okay? Even worse than it's been.

    What he's done is so incredible. "I won't give them the billion dollars," he says. "I won't give them, unless they get rid of that prosecutor." And then, voila, they got rid of the prosecutor. And the press doesn't even want to talk about it. You talk about quid pro quo. With me, there was none. With him, he's right on tape, and you don't want to cover it. You should be ashamed of yourselves. The press should be ashamed of themselves.

    But Biden shipped away our jobs, threw open our borders, and sent our youth to fight in these crazy endless wars. And it's one of the reasons the military - I'm not saying the military is in love with me; the soldiers are. The top people in the Pentagon probably aren't because they want to do nothing but fight wars so that all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy.


    But we're getting out of the endless wars; you know how we're we doing. We defeated 100 percent of the ISIS caliphate - 100 percent. When I was in - when I came in, it was a mess; it was all over. They have it, in a certain color, all ISIS. A year later, I said, "Where is it?" "It's all gone, sir. Because of you, it's all gone," because of my philosophy. But all gone. And I said, "That's good. Let's bring our soldiers back home. Some people don't like to come home. Some people like to continue to spend money." One cold-hearted globalist betrayal after another, and that's what it was.

    Biden supported NAFTA. He supported China's entry into the World Trade Organization. Two disasters. The most disastrous trade deals in history, both of them. I can't tell you which was worse; they were both terrible.

    And as you know, I ended it, and I ended NAFTA. And we're looking at the World Trade Organization. They've become much better - I will say that. We - World Health, I got out of because we're spending $500 million. China was spending $38 million, and China controlled it. But World Trade, we're looking at it. They've been very nice to us lately, I will say that - amazingly. We never used to win anything at the World Trade; would lose every case. Now, all of a sudden, we're winning a lot of cases. We just won $7 billion as a case. And they're talking to us much differently than they used to, because if they don't shape up, we're going to ship out. That's all. We're not treated fairly.

    China is treated as a developing nation. Developing nation. We're treated as a nation that's fully developed. We're not fully developed, as far as I'm concerned - when you look around at Portland and you see what these Democrats are doing to our cities. Take a look at what's happening in New York and Chicago, where you have Democrat-run cities and mayors that are running, and governors that are running states so badly, and mayors running cities so badly. It's very sad to look at it. It's Democrat-run, every one of them that I see. I guess we could probably find one or two that aren't. But I don't - so far, I haven't been able to.

    If you look at Biden, he supported TPP, Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would have been a disaster; it would have destroyed our automobile business. By the way, many plants are being built right now - auto plants - in Michigan, just like I said. They're being built in Ohio; they're being built in South Carolina, North Carolina. They're being built all over and expanded at a level that we've never seen before, because I said to Japan and Germany and others: "Sorry, you got to come here and build plants. Otherwise, we're going to have to make it very tough on you with tariffs."

    And we got out of the horrible Paris Climate Accord that he'll go back into because, you know, it sounds wonderful. It's a disaster for this country. They've basically taken away your wealth, the Paris Climate Accord. And the other countries don't have to adhere to it. China doesn't kick in until 2030; they don't have to do anything until 2030. We had very high standards. We would have had to close, under some scenarios, 25 percent of our businesses in order to qualify under this ridiculous Paris Climate Accord. It sounds good. It was very bad, very expensive.

    The New York Times has just published an entire story on Biden's China sell-outs, which is amazing for the New York Times. I appreciate that. In 2001, Biden said, "The United States welcomes the emergence of a prosperous, integrated China on the global stage because we expect this is going to be a China that plays by the rules." They didn't play by the rules. They didn't play by the rules.

    The World Trade Organization, one of the reasons it's so bad is that China didn't play by the rules. We did. We did. But their rules were easier because they're considered a developing nation, so they had a much lower standard. But even that, they didn't play by the rules. That's when they became a rocket ship. They were flat-lined for years and years and years. Then they joined the World Trade Organization. And, frankly, they cheated. Okay? They cheated. I'll say it. What difference does it make? I feel much differently. I feel I made a great trade deal with China. Great. And they're buying. You know why they're buying? Because they know I'm not happy. That's why they're buying. And I talk about it because today is Labor Day, and it's a good to time talk about when we're being ripped off by countries. But nobody is even close to China.

    Biden cheered China's rise as a great power "because great powers adhere to international norms in the areas of nonproliferation, human rights, and trade." Well, they didn't. They took advantage of stupid people. Stupid people. And Biden is a stupid person. You know that. You're not going to write it. But you know that.

    The cost of Biden's economic treachery was 60,000 shuttered American factories. And I heard this morning the real number is probably 70,000 - 70,000 shuttered American factories. And he's talking about how wonderful it is with China. No, China has been very bad, on top of which we had the China plague sent to us and other viruses - nothing near this serious - but the swine, and we had other viruses sent in over the years that came from China. I wonder why.

    If Biden wins, China wins, because China will own this country. If Biden wins, China will own this country, and hopefully you're not going to be able to find that out. It's the most important election in our history, right now. Most important election in our history.

    Under my administration, we will make America into the manufacturing superpower of the world, and we'll end our reliance on China once and for all. Whether it's decoupling or putting in massive tariffs like I've been doing already, we're going to end our reliance on China because we can't rely on China. And I don't want them building a military like they're building right now, and they're using our money to build it.

    We'll manufacture our critical medical supplies in the United States. We'll create "Made in America" tax credits and bring our jobs back from China to the United States. And we'll impose tariffs on companies that desert America to create jobs in China and other countries. If they can't do it here, then let them pay a big tax to build it someplace else and send it into our country. We'll prohibit federal contracts from companies that outsource to China. And we'll hold China accountable for allowing the virus to spread around the world.

    Now you can understand why China would much rather see Sleepy Joe than Donald Trump. But as long as I'm President, we will never waver in our undying loyalty to the American worker and to our country as a whole.


    So, Happy Labor Day, everybody. Yeah. Go ahead.

    Q Thanks, Mr. President. The issue of what happened when you were in France continues to be a story.

    THE PRESIDENT: You're going to have to take that off, please. Just - you can take it off. Your health - how many feet are you away?

    Q I'll speak a lot louder.

    THE PRESIDENT: Well, if you don't take it off, you're very muffled. So if you would take it off, it would be a lot easier.

    Q I'll just speak a lot louder. Is that better?

    THE PRESIDENT: It's better, yeah. It's better.

    Q Mr. President, some people are having a hard time believing your denials of the Atlantic story because of what you said about John McCain in the past. Do you understand that? And have you asked John Kelly -

    THE PRESIDENT: No, I don't understand that.

    Q And have you asked John Kelly to refute that story?

    THE PRESIDENT: No, I don't understand it at all, no, because I've always been on the opposite side of John McCain. John McCain liked wars. I will be a better warrior than anybody, but when we fight a war, we're going to win them. And, frankly, I was never a fan of John McCain. You know that; that's been very obvious. I was - but I had to approve his entire - his funeral. I wanted him to get - he deserved a first-class - you know, and it all was approved by me. We sent Air Force One to pick up the casket - a lot of things.

    But, no, I was never a fan of John McCain because he wanted the endless wars, and I didn't. I thought that the way the vets were taken care of - our great vets - was not good, not appropriate. And, of course, he took the fake, dirty dossier and gave it over to the FBI. So this is not somebody - am I supposed to say, "What a wonderful guy"?

    So, you know what? I lived with him. He lived with me. But we had different philosophies. I think my philosophy is right. I think it's turned out to be right. But I wasn't a fan. But I respect people, and I respect a lot of people. That doesn't mean I necessarily have to agree with them, and I didn't agree with him on a lot of things.

    The story is a hoax, written by a guy who has got a tremendously bad history. The magazine itself - which I don't read, but I hear it's just totally anti-Trump; he's a big Obama person, he's a big Clinton person. And he made up the story. It's a totally made-up story.

    In fact, I was very happy to see Zach Fuentes came out and said now he's - that's - I think that's number 15 - and these are people that were there. That's the 15th person. General Kellogg, everybody that was there knew what happened. And so I was happy to see that Zach came out and said it's not true. He just came out.

    And it's a disgrace. Who would say a thing like that? Only an animal would say a thing like that. There is nobody that has more respect for not only our military, but for people that gave their lives in the military. There's nobody - and I think John Kelly knows that. I think he would know that. I think he knows that from me.

    But Zach Fuentes, as you know, worked for John. And I think they both know that. But Zach came out, as you know, today or yesterday, last night, and said very strongly that he didn't hear anything like that. Even John Bolton came out and said that was untrue.

    Now, what was true is that we had the worst weather. I think it was as bad a rain as I've just about ever seen. And it was a fog you - you literally couldn't see. I walked out, and I didn't have - I didn't need somebody to tell me. I walked out and I said, "There's no way we can take helicopters in this." I understand helicopters very well. And they said, "No, sir, that's been cancelled."

    They would have had to go - Secret Service, I have the whole list - they would have had through a very, very busy section, during the day, of Paris. They would have had to go through the city. The Paris police were asking us, "Please don't do it," because they're not ready. When you do that, you need a lot of time. They take days and days and days to prepare for that.

    I wanted to do it very badly. I was willing to sit in the car for two hours, three hours, four hours. I didn't care. It didn't matter. And I had nothing else to do. I went there for that; I had nothing else to do. It was ended because of the terrible weather, and nobody was prepared to go through, in terms of Paris, the police, the military, and the Secret Service. And they came out very strongly and said, "Sir, we can't allow you to make this trip." If I wanted to: "Sir, we can't allow you, from a safety standpoint."

    It was a phony story, just like the dirty dossier - the fake, dirty dossier; just like the Russia collusion; just like all of the other phony stories. And there'll be more phony stories.

    But I do appreciate Zach coming out. But Zach now is the 15th person that's denied it. Zach now, I think, also talked about the weather aspect of it. And he's probably the 14th or 15th person that blamed it on weather. So that's enough of that.


    Yes, please.

    Q Thank you. Christina Bobb, One America News. Thank you for holding the briefing.

    THE PRESIDENT: Thank you.

    Q We're seeing judges, most recently in Detroit, limit police ability to use non-lethal force. My first question would be: Should the police be allowed to use non-lethal force to quell the violence in their cities?