SOURCE:
ZERO HEDGEURL:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-08-08/trump-vows-jump-start-economy-tax-revolution-interrupted-least-14-timesby Tyler Durden
In his first comprehensive speech laying out his vision for the US economy, Donald Trump presented a tax-slashing agenda which would seek to cut regulations, while blaming Hillary Clinton for America’s economic woes in a highly touted address Monday at the Detroit Economic Club. “Americanism, not globalism, will be our new credo,” Trump declared, saying his plan represents the "biggest tax revolution" since the Reagan era. "I want to jump-start America,” the GOP presidential nominee added in another line that brought both applause and boos from the crowd.
Donald Trump says his economic plan represents "biggest tax revolution" since Reagan era https://t.co/VM9BhSnRMr https://t.co/CxpsguUR9D
— ABC News (@ABC) August 8, 2016
Trump said his plan would
include imposing a temporary moratorium on new federal regulations, reducing rates for income and corporate taxes, and establishing new provisions for working parents dealing with childcare costs. Trump attacked Clinton for supporting trade deals that he claimed resulted in the collapse of the city’s famed automobile industry. The Republican used his venue as the example of the administration's failed policies saying, “Detroit is the living, breathing example of my opponent’s failed economic agenda. Every policy that has failed this city and so many others is a policy supported by Hillary Clinton.”
"She is the candidate of the past," Trump said. "Ours is the campaign of the future."
Clinton will offer her own economic vision in a speech in Michigan on Thursday. In a statement ahead of Trump's speech, her campaign said his plan would give tax breaks to the wealthy and big companies, and would hurt working families and trigger a recession.
The Detroit speech was Trump's first on the economy since announcing a 13-man team of economic advisers last week, which held its first conference call on Sunday. It also came after what was widely seen as his worst week as a presidential candidate for the Nov. 8 election.
A recurring theme, Trump proposed cutting the number of federal income tax brackets from seven to three and reducing the top rate to 33 percent from 39.6 percent. He had previously said he would drop that rate to 25 percent, an idea many tax experts said would dramatically reduce government income and balloon deficits according to Reuters.
He called for a new deduction for childcare costs. There is now a tax credit for child and dependent care, which is determined based on income and capped at expenses of $3,000 for one individual or $6,000 for two.
The presidential candidate
vowed to rewrite some international trade deals, including the North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico that was signed into law in 1994 by Clinton's husband, then-President Bill Clinton. Critics blame NAFTA for costing American jobs. Trump, whose core support is among white blue-collar workers, has long targeted Mexico with a proposal to keep illegal immigrants out by building a wall along the southern U.S. border.
Trump also repeated his
plan for a 15 percent corporate tax rate. The current corporate rate is 35 percent, and Republicans have long sought to reduce it. Trump's Detroit event gave him a chance to outline substantive policy proposals before a key audience of business leaders.
His plan would allow business to write off investments immediately instead of waiting until the end of the year, cut regulations “massively” and lower the business tax rate to 15 percent. That, he said, will “cause trillions in new dollars and wealth to come pouring into our country — and into cities like Detroit.”
“No one will gain more from these proposals than low- and middle-income Americans,” Trump added.
The businessman hammered his theme of "America First" through relentless repetition, casting himself as the defender of American prosperity and Clinton the advocate of globalist policies that he alleged favored other countries, leaving American workers in their dust. According to The Hill, he repeated the words “America” or “American” no fewer than 14 times in the final 18 sentences of his speech.
“We will put new American metal into the spine of this nation,” he said. “It will be American hands that rebuild this country, and it will be American energy — mined from American sources — that powers this country. “Our country will reach amazing new heights.”
Trump had previously announced a tax plan in September but the plan prompted significant criticism for adding to the deficit by about $10 trillion, according to one estimate from the nonpartisan Tax Foundation. But the campaign had repeatedly denied Trump would make any changes to that plan until now.
Curiously, Trump has had trouble separating himself from Clinton on economic issues, the hallmark of his campaign as a real estate magnate turned Republican nominee. Despite leading Clinton in a handful of polls from earlier in the campaign, he’s lost ground. Each of the past two ABC News/Washington Post polls, including one released Sunday, found the two candidates tied on who voters trust more to handle the economy.
* * *
Naturally, this being a Trump speech, it did not come take place without its share of interruptions and provocations. Protesters repeatedly interrupted Donald Trump as he laid out his economic platform in a highly publicized address at the Detroit Economic Club. According to a tabulation by The Hill, the GOP presidential nominee was interrupted 10 times in the first 20 minutes of his address, and a total of least 14 times by protesters, who, at regular intervals, tried to tempt the GOP nominee to depart from his TelePrompter notes and lash out at them in ways that would surely create more unwanted distractions for his campaign.
Trump speech interruption 1 pic.twitter.com/ArQ2Gllpea
— Grant Strobl (@grantstrobl) August 8, 2016
He generally refused to engage them, instead waiting for security to escort those interrupting his address out of the hall. But after the 10th interruption, he made a comments about how supporters of Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator defeated by Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries, had “far more energy and spirit.”
Yet another protester. This time, Trump just talks thru it. pic.twitter.com/WPVZjq1ycV
— Ali Vitali (@alivitali) August 8, 2016
Trump has sought to win over Sanders supporters stung by Clinton’s victory. The audience in Detroit booed as each protester was taken out. Trump stood at the lectern smiling and shrugging his shoulders, thanking the audience for cheering to drown out the interruptions.
After the third protest, Trump joked briefly about the number of the people attending the club's event with him as the keynote speaker. “This is what happens when you go from 35 people to close to 2,000 people, I guess," he said with a smile.
By the fourth interruption, he raised his voice to talk over the protester, continuing that strategy as the speech continued. The reserved response is a departure from how Trump typically handles protesters at his campaign rallies. At those events, he regularly engages with those who break into his speeches, sometimes yelling at security to remove them.
But Trump stayed calm. He smiled, said, “Thank you, thank you,” and let his audience drown out the protesters with boos. “It's all very well planned out,” he said, sarcastically, of the interruptions that cropped up every few minutes.
