Sherrod Brown: Trump ‘said he wants to help’ keep GM jobs in Ohio

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said early Thursday that President Trump expressed interest in helping him keep General Motors jobs in the Buckeye State during a phone call Wednesday night.

Brown told CNN’s John Berman on “New Day” that Trump “said he wanted to help.”

{mosads}”I said the first thing you can do is take away the provision in his tax bill that gives a company a 50 percent off coupon on their taxes.”

“If you’re producing in Lordstown, you pay a 21 percent tax rate, if you move to Mexico, you pay a 10 and a half percent tax rate.” 

Ohio @SenSherrodBrown spoke to President Trump last night about the GM cuts.

“He said he wants to fix it, I take him at his word. I’m working with his trade representative and we’re going to go to town on it in the next few weeks.” https://t.co/vJfBbqfbLB pic.twitter.com/h3HyBzspfi

— New Day (@NewDay) November 29, 2018

“He said he wasn’t really aware of that, but he said that he would help and that he would sign on to my American Cars Act which will incent[ivize] car buying in the United States of American cars and take away that tax break for companies outsourcing,” Brown added.

GM announced plans to slash approximately 15,000 jobs and shutter up to four U.S. factories on Monday, including one in Lordstown, Ohio.

Brown said on CNN that he didn’t talk about Trump blaming him for GM leaving.

“I don’t care about that, I want to fix this,” he explained.

When asked about his own support for the steel tariffs that some analysts blame for GM leaving, Brown countered that “analysts say a lot of things” and that the auto giant hadn’t highlighted tariffs as a reason for moving production.

Trump’s tariffs on imported steel and aluminum have spiked production costs for U.S. automakers struggling to compete against foreign rivals. The president’s plans to impose tariffs on foreign car companies could send prices across the sector skyrocketing even higher and roil the global economy.

Brown, who won reelection this month in Ohio, has said he is weighing a potential run for the White House in 2020.