President Trump claimed during a rally on Saturday that the U.S. economy will grow at unprecedented levels because of his trade policies.
“It really has been amazing, it’s been a miracle to a lot of people,” Trump said of recent U.S. economic growth during the rally in Ohio.
“I campaigned and I purposely didn’t mention the kind of numbers that we’re achieving because I didn’t want to be accused of exaggeration by the fake news media,” he said.
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“If I would have said 4.1 percent GDP [gross domestic product], it would have been major headlines — and by the way it’s going a lot higher. You can mark my words it’s going a lot higher,” Trump continued.
The president said that if he brings “the trade deficits down, we could pick up 3 or 4 points in GDP.”
“Nobody says that,” he said, “they think we can’t go any higher. We can go much higher.”
Trump has imposed a series of tariffs on products from other countries in recent months, most notably China and U.S. allies like Canada. Those countries have responded with their own tariffs on American products, stoking fears among U.S. manufacturers and producers of escalating trade wars and their negative affect on the U.S. economy.
The Commerce Department reported late last month that the economy grew at a 4.1 percent rate in the April-to-June quarter — the highest level in nearly four years.
The economy expanded at a rate of 5.2 percent during the the July–September quarter of 2014 under former President Obama.
The president took a victory lap touting the numbers after they were released last month, saying that the U.S. is “on track to hit the highest annual average growth rate in over 13 years.”
“We’re going to go a lot higher than these numbers and these are great numbers,” Trump said at the time.
Trump was visiting Ohio to boost Republican House candidate Troy Balderson days before a special election for Ohio’s 12th Congressional District.
Balderson faces a stiff challenge from Democratic candidate Danny O’Connor for a seat that has been reliably Republican since 1980.