President Donald Trump will return home after his first overseas trip as leader of the free world, but it didn’t go without one controversial, out-of-left-field comment.
The President told German newspaper, Spiegel Online, the country was “very bad” with regards to trade policies and called for an end of German car sales in the United States.
“The Germans are bad, very bad,” he said. “Look at the millions of cars that they’re selling in the USA. Horrible. We’re gonna stop that.”
Wherever you may stand on the political spectrum, there’s no denying this is a very, very strange comment to make.
German automakers employ thousands of Americans in the United States and have invested significantly in the America for some of the world’s largest auto plants. BMW alone builds 400,000 cars per year in the U.S. and exports them to other markets—a good thing for a trade deficit.
President Trump has threatened to impose a 35 percent tax on German auto imports in the past, similar to the rhetoric he has used with U.S. automakers building vehicles in Mexico.
The president did not respond when asked about his comment, though White House economic adviser, Gary Cohn, confirmed and tried to clarify Trump’s words.
“He said they’re very bad on trade, but he doesn’t have a problem with Germany.”
Comments
The Donald drives a Pinto and eats kitty litter.
In reality, it’s worse than that — he drives a Rolls-Royce…which has been owned by VW, a German company, for the last 20 years.
Rolls Royce is owned by BMW, your thinking of Bentley which is owned by VW.
Actually, you’re both right. Piech as head of VW bought Rolls-Royce/Bentley as a car-making division from BAE. Piech assumed the RR brand came in with the deal. Piech, being the autocratic dictator he is, didn’t listen to his advisors who told him that little RR label belonged to the Aerospace RR, not the car RR.
So Piech and VW got Crewe, Bentley, and all the warranty claims. And no rights to the RR badge.
Literally the next day after the deal was announced, BMW announced that BAE had sold the RR brand (and nothing else) to BMW for a song. They built a new state-of-the-art factory in ultra-rich Goodwood and supplied rustproofed bodies from Dingolfing where they were building the superb E34 at the time.
So VW spent a mint on getting a virtually unknown brand that they then had to invest billions in marketing for. After dieselgate and Lutz’s takedown of Piech, I still can’t understand why people say Piech was so good. What, because they like the looks of the Porsche 917? That was Mezger’s anyway.
Trump is very similar to Piech, and nothing like Lutz
I could hardly say it better — except with one clarification and adding numbers.
First: the owners of the Rolls Royce Motor Cars company and the owner of the rights to the brand name Rolls Royce were separate companies.
From 1914 on, Rolls Royce produced both automobiles and aircraft engines, just like BMW did. In 1971, RR went bankrupt, and the company was nationalised to save the aircraft engine development and production. The automobile company was separated in 1973 and operated since then as Rolls Royce Motor Cars producing both Rolls Royce and Bentley branded cars.
Another company, Vickers, acquired Rolls Royce Motor Cars in 1980.
When the aircraft engine company was reprivatized in 1987, it operated as Rolls Royce Plc.
BMW cooperated both with the automobile Rolls Royce and the aircraft engine company, and even co-owned with Rolls Royce plc an aircraft engine company in Germany. For the Rolls Royce cars, BMW delivered engines and other parts.
In 1998, Vickers put Rolls Royce Motor Cars up for sale, and the competition between BMW and VW was won by VW. The rest is as you told.
VW Group paid 1.440 million DM (corresponds to 736 milliion Euro) for Rolls Royce Motor Cars, and BMW got the name rights for 40 million GBP.
BTW, in 1999, Vickers was acquired by Rolls Royce plc…
How did you know Ivanka’s nickname was ‘kitty litter’?
The levels of ignorance. He has no knowledge of the auto industry. Nor does he respect trade among allied nations. Nor does he understand what a trade defect it. I’m blown away by his ignorance.
He can’t help it if he’s an idiot. What’s wrong here are the unAmerican buffoons who voted for this Russian and still can’t admit what’s happening before their eyes.
First off you need to understand he is a hard nosed NYC businessman. The way of doing buisness on the east coast is much different than other places.
While NY people come off as rude or brusk it is just the way they are.
He knows he is not going to stop German cars sales. But he can make them more difficult and less profitable unless they are willing to negotiate better terms for our country.
This dealing is how much of the world operates too so they get it. Here in the states everything has a price tag but overseas many places you negotiate a deal and that is what is going on here.
Americans politicians have been much like a person walking into a car dealer and paying full MSRP with some one else’s money.
We have been getting the short end of the deal for too long and we need to regain our advanatages.
America should be our priority first!
are you a trump whisperer? full of excuses for his boorish behavior. seems like every time trump says something stupid, it takes a team of spin doctors to clarify what he said.
too bad trump acts more like a sleazy used car salesman than a president but i guess that is how they do it in new yaaawk.
This tool is such a ‘patriot’ he’s still defending a man that has more Russian ties than a guy that owns a Russian tie store.
Show some real confirmed proof troll.
No fake or incomplete news.
It’s impossible to show someone something when their eyelids are rubbing against their colon.
No. That’s not how we do it in New York. trump is just a bonafide mental case asshole. Something us New Yorkers cannot relate with and is the reason we didn’t vote for him collectively except Staten Island.
First off you need to understand he is a whiny little sociopathic but organized criminal. The way the mafia does buisness on the east coast is similar to other places. Like Russia.
While thugs and gangsters come off as rude or brusk it is just the way organized crime is.
He knows he is not going to stop German cars sales. But he can make illegal offers they can’t refuse. Unless they are willing to negotiate better terms for our country.
This ruthless thuggish dealing is how much of the world operates too so they get it. Here in the states it’s silly not to be fascist when overseas so many places are fascist.
Americans politicians have been much like a person attempting not to act like animals or thugs or rapists.
We have been getting the short end of the deal for too long and we need to learn how to be animals, thugs, and rapists.
Letting an animal/thug/rapist like Trump guide America should be our priority first! It makes our weakest minds feel powerful.
Aaaand Oblunder sneaking behind our backs to send Iran $1.5 Billion dollars in cash strapped to a pallet on a cargo plane in the middle of the night didn’t raise your hackles? Nah, Barry must’ve had a great reason ’cause according to the far-left wack-job ‘news organizations’ you fascists follow, he was beyond reproach and to criticize him meant you must be a racist!
That elitist, America-hating, far-left, socialist scum bag played nice with other so-called ‘leaders’ because he was selling us out them to on their terms.
When will you morons wake up and stop breathing your own farts?
Trump is doing his best to put our nation’s best interests ahead of the interests of other nations.
God Bless President Trump.
If doing deals with Iran is bad, you must think President Reagan was a traitor. Oh…
Obama – did an open, known, truth-checkable deal with Iran, with no side-issues.
Reagan – did a secret, covered-up, nefarious deal with Iran that involved supplying arms to a communist insurgency.
Did you like it when Barra sold Opel? No I didn’t either, but there was literally no good choice and Barra had to choose the least-bad. This concept is unknowable to you.
LOL – so above board that if it weren’t for a clandestine video of the pallet of cash being loaded onto the plane we would never have known about it.
Don’t assume you know what’s unknowable to me. What’s truly unknowable (and lamentable) is how people such as yourself don’t forget to breathe.
Lucifer has a place waiting for Trump in Hell!
“Trump is doing his best to put our nation’s best interests ahead of the interests of other nations.”
I’m an American. Not a Russian.
You get it. Well said.
Here comes scott3 to drop some pearls of wisdom to set us straight.
The REACTIONS to Scott3 have changed in a very telling way over the last few months.
For a few years Scott3 was taken very seriously here. Commenters would give him many ups, and reply to him with serious sentences which took his claims further down his own road. Folks were almost in awe of his ‘insider’ looking posts. Folks had heard of BMW’s famous Scott26 (source of many first releases of insider future developments) and assumed Scott3 was GM’s version. Couldn’t have been more wrong. Nobody ever argued against him. Except the farts of this old trombone, of course.
This was strange because he never, ever, backed up his claims with any proof of any kind, like references to quotes from named sources, or media articles, or GM documents, nothing. Of course, he regularly claims to “have seen” documents, and having “been around” when people said things to other people, but no names/dates/quotes.
But now Scott3’s absolute golden-‘handed’ hero has made it all the way to the bully-pulpit. Scott3 expected happily-ever-after to become happily-ever-now as all his Hillary-hated nemesises had to cry into their PC-cups…
Only, the very same lie-detectors used on Hillary are now pinging madly away, just like before. The lie detectors haven’t stopped, because the lies haven’t stopped.
What has changed? Before, Scott3 could say what he wanted and people would respond with “Oh Guru, what more pearls of wisdom may we have”. NOW, he says what he wants and the response is “Oh no, another Dunning-Kruger lemon-juicer!!!” That’s the only change we have.
When are people going to realize that Sheldon Adelson, the Koch Brothers, and before 2016 even Trump himself openly acknowledged that they “donate to” [key-finance] BOTH PARTIES. There is no difference between Hillary and Trump, there was no difference between Obama and McCain or Romney, and there was no difference between Bush II and Gore. Want proof? Joe Lieberman, Gore’s proposed Vice-Prez, was a total supporter of the Iraq War. That war would have happened in 2003 no matter who was president.
Why is it the far left always resort to personal attack when they can not present a real debate response of substance?
Sad.
Even my normal Democratic friends are being attached by these people any more.
Really sad.
Scott3, above, in this very same article:
“While NY people come off as rude or brusk it is just the way they are.”
Lower, right here in response to me:
“Left always resorts to personal attacks”
No Scott, the Left hates hypocrisy, plain and simple.
The left hates it when they get called on their hypocricy, plain and simple.
Fixed it for you.
Except you don’t have an example in your post. That makes YOU the hypocrite. RWNJ’s: unfixable, unbuilt-argument Delaware-witch warriors, hahahahahahahaha
Really?
Easiest example is the that of Hildebeast and the commie-shill talking heads vilifying Trump for not agreeing to accept the election results and threatening to undermine our ‘democratic process’ (which they figured they had rigged)… aaaand then turning around and paying other worthless libs to protest and ‘resist’ and throw the biggest temper-tantrum in history when they didn’t win.
Because they are HYPOCRITES.
According to European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, this didn’t happen. It was reported in a German publication, Der Spiegel, but there are no recordings or transcripts to validate the publication’s claim and Mr. Juncker, who was there, and is likely no fan of Trump, said the events described by the publication are inaccurate.
it happened. trump’s own guy confirmed it.
http://www.autonews.com/article/20170526/COPY01/305269972/trump-blasts-german-automakers-u-s-sales-and-threatens-barriers
I am not, and will not, weigh in on politics but only select media sources have reported the story and a person in the room refutes it.
http://fortune.com/2017/05/26/trump-german-car-sales-bad/
Not that i have a problem with european cars. Honestly it’s japanese products I wish he’d ban, I mean i’d love to see the day when the only cars on the road are Mopar, GM and Ford and the only motorcycles are Harley Davidson motorcycles. but that’s just me!!!
Those days are gone. American roads will likely never again be filled with only domestically produced automobiles.
I have no problem with any country sending their products to the United States so long as we are allowed equal access to their markets. That’s the big complaint I have against China and why I try very hard to avoid buying anything from that nation. They flood our markets and then enact strict barriers to block our products from their markets.
Imagine how much better off American workers would be if all the US brand cars being sold in China were built here. All the Buicks that are being snapped up by the Chinese could easily be built in places like Flint and Detroit (which have been devastated by job losses) and shipped to China were it not for their protectionist trade policies. Instead Communist China forces GM to produce in China and do so with a Chinese company….and share the profits with the native company! Those Chinese companies really bring nothing to the proverbial table yet become equals. What a horrible deal for America.
I believe in time, once we’ve taught the Chinese everything we know about building cars, they’ll essentially kick us out, produce their own products and export them to the US fully taking over a business we once dominated.
The only thing that stops that are Americans refusal to buy the products or perhaps if we grow a spine and insist on more favorable trade deals that would allow US cars to be exported to China tariff-free and end the requirement that US companies partner with a Chinese company. It might be too late with even those measures; we’ve been over there training them to compete with us for years.
CiEye believes that the same number of cars could be sold in China, if China would not have protected its own industrial development, and all those hundreds of thousands of Buick etc as being produced by Joint Ventures in China could have been sold in China as imports.
Wrong. Totally wrong.
China could develop its own industry and thus save the world capitalist economy by protecting her weak industries against the much stronger competition. This was politically possible because China did not come under US control by the 2nd World War, but by the Chinese conquering China for themselves and keeping the USA out, including by intervening in Korea and preventing the USA to take over all of Korea and getting thus on the Chinese border at the Yalu river, and being tempted to cross it.
Without China securing its sovereignty and independence, China would be a poverty stricken county of misery. You could hardly sell many cars to an impoverished population. China could become the world’s largest market for automobiles only by protecting its own automobile industry and by allowing the foreign companies to enter the Chinese market only by forming Joint Ventures with local companies. Today China is the most important market for all big car makers in the world. This is possible due to the Chinese revolution of 1949-53.
Remember, the US industry did only develop by protecting itself against the English competition, and the US industry also needed a revolutionary war to turn the tide. The slavocracy in the South preferred the USA to be an exporter of agricultural products, the provider of raw materials to the English industry, and keep the import tariffs low. Only by defeating the slavocracy, arming the Blacks and slaves could the northern industrial capitalists create the conditions for becoming a world power, and by protecting its infant industry by high tariffs against foreign competition. No GM, no Ford, no GE, no IBM, no Microsoft without the 2nd American Revolution.
Only by protecting her own industry could China become the world’s largest market for ALL car makers world wide, and a saviour of GM, Ford, VW, what have you.
Observer,
I do not believe that the same quantity of cars sold in China could’ve been sold there as US exports rather than as domestic production. I never made that assertion at all.
Well, here’s what you wrote:
What a pipe dream. Were it not for China’s protectionist trade policies, there would hardly anyone in China be able to buy a car in the first place. It is China’s protectionist trade policies, based on the Chinese socialist revolution and stopping the USA in Korea, which made the emergence of a significant market for industrial products possible.
It is “communist China” which saved world capitalism by its protectionist policies. The periodic crisis is the norm of the capitalist aka market economy and ‘communist China’ by protecting the developlement of her own industry helped to soften out the effects of the regular crisis from 1987 up to 2009.
I even dare to say that GM would not have been able to get out of the 2009 bankruptcy without China’s protectionist policies, which provided the market outlet.
Get real.
Despite nearly every policy or policy proposal sticking it to every citizen that isn’t an oil, chemical, banking, software, real estate, or banking tycoon, Trump’s abysmal approval ratings somehow dwarf those of even George W. Bush’s. So it’s looking more and more likely that, yes, Trump really could have shot somebody and not lost any voters. I bet you a majority of his followers, who will someday denounce him but only after he’s resigned in disgrace, would probably even take a bullet for the man right now–if Trump promised first that it wouldn’t hurt.
I don’t understand it, I mean look at tonight’s breaking news on the man and his presidency, will even that make a dent in his numbers? (We’re talking espionage now!) Probably not!
I’m thinking now maybe that orb does have some sort of special powers…
Approval was reported up to 48% this week.
By who, Scott, who? Where is your phaaaking source? YOU are NOT a source. You have not done the surveys and interviews and data-crunching yourself, you are transferring some information you read somewhere else and not admitting that, making you 48% fake. You are a commenter, with as much fart-power as a trombone. That’s all you have.
It doesn’t shock me anymore, Scott. Nor would Mueller exonerating Trump of wrongdoing (I think he’s a fixer), nor would Trump squeaking out another electoral college win years from now. It’s now coming out that the spray-on tan is actually a Teflon coating.
Teflon Don II
Trump Jr is Teflon Don III
John Gotti had a light-sabre duel with the Orange-haired one in New York in 1983, John cut off Donald’s ‘hand’ and gave it to Lorena Bobbitt, and then said:
“Don, I am your Father”
What Donald Trump meant when he said ‘Germans are very bad’ is based on frustration Trump was feeling because of Germany’s unwillingness to honor their commitment of spending 2-percent of their GNP on Defense as promised by being a member of NATO; Germany’s PM Angela Merkel said a couple of months ago during her visit to Washington said Germany would not be able to spend 2-percent of GNP until 2025 at the earliest as this was why Trump was unwilling to shake her hand and Trump’s comment of passing legislation to stop the selling of all German cars was meant to make Germany feel pain where it may hurt the most (in the pocket book).
Absolutely no one has any idea what Trump means on anything. Including the KKKheeto himself.
Well they do make really bad cars that love check engine lights so….
Now although German brands produce cars here. (And even more than some domestic, looking at you Buick!) The problem isn’t so much the fact we have trade deficit with Germany, it’s the trade law.
Germany has a 29% tariff + duty charge on a cars not built in the EU compared to the US which is like 2% to 5% on passenger cars. Same with Japan although I don’t know the exact number as well as China. Now granted consumers in the first two countries tend to dismiss American cars, but still is that “free trade”. Those who accuse the US of protectionism forget that some of our allies/trade partners also use protectionist laws. The US has the “chicken tax” on light trucks (25%) and I think that has been beneficial. The Japanese brands have factories here because of tariffs not because they want to build here.
1st: Germany has no import tariffs, only the EU as a whole has tariffs. Germany OTOH doess, as all EU counties do, levy a Value Added Tax (VAT) on all sales with a rate of 19% (only 7% on food, books, newspapers and some other necessities). Every EU member sets its own rate. Taxes are, as labor relations a national matter. The union only agreed on a common minimal rate to keep the a more or less level field.
2nd: the US automobile builder produce themselves in the EU and are market leaders in several countries. But their share is shrinking over the decades since the last war. Chrysler sold its French subsidiary to Peugeot in 1978, GM is following suit this year.
3rd I don’t think that the chicken tax was beneficial to anyone – it acted as a brake to the technical development in the USA.
@Don >>although German brands produce cars here. (And even more than some domestic, looking at you Buick!) The problem isn’t so much the fact we have trade deficit with Germany, it’s the trade law.<<
Just a small fact: You know which company is the largest automobile exporter in the USA? Or from the USA, to put it in a slightly different way?
BMW.
Spartanburg is one of their largest factories, or even the largest.
Trump told the Nato allies what they needed to be told and that’s that. 🙂
This page should be reserved for less political commentary. I see the relevance but I regret the repercussions. Please remain civil my brothers and sisters.
The job of president requires an asshole. To be a good president you must be an asshole. Trump is an asshole. To be a great president you must be a prick! Jimmy Carter was and is a decent and moral man. But it was not such a good president. The world is not ready for a decent and moral person to be president. I did not vote for president Carter or Trump. Didn’t vote for the Hilda beast either.
Anytime Trump opens his mouth and goes of ” script ” he makes a fool of himself . Everyday in the mainstream media there are more allogations of his close ties with Russia . Putting the Germans down as being very bad is just meat for his base . They eat that stuff up . And where did the information come from that his approval rating is 48% this week ? That is fake news ,it is hovering around 36-38% that is his ceiling it has never been over 40% EVER !
Even when he launched the missiles into Syria it didn’t get above 40% .
I am so for free trade , and yes many countries have / are taking advantage of us and it needs to be corrected , however you don’t create such an atmosphere by angering our allies .
China is such a big supplier of goods for the US for many reasons , they have cheap labor , people here in this country continue to shop at Walmart looking for the best and cheapest prices that they can get , ( which I get ) and the biggest reason is that China holds our 20 TTTrllion dollar debt . So any President lets China get away with the things they do as to not upset them .
And like some other post said it is only a matter of time that when the Chinese start to learn how to manufacture a cheap and reliable car it will decimate our Car companies .
And while I am venting on here and listening to the news , Trumps son-in-law Jarred wanted to open a back channel to talk directly to the Kremlin . I mean WTF is going on in the White House and the close ties to the Russians , they either have financed Trump’s family busnicess and all his real estate holdings or they have something on him that we don’t know about YET .
Anyway……… our Trade agreements do need to be looked at and re-negotiated so the trading we do all over the world if fair and level . And if we can get to that point there isn’t a country in the world that can out do us !
To paraphrase someone’s words, the president’s thought process is like a jar of lightning bugs, each one randomly flashing.
Some of you may not like the way he says things, but he says what Needs to be said…Trump speaks the Truth, without apology or foo foo. Their were many that felt the same way about President Ronald Reagan, but he also Spoke the Truth…and got the job done.
Bottom line: The European Car Manufacturers have gone to long, way to long, skirting their fair share!! By the way, I owned German autobiles for 30+ years, until about a year ago. I sold my big German sedan, and purchased a GM pickup truck, and I love it…we are now shopping for a GM sedan for my wife, her second one actually, since we sold her European driver in 2011.
Trumps “truth”:
Lock her up
Build a wall
Take down Obamacare
Stop ‘them’ coming
Flynn is a patriot, Kushner is a patriot
I won’t make personal money from the Oval Office (but my daughter needs to build the business)
China is bad (but my daughter needs to build the business)
And the very very best “truth” of all – when the FBI wants to actually find the actual truth … “You’re Fired!!!”
Conservatively Speaking, your kind of truth would have massive problems being ‘used’ by REAL TRUE Conservatives like Ulysses Grant, TR, Eisenhower, Swarzenegger, McCain, Churchill, De Gaul, Kohl, Merkel, etc etc because those people ‘truths’ never CHANGED. Trump literally changes his facts, every day, through his mouth. You have heard him do this yourself, and you have literally closed your ears. This ear-closing makes you NOT conservative.
Remember some more truth:
– Reagan and Bush I supported Saddam Hussein from 1980-1989 with US$, arms, and propaganda
– Nixon and Reagan supported Bin Laden with US$ and CIA support
– Reagan supplied arms to the Contras and arranged payment through Iran, money earned off American streets through Ollie North’s introduction of Crack into US city ghettos, crack that was made from coke bought from Noriega. All of this has document trails
– Nixon and Kissinger initiated secret meetings with North Vietnam unknown to the US Government at the time, an act of treason exactly the same to Flynn and Kushner
>> Nixon and Kissinger initiated secret meetings with North Vietnam unknown to the US Government at the time, an act of treason exactly the same to Flynn and Kushner<<
Actually, Nixon WAS the government as that time, wasn't he? Besides, there were publicly known negotiations in Paris between USA and Vietnam over ending the war, nothing secret. Under pressure, Nixon finally recognized China and opened diplomatic relations, in order to put pressure on Vietnam.
But it all failed .. Vietnam got its freedom and won over the USA, the first war which the USA lost.
Your posts are great thanks!!! Nixon and Kissinger did have meetings with NV reps before the 1968 election. It’s why NV treated those official meetings with LBJ’s reps with politeness and nothing else. Your point about moot points still wins.
A Nazi calls Germans bad.
In Trumps campaign he said he was tired of everyone in Washington trying to be PC , ( Politically Correct ) . That is just about the only thing I agree with him about . Trump is a LIAR , it’s being proved on a daily basis with every tweet he sends and anytime he opens his mouth . He is the biggest stain on this Nations Presidency . He is as corrupt as any one to sit in the Oval Office and he is also a puppet of the Russian Gov. . Nixon resigned in disgrace for getting caught lying about a stupid two-bit crime of stealing Democratic info from their offices in the Watergate Hotel .
Clinton too was caught lying to Congress and to the American People about whether or not he got a BJ from one of his staff members . Trump TRUMPS all of this by his collusion with the Russians to beat Hilary in the Presidential Race .
When the former CIA Director comes before the congressional committee to testify will be the first nail in Trumps coffin of Impeachment .
The Germans do make good cars to get back to the point of this post .
The dots are coming together with all the lies , the money trail and his ties with the Russian Bank . The public is getting weary about the mess in the White House and what will happen when there is a real disaster that happens and we have to trust the info coming from our Government .
I can’t lie I would be all for it if he wanted to stop toyota sales in the U.S we dont need that UGLY toyota GARBAGE here if he could deport them anywhere but USA i would be Thrilled donald trump is STUPID tho he’s just and idiot I don’t know how y’all elected this moron toyota is the ENEMY not Mercedes-Benz or BMW stop toyota from selling in America they aren’t needed or wanted here toyota SUCKS
Mr. Trump, I am the first one to say American manufacturers have closed the quality gap and therefore buying a foreign product is unnecessary. Trust me, there are far too many foreign nameplates on the road. That said, sir, you’re a raving mad idiot.