Trump starts campaign for reelection

US president slams Mueller probe, calls Democrats 'radical' in his debut

US President Donald Trump touted his economic record and fight against illegal immigration while heaping disdain on his political opponents in announcing his reelection bid on Tuesday in Orlando, Florida.

Among his targets were the Robert Mueller investigation, his 2016 Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, and Washington insiders. Trade pacts North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, and the Paris Agreement on climate change also were criticized.

"We went through the biggest witch hunt in political history," Trump said of the probe by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. "It was all an illegal attempt to overturn the results of the election.

"For the past two and half years we have been under siege, ... and now they want a do-over," he said. "Nobody has done what we have done under a great illegal witch hunt."

Trump said of the probe that "they appointed 18 angry Democrats to try to take down our incredible movement".

"A vote for any Democrat in 2020 is a vote for the rise of radical socialism and the destruction of the American dream," Trump said. He made passing mention of any of the Democrats running to replace him even as he tossed out "radical" and "unhinged" to describe the rival party.

On China, Trump praised President Xi Jinping, and said the two had a good conversation on Monday. Trump expressed optimism about renewing trade talks when the two leaders are scheduled to meet at the G20 Leaders Summit in Osaka, Japan, from June 28-29.

But Trump, who also accused China of manipulating its currency and subsidizing its companies, said his administration has taken "historic action to confront China's trading abuses".

A study in March by economists from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Columbia University and Princeton University, before Trump raised additional tariffs on Chinese imports, found that the public and US companies were paying $3 billion a month in higher taxes from the trade dispute.

"This is a very big arena, for a Tuesday night, if we have about three or four empty seats, the 'fake news' will say we didn't fill up the arena," Trump said at the start of his speech, after an introduction by first lady Melania Trump.

Trump said his Democratic challengers would seek to grant citizen status to migrants coming across the southern border, so they could vote and boost the Democratic political base. He also criticized sanctuary cities, which offer refuge to undocumented immigrants.

Trump also touted the nation's low unemployment rate and praised what he said was record low unemployment for African Americans, Hispanic Americans and Asian Americans.

"Our economy is the envy of the world, perhaps the greatest economy we've had in the history of our country. The American Dream, ...is bigger, better and stronger than ever before."

Trump said the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement proposed by former president Barack Obama, would have "dealt the death blow to the auto industry". He also praised his proposed replacement for the United States Canada Mexico Agreement.

"Since my inauguration, we've added 16,000 manufacturing jobs a month. We'll tell Sleepy Joe we found the magic wand," he said.

In response, Kate Bedingfield, Biden's deputy campaign manager, said: "Our country cannot afford four more years of Trump diminishing America's role on the world stage, cutting access to healthcare, ignoring the climate emergency that is an unprecedented threat to our national security, tearing children from their parents at the border, giving enormous new tax breaks to big corporations and the wealthy at the expense of working families, and dividing our country by embracing toxic bigotry and racism that's antithetical to who we are."

Andrew Yang, a candidate for the Democratic nomination, who will take part in the party's first round of debates next week, tweeted: "When I'm President, the plan is to be too busy solving problems to be having rallies for my reelection."

Reuters and AP contributed to this story.

hengweili@chinadailyusa.com

(China Daily 06/20/2019 page11)