CANDIDATES STUMP IN BATTLEGROUND STATES
Trump promises prosperity in Michigan
Nearly 7,000 attend GOP nominee’s rally in suburban Detroit
10/1/2016
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump takes the stage at the Suburban Collection Showplace in Novi, Mich. He told the crowd that he’d rebuild the domestic auto industry, rebuild Detroit, and cut taxes.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NOVI, Mich. — Blistering his Democratic opponent as a tool of Wall Street and special interests, Republican Donald Trump promised economically hard-hit Michigan supporters a return to prosperity under a Trump administration in a large rally Friday night.
“The special interests that shipped your jobs out of the country, they’re donating to Hillary Clinton,” Mr. Trump shouted to an estimated 7,000 people inside the Suburban Collection Showplace.
A Novi police officer said there were 6,800 people in the hall when Mr. Trump started talking and a couple thousand more outside still trying to get in through the security screening during the speech.
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The Trump campaign emailed reporters a photo of Mr. Trump’s crowd, compared with two smaller Clinton gatherings in Florida.
To the cheering crowd, Mr. Trump promised to rebuild the domestic auto industry — which set an all-time sales record in 2015 — “like you’ve never seen it before.” He also promised to rebuild the military, to “keep radical Islamic terrorists the hell out of our country,” to rebuild Detroit, to provide the biggest tax cut since Ronald Reagan was president, to take care of steel workers and miners, and to bring back jobs lost to other countries.
Mr. Trump, a businessman from New York who has never held or sought public office in his life, didn’t offer a blueprint for how he would accomplish his goals for the country.
He attacked his opponent over her email scandal, challenging her to promise not to offer jobs in her administration to five staffers who were given immunity from prosecution.
He said Mrs. Clinton supports giving away the Internet to a global community of owners.
“We come up with the Internet and they give it away. Someone needs to tell them it’s not the job of our leaders to represent the global community. It’s the job of our leaders to represent American citizens,” Mr. Trump said.
“Hillary Clinton will 100 percent sign the [Trans-Pacific Partnership] trade deal. She called it the gold standard. The TPP will devastate Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania. It will also devastate Ohio,” he said.
Mr. Trump urged his supporters in the room, whom he called “the smartest people,” to vote, to also watch out for voting irregularities.
“Do not let this opportunity slip away. Get out and vote and make sure everything is on the up and up. Watch the polling places,” he said.
“Clinton and her cronies will say anything, lie about anything to keep their grip on power, to keep their control over our country,” he said, repeatedly exhorting the crowd to “follow the money.”
In addition to attacking his opponent, he repeatedly attacked the “dishonest” and “corrupt” media, saying the media ignores Mrs. Clinton’s lies, but is quick to call him out as a liar.
The Clinton campaign issued a statement from U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell (D., Mich.) that Mr. Trump’s plans would “benefit millionaires and billionaires like himself at the expense of Michigan workers.”
“Hillary Clinton voted for funding to help save the auto industry, and she supported our workers every step of the way,” Ms. Dingell said.
While Mr. Trump told the crowd that “Hillary Clinton will raise your taxes,” Ms. Dingell’s statement said that Mrs. Clinton “will make the very wealthiest of Americans pay their fair share of taxes to make the largest investment in good-paying jobs since World War II.”
In warming up the crowd, state GOP Chairman Ronna Romney McDaniel told the audience that Mrs. Clinton had been to Michigan only once in the campaign, while Mr. Trump was making his fifth trip.
“He cares about our state. He will not forget us when he gets to the White House,” Ms. McDaniel yelled to the crowd.
One attendee, Patrick Morgan, 50, of Grand Rapids, Mich., said he thinks Mr. Trump has offered plans for his administration, citing the Trump website.
“He had a good message, the fact that he keeps talking about the corruption of the Clintons and how he’s going to bring jobs back to the United States of America,” Mr. Morgan said. “He’s got more plans than Hillary Clinton. She’s been there for 30 years and nothing changes.”
Another attendee, Michael Miller, 38, of Detroit, one of a very small number of African-Americans there, said Mr. Trump is “real,” and “not controlled by the media.”
He said if African-Americans don’t support Mr. Trump it’s because “they don’t do their research,” and added Mr. Trump is not racist.
Mr. Trump is competing from behind in Michigan. The realclearpolitics.com average of polls has Mrs. Clinton leading Mr. Trump 43 percent to 38 percent in Michigan, with 11.1 percent going to Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein.
Oakland County, where Novi is located, just northwest of Detroit, had the second largest voter turnout in the state, after Wayne County, in 2012, with Democratic President Obama winning the county with 53.4 percent of the vote.
Mr. Trump won the Michigan Republican primary with 36.5 percent of the vote.
He recalled his primary showing as “a great big fat beautiful victory.”
Contact Tom Troy: tomtroy@theblade.com or 419-724-6058 or on Twitter @TomFTroy.