"I've created almost 700,000 manufacturing jobs." -- January 22 interview with CNBC's Joe Kernen January 22 interview with CNBC's Joe Kernen "And we've created 700,000 manufacturing jobs..." -- January 24 speech to mayors Facts First: Trump was exaggerating. The economy added 487,000 manufacturing jobs between January 2017, when Trump took office, and December 2019, official data shows. The number is 514,000 jobs added if you go back to November 2016, the month of Trump's election, as Trump often likes to do.
"I've created almost 700,000 manufacturing jobs. The past administration said manufacturing is dead, which I said, 'Tell me about that. How do you -- you can't do that.'" -- January 22 interview with CNBC's Joe Kernen "A lot of that goes to farmers and manufacturers. And we've created 700,000 manufacturing jobs, which we were told by past administrations -- but one, in particular -- that you would never have manufacturing jobs. I would say, you have to be -- I mean, how can you not have manufacturing jobs? So we're at 700,000 manufacturing jobs." -- January 24 speech to mayors Facts First: Trump's comments appeared to refer to a remark Obama made at a PBS town hall in 2016 -- but he was inaccurately describing what Obama said. Obama scoffed at Trump's promises to bring back what Obama called "jobs of the past" without providing specifics on how he would do so. Contrary to Trump's claims, though, Obama didn't say manufacturing was dead or that new manufacturing jobs could not be created; Obama boasted of how many manufacturing jobs were being created during his presidency, saying, "We actually make more stuff, have a bigger manufacturing base today than we've had in most of our history."
"But we find, I find, that the European Union is tougher to deal with than anybody. They've taken advantage of our country for many, many years. It was actually formed for the purpose of taking advantage of the United States, if you really think about it." -- January 22 interview with Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo Facts First: Experts on the European Union say it was not formed to take advantage of the United States. "The President's claims are preposterous. The European Communities (forerunner of the EU) were formed in the 1950s as part of a joint US-Western European plan to stabilize and secure Western Europe and promote prosperity, by means of trade liberalization and economic growth, throughout the shared transatlantic space," Desmond Dinan, a public policy professor at George Mason University who is an expert in the history of European integration, said in response to a previous version of this claim. US presidents have consistently supported European integration efforts. "The EU was launched in 1993, on the shoulders of the European Communities, to promote peace and prosperity in the post-Cold War era, an era also of rapid globalization. American officials may have had their doubts about the feasibility of monetary union, and about the possibility of a Common (European) Security and Defense Policy, but the US Administration strongly supported further European integration in the 1990s," Dinan said.
Trump claimed three times that the US has long had a trade deficit with the European Union of $150 billion per year, or "more." Facts First: The trade deficit with the European Union was $114.6 billion in 2018, $101.2 billion in 2017, $92.5 billion in 2016. The deficit was $169.6 billion in 2018 if you only count trade in goods and ignore trade in services. But Trump, as usual, failed to specify that he was using this more limited measure. We'll ignore Trump's characterization of trade deficits as losses, which is sharply disputed by many economists.
Trump claimed twice that median household income has increased by about $10,000 during his presidency. (He once said "over $10,000 a family," once said "almost a $10,000 increase.") Facts First: It's not true that household income gains under Trump have already hit $10,000 in less than three years. A firm called Sentier Research found pre-tax income gains of about $5,500 between January 2017 and October 2019. You can read a longer fact check here.
"You know, they're having the worst year that they've had in 67 years, right?" -- January 22 interview with Fox Business' Maria Bartiromo Facts First: China's second-quarter GDP growth of 6.2% and third-quarter and fourth-quarter GDP growth of 6% each were its worst since 1992, 27 years ago. Trump has repeatedly made clear that he knows that 27 years is the reported figure, but he has added additional years for no apparent reason.
"The fact is: We love our farmers, but they were doing -- the maximum they ever did was $16 billion in one year to China." -- January 24 speech to mayors Facts First: China spent $25.9 billion on American agricultural products in 2012, according to figures from the Department of Agriculture.
Trump claimed that highways used to take "21 years to get approved," but "we have that down to two years now. And we think we'll have it down to one year." -- January 24 speech to mayors Facts First: There is no apparent basis for Trump's claim that it now takes just two years to get environmental approvals for highways. According to the Federal Highway Administration's National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) page, the department's median environmental impact statement completion time was 47 months in 2018, up from 46 months in 2017 and 44 months in 2016. At a Trump event earlier in January, Council on Environmental Quality chairwoman Mary Neumayr said, "The Council on Environmental Quality has found that the average time for federal agencies to complete Environmental Impact Statements is four and half years. Further, for highway projects, it takes over seven years on average." Brad Karkkainen, a University of Minnesota law professor and expert on environmental and land use law, said in an email that he has "never heard of a highway project taking 18 or 20 years, though it's certainly possible that when the median time was six or seven years, a few projects took twice as long, perhaps more." He said some projects can "sail through" much faster than the median time, "but to suggest as Trump does that the typical time has gone from 17+ years to two years is just nonsense."