President Donald Trump said during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday that the United States was on schedule to implement tariffs on other countries.
“We’re on time with the tariffs, and it seems like they’ve been moving along rapidly,” Trump said. “We’ve been mistreated badly by many countries, not just Canada and Mexico. We were taken advantage of.”
“We were led by, in some cases, fools, because anybody that would sign documents like they signed, where they were able to take advantage of the American people, which happened over the last long period of time, except for a little four-year period that took place four years ago,” he continued. “But anybody that would agree to allow this to happen to our country should be ashamed of themselves.”
He said that the tariffs are “going forward on time and on schedule.”
“This is an abuse that took place for many years and I’m not even blaming the other countries that did this. I blame our leadership for allowing this to happen,” he said. “Who can blame them if they made these great deals with the United States and took advantage of the United States on manufacturing, on just about everything? Every aspect you can imagine they took advantage of.”
He said that the tariffs will allow the U.S. to “make up a lot of territory” quickly.
“All we want is reciprocal. We want reciprocity,” he added. “We want to have the same. If someone charges us, we charge the same. It’s very simple. It will be very good for our country. Our country will be liquid and rich again.”
