Hillary Clinton gives speech blasting Trump as dangerous for the economy

Introductory remarks about her hosts, the Fort Hayes job center in Columbus. Shout out for “soon to be Senator Ted Strickland,” and all the locals. And her second grandchild. Cuz that’s what grandmas do.

Now hitting the theme: “growing the economy for everybody.” Talks about loss of jobs, sinking home values, loss of savings. “A president’s economic decisions have real consequences for families.” Praises Obama’s leadership taking country out of recession. She’s setting up the attack.

Talks about the basics of the economy for most—high cost of living, college, child care. The economy “isn’t where we want it to be” but we’re in a strong position to make it better. Gives a bit of her long résumé showing her background, experience in dealing with these issues. “I have this old-fashioned idea that says if you’re running for president, you should say what you’re going to do, how you’ll pay for it, and how you’re going to get it done.” 

Infrastructure! And clean energy. These are the things, among others, she’s going to be focusing on in reinvestments. Will make sure “Wall Street and the superrich” pay their fair share in those investments. Now turning to Trump: it’s important to “hold him accountable” for what he says he’ll do.

“You might think because he’s spent his life as a businessman, that he’d be better prepared to handle the economy. He’ll be dangerous there, too…. He shouldn’t have his hands on our economy.” Everybody thinks—right, left. and center—Trump would throw us back into recession. McCain’s guy even says we’d lose 3.5 million jobs, debt would explode, etc. under Trump’s leadership.

“He’s proud of” how reckless he is. He “actually stood on a debate stage...and said salaries are too high...having a low minimum wage isn’t a bad thing for this economy.” Quoting him again on his “hope that the housing market crashes,” because he’d make money off of it. Quoting him on women—the liability of pregnant women in the workforce, that women will make as much as men when they’re as good as men, etc. 

Hits him on Obamacare repeal and his lack of a plan to replace something. Talks about how bad it would be for the economy, and families, to have 20 million people lose healthcare.

Now turning to Dodd/Frank and Trump’s plan to repeal it. Talks about the billions that the CFPB has secured for people who’ve been ripped off. He’d take us back to where we were before the crisis. “I would veto any effort to weaken those reforms” and work to strengthen them.

Hitting him on calling himself the “King of Debt—his tax plan sure lives up to that name.” He’d run up the debt more than any other candidate has ever proposed. How he’d pay for it? “I’d borrow… it’s like a poker game.” “The full faith and credit of the U.S. is not something to gamble away…. We pay our debts. That’s why investors come here.” 

“The U.S. does not do business Trump’s way, and it matters when a presidential candidate talks like this because the world hangs on what a U.S. president says.” “Why would he want to mess with the U.S. dollar?” the most solid currency in the world. “The full faith and credit of the United States is sacred….” Nice hit against fiscal austerity, good to have that slipped in here.

Now his tax plan. “Really? He really said that?” talking about researching for the. $3 trillion cuts to the wealthy, $2 trillion to corporations—“this is like nothing we’ve ever seen.” “Wall Street millionaires will pay a lower tax rate than many working families….” Now turns to his refusal to release his tax returns, his hitting Romney for not doing it in 2012, and now he’s refusing. “What’s he afraid of? That we’ll learn he paid nothing? Or maybe he’s not as rich as he claims? Or he hasn’t given as much to charity as he brags about.”

Now to job losses under Trump plan. First, immigration—deporting millions, build a wall, force Mexico to pay for it. Not only “wrong-headed and unachievable, it’s really bad economics.” Just the policy of deporting 11 million alone would “send us into a Trump recession.” Pivots to the all the ways the immigrant community is strengthening the country and the economy.

On trade, we should “renegotiate” existing agreements, throws in another refutation of TPP. Has a “Make it in America plan” to invest in manufacturing, research, etc. Trump “makes big threats” on trade, but has no plan for investment in U.S. “Interestingly, Trump has made a lot of investments in products that aren’t made in America.”

Blasts him for calling climate change a “hoax” cooked up by the Chinese, and adds a bit about fighting it. Says “it’s tempting to give simple answers” to complex problems, but she won’t do it, because it matters too much to talk about the problems, have real policies as solutions. 

Now hitting his business record. “He’s written a lot of books about business. They all seem to end at Chapter 11. Go figure.” He’s bankrupted his company four times, costing thousands of jobs and disaster for others. “What the hell did I care,” says Trump. “Everything seems to be a game for him.”

Brief history of his Atlantic City casino, how he got paid no matter how badly they failed, and he says “AC was a great cash cow for me for a long time.” “This is one move: he makes over the top promises that if people...put their faith in him, he’ll make them wildly successful” then it all falls apart. The same promises he made at Trump University, now he’s being sued for fraud. Same people he’s trying to get to vote for him are the people he’s been exploiting all these years.

Talks about all the people—the painters, construction workers, all the working people—he just didn’t pay. Over decades, and all the resulting lawsuits. “My late father was a small business man. If his customers did what Trump has done, he’d never have made it. So I take this personally.”

“This is not normal behavior.” She could just leave it at that! You don’t succeed by “destroying other people’s dreams. If I weren’t running against him for president, I’d be saying the same thing….We can’t let him bankrupt America like one of his failed casinos. We can’t let him roll the dice on our economy.” Invokes FDR, leading us out of the Great Depression, all the hard work and learning and effort that took. Then Obama in 2009 and how he had to take the previous president’s disaster to get us out of it. “Just imagine Donald Trump...being in charge when your job and savings are at stake.” “Would he even know what to do?”

“This election will say something about who we are as a people. Trump believes the worst in us… He thinks the only way forward is to go back.” “I believe in an America always moving to the future.” “The formula for America’s success has always been that we’re stronger together…. That’s how we’ll rebuild our economy…. We’ll make sure no one in our country is left behind.”