Trump: ‘Our Free Trade Has Led To A Lot Of Bad Things’

President Donald Trump emphasized the difference between his support for so-called “fair trade” and isolationism on Friday, calling reports that he supported the latter “fake news.”

Trump was responding to a German reporter, during a joint press briefing with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who asked Merkel, according to NBC’s translation, “how dangerous do you think this isolationist policy of the U.S. President is?”

The reporter asked Trump if he thought his “America First” policy would weaken the European Union, and why “he was so afraid” of what he called “fake news,” in light of his own unsubstantiated claim that former President Obama had ordered surveillance on him.

President Trump: “I am not an isolationist. I’m a free trader, but I’m also a fair trader.” https://t.co/tj6SQXxkfi

— NBC Politics (@NBCPolitics) March 17, 2017

“Nice, friendly reporter,” Trump responded. “First of all, I don’t believe in an isolationist policy. But I also believe a policy of trade should be a fair policy. And the United States has been treated very, very unfairly by many countries over the years. And that’s going to stop. But I’m not an isolationist. I’m a free trader, but I’m also a fair trader.”

“And our free trade has led to a lot of bad things happening,” he continued. “You look at the deficits we have and you look at all of the accumulation of debt. We’re a very powerful company – country. We’re a very strong, very strong country. We’ll soon be at a level that we, perhaps, have never been before. Our military is going to be strengthened. It’s been depleted. But I am a trader, I am a fair trader, I am a trader that wants to see good for everybody worldwide.”

“But I am not an isolationist by any stretch of the imagination,” Trump concluded. “So I don’t know what newspaper you’re reading, but I guess that would be another example of, as you say, fake news.”