Trump’s False Auto Industry Claims
by Lori Robertson
Sep 24, 2020
5 minutes
Continuing a yearslong trend, President Donald Trump made false and misleading comments about new auto plants in Michigan, and the industry at large — boasting in recent campaign rallies about accomplishments that aren’t true.
- Trump claimed his entreaties to the prime minister of Japan led to the announcement of “five plants” in Michigan. There have been five new investments — not “plants” — by Japanese car companies since 2017; one of them is a manufacturing facility for fuel cells, not an auto assembly plant.
- The president falsely claimed there hadn’t been a new auto plant built in “40 years.” Volvo and Mercedes-Benz both announced new plants in 2015.
- He claimed that car manufacturing and sales were “record setting.” Neither is at record levels, and annual figures show manufacturing and sales have dropped since 2016 under Trump.
The number of motor vehicle and parts manufacturing jobs in Michigan has gone down — not up
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