2016 FactCheck: on Free Trade

Donald Trump: FactCheck: Yes, has opposed trade deals since Reagan

Yes, for as far back as we have records: in his 2015 book, in his 2011 book, and in his 2000 book. Some sample excerpts:

• "There are people who wish I wouldn't refer to China as our enemy. But they have destroyed entire industries and cost us tens of thousands of jobs."--Crippled America, p. 43-5, Nov. 2015
• "We need to bring manufacturing jobs back home--the jobs China is stealing."--Time to Get Tough, p. 37-9, Dec. 2011
• "You only have to look at our trade deficit to see that we are being taken to the cleaners by our trading partners. We need tougher negotiations [to] cut better deals with our world trading partners."--The America We Deserve, p.145, July 2000

Donald Trump: FactCheck: NAFTA reduced U.S. jobs by 1%, not 30% or 50%

Bloomberg Fact check: NAFTA had a modest effect on manufacturing jobs. An Economic Policy Institute analysis says manufacturing jobs dropped in the 1990s from 17.9 million to 17.6 million.

Trump said of Hillary, "She's been doing this for 30 years. And why hasn't she made the agreements better? The NAFTA agreement is defective," [implying that Hillary and Bill Clinton held primary responsibility for NAFTA]. Chicago Tribune fact-checkers noted that while NAFTA was signed by former U.S. President Bill Clinton, it was largely negotiated under the administration of George H.W. Bush.

Donald Trump: FactCheck: yes, Ford plant in Mexico, but no U.S. job cuts

Ford is moving production of the Ford Focus and Ford C-Max from its Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne to Mexico in 2018. Ford said in April it plans to invest $1.6 billion to build a new plant in Mexico and create 2,800 jobs to build small cars there. However, Ford also plans to replace the products it makes in Wayne with two new vehicles and has repeatedly said no jobs will be lost. Ford's CEO said that "zero" jobs will be lost in the US and said "it is really unfortunate when politics get in the way of the facts."

Trumps' comments also prompted tweets from both Ford and the UAW countering Trump's claims. The automaker also made a commitment in November to invest $9 billion in U.S. plants and creates or retains more than 8,500 jobs as part of a new four-year contract with the UAW.

Donald Trump: FactCheck: No, VATs are not tariffs against US exports

When a company in Germany makes goods to sell at home, it has to pay the VAT. But if it makes them to sell in the US, it doesn't--the tax gets waived at the border. If a US company sells in Germany, it does have to pay the VAT. [The UC Irvine] interpretation is that] border adjustability turns the VAT into an "implicit export subsidy" for foreign companies and an "implicit tariff" on US exporters. This is just dead wrong. Everybody has to pay Germany's VAT when they're selling goods in Germany. Nobody has to pay Germany's VAT when they're selling goods outside of Germany.

You can't really blame Trump for this one: a guy with a PhD in economics fed this stuff to him.

Hillary Clinton: FactCheck: Yes, called TPP "gold standard," unambiguously

THE FACT CHECKER: Trump is right. Clinton is subtly adjusting her words here when confronted with a question about her consistency on policy positions. The fact is she never used the word "hoped." Instead, she was more declarative, using the phrase "gold standard" when she was Secretary of State: "This TPP sets the gold standard in trade agreements to open free, transparent, fair trade, the kind of environment that has the rule of law and a level playing field," she said in Australia in 2012. "And when negotiated, this agreement will cover 40 percent of the world's total trade and build in strong protections for workers and the environment."

Ted Cruz: I always opposed TPP, but I supported TPA

CRUZ: Actually that's incorrect. There are two different agreements. There's TPA and TPP. I opposed TPP and have always opposed TPP, which is what you asked about. Free trade, when we open up foreign markets, helps Americans. But we're getting killed in international trade right now.We're driving jobs overseas.

FACTCHECK: No one explained the acronyms, so we looked them up. According to Mother Jones magazine:

TPP = Trans Pacific Partnership, a trade treaty between the US and a bunch of other countries around the Pacific Rim. It's been under negotiation for years.

TPA = Trade Promotion Authority, aka "fast track." This comes before the TPP vote, and guarantees that the treaty text will be submitted to Congress for an up-or-down vote with no amendments allowed. Without it, the treaty is dead, since other countries won't allow the US to unilaterally makes changes.