Trump pledges to create protectionist policies and deport immigrants before cheering crowd at IUP rally

Former President Donald Trump spoke to a capacity crowd at Indiana University of Pennsylvania on Monday night, detailing his protectionist policies of tariffs, criticizing immigrants’ impact on Pennsylvania towns, and keeping steel production in America.

“We are going to keep U.S. Steel right here in America,” Trump said. “We have to make U.S. Steel great again.”

Earlier in the day, he reiterated his opposition to the $14.9 billion proposed sale of U.S. Steel to Japanese company Nippon Steel Corp.

The former president spoke for about 100 minutes to large cheers from the 5,000 supporters in the crowd, particularly when speaking about immigrants and how they are changing some towns in America, including Charleroi.

He said falsely that Haitian immigrants in Charleroi have increased the town’s population by 2,000%. The Mon Valley town of 4,200 has added between 750 and 2,000 legal Haitian immigrants in recent years.

Trump interacted with some in the crowd that said they were from Charleroi.

“Has your beautiful town changed?” Trump asks.

“Yes!” shouted a supporter, and another yelled “It’s disgusting.”

Joe Manning, manager of the Mon Valley borough, told TribLive last week that Charleroi has not had any major issues with the influx of Haitian immigrants, with no discernible increase in crime and no discernible impact of the borough’s resources.

Immigration was a big theme of Trump’s speech, where he portrayed himself as the protector of Americans against his rival, Vice President Kamala Harris. He threw several insults at Harris, including calling her an idiot and a Marxist who is too extreme for the nation.

“As president I have to be your protector, I will make you safe at the border and on the sidewalks of your now violent cities,” he said. “You live in a small town your whole life. And suddenly (Harris) flies in thousands of people and she deposits them in the middle of your nice community.”

Trump went on and off script throughout the evening and lobbed some personal grievances against ABC News.

“How dishonest was ABC?” said Trump, referring to the Sept. 10 debate on ABC News.

He also spoke at length about celebrity TV personalities Oprah Winfrey, Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel, complaining that they don’t support him.

Trump repeated several of his campaign promises during the rally, vowing to help Western Pennsylvania workers by eliminating taxes on tips and overtime, as well as increasing fracking and domestic energy production.

“I am the candidate of the American worker and I always will be,” he said.

Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Angela Ferritto said in a statement that Trump sold out Pennsylvania workers when he was president and Harris offers a better path forward for the Keystone State.

“He promised to bring jobs to Pennsylvania, but instead he paved the way for companies to ship them overseas, rewarding companies with a tax break if they did it. Trump killed over 275,000 Pennsylvania jobs — 15,000 of them sent overseas,” Ferritto said. “Under Vice President Harris’ leadership, more than half a million good-paying jobs have been created in Pennsylvania.”

Trump’s tour across Western Pennsylvania hit three stops that are home to many of his supporters, traversing from Westmoreland County, to Armstrong County, and finally Indiana County. Trump won all three in 2020 by massive margins.

He first visited a farm in South Huntingdon in Westmoreland County on Monday afternoon, then stopped at Sprankle’s Supermarket in Kittanning with hundreds waiting outside. For a night cap, he spoke at IUP.

The campus is about 65 miles east of Pittsburgh in Indiana County, a major GOP stronghold. Indiana County voted 68% for Trump in 2020, while only giving about 30% of its vote to President Joe Biden.

Trump has some ground to catch up on Harris after a poor debate performance earlier this month in Philadelphia. Several polls of Keystone State voters were released last week and the majority of them showed Harris with a narrow lead.

Supporters pack arena

The speech started at 7:45 p.m. at Ed Fry Arena on the campus of Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Thousands waited in line for several hours before the rally, and the arena was filled to capacity before 7 p.m. A few hundred fans outside the arena didn’t make it in, but they gathered in the arena’s parking lot to watch the rally on a big screen.

Some rallygoers waited several hours to ensure they made it inside.

Kelly Davis, 50, of nearby Altman in Indiana County, said she waited since 11 a.m. to attend.

“It was just awesome just seeing everybody and the turnout,” Davis said. “What [Trump] did for the country and the state the country was in when he was president … everything was so much better than it is now.”

Breanna Cribbs, a 20-year-old Indiana, Pa., native, attended the rally with her family.

She said one reason she is backing Trump is because she doesn’t support abortion.

“I am very pro-life,” she said. “That’s a big issue for me.”

A small group of protesters also traveled to the campus to object to Trump’s rally.

Mitch McCoy, of Armstrong County, came to the rally with a Harris/Walz campaign sign.

“(Trump) doesn’t deserve to be here,” McCoy said. “He deserves to be in jail. He doesn’t deserve to be in this town.”

Trump tariffs

Earlier on Monday, Trump visited a farm in South Huntingdon in Westmoreland County. He highlighted his tariff proposals in front of the invitation-only crowd at the farm, vowing to put a 200% tariff on John Deere if it continues a plan to move manufacturing of certain machinery from Iowa to Mexico.

Trump has proposed installing anywhere from 10% to 20% tariffs on all international products, and he warned during the South Huntingdon visit that he could install them without congressional approval.

The Harris campaign has said this would amount to a national sales tax that could add $3,900 to Americans’ expenses each year.

Trump said in South Huntingdon that his policies will help American farmers, and the crowd cheered as he talked about a deal with China to sell $50 billion of American-grown products.

“Nobody’s done for farms what I’ve done,” Trump said.