Billionaire Investor Says Report Claiming Trump Economic Plan Will Grow Debt Is ‘Bogus’

Wilbur Ross knows a thing or two about how to turn around “troubled assets.”

The billionaire investor has made his fortune largely by specializing in leveraged buyouts and distressed businesses, restructuring failed companies. And there are few assets in the world as “troubled” as the U.S. government.

As a key economic adviser to Donald Trump, he was one of the key architects of the Republican presidential nominee’s plan to revitalize the American economy. But when the left-of-center Peterson Institute for International Economics suggested the plan would add trillions of dollars to the U.S. debt, Ross penned the following rebuttal:

For decades, the Peterson Institute has shamelessly lobbied for every bad trade deal now draining jobs and wealth from America—1993’s NAFTA, China’s 2001 entry into the World Trade Organization, South Korea’s 2012 fiasco, TPP, the list goes on and on.

The Peterson Institute dresses up propaganda in a wardrobe of “scholarship” that shamelessly promotes globalism and criticizes anyone who dares oppose it. It’s latest hit piece on Donald Trump makes sweeping, unsubstantiated assumptions about how Trump would implement his trade policies and about how countries and businesses would react. Even slightly more granular analysis shows how wrong these assumptions are.

Perhaps the silliest assumption is that China would stop importing U.S. soybeans. We are the world’s largest producer, and they are the world’s largest consumer. Soybean consumption has been growing rapidly, and there is simply not enough capacity in the rest of the world to displace U.S. sales to China. If China cuts off American farmers, Chinese people will go hungry.

The broad false premise is that Donald Trump wants to start a trade war—rather than end the undeclared trade war now being waged on American workers by cheaters like China. This fear-mongering fails to understand the negotiating power of the U.S. in the world economy.

America is the world’s largest consumer market. All of the countries now running major trade surpluses with the U.S. have far more to lose by disrupting trade. Through smart, tough negotiations, Donald Trump will stop unfair trade practices and cut fair deals that benefit all parties. The U.S. holds both the moral high ground and strong negotiating hands here.

The only honest passage in the report predicts how a President Hillary Clinton would approve the horrendous Trans-Pacific Partnership deal: “She could replicate President Bill Clinton’s maneuvers in the early 1990s when he opposed NAFTA while campaigning … and then supported its passage in office, citing the side agreements that he negotiated.” No wonder nobody trusts her.

If the Peterson Institute wants to honestly model the Trump economic plan, it will include the WHOLE plan—tax, regulatory and energy policy as well. The fact that they did not is proof this is a globalist hit job, not a serious analysis and should be summarily dismissed as such. We show a near doubling of the economy under the Trump plan, 25 million more jobs, and trillions in additional tax revenues from growth.