Trump's statement of statements to the nation

In his second address to the nation in Congress, President Donald Trump called for the unity of both parties in the name of progress. Trump focused on some of his top priorities: immigration, the economy, infrastructure, drug prices and national security.

Edition CNN held a fact check presidential statements.

Immigration

Statement: "Every third woman is sexually abused on a long journey to the north" in migrant caravans

Indeed, the road to the Mexican-American border is full of violence. According to Doctors Without Borders, 68,3% of migrants and refugees reported being victims of violence during their trip to the United States, and almost a third of women said they had been sexually abused along the way.

But this information needs to be inserted in another context. It is this violence that causes women to travel in caravans to ensure their safety in a large crowd of other migrants.

Statement: “Year after year, countless Americans become victims of illegal immigrants”

Trump has repeatedly referred to crimes committed by illegal immigrants. The President invited the relatives of the victims to both of his appeals to the Congress.

The US Bureau of Justice does not include citizenship information in national arrest statistics, so there is no reliable federal data to quantify the number of crimes committed by illegal immigrants.

A 2018 study by the libertarian Cato Institute, which looked at data from the Texas Department of Public Safety, found that immigrants—legal or illegal—are less likely than U.S.-born Americans to be convicted of violent crimes.

Other studies have shown that murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault did not increase with the increase in illegal immigration since 1990.

Claim: “The border city of El Paso, Texas, used to have extremely high rates of violent crime—one of the highest in the country—and was considered one of our nation's most dangerous cities. Now that there is a strong border barrier there, El Paso is one of our safest cities."

This presidential statement has certain inaccuracies in causation. According to the analysis of the FBI’s crime data and city law enforcement data, the level of violent crime in El Paso reached its peak in 1993. The construction of the border fence began no earlier than 2008 of the year and was completed in 2009. Before the border wall was built in El Paso, during the period from 1993 to 2006, the number of violent crimes in the city was reduced by 34%.

And from 2006 to 2011 year (immediately after the construction of the fence) the level of violent crimes in El Paso increased by 17%.

Statement: “Lawlessness on our southern border is a threat to the security and financial well-being of all Americans”

Trump said that the southern border of the United States faced lawlessness, as an argument in favor of sending additional 3 750 troops to the US-Mexico border. This is what is known about the nature of crime in the border region, as well as about the presence of law enforcement agencies and the military there.

In the 2018 fiscal year, 19 555 border control agents were appointed to patrol state borders. It was the first year in five years when the number of this staff was increased.

Most border patrol agents were assigned to the southern border. These border patrol agents detained 396 579 immigrants illegally crossing the border in 2018 year, which was lower compared to the peak in 1 643 679 arrests a year ago 19. Meanwhile, in recent years, border guards have seized tens of thousands of pounds of illegal drugs at the border.

Studies and officials also found that US border settlements are relatively safe compared to other US cities.

The level of violent crime has remained at the same level or decreased in many border towns over the past five years to the 2016 year (the last year for which data are available).

Statement: “I want people to come to our country in the greatest quantity, but they must enter legally”

This is contrary to the position of the administration regarding legal immigration. Trump sought to reduce legal immigration and complicated the process of obtaining asylum.

Administration officials have expressed their desire to reduce the number of forms of legal immigration system, from family immigration to the lottery of green cards. The Trump administration has also reduced the number of refugees that the US has accepted.

Last week, the administration also launched the so-called Migrant Protection Protocols, which allow the administration to return some migrants seeking asylum in the United States to Mexico while awaiting a court hearing on their case.

Economy

Statement: “Just two years after the elections, we saw an unprecedented economic boom, which was rarely seen before.”

Trump can claim some points for accelerating the economy, but not everything that has happened is due to him.

He inherited a labor market in the late stages of the long recovery from the Great Recession, with fairly consistent job creation rates. Monthly job growth averaged 217 jobs during Barack Obama's second term, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and averaged 000 under Trump, pushing the overall unemployment rate to its lowest level since 203.

Since Trump took office, the economy has added 4,87 million jobs, not 5,3 million, as he called.

Wage growth has accelerated since late 2017, especially among rank-and-file workers, but not above 3,5%—the wage growth seen in the late 1990s and mid-2000s. Some of the growth was due to states and cities raising minimum wages, something the president did not mention in his speech.

Indeed, in the second quarter of 2018, the US economy grew at a rate of 4,2%, which was partly due to increased government spending on defense, as well as a significant reduction in corporate tax. By the third quarter of 2018, growth slowed to 3,4%.

Economists predict a further slowdown in the 2019 year, as the effects of fiscal stimulus gradually subside, and businesses and consumers face higher interest rates.

Claim: “We have started a revolution in American energy—the United States is now the largest producer of oil and natural gas in the world.”

This is true, but the statement is worth putting in context.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, the States became the world's largest crude oil producer in August, 2018, when for the first time since 1999, they surpassed Russia in total oil production. Earlier this year, the United States surpassed the level of crude oil production in Saudi Arabia for the first time since 1973. The country has been the largest natural gas producer since 2011 of the year.

The growth of oil and gas production in the United States is largely due to advances in fracking technology, which allowed drillers to gain access to reserves washed in shale formations buried deep underground. Production declined in 2015 and 2016 as a result of overproduction and falling oil prices, but recovered quickly as supply stabilized and prices rose, it was just when Trump took office.

Statement: “We have added 600 000 new jobs in manufacturing. This is something that almost everyone considered impossible to do, but the fact is that we have just started. ”

Trump exaggerates the number of manufacturing jobs created during his presidency. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, around 454 000 manufacturing jobs have been added in the US since the beginning of 2017.

But it is true that job growth has accelerated over the past two years. Probably the reason for the growth is a number of factors, including falling oil prices, high employment throughout the country and deregulation.

Statement: “No one won more from our thriving economy than women, who filled 58% of newly created jobs last year. All Americans can be proud that we have more women in the labor force than ever before. ”

Trump twisted the data here. According to the figures, there are more women in the United States now than ever before. But in terms of women's participation in the workforce, America is lagging behind other developed economies.

Today, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately 57% of all women in the US are working or looking for work. But this is lower than 60,3% in April 2000.

More than three decades ago, the United States was among the leading countries in terms of the proportion of older women in the labor force. But since then, the cumulative participation of American women in the workforce has decreased, while other advanced economies have increased this figure since 1985, according to the report of the International Monetary Fund for April 2018.

This trend is due to several reasons, including structural problems and an aging population. The United States is the only developed economy where there is no paid maternity leave authorized by the government and there are no options available to care for children and the elderly, which makes it difficult for women to work.

Statement: “Now there are more people working than ever in our history. 157 million people work »

This is true, but it is worth putting in some context.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics published this month, the number of employed US residents is 156 694 000 people. However, as a percentage of the population, the employment rate has still not reached the figure that was before the 2009 crisis of the year.

Infrastructure

Statement: “I know that Congress is ready to pass an infrastructure bill, and I am ready to work with you on this legislation to provide important new investments in infrastructure, including investments in advanced sectors of the future”

While there was a lot of talk about infrastructure, there was little real action.

That's what happened today: last February, Trump proposed an infrastructure development plan worth 1,5 trillion dollars, although the federal government will receive only 200 billion dollars. The plan relied on state and local governments, not just federal funding.

The plan also focuses on making it easier to obtain federal permits and would allow the federal government to sell assets that "would be better served by local or private entities," according to the proposal.

Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi and minority leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, both said that there is an opportunity to make a deal on infrastructure, but so far this agreement has not been reached.

Prices of medicines

The statement: “It is unacceptable that Americans pay much more than people in other countries for the same drugs, often produced in the same place. It’s wrong, it’s unfair, and together we’ll stop it. ”

It is true that Americans spend more on drugs than in Canada, Europe and many other places. Trump often pointed this out as another example of how the world uses the United States.

In October, his administration published a report stating that drug manufacturers set drug prices in the US in 1,8 more than in other countries.

To counter this, the administration is exploring the possibility of setting prices for these medicines, depending on their cost in other countries. The so-called “target price” of these drugs will be 126% of the average for other countries.

This model of the International Price Index was quickly criticized by representatives of the pharmaceutical industry, as well as by many conservatives who call it price controls. This is contrary to the Republican commitment to the free market system.

Statement: “As a result of my administration’s efforts, drug prices in 2018 have fallen to their lowest level in 46 years”

That's true, but the president is twisting the data. The president refers to the 12 monthly change in the consumer price index for prescription drugs. In December, it fell by 0,6%, which was the largest decline since April 1973.

However, the consumer price index varies widely from month to month. Over the 12 months ended in June 2018, it grew by 3,2%.

Pharmaceutical companies are still raising drug prices, despite Trump urging them not to. According to Rx Savings Solutions, prices for more than 2300 drugs have risen this year. However, growth this year is more restrained than in the 2018 year. The average increase in drug prices in the first month of 2019 was 6,8%, which is lower compared to 10,4% in the same period of 2018.

National security

Claim: "We've spent over $7 trillion in the Middle East," Trump said, referring to the "conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq."

This is not true, not to mention the fact that Afghanistan is not in the Middle East. And this is not the first time Trump has announced spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Congressional Research Service stated that between 2001 and 2014, operating costs for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan amounted to 1,6 trillions of dollars.

A CNN analysis showed that to get 7 trillions of dollars, you need to add future expenses, most of which are intended to pay veterans over the next 35 years.

Statement: “When I took office, ISIS controlled more than 20 000 square miles in Iraq and Syria. Just two years ago. Today, we have freed almost the entire territory from the capture of these bloodthirsty monsters "

Trump is right about the territory re-seized from ISIS during his work in the office. According to IHS Jane’s defense publication, at the end of 2016, ISIS-controlled territory in Syria and Iraq was about 23 320 square miles. On Tuesday, the commander of US Central Command, General Joseph Votel, stated that the territory of the group "is about 20 square miles, which they still control."

Statement: “If I had not been elected President of the United States, we would now, in my opinion, be in a big war with North Korea”

This is doubtful. The diplomatic thaw did not start with Trump. It began at the beginning of 2018, when South Korean President Moon Jae-in welcomed the North Korean athletes to the Phenchen Khan Olympic Winter Games in February. In April, Moon and Kim Jong-un held the first inter-Korean summit in more than a decade in the Korean demilitarized zone.

Prior to this, Trump's rhetoric may have caused tension. His August 2017 threat to meet North Korea "with fire, rage, and, frankly, a force the world has never seen before," forced Pyongyang to threaten a strike on Guam’s American territory the next day.

Negotiations between the US and North Korea in June 2018 reached an agreement on denuclearization, but their results were controversial due to fundamentally different definitions of denuclearization on both sides, but Trump announced during his speech that he would meet with the DPRK head again in February in Vietnam .

Claim: “We are finally making other countries pay their fair share. For many years, our friends in NATO have treated the United States very unfairly. But now we've been covered for the last couple of years. But now we have secured an increase in defense spending from our NATO allies of more than $100 billion. They said it was impossible to do"

Trump is right that NATO allies have increased their defense spending under pressure.

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview with Fox News last month: “By the end of next year, NATO allies will add 100 billions of US dollars in defense. So, we see real money and some real results. And we see that a clear message from President Donald Trump is having an impact. ”

However, the US insisted that NATO countries spend more on national security and under the leadership of Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. In recent years, spending has increased, but many countries in the multi-year alliance still do not fulfill the requirement to spend at least 2% of their GDP on defense.

Statement: Trump said the United States is withdrawing from the Treaty on Missiles of Shorter Medium Range 1987 of the Year, adding that “while we followed the agreement, Russia repeatedly violated its terms.”

It's true. The United States claims that Russia violated this treaty with 2014 of the year, although Moscow has consistently denied the fact of violations, and claims that the US’s claims are due to Washington’s desire to develop weapons systems prohibited by this treaty.

Governance of the country

Claim: “This new era of collaboration can begin with the final approval of more than 300 highly qualified candidates for positions whose applications are still stuck in the Senate—in some cases, waiting for years. It is not right. The Senate was unable to make a decision on these nominations, which is unfair to the candidates and very unfair to our country. Now is the time for bipartisan action."

This is a misrepresentation. It is true that Trump's candidates for federal positions are lagging behind the speed with which they were affirmed by other US presidents, it is wrong to believe that this is entirely the fault of the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans.

Of the 705 key executive branch positions, 274 were not confirmed by the Senate. While Senate Republicans have sharply criticized Democrats for slowing the confirmation process, more than half of those positions—144 to be exact—are open because the Trump administration has not yet nominated candidates for them. Such positions range from ambassadors to deputy ministers.

On the whole, only 54% of the candidates for state posts put forward by Trump were confirmed, which is much lower than the 77% of the statements of candidates put forward by Obama during the first two years of his presidency.

Recall, February 5 US President Donald Trump delivered his second address to the nation. What did he talk about in the hall of the congress read here.

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