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Donald Trump for President: 'I Don't Care, I'm Really Rich'

  • Donald Trump announces his presidential bid, June 16, 2015.

    Donald Trump announces his presidential bid, June 16, 2015. | Photo: Reuters

Published 16 June 2015
Opinion

He’s been called everything from asenine to xenophobic, now he wants to be called Mr. President. Billionaire Donald Trump throws his mysterious hair into the ring.

Donald Trump announced Tuesday that he hopes to become the Republican candidate for president in 2016, saying he will run, regardless of donations, thanks to his mega wealth.

"I'm using my own money. I'm not using the lobbyists, I'm not using donors, I don't care. I'm really rich," said Trump, later saying his net worth is well over US$8 billion.

I am officially running for President of the United States. #MakeAmericaGreatAgain

Posted by Donald J. Trump on Tuesday, 16 June 2015

But what would a Trump presidency look like? His campaign speech provided few concrete answers, but did provide voters with a good feel for his firebrand rhetoric.

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While the mogul’s own campaign website describes his interests as “real estate, sports and entertainment,” during his speech, he proffered opinions on the military, the Middle East and healthcare, among other geopolitical issues.

The first thing he made clear in his speech is that he wants to trump China, Japan and Mexico, because “The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problems.”

While politicians fail to undercut China’s prowess in international trade, and the Japanese “beat us all the time,” Trump said, and in Mexico “they’re laughing at our stupidity … they’re killing us economically,” he went on to brag, “I beat China all the time.”

On immigration, he said that Mexico is not “sending us not the right people,” but that it wasn’t just Mexico: “More than Mexico, it’s coming from all over South and Latin America and it’s coming probably from the Middle East, but we don’t know because we have no protection and we have no competence,” he said.

Commenting on the Middle East’s woes, Trump says the Islamic State group now controls the oil that “when we left Iraq I said we should have taken.” He then said Iran is now “big league” taking over Iraq. “We are getting weaker,” he said of the U.S. position on an international stage. He said the superpower was recently shamed by news that its nuclear arsenal is out of date:

“Boy does that send signals to Putin and all of the other people that look at us and say that is a group of people and that is a nation who don’t know what they’re doing.”

Citing one doctor friend who does not approve of incumbent President Obama’s health care reforms, he said Obamacare will be “amazingly destructive,” vowing to repeal it. On the current president, Trump says Obama “has been a negative force,” instead we need someone “who can take the brand of the United States and make it great again.”

RELATED: Donald Trump Blames Obama for Baltimore Uprising, Not Racism

Back on the subject of his campaign funding, there was one point few could argue with: U.S. politicians are “controlled fully by the lobbyists, by the donors and by the special interests.” At least a Trump presidency would only be controlled by Trump.

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