At a meeting with senators in the White House, President Trump talks about his plans to reform NAFTA with the help of Wall Street talent Wilbur Ross and Carl Icahn.
TRUMP: I have very serious concerns about NAFTA. NAFTA has been a catastrophe for our country. It's been a catastrophe for our workers and our jobs and our companies. They're leaving our country.
I want to change it. And maybe we do it -- maybe we do a new NAFTA and we put an extra "F" in the term NAFTA. You know what the "F" is for, right? Free and fair trade -- not just free trade; free and fair trade, because it's very unfair.
So all of the statutory guidelines we're adhering to. I would like to speed it up if possible. And you're the folks that can do it, Senator. So important.
And we will make great trade deals and we will have something that will -- I don't care if it's a renovation of NAFTA or a brand-new NAFTA. But we do have to make it fair. And it's very unfair to the American worker and very, very unfair to companies who do business in this country.
That's why they're leaving; one of the many reasons, including the taxes are too high. We're going to take care of that also.
You all know Wilbur Ross, who is one of the great people of Wall Street. And he's going to be representing us in negotiations, along with -- along with a lot of other great people. So we've really assembled tremendous talent, some of the best in the world. Carl Icahn called me, said, "I can't believe you got Wilbur." Wilbur on Wall Street is just known as Wilbur. And he's one of the greats.
And he's fair. And he's fair to other countries. He will be fair to other countries. And I think we're going to have a whole new -- a whole new picture by the time we're finished.
So I just want to thank the four of you for being here. We're starting the process. And I think it's going to be a tremendous thing for our country, for the workers, and for our companies that employ the workers.
