The Donald tweeted, of course. The press weren't called in to filter the news. In Canadian terms, this is Justin Trudeau saying we will abolish interprovincial trade barriers, halve the corporate tax rate but if you leave Canada after we get off your back, we'll tax the heck out of anything you sell back.
Here's the statement in full, extracted from six consecutive tweets this morning:
"The U.S. is going to substantially reduce taxes and regulations on businesses, but any business that leaves our country for another country, fires its employees, builds a new factory or plant in the other country, and then thinks it will sell is product back into the U.S. without retribution or consequence, is WRONG! There will be a tax on our soon-to-be-strong border of 35% for these companies wanting to sell their product, cars, A.C. units, etc., back across the border. This tax will make leaving financially difficult, but these companies are able to move between all 50 states, with no tax or tariff being charged. Please be forewarned prior to making a very expensive mistake! THE UNITED STATES IS OPEN FOR BUSINESS."
Source:
https://mobile.twitter.com/realdonaldtrump?lang=en December 4th 2016.
This will surely be misrepresented. Trump says the first move is the government's move, to reduce tax and regulation. The companies will face punitive tax only if they reject freer trade at home and only if their foreign plants target the U.S. for sales.
The statement is rough-and-ready but not hard to parse.
The culture in which CEO's make choices has been altered as well.
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