Donald Trump said Friday the forces that persuaded the United Kingdom to leave the European Union will help elect him president of the United States later this year.
“I think I see a big parallel … people want to take their country back,” Trump said in re-opening his Turnberry golf course in Scotland just hours after the results of the “Brexit” vote were announced.
Before his golf course news conference, Trump said the British people “took their country back, just like we will take America back.”
Trump said the desire to control borders and block illegal immigration are big factors in both the Brexit results and his own presidential race, adding that people in both countries tired of seeing migrants “pouring” in.
Many analysts believe the British decision to leave the EU will hurt the global economy, but Trump said no one knows for sure.
“We’re going to see how it plays out,” Trump said. “I think it’s going to end up being a very good thing, but it will take time.”
Trump also mocked President Obama and former secretary of State Hillary Clinton — his election opponent in November — for urging British voters to stay in the European Union.
Obama tried to “tell the people what to do,” Trump said, and “the result might have been different” if the U.S. president had stayed out of the U.K. referendum.
Claiming he foresaw the British vote, Trump also predicted the UK will not be the last nation to leave the European Union and suggested the entire EU could break up.
“It looks like its on its way,” he said. “I could see it happening.”
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee also issued a written statement on the “Brexit” results, saying that “the people of the United Kingdom have exercised the sacred right of all free peoples” and “voted to reassert control over their own politics, borders and economy.”
He added, “come November, the American people will have the chance to re-declare their independence.”
Trump drew other parallels between his campaign and the support for the decision to leave the EU. “People are angry,” he said. “All over the world they’re angry. They are angry at the borders. They are angry over people coming into the country and taking over.”
Trump, who has clashed in the past with British Prime Minister David Cameron, did not comment in detail on Cameron’s announcement Friday that he will resign in three months because of the EU vote. Trump said Cameron “was negotiating to meet me” at some point, but that probably won’t happen now.
In his remarks at Turnberry, Trump bragged about changes to the historic golf course that has hosted the British Open, including an improved hotel on the site.
While exiting the EU could cause problems for Great Britain in the short term, it should benefit the British in the long term, Trump said.
The devaluation of the British pound could help the United Kingdom in some aspects, he said, perhaps encouraging more people to travel to a less expensive country.
“When the pound goes down, more people are coming to Turnberry, frankly,” Trump said.
(via: USA Today)
