The former president reinforces his stance on the China trade war in a speech outlining his economic policy.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at the Economic Club of New York on Sept.
news update USA fast -- Former U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday he would create a government efficiency commission to be headed by billionaire Elon Musk, who suggested the idea, if he were elected president in November.
The commission would audit the entire federal government before recommending "dramatic reforms" to root out "fraud and improper payments" within six months of its creation, Trump told business leaders in New York.
"I look forward to serving America if the opportunity arises," Musk said on X, formerly Twitter.
Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, among others, also suggested such a commission for government efficiency during an interview with Trump on X back in August.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office already serves as an independent agency in the legislative branch to audit and evaluate if federal money is being well spent and investigates claims of improper spending.
U.S. voters will decide between Republican presidential candidate Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris as the next in command on Nov. 5.
The pledge was part of a speech that ran well past an hour, supposedly to lay out his campaign's economic policies to the Economic Club of New York before business leaders such as JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon and Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman.
Reinforcing or expanding upon many of the policies of his 2016 and 2020 campaigns, Trump vowed to cut 10 regulations for every new one put in place - in 2016 that vow was cutting two old regulations for every new one.
He also pledged to cut the corporate tax rate to 15% from 21% for companies that make products in the U.S. In his first term, Trump cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%. Democratic nominee Harris has proposed raising the rate from 21% to 28%.
This usage of tariffs was a sustained theme in Trump's economic plan both as a means to try and get more manufacturing back to the U.S. and as a revenue source that could help offset the deficit, even with the significant cuts in taxes that Trump has proposed.
At one point during the speech, he even alluded to the idea of the U.S. creating a sovereign wealth fund of its own.
"We'll put tremendous amounts of money -- money that will be taken in through tariffs and other smart things, and we'll have the greatest sovereign wealth fund of them all," he said.
Another way tariffs would combat China economically would be with great increases in those imposed on Chinese vehicles, up to or more than 100%, he said.
In a question about how to better coordinate trade and national security policy with regard to China-the U.S.'s primary strategic rival but also one of its largest trading partners-Trump gave a rambling answer that the U.S. got very little from its relationship with China other than cheap goods before pivoting to North Korea and nuclear war as America's greatest security threat.
Tariffs imposed during Trump's first term and retained or expanded under President Joe Biden have raised costs for Americans by an average of $625 per household, amounting to a net negative for U.S. economic growth, according to the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan Washington-based think tank.
Proposed new tariffs, such as a 10 percent tax on all imported goods, and a 60 percent tariff on those from China proposed by Trump, could shrink the gross domestic product by 0.8 percent and result in $524 billion in new costs annually.