Voters of her the economic policies of both major nominees and we will hear from a Democrat who is now consulting for the Trump campaign. This is KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Maureen Cavanaugh it is Thursday, August 11. Our top story on midday addition is Hillary Clinton made a major economic speech in Detroit. The same city in which Donald Trump outlined his economic proposal earlier this week. Clinton's policy speech adhere closely to the economic plan she has been promoting for months. This time she took the opportunity to draw sharp contrast between her proposals and trumps. Joining me is Jon Baumunk . Welcome to the show. Did you hear any new policies put forward by Clinton in this speech? First of all we have to look at what Clinton acknowledged. She acknowledged that the economic revitalization that has occurred has not reached all Americans. She also said that we need to work harder. People need to work harder to get ahead today. She blamed Congress for a lot of that. She acknowledged this but I think a lot of candidates really differed on how they would approach solving these problems that many American workers have been left behind are facing. One of the things she mentioned today is this huge infrastructure plan that she has to leverage public money with private investment to create jobs. This has been one of the hallmarks of her economic plan. Did you hear anything different about that today. Her approach is to use tax credits and try to encourage companies to behave in a certain way by giving them the incentives of tax credit rather than cutting taxes across the board which is really trumps main approach to getting businesses to work toward this goal of getting our infrastructure back. I think she will try to encourage companies to do this through tax credits but again it is difficult to see how she's going to do it. Let's hear something from Hillary Clinton's speech today. She contrasted her job creation proposals with those of Donald Trump. According to an independent analysis by a former economic adviser to Senator Jon McCain , if you add up all of trumps ideas from cutting taxes for the wealthy and corporations to starting a trade war with China to deporting millions of hard-working immigrants the result would be a loss of 3.4 million jobs. By contrast the same analyst found that with our plans the economy would create more than 10 million new jobs. Job creation is a centerpiece of the Trump campaign. Is this a problem for him? It's not a problem. If corporations behave the way they are supposed to and they bring the jobs back to the United States so far they have been going overseas because corporations pay lower taxes overseas. Because they are paying lower taxes overseas because that's where the assets are going this is where the jobs are also going and they are not starting and need to be brought back into the United States. Donald Trump says the corporate tax rate he wants to cut it from 30 to 15% in order to keep corporations in the United States. Hillary Clinton said today what she wants to do is either reward or punish corporations. She wants to either up their tax rate if they take jobs overseas, lower it if they keep manufacturing here in the states. What do you think of those two proposals? I think Clinton's attitude about Corporation is an upper -- us against them philosophy and the corporations are the bad guys and that we need to make them behave the way we want them to behave and Trump is basically saying if we give them a greater incentive to do with we want them to do then we trust them to behave this way by creating more jobs in the United States and having less investment overseas. One of the big things, strangely, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump seem to agree on is trade. And free trade agreements. Here is what Hillary Clinton had to say today about the TPP. I will stop any trade deal that kills jobs or hold down wages including the transpacific partnership. [applause] I oppose it now, I will oppose after the election, and I will oppose as president. Donald Trump also opposes TPP. He does not like NAFTA either. Is this one area where the two candidates actually agree? They definitely agree here although the methods of addressing it are certainly different. One thing that is an overriding theme that we are starting to see a emerging from both campaigns is this sort of America first tilt. Donald Trump first had it in his campaign slogan and now Clinton is adopting the same kind of message. She is saying we will stand up to China and appoint a trade prosecutor. She also acknowledged in the past that China has gained the system. She attributed most of it to Bush but some of it might also rest with the Obama administration. Certainly they play a part because they have been watching the hen house for the last eight years. To the Clinton and Trump economic policies as far as you can see it, fall solidly within partisan lines or are they reaching for a middle ground. First of all not -- acknowledging that we need to put America first and how we get there is something we need to agree on but both parties are acknowledging that we need to do this. I think that is a key point to make. It is how we do it. Basically Clinton is emphasizing fairness. She's emphasizing upward mobility for people in the lower middle income tax brackets and opportunities for that group of people and Trump is basically saying if we get the corporations the incentive to do things by lowering tax rates than they will do what we want them to do. I have been speaking with Jon Baumunk and accounting lecture and tax expert at San Diego State University. Thank you so much. Thank you so much morning -- Maureen.
Her political fortunes flourishing, Hillary Clinton attempted to undercut Donald Trump's claim to working class voters Thursday, portraying her Republican rival as untrustworthy on economic issues and pushing policies that would only benefit the super-wealthy — himself included.
The Democratic presidential nominee sought to seize momentum as Republicans — including Trump — struck an almost defeatist note about their Election Day chances. As Republican leaders sounded alarms about Trump's unconventional approach, Clinton attacked was she dubbed "outlandish Trumpian ideas" that have been rejected by both parties.
"Based on what we know from the Trump campaign, he wants America to work for him and his friends, at the expense of everyone else," she said, at a manufacturing company.
Appearing in the county known for the so-called Reagan Democrats — working-class Democrats who voted Republican in the 1980s — Clinton tried to seize the opportunity to win back some of the blue collar voters who've formed the base of her rival's support, making the case that she offers a steadier roadmap for economic growth and prosperity.
"I can provide serious, steady leadership that can find common ground and build on it based on hard but respectful bargaining," she said. "I just don't think insults and bullying is how we're going to get things done."
Clinton, who frequently boasts about her numerous policy plans, didn't offer any new, major ideas to improve the country's economy in her afternoon address. She reiterated her strong opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, leaving herself little room for backtracking should she win the White House if it is taken up by the lame-duck Congress later this year.
"I oppose it now, I'll oppose it after the election, and I'll oppose it as President," she said, while also noting that the U.S. should not cut itself off from the rest of the world.
Clinton once called the TPP the "gold standard" of trade deals when she served as Obama's secretary of state but announced her opposition to the deal last year, saying it did not meet her standard for creating jobs, raising wages and protecting national security.
Hoping to keep the pressure up on Trump, Clinton is also planning to release her 2015 tax returns in the coming days. Trump has said he won't release them until an IRS audit is complete, breaking traditional with every presidential candidate in recent history.
A source close to Clinton said she would soon release the return, supplementing the decades of filings she and her husband have already made public. Her running mate, Sen. Tim Kaine and his wife will also release the last 10 years of their taxes. The source spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the plans in advance.
Her appearance followed Trump's own speech on the economy, which he delivered in Michigan on Monday. But his scripted remarks were quickly eclipsed by the latest in a series of blunders and controversial statements that appear to have handed Clinton's campaign a boost in the polls, particularly with Republican women and college-educated voters that make up a key piece of the GOP base.
Just hours before her address, Trump unleashed another round of attacks on Democrats, calling Obama the "founder" of the Islamic State militant group — and Clinton, its co-founder.
The Republican presidential nominee brushed off conservative radio commentator Hugh Hewitt's attempt to reframe Trump's observation as one that said Obama's foreign policy created the conditions in Iraq and Syria that allowed IS to thrive.
"No, I meant he's the founder of ISIS. I do," Trump said, using another acronym for the extremist group that has wreaked havoc from the Middle East to European cities.
The latest bit of controversy shook Republicans, already rattled by polling showing Trump losing support among women and other segments of their party's base.
Dozens of frustrated Republicans gathered signatures Thursday for a letter to Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus that urges the party chief to stop helping Trump and instead focus GOP resources on protecting vulnerable Senate and House candidates. Speaking to reporters in Kentucky on Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell described Republicans' chances of keeping control of the Senate after the November elections as "very dicey."
A draft of the letter, which operatives say has at least 70 signatories, warns that Trump's "divisiveness, recklessness, incompetence, and record-breaking unpopularity risk turning this election into a Democratic landslide."
Trump said he had no intention of changing his inflammatory approach to presidential politics, pledging in a CNBC interview to "just keep doing the same thing I'm doing right now."
But he seemed to acknowledge the risk his campaign — and party — was taking. "At the end, it's either going to work or I'm going to, you know, I'm going to have a very, very nice long vacation," he said.
