It was a do-over of a softball question, but President Donald Trump still seemed to struggle to answer what he would do with a potential second term in an interview that aired Wednesday evening.
The President said he hadn’t heard the criticism of his answer the last time he was asked the question, by Fox News’ Sean Hannity, but said there was still “more to do” in his next term, again without naming any concrete policy goals.
“We’re going to make America great again. We’re doing things that nobody could have done,” the President told Sinclair’s Eric Bolling, before listing achievements from his first term.
At one point, Trump said, “We’ve got to bring back our manufacturing,” before immediately claiming he already had, saying he had “brought it back very big.”
“We’re doing it – whether it’s trade, whether it’s military – all made in the USA. It’s so important. Made in the USA. … We’ve got to bring back our manufacturing, and I’ve brought it back very big,” he said.
“But we have to make our own pharmaceutical products, our own drugs, prescription drugs, we have to make our own things. … So we have a lot of things we can do. We’ve done a lot, but we have a lot of things we can do.”
During Trump’s interview last week with Hannity, he made vague references to “experience” without listing policy items he hopes to see enacted or problems he’d like to resolve over the next four years should he be reelected in November.
The answer encapsulated what some of Trump’s political advisers fear is an unfocused approach to reelection a little more than four months before ballots are cast. They hope he will begin using his platform to define rival Joe Biden and articulate his argument for being reelected.
In some ways, Trump’s approach mimics the way he ran his first campaign, which few expected him to win. In that race, Trump ran on divisive rhetoric and a vague plan to “Make America Great Again” without laying out a clear governing agenda for a potential presidency. After taking office, Trump’s agenda came into sharper focus, yet it often still appears ad hoc.
During the latest line of questioning about a potential second term, the President also said there was “more to do” on trade deals before going on to tout the “incredible” ones he’s already made.
“Our country will be so strong at the end of our first term. It’s going to be great. It would have been phenomenal. We got hit with the plague. At the end of the second term it’s going to be at a level that nobody will have ever seen, the country,” Trump said.
CNN’s Kevin Liptak contributed to this report.