Trump Vows to 'Liberate' U.S. From List of 'Villains' in Michigan Speech

Former President Donald Trump railed against a mounting list of "villains," which included electric vehicles, his presidential rivals and "radical left lunatics," during a speech to a sold-out conservative crowd in Michigan.

Trump was honored with a "Man of the Decade" award on Sunday at the Oakland County Republican Party's Lincoln Day dinner in the Detroit suburb of Novi, where he addressed the event's roughly 2,500 attendees. Trump, in the hour-long speech, frequently lashed out rival Democratic President Joe Biden. He also dismissed the criminal indictments against him as "B*******" and referred to law enforcement as "corrupt."

The event was Trump's first visit to the battleground-state since he launched his 2024 presidential campaign. While Michigan voters helped the MAGA leader win the presidency in 2016, Trump narrowly lost the state to Biden in 2020. Michigan was one of three states that flipped and helped secure Biden's victory.

Trump told the crowd on Sunday night that Biden's "environmental extremism" and the Democrat's effort to see more electric vehicles on American roadways would "decimate" Michigan.

"The push for all electric cars, it's killing the United States, it's killing Michigan and it's a total vote for China," Trump said. "Biden is a catastrophe for Michigan and his environmental extremism is heartless and disloyal and horrible for the American worker and you're starting to see, driven by his ridiculous regulations."

Trump condemned Michigan state lawmakers, specifically taking aim at Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer, for approving more than $700 million in economic development incentives for a $2.4-billion battery plant near Big Rapids, to local outlet MLive reported. The battery plant is expected to create more than 2,300 "good-paying" jobs, according to state officials.

"The governor of your state is now giving away hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of billions of Michigan taxpayer dollars to Chinese companies and one in particular, Gotion, to build batteries in Michigan," Trump said. "That sounds good, but the money's going to Chinese companies, and then they're gonna leave, they're planning to take our money and then they say 'bye bye, you stupid fools.'"

During the address, Trump also ranted against the state and federal criminal charges he's facing in two separate probes.

Trump, the frontrunner in the crowded GOP presidential field, is campaigning while facing 37 federal charges over his alleged mishandling of classified documents. Just a few months before the federal indictment, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg accused Trump of 34 counts of falsifying business records. While he maintains his innocence in both cases and has pleaded not guilty to all charges, Trump said considers the charges against him to be a "great badge of courage."

During his address on Sunday evening, Trump blamed his consistent lead in polling for the presidential race for the criminal probes.

"These incredible poll numbers are one of the main reasons the Marxist left is weaponizing the criminal justice system to try and stop us if I wasn't running," he said. "Or if I was doing badly in the polls, all of this investigation b******* would stop immediately."

Right Side Broadcasting Network (RSBN), which also streamed Trump's Michigan remarks online, shared a clip of his comments on Twitter.

Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung reiterated the former's presidents claims to Newsweek that "the weaponization of the Justice department and the two-tiered Justice system is an effort to influence the 2024 election."

While ending his speech, Trump lashed out at a mounting list of what he dubbed to be "villains."

"And now these radical left lunatics want to interfere with our elections by using law enforcement. It's totally corrupt, and we will never let it happen. This is the final battle with you at my side. We will demolish the deep state. We will expel the warmongers from our government. We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the communists, Marxists, and fascists, and we will throw off the sick political class that hates our country. We will route the fake news media, and we will defeat crooked Joe Biden. We will liberate America from these villains once and for all."