Better than anyone · First term · № 34

Nobody knows more

Studied windmills better than anybody he knew

“We'll have an economy based on wind. I never understood wind. You know, I know windmills very much. I've studied it better than anybody I know. It's very expensive. They're made in China and Germany mostly; very few made here, almost none. But they're manufactured tremendous—if you're into this—tremendous fumes. Gases are spewing into the atmosphere.”
Said
, Turning Point USA Student Action Summit, West Palm Beach, Florida
Subject
wind power
Topic
Energy & environment
Era
First term

What the record showed

Slate's fact-check found no evidence that turbine manufacturing produces more emissions than other energy sources, that wind has a particularly small carbon footprint, that fossil-fuel plants and glass buildings kill far more birds than turbines, and that the maximum sentence for killing a bald eagle in California is two years, not the ten he claimed. PolitiFact had rated his March 2019 claim that "when the wind stops blowing, that's the end of your electric" Mostly False.

Sources

  1. Remarks at the Turning Point U.S.A. Student Action Summit in West Palm Beach, Florida The American Presidency Project (UCSB), Dec 21, 2019
  2. Fact-checking Trump's rant against windmills, fumes, and eagle deaths Slate, Dec 23, 2019
  3. Fact-checking Donald Trump's take on wind energy PolitiFact, Apr 3, 2019