David McCormick, a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, speaks at an American Legion hall, Jan. 18, 2024, in Harrisburg, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy, File)

During a campaign stop at Penn State University last month, Pennsylvania Republican Senate candidate David McCormick said that he is content with certain manufacturing jobs remaining overseas.

When a student asked if the United States should look to increase domestic production, McCormick said he only cares about making certain industries like steel and pharmaceuticals keep their jobs domestic and that he doesn’t care about certain other manufacturing jobs remaining overseas.

“I also don’t think that we can subsidize businesses across the board or things like that, that really undermine capitalism,” McCormick said in audio provided to Heartland Signal on the condition of anonymity. “Things that are critical to our national security, we say, ‘Do we want to trust anybody in the world to provide those things to us?’ … I don’t really care if we’re not manufacturing T-shirts, or rugs or a variety of other things that aren’t critical to our economy. I don’t really care if those jobs are elsewhere.”

McCormick also said that the United States made a “big mistake” with outsourcing jobs over the past 30 years due to globalization. Outsourcing is a practice that McCormick used and taught other companies how to do when he was an executive in the financial sector. McCormick also invested anywhere from $4.5-$92 million in companies that outsourced thousands of American jobs, many of which were in his “home state” of Pennsylvania.

McCormick also has a long record of supporting investments in China.

“When China succeeds, the United States succeeds,” McCormick said in 2007 when he was the Treasury undersecretary for international affairs. “We owe much of the strength and vitality of our economic relationship today to the remarkable success of China’s economic development over the last three decades.”

Despite his long-standing record of economic coupling with China, McCormick has echoed former President Donald Trump’s “America First” agenda, which involves heavily criticizing China. McCormick’s campaign website includes a section for banning “any U.S. investment or trade that supports the CCP’s national security state.”

McCormick is the main Republican candidate vying for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Sen. Bob Casey (D). Pennsylvania’s primary election will be held on April 23.