Story highlights Trump met with eight pharmaceutical company executives at the White House

"We have no choice" but to limit regulations, the President said

Washington (CNN) President Donald Trump issued a message Tuesday to pharmaceutical company executives akin to one he delivered to auto executives last week: bring your production back to the United States and the Trump administration will lower regulations for you.

In a "pharma" meeting in the Oval Office, the President told executives from companies such as Merck & Co. and Johnson & Johnson that they have done a "terrific job over the years" but that prices for drugs must come down.

"So you have to get your companies back here. We have to make products ... We have to get rid of a tremendous number of regulations," Trump said. "I know you have some problems where you cannot even think about opening up new plants. You can't get approval for the plant and then you can't get approval to make the drugs."

"We have no choice," the President added, sitting at a table surrounded by aides, Vice President Mike Pence and eight pharmaceutical executives. "For Medicare, for Medicaid, we have to get prices way down, so that's what we're going to be talking about. We're also going to be streamlining the process so that from your standpoint so that when you have a drug you can actually get it approved -- if it works -- instead of waiting for many, many years."

Read More