By Chris Megerian, Josh Boak and Stephen Groves
Washington (AP) – Less than an hour before the stock market closure on Monday, journalists gathered in the oval office for their only chance of the day to ask President Donald Trump on the turmoil caused by his pricing plans.
Are new prices scheduled for Wednesday, a negotiation program to conclude better commercial offers? Or are they engraved in stone on a mission to reorganize the global economy?
Investors around the world were hung on Trump’s word, but he didn’t do much to eliminate the situation.
“It can be true,” he said. “There may be permanent prices, and there may also be negotiations.”
The markets skidded in order. At a time when foreign leaders and business leaders are desperate for clarity, the White House sends mixed messages while it pursues contradictory objectives.
The advisers have successfully tried to write a sale of stocks of several days by discussing prices as a starting point for negotiations, which could appease Wall Street and nervous republicans at the congress. The S&P 500 stock market index opened 3.4%on Tuesday. But the president continues to insist so that he can raise hundreds of billions of dollars in income with his new taxes on foreign imports, and he has shown no desire to retreat from a program which he recommended for decades, even before entering politics.
The current paradox could erode confidence in Trump leaders in the country and abroad after promising a booming economy and tax reductions, not exhausting retirement accounts and fears of a recession. For the moment, while prices should come into play, there is no clear resolution for what could be the most important overhaul of the international trade of a generation.
Senator Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, urged the White House to “settle the situation”.
He said that “the perception of whether or not there was a final game is very important.” Tillis said that he “gives the administration the benefit of the doubt” for the moment. But he added: “You have to do it as quickly as you can do.”
The administration has not yet articulated its objectives for no maintenance with business partners, apart from suggesting that negotiations may take several months and that nations may also need to considerably revise their tax systems and their regulations to meet Trump’s requests. Canadian and European officials do not know how to proceed even though Trump’s administrations, officials insist that up to 70 nations seek to start negotiations.
Trump insists that he wants to erase the trade deficits that have developed while the United States bought more products from other countries than it sells. Tuesday morning, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had spoken with the acting president of South Korea, Han Duck-Soo, of their excess “formidable and unbearable”.
“We have the limits and the probability of many for both countries,” he wrote. “Their best team is on a plane towards the United States, and things are fine.”
But on Monday, when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would “eliminate the trade deficit with the United States,” Trump seemed insensitive.
When asked if he would hold the new prices on Israel, the president said “maybe not.”
“Don’t forget, we help Israel a lot,” he said, citing billions of dollars in military aid in the country.
Trump has long pleaded for prices as a solution to economic challenges, and its insistence that other countries tear the United States is one of its most regularly expressed beliefs over the years.
Last Thursday, when he went to Florida aboard the Air Force One, Trump told journalists that “the prices give us great power to negotiate”.
On Sunday, on the flight to Washington, Trump described the prices as a necessity and said that he was not discouraged by the Cratation stock market, adding that “sometimes you need to take medication to repair something.”
Peter Navarro, a leading sales advisor, also took a hard line.
“It is not a negotiation,” wrote Navarro in the Financial Times. “For the United States, this is a national emergency triggered by commercial deficits caused by a rigged system.”
But other officials such as Kevin Hassett, the best economic advisor in the White House, and Scott Bessent, the secretary of the Treasury, said that the dozens of countries are queuing to negotiate with Trump on prices.
“It will be a busy April, maybe in June,” said Bessent at Fox News. He said Trump “gave himself a maximum of negotiation lever, and just when he reached the maximum lever effect, he is ready to start talking.”
Speaking on Monday at the Hudson Institute, a conservative reflection group, Stephen Miran, president of the Trump’s economic advisers’ council, said that the mixed messages on the tariffs reflected a “healthy” internal debate.
“There are contradictory stories because everyone has an opinion,” he said. “And that’s good. The disagreement is how to improve your arguments and avoid group thinking, and I think it’s very healthy.”
As for whether agreements could be concluded before the prices take effect, Miran said: “This choice will ultimately remain with the president.”
Senator John Kennedy, a Louisiana Republican, said some of Trump’s collaborators “like to speak”.
“There is a certain uncertainty about the president’s objective and I think it is a product of some of his aid, who have made contradictory reports on television this weekend,” he said.
Kennedy said he was supporting Trump’s business goals. But he also receives calls from business by his state, and he had no answer for them about what to expect.
Trump is constitutionally forbidden to present himself again for the president, despite his speech on the service of a third term. However, the Republicans face elections next year which could reshape control of the congress, and they were more nervous about the president’s plans.
On Friday, Bessent visited the legislators, the day after the price announcement. Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming said that Bessent had told them that prices were a “high -level brand with the ultimate goal of reducing them” unless other countries are working.
“The president is a negotiation mechanism if nothing else, and he will continue to treat the country by country with each of them,” said Barrasso thereafter.
But China has already retaliated with plans for its own 34% prices, which prompted Trump on Monday to threaten additional 50% tariffs against the country.
The American president had a sufficiently positive conversation with Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba that the Nikkei stock market index jumped by 6% on Tuesday, but it was not yet clear how an agreement would work.
Trump has placed a price of 24% on Japan and a separate 25% rate on automotive imports, much higher than the average rate rate of 1.9% billed by Japan, according to data from the World Trade Organization. Trump described the “permanent” automotive rates and also installed a permanent basic rate of 10% on most countries, suggesting a limit on the quantity of prices that could drop by negotiations.
But the head of the majority of the Senate, John Thune, of the southern Dakota, clearly said that he hoped that the prices are part of a flexible strategy which leads to the reciprocal drop in prices.
“I think most people here, like most Americans, look at and wait to see what will be the implementation of ultimate policy,” he said on Monday.
On the other side of the Capitol, the president of the Mike Johnson room in Louisiana underlined his confidence to the president.
Johnson argued that the country had a trade deficit of $ 1.2 billion last year and that the Americans understand that Trump is trying to solve this problem.
“We are going to give him the necessary space to do so,” he said on Monday.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
