Say what you will, and most people were screaming, but the fact is that President Donald Trump’s original Liberation Day announcement of punitive reciprocal tariff charges on almost everyone in the world has actually worked.
Pundits told us that former friends and allies would flock to China. They were dead wrong.
Roughly 75 countries – and still counting – have flocked to the U.S. to make a deal with Donald Trump.
Exactly what he predicted would happen. That’s the art of the deal for you.
And the next step announced today is a 90-day pause to the reciprocal tariff charges for all those nations who heeded the Trump administration’s warnings and chose not to retaliate. They will pay only the 10% baseline tariff during the pause.
This is an absolutely brilliant move by Mr. Trump. A logical next step in his negotiating process.
I’m sure his top economic adviser, market-savvy Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, advised the President about turmoil in stock and bond markets.
But it’s also just going to take a while to make tailored deals with 75 countries. Plenty of staff will be involved, there will be a lot of paperwork, calls back and forth, and so on.
The pause is not, however, a change in Mr. Trump’s policy vision to battle unfair trading practices, to fight hard for export market access, and to create a level playing field.
And, of course, Mr. Trump’s vision of reciprocity over time could well mean lower tariff rates and other non-tariff barriers to American exports.
What is changing with the 90-day pause is the management and execution of the policy.
Again, a brilliant move by the President.
All this may well take us toward a world of freer trade. Certainly freer than the broken system we’ve had to live with in recent decades.
And let’s not forget that the Trump tax cuts will be passed by Congress in a few months.
Those tax cuts will overshadow the tariffs. But, in fact, the tax cuts and the tariffs go hand in hand, as investors and businesses from around the world will be incentivized to come to America.
And one final point: Mr. Trump has completely outfoxed China’s Xi Jinping.
Xi took the road of escalation and retaliation. Big mistake.
By slapping 125% tariffs on China, Mr. Trump has basically ended the Chinese model of government subsidies for cheap manufacturing goods at low wages as their principal export policy.
Trump has basically closed the U.S. market to China.
The export-dependent China will now be faced with a catastrophic economic crisis.
And China’s ruse to manufacture in Mexico and take advantage of the free-trade USMCA will also be cut off.
Meanwhile, China is surrounded by American allies who are doing business with Mr. Trump to lower their trade barriers. We’re talking about Vietnam, South Korea, Taiwan, Malaysia, Japan, India, Australia, and others.
China is surrounded now. China is boxed in.
Not only is their economy in shambles, but their world position is also in shambles.
Think of this again: the world voted with its feet. They came to America, not to China.
Those countries chose freedom over dictatorship.
And that too is part of Mr. Trump’s art of the trade deal.
