Heather Boushey, former member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers under President Biden, joins Morning Brief anchors Brad Smith and Madison Mills to discuss the escalating trade war as President Trump's tariff policies set in, noting that the president's "own advisers are not prepared" for tariff negotiations.
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These are some of the highest tariffs that we might see in world history. And so, with that in mind, how unprecedented of a state are we in now? And how much more difficult does that make negotiations going forward from here to bring them down from those levels?
Well, I mean, this is the thing. We have spent decades building up a global economy with highly integrated supply chains. And um, China has been a key part of those supply chains. And you know, here we are with this, uh, imposition of tariffs in a very you know, the way that the President has done this, you know, since he's come into office, has been very chaotic, on again, off again. Um, you know, now he seems to have, uh, you know, he's made these big steps. He's said on, you know, one day, I'm not negotiating, then two days later, oh, I am negotiating. So I think both this uncertainty, where is the President going with this? Um, what is his end game? And is the goal to make sure that the United States, um, has vibrant manufacturing sectors and producing things that matter, that we can be competitive in, that are going to help create good middle-class jobs, or is it retaliation? Is it, you know, something else? I think we're all wondering that, and that is, I think, what makes both the level of these tariffs so unprecedented. But I think, you know, as everyone's talking about the off-ramp, or how we're going to get back to a sane economic policy, also, um, seems very unclear at this point. I I just keep thinking, this is a president right now, who does not have the concept of a plan for what he's going to do to improve the domestic economy. That is what he was elected to do, it's what many of his voters want, it's what the American people need, and yet that it does not appear to be, um, that it does not appear to be a plan, and does not appear to be his priority.
And Heather, investors are grasping for anything that may be able to put pressure on the president's tariff agenda here. I spoke with Senator Elizabeth Warren about this, and here's what she said on that.
Congress has power, and that Congress can roll these tariffs back and steady this economy out. But it's going to take Republican support to make that happen. The laws are in place. We just need to vote to make that happen.
Heather, what's the most likely off-ramp to the severity of these tariffs in your view? Some kind of negotiations unfolding slowly over time, or actual, feasible congressional pushback?
Well, here's the thing. You know, what President Trump has done is shocked the global economy, and particularly shocked the US economy. And so what you know, I think many of us thought, oh, if markets dropped, he might change his tune. He certainly has not. He, um, you know, he's said, uh, he doesn't care if people's 401Ks go down, he doesn't care what's happening in the markets. He said we might have need to have a recession. He said he doesn't care if things get more costly, um, for American consumers. And, you know, on the other side of his administration, he has, you know, allowed Elon Musk to make all these decisions that mean that the kind of jobs we will create, or the supports that firms need to make these investments to create this this new world that he says he wants to see. He's actually tearing away all the foundations for them to do that. Um, you know, and of course, you know, he's gutted the Department of Labor and made it harder to enforce labor law, which will, of course, not lead to better quality jobs now and into the future. So, I think, you know, what is going to contain him, what the next steps are? You heard him, the President just say himself, he's got all these countries calling him, and now he's saying, oh, it's going to take us a lot of time to figure out how to make these deals. Well, if they had a plan, they would have known that. It seems like his own advisors are not prepared for this moment. So, and yet, the global economy, uh, markets are responding very, very quickly, and the pain that could be felt for American workers and American communities in the short term could be very dire. Um, so I do hope that, uh, you know, action is taken quickly, but I think by the minute we are losing hope.
