The stock market was crashing, people were getting panic attacks whenever they checked on the 401Ks, the bond market was in disarray and Fortune 500 companies watched as trillions of dollars were wiped away every day since Donald Trump made his bonkers tariff announcement last week. Apparently, Trump’s advisors kept trying to show him data and analysis to prove that his tariffs would lead to a global recession, if not a depression. He kept insisting that everything was going to plan. Then China and the EU announced retaliatory tariffs on American goods this week. Additionally, many of the business pages began running stories about how analysts were increasingly convinced that Donald Trump is the dumbest person ever to sit in public office. By Wednesday afternoon, Trump announced a 90-day pause on the tariffs (except for China).
President Donald Trump projected confidence about his global trade war at a GOP dinner just hours before suddenly reversing course on his widely condemned tariff plan on Wednesday, April 9. After the 78-year-old president announced sweeping tariffs on foreign goods on April 2, the U.S. stock market took a remarkable dive and politicians on both sides of the aisle spoke out in dissent.
Countries quickly began responding to Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” tariff plan by increasing taxes on U.S. goods in retaliation — which would only further heighten inflation — and Republican members of Congress lampooned the administration for putting the nation on a path toward recession and damaging the party’s popularity.
While attending the National Republican Congressional Committee dinner on April 8, Trump defended his controversial actions and implied that all was going according to plan.
“I know what the hell I’m doing,” he said, according to the White House press pool. “The chipmakers are coming in. They’re all coming in. We’ve never had anything like this.”
During his appearance at the dinner, Trump suggested that he wasn’t concerned with the threat of retaliation from nations that he hit hardest.His comments came just before the European Union announced a 25% retaliatory tariff on U.S. goods on Wednesday morning. According to The Washington Post, some of the items that would be hit with increased taxes include “soybeans, meat, iron, steel, textiles, tobacco and ice cream.” The EU suggested that more trade restrictions could be coming in response to Trump’s tariffs on automobiles.
Meanwhile, China also upped their tariffs on all U.S. goods to 84% on Wednesday, according to reporting by The New York Times. In response to China’s escalation, Trump blindsided the world and put a sudden 90-day pause on his tariffs for nearly all nations — excluding China. Instead, as other countries were granted temporary reprieve on Wednesday afternoon, Trump punished China by bringing their import tax up to 125%.
It’s a pause, but there are still going to be 10% tariffs on most countries, and obviously, Trump is still very focused on punishing China, the country which holds $759 billion of America’s debt. Trump announced the pause after the European markets closed, but the American stock market had a huge rebound – the S&P soared 9.5% (but is still lower than its pre-tariff-announcement level) and the Dow spiked by almost 3,000 points. Before Trump’s announcement, he was on Truth Social, telling people to buy stocks while the Dow was in the sh-tter. That is pure market manipulation. Anyway, yet another day in the American clownshow.
Photos courtesy of Cover Images.
