President Donald Trump’s stop-start tariff warring and fluctuating economic messaging is causing anxiety among some of his own advisers, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The newspaper reported Monday evening that some staff on the National Economic Council (NEC) have been startled by his insistence on remaking U.S. trade policy into a game of will-he-won’t-he tariff threats, worried that Trump is fuelling a stock market selloff and potentially contributing to inflation.
Citing people familiar with the matter, the Journal said that Trump’s economic advisers have warned him that tariffs could stymie economic growth and tank the market, but that the president has remained unyielding in his desire for trade wars.
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On Wednesday, Trump’s latest round of tariffs—new 25 percent levies on all imports of steel and aluminium—kicked in and immediately were the subject of retaliatory measures from allies including the European Union, which said it will slap counter-tariffs on $28 billion of U.S. goods.
A day earlier on Tuesday, Trump blustered that he would double the steel and aluminium tariff on Canada, after which the S&P 500 fell into correction territory during the trading session.
The index clawed back some of its losses after the White House reversed itself—the latest case where Trump has said he would impose tariffs and then either delayed their implementation or backed off in the face of market turmoil.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said he will meet with Canadian officials tomorrow to discuss the two countries' free trade agreement.
The Journal reported that Lutnick, a trade war hardliner who Trump appointed to be the lead on the tariff file, has sometimes failed to loop in other economic advisers, including NEC Director Kevin Hassett, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, and officials at the Council of Economic Advisers.
Lutnick, for example, appeared on Fox News last week and said Canada and Mexico were close to a deal to get out of some of the 25 percent tariffs Trump imposed on them earlier this month. According to the Journal, this took Greer and CEA officials by surprise and they were left to scramble for a solution, which ultimately led to them to convince Trump to pause tariffs on trade that complies with the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement.
The White House denied any divisions, telling the newspaper: “Every member of the Trump administration is playing from the same playbook—President Trump’s playbook—to enact an America First agenda of tariffs, tax cuts, deregulation, and the unleashing of American energy.”
Lutnick himself objected to the idea that the administration’s rollouts of tariffs has been disorganized, telling CBS News Tuesday: “It is not chaotic, and the only one who thinks it’s chaotic is someone who’s being silly.”
The Journal also reported that senior Trump officials, including White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, have gotten concerned phone calls from corporate CEOs and industry lobbyists who have asked the administration to lay out a clear tariff agenda that they can plan for, as opposed to Trump’s sudden and shifting approach that has seen him announce several economic measures without warning in angrily written social media posts.
The newspaper reported that some tech CEOs told Trump and his top advisers at a meeting in the White House on Monday that they were worried tariffs would hurt their industry.
Two Republican lawmakers also told the Journal that they were concerned about Trump’s tariff confusion.
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) told the newspaper he is “very frustrated” by the uncertainty farmers and businesses in South Dakota are having to deal with because of Trump’s inconsistent tariff messaging.
And Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) said the stop-start rollout was roiling stock markets, telling the Journal: “Business hates uncertainty.”
