Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Wednesday on Fox Business Channel’s “Kudlow” that President Donald Trump’s tariffs are a “means to an end.”
Host Larry Kudlow said, “Mr. Trump has had actually some success with his tariff threats, although I think he’s quite serious. And at some point, we’ll come back to that, and tariffs will go up, not down. But how do you see, as Treasury Secretary, and you’re going to be a key player, according to the president, how do you see the tariff strategy right now?”
Bessent said, “I think it’s a, there’s several different aspects to the strategy. We saw what happened with Colombia. The president threatened tariffs, and the president of Colombia not only allowed illegal immigrants back into his country, he offered to send his own plane. He threatened tariffs on or signed an order for tariffs on Mexico and Canada over the weekend, and then on Monday, President Mexico offered 10,000 troops at the southern border, and Justin Trudeau virtually the same thing, and this is in response to the fentanyl crisis. Also tariffs on China and again this is due to the fentanyl crisis this is not a revenue issue right now.”
Kudlow said, “But because Mr. Trump seems to be moving, I mean, Steve Miller said this yesterday, but I’ve heard from President Trump, he seems to want to move the system towards more tariff related revenues and fewer income tax-related revenues and a universal tariff seems to be out there whether it’s 10 or 20 percent I don’t know. What can you tell us about that?”
Bessent said, “Well, Larry, I think tariffs are a means to an end, and I think that end is bringing the manufacturing base back to the U.S. That, in theory, tariffs would be a shrinking ice cube. That you would tariff a country, and then as the production comes back to the US, the income tax goes up, and the tariff income was good would go down are the current account deficit goes down, our trade deficit goes down, so tariffs are a mean to means to an end to restore economic security in the U.S.”
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