The U.S. president asserted that “it is a great time to get rich.”
President Trump has defended his decision to implement widespread tariffs on numerous U.S. trading partners, a move that has created upheaval in global markets and criticism from international leaders.
“To the many investors coming into the United States and investing massive amounts of money, my policies will never change. This is a great time to get rich, richer than ever before!!!” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform.
The president has remained firm despite the U.S. stock market experiencing its most significant decline since the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling 2,231 points on Friday, according to CNN.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell stated that “it was becoming clear that the tariff increases would be significantly larger than expected.”
“While tariffs are highly likely to generate at least a temporary rise in inflation, it is also possible that the effects could be more persistent,” Powell added.
White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt argued that the restrictions would not harm U.S. businesses. “There’s not going to be any pain for American-owned companies and American workers, because their jobs are going to come back home, and again, as for prices, President Trump is working on tax cuts to put more money back into the pockets of Americans,” she stated to NewsNation on Thursday.
On April 2, Trump announced a 10% baseline tariff on all imports and additional “reciprocal” duties on numerous countries that he claimed had an unfair trade imbalance with the U.S. The president contended that many nations were “ripping off” American citizens through “harmful policies like currency manipulation and exorbitant value-added taxes.”
In response, China has imposed a 34% tariff on American goods, mirroring Trump’s tariff on Chinese goods. The EU has criticized the U.S. tariffs and pledged to adopt “further countermeasures.”
Canada has announced it would counter Trump’s “series of unwarranted and unjustified tariffs” with a 25% tariff on vehicles imported from the U.S.
World Trade Organization Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala warned that a full-scale trade war would be “destructive for the global economy,” potentially leading to a reduction of approximately 1% in global merchandise trade.