{"id":10968,"date":"2025-05-08T18:49:38","date_gmt":"2025-05-08T10:49:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=10968"},"modified":"2025-05-08T18:49:44","modified_gmt":"2025-05-08T10:49:44","slug":"trump-struggles-with-mixed-economic-message","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=10968","title":{"rendered":"Trump struggles with mixed economic message"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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President Trump and his economic team are experimenting with a hodgepodge of messaging tactics to sell his tariff policy as it struggles to appease concerns over rising prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump this week began likening himself to a shopkeeper. Meanwhile, his Treasury secretary said young girls would be better off than their parents if they had fewer dolls this Christmas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The contorting doesn\u2019t seem to be landing with some Republicans or the public where polls show Trump\u2019s trade policy growing unpopular.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be hard to find a metaphor that makes Americans\u2014 and many congressional Republicans\u2014 comfortable with the idea of higher prices, fewer options, and lower growth,\u201d said former Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.). \u201cThe administration needs to find a way to make this policy politically sustainable. They bought themselves some time, but the clock is ticking.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bruce Mehlman, former assistant secretary of Commerce for technology policy under President George W. Bush, argued there is a two-fold approach to the White House\u2019s messaging \u2014 outlining multiple objectives and trying out what works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kash Patel on FBI staffing and budget<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe varying messaging on tariffs reflects both the various goals they hope tariffs will advance \u2013 revenue, reshoring, reciprocity, respect \u2013 as well as the standard communications experimentation one expects from major issue campaigns, seeing what resonates best,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump and the White House have been beating back a host of questions related to trade and in particular when, if any deals, would be announced with just about any country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Officials are adamant that several countries are willing to make trade deals with the U.S. but they have been scant on details. Instead, Trump and his administration have handled questions by offering an assortment of examples, analogies and slogans to explain the president\u2019s tariff policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI can announce 50 to 100 deals right now because I\u2019m the shopkeeper and I keep the store,\u201d Trump said. \u201cThey can go shopping or they don\u2019t have to go shopping because everybody wants to shop here. This is like a beautiful store.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump earlier this week likened the country to \u201ca super luxury store, a store that has the goods\u201d in insisting that countries would want to buy from the U.S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Doug Holtz-Eakin, president of the center-right American Action Forum, said one struggle around messaging stems from the White House working around saying tariffs are a type of tax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe reality is this, tariffs are taxes. They never want to admit that. The president doesn\u2019t want to admit that,\u201d Holtz-Eakin said. \u201cAnd Republicans have lots and lots of messaging about how taxes are a bad idea and how taxes harm Americans\u2019 abilities to do things they want. And so, it\u2019s hard to do messaging, which is 180 degrees from that, and that\u2019s what they\u2019re struggling with.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s rhetoric has also sometimes flip flopped. The president this week downplayed the need for trade deals, telling reporters, \u201cwe don\u2019t have to sign deals\u201d and that he could have 25 signed if he wanted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent clarified that there are not ongoing talks with China, despite White House officials, including Trump, insisting otherwise in recent weeks. Chinese officials have said that U.S. officials are asking to meet in Switzerland over the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Holtz-Eakin argued that downplaying the need for trade deals is an issue because Wall Street is counting on reciprocal tariffs not being permanent to avoid another massive hit to the stock market like in the days after \u201cliberation day.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think they need to figure out that message in particular because financial markets, I believe, took the notion that those trade deals or the exit ramp from the reciprocal tariffs very seriously, and we saw equity markets recover, and valuations got back to where they were on April 2,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, no deals\u2026 we could have just a rerun of that week following liberation day.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The administration has also leaned further into Trump\u2019s doll analogy, defending his recent suggestion that the U.S. needs a cultural shift on consumer spending. Trump told NBC\u2019s \u201cMeet the Press\u201d host Kirsten Welker that American children \u201cdon\u2019t need to have 30 dolls. They can have three.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bessent, in an appearance on Fox News\u2019s \u201cThe Ingraham Angle,\u201d argued that because of Trump\u2019s sweeping tariffs, children in the U.S. could have an improved life in the long term even if it means less in the short term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis reporter behind me was quite snarky the other day when President Trump talked about the girl having two dolls and he said\u2026 \u2018What would you tell that girl?\u2019\u201d Bessent said. \u201cAnd I said, \u2018I would tell that young girl that you will have a better life than your parents, that you and your family, thanks to President Trump, can now be confident again that you will have a better life than your parents\u2026 your family will own a home. You will be able to \u2026 advance. You will have a good education. You will have economic freedom.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, senators on Capitol Hill have called on Trump to stop talking about dolls as he pitches his tariff plan, with many GOP lawmakers telling The Hill that they view the rhetoric as counterproductive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not really sensitive to the circumstances of people that are struggling every day,\u201d one Senate Republican said. \u201cIt would be helpful to be more relatable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump first posed the idea of Americans getting by with less as a way to pitch his tariff agenda in a Cabinet meeting last week, surrounded by a number of multimillionaires and billionaires serving in the administration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Others have also taken note that the messaging appears tone deaf, suggesting Trump try another strategy to sell his tariff plan to Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Political commentator and former Fox News host Bill O\u2019Reilly said Trump has \u201cno strategy\u201d with his talk about the price of dolls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRich guys say anything they want to say, OK? And since he fits into that category from the time he\u2019s been 7 years old, he said whatever he wants to say,\u201d he told NewsNation\u2019s Leland Vittert.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Trump and his economic team are experimenting with a hodgepodge of messaging tactics to sell his tariff policy as it struggles to appease concerns over rising prices. Trump this week began likening himself to a shopkeeper. Meanwhile, his Treasury secretary said young girls would be better off than their parents if they had fewer […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":10969,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3311,3310,1724],"class_list":["post-10968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","tag-mixed","tag-struggles","tag-trump"],"yoast_head":"\nTrump struggles with mixed economic message - LISTEN WORLD<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=10968\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Trump struggles with mixed economic message - LISTEN WORLD\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"President Trump and his economic team are experimenting with a hodgepodge of messaging tactics to sell his tariff policy as it struggles to appease concerns over rising prices. 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