Trump’s commerce secretary is emphasizing that the main goal of reciprocal tariffs is not simply to force countries to bring down their tariffs, but to bring jobs back to America instead of relying on foreign workers.
Secretary Howard Lutnick, during an appearance on Fox News, once again addressed misconceptions about tariffs. Lutnick, who previously explained that tariffs are important as other nations since World War II have imposed extortionate tariffs on U.S. goods without a reciprocal response, emphasized that tariffs also help American workers. In fact, according to him, the primary goal of the high tariffs on certain foreign goods is to bring manufacturing, mining, and thus more jobs back to America.
“Canada exists leaning on our economy. Let’s face it, cars used to be made in America. Why did Michigan’s cars move to Canada? To break out of the UAW,” Lutnick said, referring to the United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America union. “That’s just unfair to American workers and American union workers.” Finally, after years of government overregulation and big businesses seeking cheaper labor or other favors overseas, Trump is standing up for American workers.
Lutnick said, “Donald Trump’s got their back and is wondering why are cars made in Canada, why we are doing all this business in Canada if they’re not respectful, if they’re not thankful, and they don’t want to do it?”
In the humorous vein of Trump, who likes to call Canada the 51st state, Lutnick continued, “Can you imagine a provincial leader…the equivalent of a governor deciding that they’re going to attack America and put a 25% increase on energy prices to teach Donald Trump a lesson?,” as Ontario’s premier just did. “What happened? He learned a lesson. We’re going to come in and talk. But what should you expect? You should expect exactly what you heard President Trump [say] today, ‘what are you doing for us? I know what we’re doing for you, but what are you doing for us?’ And I think that’s the right way to look at it, that’s our president’s way of looking at it, and that’s what you should expect.”
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Fox anchor Martha McCallum huffily demanded, “Why not just eliminate the tariffs between Canada and the United States? Is that a place that we can get to? Because it’s mind-boggling, like, 25%, no, it’s going to be 50%, no, we’re back to 25%.” Lutnick laughed out loud. “No, no, no, no… That would be true if you were Fox Canada. Fox Canada would like that.”
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MacCallum retorted, “I heard President Trump, moments ago, say $200 million we send in aid, essentially, to Canada. So, are we going to eliminate that? Tell me what the starting points are, I’m just — that’s what I want to know.”
Lutnick emphatically stated, “The starting point is, we care about America first, we care about American workers first, and we want to bring back those jobs to America. So we’re going to bring back more and more jobs to America. We don’t want to buy 60% of our aluminum from Canada. We want to bring it to America. We want [to bring] the cars to America. We want to make America great first, then we can worry about Canada.”
