Former Vice President Mike Pence urged President Donald Trump to reverse course on the sweeping tariffs he announced in April.
In an op-ed published in The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, Pence wrote that “economic warning signs are flashing” as he criticized Trump’s tariffs as a “massive policy misstep.”
In reality, slapping taxes on car parts imported from Canada and Mexico will hurt U.S. automakers harder than their competitors offshore because U.S. automakers have extensive operations in Canada and Mexico.
U.S. auto dealers have warned the Trump regime that tariffs will make cars less affordable to American consumers at a time when many Americans remain concerned about inflation.
Trump has waved away such concerns, insisting his tariffs will raise revenue — enabling him to lower taxes. The White House calculates that his tariffs could raise $100 billion annually. But the mere threat of such tariffs has erased more than $100 billion from the largest carmakers’ market capitalization in recent weeks.
Plus, as I’ve shown, his tariffs are a regressive tax that will be paid mostly by lower-income Americans, while his planned tax cuts will mostly benefit higher-income Americans.
The result: a huge hidden upward redistribution.
Another dumb Trump move that’s not just a gross mistake | Opinion
