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00:00The companies I've spoken to, the people who have come, the CEOs who have come into Treasury, tell me that the economy is very solid.
00:08We got some very good jobs numbers last Friday.
00:12So, you know, I think that we are in pretty good shape.
00:19I was out telling other countries, don't retaliate.
00:23And I think what a lot of people are missing here is that the levels that were put out last Wednesday are a ceiling.
00:33So if you don't retaliate, but if you don't retaliate, that is a ceiling.
00:38So we've been overwhelmed with the response to come to D.C. and negotiate.
00:43So President Trump on Monday had a very good call with the Japanese prime minister, had a very good call with the president of Korea yesterday.
00:52We're seeing a delegation from Vietnam.
00:56So I think we have about 70 negotiations lined up.
01:00I'm not planning on going anywhere for Easter.
01:04And I believe that I had obviously been providing advice on the tariffs, working more on the tax bill that we'll talk about.
01:17And now I'm going to take a lead negotiating role in a lot of the tariffs, starting with the Japanese delegation.
01:26But in terms of escalation, unfortunately, the biggest offender in the global trading system is China.
01:33And they're the only country who's escalated.
01:38And I can tell the rest of the world that I'm not sure whether it's the prime minister or the economic minister in Spain made some comments this morning.
01:47Oh, well, maybe we should align ourselves more with China.
01:51That would be cutting your own throat, because I can tell you that these Chinese exports that the U.S. tariff wall is going to keep out, that China, for all of you who can remember that Disney movie of the brooms carrying the buckets of water, that is the Chinese business model.
02:09It never stops.
02:10They just keep producing and producing and dumping and dumping, and it's going somewhere.
02:16And, you know, I think, Rob, at the end of the day, that we can probably reach the ideal with our allies, with the other countries that have been long term.
02:30They've been good military allies, not perfect economic allies.
02:34And then we can approach China as a group.
02:37So we want to deleverage the government sector, re-leverage the private sector, but we can't do it all at once.
02:45And I tell these congressmen, I tell the senators, look, our fiscal situation is a 350-pound, two-pack-a-day smoker on the ICU table, and he or she is not going to get off that table and run the Ironman.
03:03We're going to get on a treadmill.
03:04We are going to bring the deficit of the GDP, hopefully down by a percent every year, and get it back toward the long-term target of three, three and a half percent.
03:16What will keep us from having a recession is making sure that the tax bill doesn't expire, adding back 100% depreciation, and then adding some of President Trump's agenda, no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security, no tax on overtime, and making, when I bought my first car, I'm 62.
03:38When I bought my first car, auto loans were tax-deductible, so we're going to do that again for American-made cars.
03:45Thank you for joining us today.
03:47Thank you for your leadership on behalf of the nation.
03:49Please join me in thanking Treasury Secretary Scott Besson.