On Sunday, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) joined CNN's Jake Tapper to discuss President Trump's tariff policies and his push to remove Harvard's tax-exempt status after the university failed to comply with his demands.
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00:00Senator, thanks so much for joining us. I do want to start with something close to home for you.
00:04At least nine schools in Milwaukee have been temporarily closed this year after some students
00:08were found to have elevated blood lead levels, which can cause developmental issues. The CDC
00:14has denied city officials' request for help after HHS Secretary Kennedy shut down the agency's lead
00:21poisoning prevention program. Your fellow Wisconsin Senator, Democrat Tammy Baldwin,
00:26wrote to Secretary Kennedy saying he needs to immediately rectify the issue, unquote.
00:30Do you agree? Have you talked to Secretary Kennedy about this?
00:35Good morning, Jake. First of all, you know, lead in paint in buildings has been an issue for decades.
00:42We know how to test for it. We know how to mitigate it. I wouldn't think this is something that
00:46requires federal government involvement in it. It sounds like Secretary Kennedy, again,
00:51when you have a budget now that's $7 trillion large, having only been $4.4 trillion large in
00:582019, and you try and pare back government, there's some things you're going to have to reverse. And
01:04it sounds like Secretary Kennedy is going to take a look at this and see if he needs some experts on
01:09this and CDC. But again, this is an issue that's been around a long time, and local and state officials
01:15ought to be able to handle this. Let's turn to the U.S. economy. I want you to take a listen to
01:19what President Trump told NBC. He was asked if he would be comfortable with the country
01:24potentially dipping into a recession in the short term if he were to able, if he were able to achieve
01:30his long-term goals. Here's his response. Some people on Wall Street say that we're going to
01:38have the greatest economy in history. Is it okay in the short term to have a recession?
01:41Look, yes, everything's okay. Everything's okay. That's the president saying everything's okay,
01:50including a short-term recession. Do you agree?
01:54Well, I'm old enough to remember when Ronald Reagan took office and inflation was completely
01:58out of control. He and Paul Volcker had to take some pretty bold and swift actions to tame inflation.
02:02That included a pretty severe recession, but that's what it took. When you come into office and you
02:08are inheriting enormous messes across the spectrum, you know, an open border that presents a clear and
02:17present danger, a 40-year high inflation that has dramatically devalued the dollar, endless wars
02:23going on. It's hard to clean up those enormous messes. So I appreciate President Trump has acted
02:29boldly, swiftly, decisively to clean up some of these messes. And, yeah, it's not going to be easy.
02:36And sometimes the results are going to have to be re-evaluated and re-looked at. Some actions
02:41reverse, but you have to act boldly when you have that responsibility.
02:45I hear you when it comes to the border. I hear you when it comes to inflation. I hear you when it comes
02:49to massive debt. But this is President Trump trying to reshape the American economy, bring more
02:56manufacturing jobs here through a very aggressive menu of tariffs all over the world, which will, of course,
03:04raise prices, according to almost every major economist. And it does seem like there's been
03:10a reluctance on the part of the president to acknowledge, he acknowledges disruption, but
03:14to acknowledge how much this could hurt lower-income people. I want to play something else President
03:20Trump said about concerns over the impact that the tariffs are having on prices.
03:25You know, somebody said, oh, the shelves are going to be open. Well, maybe the children will have
03:32two dollars instead of 30 dollars, you know, and maybe the two dollars will cost a couple of bucks
03:37more than they would normally.
03:38The, the, the, so the fact is that we have allowed manufacturing of very strategic, very important
03:45products to be offshored. President Trump fully understands that. He fully understands one of the
03:50reasons he won the presidency is because of Joe Biden's high inflation. So he's fully aware of that.
03:55Again, I have my concerns. The markets have shown those concerns. They've bounced back.
04:01For my part, what I've been trying to keep the administration prides of, of the businesses that
04:05are going to suffer if this continues long term. But it does sound like, you know, his bold strategy
04:10is resulting in other nations coming to the table, negotiating in better faith than they have in
04:15the past. I don't know where this all goes. I don't want to lessen President Trump's leverage by
04:21undermining him whatsoever. I just keep him and his administration prides of how it impacts the
04:27Wisconsin businesses. I think that's currently my role. And again, actually cheerlead, hope for the
04:32best here as opposed to, I think a lot of people are hoping he fails. I hope he succeeds.
04:36I hope he succeeds, too. How concerned are you about the next four to six weeks with the final Chinese
04:46container ships pre-tariff reaching American shores with warnings of empty shelves, with
04:53warnings of higher prices? What are you, what industries in Wisconsin are you worried about
04:58most right now? Primarily those that are involved in manufacturing, where they also export, they'll
05:05import component parts. They're competing against foreign companies that won't be subject to those
05:12types of tariffs. So again, it all depends on how, how high those tariffs are, you know, and 10% above
05:17the board tariff. I mean, that's on the wholesale cost of goods that probably will not have that
05:23significant impact on inflation. Nobody can predict all of these things. But again, my role is listening
05:28to my constituents, relaying that to the administration. I will say the administration,
05:32the trade representatives are very accessible. They are listening to this. They understand
05:37the concerns. I think President Trump understands concerns. But, you know, this is a multi-decade,
05:42you know, firmly held belief on the president, part of President Trump, that America has put itself
05:47in peril by allowing so, so many strategic products to be offshored. It's trying to turn that situation
05:53around. It's not easy. This is a problem that's built over decades. He's trying to do it in within
05:57one administration. That's why he's acting boldly and swiftly. Yeah, I don't think dolls are in the
06:04American strategic interest, though, right? I mean, you're talking about semiconductors and the like,
06:07and I understand your point. And that's why even many conservatives say that there should be more,
06:11like Stephen Moore, for example, there should be more discrete targeting of industries and not just
06:16a wide swath of anything coming from any other country.
06:21Well, again, President Trump has a negotiating strategy and negotiating style. I think he's
06:26throwing the entire world out of balance. I think he understands that creates uncertainty and
06:30instability, which is not good for economic activity. He understands those things. But that's
06:34his negotiating strategy. And it sounds like nations are coming to the table, starting to negotiate in
06:39good faith, which they have not been willing to do in the past. I've done a lot of negotiating.
06:43Sometimes you've got to be hard, take a hard position with your negotiating partners.
06:48Sounds like that's the approach he's taking. Again, I, for one, am wishing him success.
06:53You have long been opposed on principle to the IRS being used to punish an administration's
06:59opponents in any way. You were very outspoken about that during the Obama administration.
07:03We would have you on all the time to talk about it. And here you are during the Biden
07:06administration at a hearing on government weaponization. Take a listen.
07:10My eyes began opening to this reality with the disclosure of how the Obama administration
07:17weaponized the IRS to harass Tea Party groups by denying them tax-exempt status.
07:24President Trump is out in the open threatening to target Harvard, a move that the conservative
07:31editorial board of The Wall Street Journal says is unwise and sets a bad precedent. Do you oppose
07:36his instruction to the IRS to take away Harvard's tax-exempt status?
07:43Well, first of all, what I would like to do is simplify and rationalize our tax code.
07:48So we really don't try and socially and economically engineer the economy through the tax code. It should
07:54be simple. It should be rational. It should raise the revenue we have. You know, the tax-exempt status of
07:59all kinds of entities kind of scratch your head. You know, so many of these entities, for example,
08:03universities, pretty easy for them to not make a profit. So what values that tax-exempt status have?
08:09So again, that's part of the complication of our tax code. We need to simplify it. And that's certainly
08:15what I'm trying to do, certainly with this reconciliation bill.
08:18Right. But President Trump is out there instructing his IRS to target Harvard. And you've been very
08:26outspoken about when targeting was done of conservative groups during the Obama years,
08:32which he apologized for ultimately. And I'm wondering if you are also upset at this.
08:40Well, in the past, people have used tax-exempt status on churches and religious universities as
08:46well. Again, that's why I don't like a complex tax code. I don't want anybody to be using the tax code
08:52in this type of manner. And so what I'd say is, let's simplify the tax code. That's the solution
08:57here. All right. Senator Ron Johnson, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.