On CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) spoke about President Trump's tariffs.
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00:00Let's turn to the U.S. economy.
00:02I want you to take a listen to what President Trump told NBC.
00:04He was asked if he would be comfortable with the country
00:07potentially dipping into a recession in the short term
00:10if he were able to achieve his long-term goals.
00:15Here's his response.
00:18Some people on Wall Street say
00:19that we're going to have the greatest economy in history.
00:22Is it okay in the short term to have a recession?
00:24Look, yeah, everything's okay.
00:30Everything's okay.
00:31That's the president saying everything's okay,
00:33including a short-term recession.
00:34Do you agree?
00:37Well, I'm old enough to remember when Ronald Reagan took office
00:39and inflation was completely out of control.
00:42He and Paul Volcker had to take some pretty bold and swift actions
00:44to tame inflation.
00:45That included a pretty severe recession,
00:47but that's what it took.
00:49When you come into office
00:51and you are inheriting enormous messes across the spectrum,
00:57you know, an open border that presents a clear and present danger,
01:01a 40-year high inflation that has dramatically devalued the dollar,
01:05endless wars going on.
01:07It's hard to clean up those enormous messes,
01:09so I appreciate President Trump has acted boldly, swiftly, decisively
01:14to clean up some of these messes,
01:17and, yeah, it's not going to be easy,
01:19and sometimes the results are going to have to be re-evaluated
01:22and re-looked at some actions reversed,
01:24but you have to act boldly when you have that responsibility.
01:28I hear you when it comes to the border.
01:29I hear you when it comes to inflation.
01:31I hear you when it comes to massive debt.
01:34But this is President Trump trying to reshape the American economy,
01:38bring more manufacturing jobs here
01:40through a very aggressive menu of tariffs all over the world,
01:46which will, of course, raise prices,
01:48according to almost every major economist.
01:51And it does seem like there's been a reluctance
01:53on the part of the president to acknowledge,
01:55he acknowledges disruption,
01:57but to acknowledge how much this could hurt lower-income people.
02:02I want to play something else President Trump said
02:04about concerns over the impact that the tariffs are having on prices.
02:10You know, somebody said,
02:11oh, the shelves are going to be open.
02:13Well, maybe the children will have two dollars instead of $30, you know,
02:17and maybe the two dollars will cost a couple of bucks more
02:20than they would normally.
02:21So the fact is that we have allowed manufacturing
02:26of very strategic, very important products to be offshored.
02:30President Trump fully understands that.
02:31He fully understands one of the reasons he won the presidency
02:34is because of Joe Biden's high inflation.
02:36So he's fully aware of that.
02:38Again, I have my concerns.
02:41The markets have shown those concerns.
02:42They've bounced back.
02:43For my part, what I've been trying to do is keep the administration
02:46prized of the businesses that are going to suffer if this continues long-term.
02:50But it does sound like his bold strategy is resulting in other nations
02:55coming to the table, negotiating in better faith than they have in the past.
02:59I don't know where this all goes.
03:00I don't want to lessen President Trump's leverage by undermining him whatsoever.
03:06I just keep him and his administration prized of how it impacts the Wisconsin businesses.
03:11I think that's currently my role.
03:12And again, actually cheerlead.
03:15Hope for the best here as opposed to, I think, a lot of people are hoping he fails.
03:18I hope he succeeds.
03:20I hope he succeeds, too.
03:21How concerned are you about the next four to six weeks with the final Chinese container ships
03:29pre-tariff reaching American shores with warnings of empty shelves, with warnings of higher prices?
03:38What industries in Wisconsin are you worried about most right now?
03:44Primarily those that are involved in manufacturing, where they also export.
03:47They'll import component parts.
03:50They're competing against foreign companies that won't be subject to those type of tariffs.
03:56So, again, it all depends on how high those tariffs are.
03:59And 10 percent above-the-board tariff, I mean, that's on the wholesale cost of goods.
04:05That probably will not have that significant impact on inflation.
04:08Nobody can predict all of these things.
04:09But, again, my role is listening to my constituents, relaying that to the administration.
04:14I will say the administration, the trade representatives, are very accessible.
04:18They are listening to this.
04:19They understand the concerns.
04:21I think President Trump understands concerns.
04:23But this is a multi-decade, you know, firmly held belief on the part of President Trump
04:28that America has put itself in peril by allowing so many strategic products to be offshored.
04:34He's trying to turn that situation around.
04:36It's not easy.
04:37This is a problem that's built over decades.
04:39He's trying to do it within one administration.
04:41That's why he's acting boldly and swiftly.
04:43Yeah, I don't think dolls are in the American strategic interest, though, right?
04:48I mean, you're talking about semiconductors and the like, and I understand your point.
04:51And that's why even many conservatives say that there should be more, like Stephen Moore,
04:55for example, there should be more discrete targeting of industries and not just a wide swath
05:00of anything coming from any other country.
05:02Well, again, President Trump has a negotiating strategy, a negotiating style.
05:08I think he's throwing the entire world out of balance.
05:11I think he understands that creates uncertainty and instability, which is not good for economic
05:15activity.
05:15He understands those things.
05:17But that's his negotiating strategy.
05:18And it sounds like nations are coming to the table, starting to negotiate in good faith,
05:23which they have not been willing to do in the past.
05:25I've done a lot of negotiating.
05:26Sometimes you've got to be hard, take a hard position with your negotiating partners.
05:31Sounds like that's the approach he's taking.
05:33Again, I, for one, am wishing him success.