Trump’s tariffs rollout beset by confusion, uncertainty and mixed messages
President Donald Trump on Wednesday officially fulfilled a campaign promise to unleash sweeping tariffs, a move that has sparked fears of a global trade war and prompted a major question about what has become the centerpiece of his economic agenda: What’s his endgame?
In both size and scope, Trump’s ultimate blueprint for global tariffs — a 10% baseline tariff on virtually every country, with higher numbers on countries with which the United States has larger trade deficits — was more than most expected. It has left global financial markets tumbling and Trump’s Republican supporters trying to thread the political needle of not criticizing him while also understanding the economic peril the tariff plan may usher in ahead of 2026 midterm elections in which the GOP will try to defend its slim House and Senate majorities.
Trump’s team has so far not had a clear message to either explain the strategy behind the tariffs that his political allies can echo or his thought process behind the decision to go much further than even supporters were expecting.
What’s more, multiple elements of the sweeping measures made it seem as if the administration rushed through the process — including its decision to levy tariffs on uninhabited islands and its initially listing tariff numbers on the White House list published Thursday that were different from the ones on the chart Trump held in the Rose Garden on Wednesday.
One day after the announcement, Trump was not helping provide any of that clarity, posting cryptic messages on Truth Social that the “patient lived,” an apparent reference to the U.S. economy, and that the “operation is over,” though the tariffs have yet to be imposed.
“THE OPERATION IS OVER! THE PATIENT LIVED, AND IS HEALING,” he posted on a day when the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 1,600 points. “THE PROGNOSIS IS THAT THE PATIENT WILL BE FAR STRONGER, BIGGER, BETTER, AND MORE RESILIENT THAN EVER BEFORE.”
“MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!,” he added.
On Thursday afternoon, Trump doubled down on the analogy in defending his move to reporters who asked about the financial markets’ tanking one day after his tariff announcement.
“I think it’s going very well,” he said. “It was an operation like when a patient gets operated on.”
Trump at various points has framed the tariff plan as a revenue generator for the country, saying last week that the tariffs would raise “billions of dollars, even trillions of dollars, coming into our country.” At the same time, though, he has discussed them in terms of “fairness,” the idea that they could be used as a tool to rebalance the global economy, which, according to Trump, has been plagued by foreign nations’ taking advantage of the United States.
Trump has long viewed a trade deficit as a “subsidy” the United States provides another country. Economists have almost uniformly rejected that idea, pointing out that many countries are either too small or too poor to buy enough U.S. goods to offset their exports.
The sheer size of the tariff proposal and the lack of clear communication from the administration have left some Trump supporters skeptical and unsure what’s coming next.
“I have no idea,” a Trump supporter and 2024 donor said when asked what they thought Trump’s end goal was. “This is much larger than I think most thought would happen during the campaign. I guess the best case is he gets some concessions from countries quickly and pulls back. I don’t know.”
A senior Senate GOP aide said White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller spoke at a lunch with Senate chiefs of staff Thursday to address concerns. This person said Miller handled the tough questioning well and made strong points about the national security rationale behind reshoring critical supply chains, given the Covid crisis.
But this person said the White House has yet to offer effective messaging on other fronts related to the wide-ranging tariffs.
“They’ve got the broad, overarching theme down of what they’re trying to say with reorienting the economy,” this person said. “The difficult part of this is what do you say to the small business that says these tariffs are going to put me under. And I’ve yet to hear a compelling talking point on that.”
The tariffs give congressional Republicans even more urgency to pass tax cuts to alleviate some of the pressures of the tariffs, said this person, who believes Trump is “willing to make a deal” on the trade measures, though.
“Donald Trump views everything as a negotiation, right?” this person said. “That’s kind of his worldview. So I think this is a negotiation, and there’s going to be countries that come to the table one by one and make a deal to do business with the No. 1 economy in the world.”
Since Wednesday’s announcement, Trump advisers have been dispatched to do rounds of media interviews to explain the plan. At times, the explanations have only muddied the water.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told CNN on Thursday morning that Wall Street should “trust President Trump” and that no level of negotiation by other countries would reduce or eliminate the outlined plan before the tariffs go into effect.
“The president made it clear yesterday this is not a negotiation, this is a national emergency,” she said.
White House talking points obtained by NBC News also emphasized that the tariffs were not a negotiating tool.
The message about “not a negotiation,” however, has been contradicted by Trump’s own economic advisers — who insist the move is part of a negotiating ploy to bring back what they call “fair trade” — as well as his own family and even Trump himself.
“The tariffs give us great power to negotiate. Always have,” Trump told reporters Thursday on Air Force One.
Trump’s son Eric posted Thursday morning on X: “I wouldn’t want to be the last country that tries to negotiate a trade deal with @realDonaldTrump. The first to negotiate will win — the last will absolutely lose. I have seen this movie my entire life…”
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick also told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Wednesday night that the tariffs would prompt negotiations by foreign trade partners.
“I’ve got to imagine that a lot of these countries are not going to like the tariffs that go into effect tonight at midnight, and they are going to want to negotiate,” he said. “You think I’m wrong?”
Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Bloomberg News on Wednesday that he was not part of tariff talks within the administration and was not sure whether negotiations with foreign countries would happen before the baseline tariffs take effect Saturday.
“I am not part of the negotiations, so we will see,” he said. “I’m sure there will be a lot of calls. I’m just not sure there will be negotiations.”
Though the announcement did broadly fulfill a Trump campaign promise to institute tariffs, it is also seemingly in contradiction with another big message he used on the campaign trail: that he would lower prices.
“When I win, I will immediately bring prices down, starting on day one,” Trump said in August.
That theme has transformed in recent weeks as the impact tariffs would be likely to have on the cost of most consumer goods came into view. The administration now says that its tariff-focused economic policy will lead to some “short-term pain” for consumers but that it is all part of a larger plan to usher in what Trump has called the “Golden Age of America.”
It is the message being echoed by Trump’s most staunch congressional allies, even those concerned about economic and political blowback.
“Sometimes in business you have to have short-term pain to have long-term gain, and we don’t think this is even going to be that long of a short term, if it is at all,” Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., said.
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La, acknowledged to reporters that the Trump administration might have to “recalibrate” if the original tariff plans prove negative for the domestic economy.
“If they make things better, they should want more. If it makes things worse, they should want to recalibrate,” he said. “If the tariffs end up hurting America, I think you’ll see President Trump recalibrate.”
For Republicans members of Congress, it has become a delicate balancing act. They are trying not to criticize Trump while keeping an eye toward the 2026 midterms and taking into consideration recent polling that has found the tariff plan to be increasingly unpopular.
A CBS/YouGov poll released this week found that 55% of respondents feel Trump is focusing too much on tariffs, while 64% think he is not focused enough on lowering prices. A Fox News poll released last month found similar sentiment, with 53% of registered voters saying tariffs “hurt the economy.”
Even before Wednesday’s announcement, voters have increasingly questioned Trump’s economic agenda. Last month, an NBC News survey found Trump underwater on the economy for the first time in either of his presidential administrations.
Democrats, meanwhile, blasted Trump and his White House as officials say Americans merely need to trust Trump’s instincts on trade as the market takes a nosedive.
“It is insane to me that the stock market has plummeted, economists are sounding the alarm that we’ll plunge head-first into a recession, 900 workers were laid off from Stellantis in Indiana and right here in Michigan and the Trump White House has the gall to call this ‘Liberation Day,’” said Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, who announced a bid for an open U.S Senate seat Wednesday.
Despite the polling numbers, most Republicans are maintaining faith in Trump’s trade agenda. They include Sen. Jim Justice, R-W.Va., who said he understands the concerns but trusts Trump to protect West Virginians.
“You’ve got to grow,” Justice said. “And that’s what I believe our president’s trying to do. I mean, we’re not making anything. We have to grow.”
“Let it play out,” he added. “Let’s see what happens, especially in the next seven days. You’ll see a lot of activity in the next seven days, a lot of different things.”
