US President Donald Trump has claimed that virtually every country in the world wants to negotiate tariffs with the United States. Trump was speaking to journalists at the White House, during a meeting with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Every Country Wants Trade Talks: Trump
The US President said, “I will say this, virtually every country wants to negotiate. If I didn't do what I did over the last couple of weeks, you wouldn't have anybody who wants to negotiate. We would have gone to these countries who want to talk, and they were, well, we don't want to talk, now they're coming to us.”
Now They Are Offering…: Trump
Donald Trump also claimed that most countries around the world are now offering ‘things’ to the US, which the US wouldn’t have even asked for. He said, “Now they're offering things to us that we would have never even thought of asking them for because they're experiencing a lot of hurt and the hurt is that they've taken advantage of us and we finally fought back.”
Tariffs Will Make US Rich: Trump
Justifying his reciprocal tariffs, Trump reiterated the benefits that he expects tariffs to bring. He said, “Tariffs will make this country very rich. We're rich anyway, but we're rich in a certain way. We have $36 trillion in debt. I want to get rid of it and we can do it quickly with proper deals. So, when countries don't allow us to sell our product, but we allow them to sell their product, when they charge us massive amounts of money for the privilege of going into their country, those days are over.”
United States Versus China
Trump’s comments follow a series of threats and counter-threats between the United States and China. Trump has warned that he will impose another 50% tariff on Chinese goods, if China didn’t withdraw its 34% retaliatory tariff on American goods. China has responded, vowing “not to bow down” to these threats. China has also called it “blackmailing.”
