In the US-China trade war, did Trump just blink?

FILE PHOTO – President Donald Trump, right, with China’s President Xi Jinping, left, during their bilateral meeting at the G20 Summit, Saturday, Dec. 1, 2018 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

In the current trade war with China, did Trump just blink?

This weekend – a day after China called Trump’s bluff and put tariffs at 125 percent on US goods, and Trump raised tariffs on Chinese goods to 145 percent – the US announced it would exempt phones, laptops and other electronics coming in from China from any tariffs.

That’s a blink, right?

Or is it a fig leaf for the naked economic genius’ trade war?

The move spares companies, primarily Apple, with their Chinese-made products, from paying tariffs that could have resulted in $3,000 iPhones.

More broadly, it was an admission that tariffs are taxes that mean higher prices passed on to consumers.

Please note: The specific China exemptions didn’t stop all tariffs.

While some tech companies are relieved, the exemptions don’t impact the existing 10 percent across-the-board tariffs, and the 25 percent tariffs on cars that Trump enacted last week.

So while we would like to forget this past week, it still must be recorded as a milestone in history.

Less than 80 days into its tenure, the Trump administration has defined itself and where it is taking the US downward.

With Trump driving the economic agenda, he’s put us in reverse, taking our 21st-century nation, that in January was considered the leader economically in the world, and driven us to the bottom.

Trump’s thrust us into a world of F.U.

Future uncertainty.

Who knows what he’ll do? Did anyone predict the exemption on phones on Saturday?

And who knows how the market will respond to what appears to be a favor to Apple, which has said it would move some manufacturing back to the US.

After losing more than $6 trillion last week, how will the markets respond to the partial move. It certainly wasn’t a correction of our current course, more a confirmation that tariffs will be painful. So he eased up a bit on Apple.

This is Trump acting on as he put it, “instinct,” and you may not feel it yet. But it will have an impact on us.

Forget electronics. Do a quick inventory of everything within three feet of you right now, from your clothes to everything you can touch.

Was anything made in America? Was the vast majority made elsewhere, specifically China?

Personal impact

I was at a funeral for my cousin’s husband Federico, this past week, when Trump made his first reversal and put a 90-day pause on the reciprocal tariffs.

I would have rather seen Federico come back from the dead.

One of my relatives asked me what I thought about the tariffs? I said Trump is the only one who knows what he wants. And that’s not good.

His aides – from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant to Commerce Secretary Howard Luttnick to the economic advisor – know nothing. So they sound confused.

Economic advisor Peter Navarro speaks more passionately about the chaos because he believes his own B.S. on trade imbalances being absolutely the work of the devil.

They are not totally. But Navarro – who proved his loyalty to Trump by spending four months in prison after being convicted for contempt of court for ignoring a congressional subpoena for the Jan. 6 hearings – has the president’s ear. He’s also the perfect yes man.

And that makes him dangerous when the president tries to articulate his nationalistic, protectionist “America First” ideas.

Trump sees all trade imbalances in simple math terms. But economists are critical of his fuzzy math that focuses on hard goods and discounts, things like software and services. Nor does he take into account that the US and the dollar have status as the world economic leader right now.

Last Monday, when Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu came for a meeting, Trump cancelled a formal press conference, then had an informal exchange with media.

“Nobody but me would do this,” Trump said about his trade war, ignoring the reason most presidents wouldn’t – because the pain and consequences to America are real.

“But we have an opportunity to reset the table on trade. We lose billions of dollars,” he said.

Still, nothing like the $6 trillion that evaporated from the US stock market last week, making it $11 trillion lost in the market in 11 weeks.

You may have felt it in your 401K. But Trump is still bullish on tariffs.

At that same Netanyahu Oval Office media gaggle, Trump talked about why he’s bullish and when he got tariff fever.

“Our country is going to be at a level that has maybe it’s never been,” Trump said. “Our country was the strongest, believe it or not, from 1870 to 1913. You know why? It was all tariff-based. We had no income tax. Then in 1913 some genius came up with the idea.”

And that is the driver of Trump and tariffs. It’s his mistaken history lesson that America in the 21st century should go back to the time of the post-Civil War Reconstruction to the era when the US went to war in the Philippines and declared its first colony.

That’s how far back in reverse we’re going.

Already, our allies don’t trust us. China is making deals with other countries. And America is seen not as the world financial leader, but as weaker and poorer than ever. Investors are shorting the stock market and selling bonds.

The world is selling not buying America.

Some other facts after last week, when Congress is trying to balance our budget. The interest paid on the $36 trillion national debt is already $881 billion dollars, more than the country’s defense spending.

Not great, but it’s a different perspective when you’re the world leader and not where Trump is taking us.

And where is that? Under Trump’s leadership we’re isolated and alone – an America in real decline driven by irrational policies formed by a president who thinks America was at its best when the Philippines was its colony.

It’s not too late to reverse course on tariffs. And to start acting rationally when it comes to economic policy. But it may take more than a blink or two.

April 2nd, Trump’s Liberation Day is when America lost its mind.

The fallout last week is when we lost our lunch.

The week may be so historical, the world order has already been irreparably reset.

Emil Guillermo is an award-winning journalist, news analyst and stage monologuist. He writes for the Inquirer.net’s US Channel. He has written a weekly “Amok” column on Asian American issues since 1995. Find him on YouTube, patreon and substack.