FULL INTERVIEW: Elizabeth Warren Reacts To Trump's Tariff Policies, Future For Democratic Party

2 days ago

On CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) discussed President Trump's tariffs and the future for the Democratic Party with Jake Tapper.

Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:

https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript

Stay Connected
Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes
More From Forbes: http://forbes.com

Transcript

00:00Biden's decision to slap tariffs on Chinese goods because he was, in your words, quote,

00:04standing up for American workers, unquote. So specifically on China,

00:09can you detail what exactly you would be doing differently than President Trump?

00:15Well, let's keep in mind, tariffs can be an important tool in the toolbox

00:19when used in targeted ways. But right now, what we've got is chaos and corruption.

00:26Donald Trump has imposed a tariff on everyone, everywhere, on all products. That's the 10%

00:34tariff. Of course, it was much higher earlier in the week. And now in this trade war with China that

00:40basically tries to shut down all trade. And then right out in plain view, as if the chaos weren't

00:47enough, he adds a nice layer of corruption for everyone to see. And that is a special, special

00:55deal for his CEO donor. And that is an exception to the China deal for iPhones. You know, look,

01:06here's the problem. You can't get an economy strong and moving forward when it's loaded with chaos and

01:15corruption. Investors will not invest in the United States. When Donald Trump is playing red light,

01:22green light with tariffs and saying, oh, and for my special donors, you get a special exception.

01:30People make investment decisions that are years into the future. If they're going to build a factory

01:35or they're going to rehab an old factory or buy a bunch of new tools. And right now with Donald Trump,

01:42nobody can figure out what the rules will be five days from now, much less five years from now.

01:48That's a real hit to our economy and to developing more manufacturing here in the United States.

01:56So on Wednesday, the president announced a pause on most of the tariffs, a 90-day pause,

02:03except for the ones on China and except for the 10 percent across the board.

02:07You called for the SEC to investigate whether President Trump intentionally manipulated the

02:13market or covered for insider trading when he told Americans on Truth Social and in the Oval Office

02:18that they should go invest in the stock market before he announced that pause on the tariffs and

02:25the market soared afterwards. Have you seen any actual evidence that insider trading was going on

02:31instead of the just general advice he gave to for people to invest?

02:34Well, there are people who have looked at what happened to purchases and to calls just before

02:45he made that announcement that caused the stock market to skyrocket. But let me be clear with the

02:52back and forth here. That's what investigations are for. And it's entirely appropriate to have an

02:58investigation to make sure that Donald Trump, Donald Trump's family, Donald Trump's inner circle

03:04didn't get advanced information and trade on that information. This is just, you know, kind of this is

03:12how the stock market works in order to make sure on a consistent basis that nobody's trading on inside

03:22information. And by the way, Jake, the same thing should apply to Congress. And that is we should have

03:28a rule that no one in Congress can trade on any trade in any individual stocks. No senator, no

03:38representative. I've had that bill for a long time. It's got a lot of support. In fact, it's got some

03:44bipartisan support. I think now would be a good time to get it across the finish line and get our

03:51representatives out of the business of trading in individual stocks. The American people should never

03:57have to wonder when the president, when his cabinet, when members of Congress are making a

04:04decision, whether it's for the good of the country or for the good of their own bank account.

04:09Let me ask you a larger philosophical question, because the Democratic Party,

04:13obviously not in a great place right now. Democrats seem divided on whether to try to allow room for the

04:19belief that tariffs, as you say, targeted tariffs can be a good thing, or whether to reject all

04:23of Trump's tariffs outright. We saw this play out with Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer making

04:28headlines when she visited the White House. She praised tariffs as a useful tool. Take a listen.

04:35I understand the motivation behind the tariffs. And I can tell you, here's where President Trump and

04:40I do agree. We do need to make more stuff in America, more cars and ships, more steel and ships.

04:48We do need fair trade. Is there room for that kind of nuanced discussion right now? Or do you think

04:56what she said was a mistake? You know, I want to put it slightly differently. And that is,

05:04it is a mistake to have the president of the United States out there just playing red light, green light

05:10and saying, oh, this morning I woke up and think the tariffs should be this big. Now I think they should

05:15be this big. Now I think they should be somewhere else. And I got to say, saying, well, I will continue

05:21to make those decisions and I'm going to hold off on these tariffs for 90 days. That doesn't put the

05:26economy in a better place. That doesn't put investors in a better place. Congress has a job right now,

05:33and that is to step up and take this authority away from Donald Trump. He has proven how he will use it.

05:41But remember, the statute that he's now using starts with a declaration of emergency.

05:47And in that same statute, Congress has the responsibility to decide, is it really an

05:54emergency or not? Are we really in an emergency with Belgium right now? Are we really in an emergency

05:59with South Korea? Congress can say, no, there's no emergency. It's a resolution. And if we do that,

06:07it takes Donald Trump back to the trade as we had it before. And tariffs are then decided,

06:15with Congress having an important say in it. And that's an important signal to the rest of the

06:20world. Right now, it's a no curbs on Donald Trump, and that means chaos and corruption.

06:28We have an opportunity in Congress to vote that down and to say, no, we are going to use tariffs in a far

06:35more targeted way. We're sure not headed in the direction he wants to go. All of the Democrats

06:41are ready to support that. But we've got to get the Republicans, or at least some of the Republicans,

06:48on board to make that happen. They've got to decide, is their job just to suck up to Donald Trump,

06:54or is their job to stand up for the American people?

06:58J.P. Morgan says the odds of a recession are now 50-50. Goldman Sachs puts the odds at 45%. You

07:04were one of the loudest voices warning about the 2008 financial crisis. What do you think the

07:09likelihood of a recession is right now? Well, it's the economists, it's Wall Street are all

07:15telling us there's a problem, and the warning lights are flashing red. You know, though, Jake,

07:21the part I remember from 2008 is what a recession means, family by family, small business by small

07:28business. You know, I watched back in 2008 when 10 million people lost their homes, when millions of

07:36people lost their jobs, when millions of people saw their savings wiped out. I also watched when

07:42little tiny businesses got turned upside down and never had a chance to recover. Recessions are

07:50something that people like to talk about. They talk about the stock market. They talk about the big

07:54numbers that move. But the reality is they are experienced one family, one small business at a time,

08:02and they are hard to recover from. So I am worried that the continued chaos, the continued corruption,

08:11the fact that Donald Trump is just out there shooting wildly is pushing our economy in the wrong

08:18direction. And the people who are going to feel it most are not the wealthy traders. It's going to be

08:23the families and the small businesses who get wiped out. So given all the given all the chaos, given the fact that

08:31the president's approval ratings are declining, given all the uncertainty in the market, why do you think the

08:39Democratic Party has such a low approval rating? I would think this would be an opportunity for Democrats to rise

08:44and present an alternative. But it doesn't seem like that's happening. And as you know, your party's

08:50approval ratings are historically low.

08:53You know, look, the way I look at this is that Donald Trump has created a lot of chaos in his first three

09:02months in Washington. Remember, he started out, made the promise that on day one, he would lower prices

09:09for American families. Those were his words on day one. By the time he gets two months in and he's told

09:16that his tariff plans will increase costs, his answer was he couldn't care less. I think that the

09:23Democrats have really coalesced around the central message. Our job is to fight to lower those costs

09:31for American families. Our job is to fight against a Republican Party that not only doesn't care about

09:38those families, but is working hard right now while all this chaos is going on to give more tax cuts to

09:47billionaires and billionaire corporations and to cut access to Social Security, to cut veterans services,

09:57to cut health care for little babies and for seniors in nursing homes, to cut help for our public schools

10:05so that class sizes get bigger, so that little kids with special needs can't get an aid, so that after

10:12school programs are canceled. Look, I think our secret super duper strategy is just tell the truth

10:20about what's going on. The American people will see pretty clearly who's fighting for the billionaires

10:27and who's fighting for them. Senator Elizabeth Warren from the Great

10:31Commonwealth of Massachusetts, thanks for joining us today. Thank you for having me.

FULL INTERVIEW: Elizabeth Warren Reacts To Trump's Tariff Policies, Future For Democratic Party

Category

Transcript

Recommended