Why Trump Is Likely To Negotiate Trade Deals | Charles Gasparino on Tariffs, White House Factions, and Protectionist Conservative Coalition
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The ECB is ready to do whatever it takes to preserve the euro. And believe me, it will be enough. Thank you. Just close the f***ing door.

I am joined by Charles Gasparino, Fox Business senior correspondent and New York Post columnist and author. Charlie, welcome to Monetary Matters. It looks like the Trump tariffs, the reciprocal tariffs are going to be in place. We record the afternoon of April 8th, just one minute after midnight.

Charlie, how are you sort of assessing the odds that the reciprocal tariffs, the 104% tariff on China, the very high tariff on other countries in Asia, the 20% retaliatory tariff, excuse me, reciprocal tariff on the European Union, how likely do you think it is that those go in place and how likely it is that they stay in place?

Um, you know, I'm only as good as my sources. And I talked to a lot of people that are in the financial business with ties to the Trump White House, or at least, you know, no people there. And, you know, we should point out the Trump White House is not a monolith. There's all sorts, there are factions. And, you know, one of the things is tariff issue is exposing is the sort of

fissures in the economic team. You have Scott Bessins and maybe Mr. Hassett on one side and

You have Lutnick and Navarro on another, a much more protectionist, mercantilist approach, at least. At least that's, you know, I'm not quite convinced that Howard Lutnick is the trade hawk and protectionist he claims to be. But be that as it may, that's the role he's playing. He's a longtime Wall Street executive. I think Peter Navarro is. Peter Navarro is ideologically pretty rigid in this stuff.

Scott Besson isn't, although he believes tariffs can be used as a means to an end. And I would say Kevin Hassett believes the same thing. So now the question is, you know, where are they going with this? And I'm convinced mostly, not 100 percent, based on what my sources are saying, is that Trump will err on the side of the Bessons and Hassett. So there will be tariffs tomorrow.

There will be a flurry of negotiations after that. The toughest one, I believe, will be China. I believe that there is room there for a deal. We should point out that Trump wants TikTok to be in U.S. hands.

Not because he likes to dance or watch dance videos, short videos. He believes it helped him win with young people. And, you know, going back, it kind of did. So he wants TikTok. He wants the ports, particularly the ports around the Panama Canal, to be in U.S. hands. And there's a BlackRock deal where BlackRock, a U.S. company, wants to buy it from a Chinese company, which means the president of China has to sign off on it. That's Xi Jinping.

So he wants that. He wants access to their markets. He knows that they want access to our markets. They don't really buy anything from us. They steal a lot of stuff. So there's even in China, which seems to be the toughest nut to crack, there is room for negotiation. Plus, he gets along with the Chinese president. But I think that's where we're going with this. We're going with, you know what hits the fan tomorrow. You're going to see all these big headlines.

markets could get real crazy and then you'll see a stream then you'll see negotiations and uh markets will bounce back uh the real question is the real economy how big of a hit does this mistake i mean

Because of the uncertainty, a lot of big companies just stopped spending. There was retrenchment. We could get a quarter of negative growth because of that, GDP-wise. It's another thing I keep hearing. So now the question is, is this short-lived? I think if there are deals, there is. And I think then the markets and the economy will start to reflect that.

some of the growth aspects of the Trump agenda, which is tax cuts and deregulation. But, you know, this trade thing is going to be interesting to see how it unfolds. But I really do believe, at least based on what I'm hearing now, that Trump is going to err on the side of Besant and Hassett. And if you notice...

in the last 24, 48 hours. And it's something that I kind of first reported on Fox Business. The messaging is now Besant and Ascent. It's not Howard Lutnick and it's a lot less Peter Navarro.

And so you think Trump is looking to do a deal? Besant and Hassett are saying that countries are coming to the Trump administration to do a negotiation. But President Trump has, to my knowledge, not really said that he's looking for a negotiation. He said people can come and talk and we'll see if there's a perfect deal, if there's an incredible deal, we'll see. But he is talking quite tough. But you're saying that

Deep down, he is looking to do a deal. And can you also just speak to President Trump's ambition to reorder global trade? How serious is this commitment? And is this something do you think that he will see through, even if it means increased market volatility, higher credit spreads?

lower stock prices, just how committed is he to his agenda of changing global trade and rebalancing deficits and turning deficits into eliminating trade deficits? He has said that he was open to negotiation. He has said that specifically. He says it depends. Are they willing to negotiate? Are they willing to negotiate a fair trade deal?

Now, what trade fairness means in his eyes, I mean, he's not never gets that granular and don't expect him to. But if the EU came back with zero percent tariffs, I mean, I think he'd take that deal. That's what I'm hearing. And that's something that they've kind of put on the table. I mean, that that was not a fake headline. There were a few fake headlines about 90 day pauses, but that was not one of them. That actually came out of somebody in the EU of power, their mouth.

So I think he is willing to do deals. And he, you know, with China, you know, that's the real, that's the big kahuna, so to speak, right? There is reason to do deals because he wants stuff out of them. I mean, he wants that ports deal. He wants the Panama Canal to be, have two American flags from a U.S. firm owning that. There's no doubt. He wants TikTok. He wants some access to the Chinese markets. And, you know, their economy is not doing so great right now. And by the way, I'm not,

And we you know, it's one of the more underplayed stories just how horrible the Chinese economy is right now. You know, they manipulate their currency to keep their trade balance and, you know, green, so to speak. But make no mistake, it's from what I understand, the economy there is not doing well. So, you know, he he thinks he has some.

he thinks he has some some some cards in in his favor uh how serious is he he's very serious now does that mean it's going to negate that if armageddon occurs he won't back off i i you know i don't know you know 2 000 points down every day for the next you know next two weeks would be pretty horrible credit spreads widening out

Although I will tell you this, I don't hear the sort of panic from market people that I'm hearing from journalists. I mean, check me if I'm wrong here, but everybody's telling me, friends of mine that run major firms, market making firms are telling me stuff is orderly. There is retail buying on the dip of certain names like NVIDIA and stuff like that.

This is not an Armageddon 87 like crash or, you know, crash that I covered specifically in 2008. I was in journalism school in 1980. I said, I remember what had happened. And I remember the pictures on the floor of the stock exchange. We're not into that, into that mode of panic selling where the markets are jamming up. And, you know, as far as credit spreads,

you know they might be widening but they're not like insane and I I I don't think they I don't think the financial system right now is shutting down by an instruction imagination

I think that, so it's interesting you're hearing that from market people. I think that I agree with you that the retail is buying the dip. And I'm also hearing that it is orderly. You're not really seeing very disjointed markets. Treasury Secretary Scott Beston said that about the sell-off on Friday. I will note that yesterday on Monday, you did have that

very, very, very large surge of down 4% to up 2% in about 15 minutes. So Marcus R. Ancy, you did have the VIX at 57 at the peak of a high today. So I think the record for the VIX is somewhere in the 80s. So it's not there yet. I don't think the VIX existed in 1987, but that was a 70% decline. That big swing you're talking about occurred off of

a fake headline, a wrong headline where people thought, thank God, you know, and you remember what happens now. We want to talk about swings. A lot of this is algorithm based, you know, right off headlines, sell, sell signals go out and the trades tried to beat each other. And it's, it's a race of computerized of technology essentially. So that sort of exaggerates the swings a lot. So remember, this is a,

Even in that type of environment, this is not a market that's jammed up right now that you can't call your broker, you can't do something, that people can't get credit if they want it. All that is there. And the way it seems to me, if he does deals, this is going to be kind of – it's not going to last forever.

And, you know, markets will reflect a, you know, whatever those deals. I mean, remember, the markets right now are just reflecting half of the deal, the tariff. They don't they're not reflecting if each tariff becomes zero tariffs and then that will be a different calculus.

And you're going to have to put that in and into your equation. I mean, I guess the calculus is how much does a tariff impact corporate earnings of the big companies? And so this tends to get sort of exaggerated because we're inputting the bad news now. Listen, I'm usually a pessimist. So, you know, I

I've covered too many crashes, you know, just that this one seems seems a little different in the sense that it's mainly about trade. This is Trump. And, you know, people, you know, I don't think you can exaggerate the volatility of market from the interpreters, from the volatility of the man, so to speak. You know, Trump does instill a certain fear in.

into traders and into markets that i you know like obama never did and you know joe biden never did even though their policies could be horrible

It's something about him. You know, you know, he's actually a guy who does what he says he's going to do. I don't understand why people were so flat footed on this. I mean, the easiest trait to know would be that he's going to remark trade. Right. He made sure he said it, said it a hundred times. I mean, I remember people were telling me, oh, everything is hunky dory in January. And I was like, no.

You know, he's going to do this tariff thing. Is he putting that off? You know, is it after the tax cuts? Well, if it's before, then we're going to get this. So, you know, you kind of had to expect this because of the uncertainty. But like I said, there could be a very positive outcome here. It's not, I just, I was just amazed that Friday, Sunday night, I was getting reports from

my competitors how they thought this was 1987 uh all over again and which i know a lot about the 87 crash and this was nothing like that you know the economic fundamentals are different the uh the structure of the market is a lot different um you know this is not 2008 we don't have a banking crisis where every bank was loaded up with you know had on their balance sheets

investments that were being marked down from one to 50 cents to 30 cents to 20 cents which is what what really made the banking crisis the banking crisis so um this is not that it I'm not I'm not saying it's nothing it's obviously something uh obviously if we go full-on protectionists you know the markets are going to just wickedly rapidly down and before you know who knows I mean because that that is just

that doesn't seem feasible. Now, if it's, if we go and, and that, I think that's the problem with the white house. Some of the messaging was full on protectionism. You know, it's, that's, it seemed like that. That's what Howard Lutnick was saying, how he became such a protectionist is beyond me. I mean, the guy made his mark running a midsize brokerage firm that, you know, did business, you know, and, and of course he was known for,

for what he did, what happened after 9/11. He lost much of his firm and built it back. I'm not saying he's a stupid guy. He's a smart, relentless, resourceful guy personally. But how he became the sort of spokesman of economics from the national economics is beyond me. I think a lot of people on Wall Street are saying that too. I think there's a lot of calls to sideline him immediately and make Besant the spokesman. And I think they're kind of doing that now.

Charlie, yesterday afternoon, you tweeted, breaking. Markets are improving on less Lutnick and more Besant. Expect more of it. Story developing. And later, we learned that Scott Besant went down to Mar-a-Lago. And I'm just speculating here, perhaps, told President Trump the markets are crashing and we should do something. Just tell us a little bit about that story. Obviously, I'm not expecting you to reveal your sourcing. But

But what made you say that? What were you hearing? And what are you hearing now about is Treasury Secretary Besson going to be in the driver's seat and the more moderate wing rather than the protectionist wing is going to be driving the bus, so to speak? Right. So I always caveat everything I said that you never know. It could change on a dime because that's Donald Trump. You know, I don't know what's going through his head. I do know.

that those initial reports, there was some report, I think it was on the MSNBC, that he was looking for a way out. I knew that was bullshit from day one, from the minute it came out. I don't know who else said that. Must have been smoking some of the good stuff, maybe. That's a joke, okay? I don't know if there's more of it than it is smoking. Definitely poorly sourced.

Besson is not looking to leave. Howard Letnick is an aggressive infighter. I'm pretty sure he would love to run national economic policy. And I'm pretty sure that someone made the determination, maybe it was Susie Wiles, maybe it was Trump himself, maybe it was J.D., maybe Vance, maybe it was a few people, that whatever Howard's doing is not working in messaging America.

And, you know, the way you kind of and if we can get trade deals out of this, it's all the better because we can bring jobs back home. We can have our cake and eat it, too. You know, and I think, you know, and I think they want people want to invest into most people on the street want to invest in to provide that that messaging.

And if you notice, he was on Tucker Carlson just as he was supposed to be looking for a way out. He was on the Tucker Carlson podcast. Seems like an odd way to, you know, to, you know, quitting your job. So essentially saying all this. And I think when I tweeted that out,

I didn't know what would come next. And what I was saying is Besson would be messaging. There'll be a lot more messaging of trade deals and a lot more less protectionist rhetoric. And that's kind of what you saw out of the White House after that. Literally, like after I tweeted that, it was probably 15, 20 minutes where they came out that they might have a deal with South Korea or somebody. I can't remember who we said. And we've been seeing periodic updates on that since. So.

Yeah, the messaging is going to be real. It's going to be probably led by Besson. But if you told me that Besson was out tomorrow, just to know what I know about Trump and how he operates, I wouldn't be surprised. I'm saying that Besson is probably in the driver's seat right now, particularly on this issue. But if that somehow changed tomorrow...

he was ousted or something, I wouldn't be totally surprised because, you know, Trump has always operated in this sort of fashion. And, you know, and I think that's kind of what's driving some of the uncertainty in the markets. I mean, if you thought, if major traders and investors thought, you know, Donald Trump

is is is we can read him he's going to do deals I I I don't think we'd be getting these 2 000 point you know all these big big swings and everything um he's volatile and he's unpredictable and that's being reflected in some of the the trading right now from what I understand

And you earlier, you said, I don't know how Howard Lutnick became so protectionist. I have a theory just from listening to him being interviewed from when he said that he was hanging out with Donald Trump in the 90s. And he got a lot of these ideas from Donald Trump and Trump.

that the president himself is a very stern believer what about the president himself because ultimately we could say uh faction a versus faction b who has the upper hand but really it is what does the president think what are his priorities yeah that's a great question i tried to address that in my new york post column this week uh we should point out i should also point out i went back into factiva

which is a really good, interesting database of news articles. And I put the name Howard Lutnick and tariff in. And then I put, you can manipulate the numbers. I said, you know, I said oldest first, right? You wouldn't believe like how little came up in recent memory. Now, there was an interview he did during Trump's first term.

where he's where he was trying to explain it in a i can't remember he was like a cnbc interview or something like that he was trying to explain why what trump was trying to do with trade policy back then but he wasn't the gung-ho guy ever on this at least at least publicly um so he may have become like a convert by sitting more with trump over the years but

to try i mean do it yourself i i mean i i did not see lots of evidence of him being you know pounding the table for for tariffs now peter navarro you

He wrote books. He's an academic on this. You know, you could trace his sort of transformation on tariffs and on protectionism from an economic standpoint. He's a Ph.D. in economics. I mean, he's it's there. There's a there's a record. But I didn't find that with Lutnik. As far as Trump is concerned, from what I understand, you know, he's known for the guy that likes to do deals. But I do hear that he's over the years become much more rigidly protectionist in the sense that,

He really does believe that this country has gotten ripped off on trade. And by the way, not totally wrong, as you know, that is easy to document. He really believes that we cut bad deals. Again, not totally wrong. And he really wants to end it. And he thinks that tariffs can be a tool not just to straighten out the trade imbalance or create fair trade.

He really believes it can be a tool sort of globally, in a sort of broader way. Like he can achieve more broad economic goals

desires he could achieve like desires when it comes to negotiations between countries our country and another country on all sorts of matters through tariffs he thinks it's an effective tool to reestablish U.S. dominance on a geopolitical standpoint and I've heard that from people that know him he really does believe that

So, you know, I guess if the markets hate tariffs and get jittery over them, it's going to be a lot of market jitters over the next three years.

And so he's a strong believer in tariffs as a geopolitical tool, but that kind of implies it's a negotiating tool and that you put a very high level and then they're lowered. So, OK, 104 percent tariffs on China. But then once they do a TikTok deal, you take it down to 30 percent. Once they do a Panama Canal deal, they do a 10 percent deal and do various bilateral trade deals. OK, down to 10 percent.

That is one version of President Trump. There's also the version of President Trump that just fundamentally believes in tariffs as a way to have them high and keep them high in order to build in America, as well as a way to generate revenue. Can you talk about that tension between...

Using it as a geopolitical tool, as a negotiating tool, basically, where you put the very, very high and then you lower them, you use that as kind of a carrot. Or is it a stick to kind of punish companies who build in foreign nations and also a way to generate revenue for the United States? OK, I can only tell you what I think based on what I hear. What I think is that he does believe in him. He does believe we need to bring jobs back here. He is a dealmaker.

And he knows at some point we got to move on. There's a practical side of Donald Trump. That's what I believe. I've covered the guy for 30 years. I've not interviewed him in years, but I interview a lot of people around them. And, you know, he's the least ideological guy I've ever met. And that's a that's now a politician. That said, there is.

a theory among a lot of people know says he's very he really does believe that these tariffs can work miracles or semi miracles so i i can only say this is what i think i think he's going to cut deals because i think that that that deal maker thing is is is much more prevalent in his brain cells after years and years of of utilizing it in various forms then the um

than the ideological part here i really do and i i do think if he was totally ideologically opposed to doing deals he would have said it he would have said listen forget about these deals you know we're just this is it you know we don't want to deal with these countries we want to bring all the manufacturing home and that's what i'm doing right now um probably would have said it uh but you know time will tell i think you know we'll see let's let's see the first big deal

Besson says they keep touting the White House keeps doubting that they got people lined up. Well, you know, they're touting it for a reason. Right. So I think they want to do deals. And I think he'll use tariffs as a weapon. That doesn't mean he's going to use it and keep it there and, you know, think that he's going to be rebuilding the industrial Midwest like back to the 1960s.

That's what I think. I'm not in his brain cell. I might have a dinner with him at Mar-a-Lago. Although, the people that are kind of close, there are people that talk to him all the time in the news business. You don't get the impression that they have a good sort of read on him either. You notice that? Trump is a little bit of a cipher even to people who know him. He does a lot of listening to people. He doesn't quite

you know he'll he'll spout off every now and then but he doesn't like betray what's really going on back there so i mean

That's the best I could do. I could only do what I would what people tell me. I could tell you what people tell me. Pretty informed people, people pick up the phone. I mean, listen, he does want certain things. I know he wants banks to lend money to small businesses. He thinks Jamie Dimon and all these big banks, they they've been wasting. They've basically become more worried, more about what's going on in Asia than what's in mainstream America. They don't do enough small business lending. I mean, I know that.

now is that ideological or not i don't know but he does believe that the america that that we're that the business leaders of this country have been focused so much on global affairs and not enough on the us they are regulated entities that he wants to change that i mean you could say okay that's not capitalism well no offense but banking is not capitalism right

Jamie Dimon is too big to fail. You know, so I was banking. It's not capitalism. You're saying it's not. It's not. It's too big to fail. I mean, if it was capitalism, that a lot of them be out of business by now. Jamie Dimon might have been the last one standing, but maybe not. If you have no Fed backup. I mean, who knows? Right. I'm just telling you that meaning JP Morgan. I covered it. This was all those banks would have been out of business except for maybe him.

And even that, if you have that much of a downdraft, you know, he had stuff on his books too. Trust me, before they sort of rewrote the mark-to-market rules, that could have been problematic from a solvency standpoint. So remember, if these banks were not, these banks are all too big to fail. They are regulated entities. They got to do stuff that the federal government wants them to do to a certain extent.

for that privilege, right? This is not the flower shop guy. You know what I mean? So there is a degree that the Trump administration believes these are institutions that are global and they care more about the globe than the US of A. And they want to change that. And I do think the tariff stuff is part of a broader scheme in that direction. Charlie, thank you for that. What are you thinking about

If there are deals and other countries lower their tariffs, will that be enough? Because Vietnam, I think they said we can lower our tariffs to zero. I believe the Trump administration said that's not good enough. Why? Their actual tariff rate, I'm looking at according to the World Trade Organization, is 5%. According to the World Trade Organization, China, their trade weighted is 3%. If you measure it a different way, it could be a little bit higher. But this mean that...

the rest of the world tariffs the United States at 40% and the US tariffs them at 2.5%. I don't believe it's true. I think that's why the Trump administration has really stressed non-tariff barriers and non-monetary measures. So

Is it the case that if countries that have 5% tariffs on the United States that President Trump accuses them of cheating on trade and they say we'll lower it to zero, will that be enough for the Trump administration? Or is he going to seek these non-tariff measures, which can be kind of varied? And so much so that when President Trump said, this is what other countries tariff us in that equation, as you know, and if you don't, please disagree with me, correct me. That is...

just the level of the trade deficit that the US has with other countries divided by the total trade balance. And then if it's, of course, if it's a surplus country, then it's just 10% at the minimum. But talk about that tension between non-tariff measures. It's not the case that the rest of the world has 30% tariffs on us and boom, they'll drop it to 5% or 0% and then we have a deal. It's a lot of other stuff. Right.

Yeah, I mean, listen, there was an interesting, I mentioned Tucker Carlson again. I listened to his podcast. He had Bob Lighthizer on. I listened to that too, yeah. Oh, you listened to that. So the real sort of weapon that our trading partners, they're not really partners, use against us are these non-tariff barriers, these value, what do they call them, value-added taxes and VATs and all this stuff, VATs, value-added tax, and a lot more.

And that's really where they put us at a huge disadvantage. And yeah, I mean, they're looking at this holistically, like everything they do. You know, if, you know, you know, Vietnam might have, you know, zero percent tariffs. But if they're squeezing us on value added taxes and this and that, what's the difference? Right. It's not a tariff. It's something else. It's a tax tariff or taxes. I mean, it's the same thing.

So they're looking at this broadly. And so that's where this gets interesting. You know, the real question for me is what do they consider fair? And we don't have a good reading on that right now, because if you know what they consider fair, then you can seek sort of the end of the tunnel. Right.

EU takes down its tariffs to zero. Maybe they want to do that because they get all, you know, the way they favor their in-house product is through VAT. I don't know. You know, I don't have that level of grant. We've not, it's actually something I'm going to start reporting on now. But you see what I'm saying? I mean, the way Kaiser made the point,

In in in the Tucker interview that that's where they get and that that's where they get a lot of their that they put us at a huge disadvantage. But our weapon against that would be the tariff, not to just value and attacks. That would be the tariff.

He believed that that's a stronger way to essentially get them to to sort of reverse themselves on the bats and and the other various non-tariff barriers that they have. And, you know, maybe it is. I don't know. We'll see in the next few days. But I think one thing that is not really been explained is what is fair trade.

Yes. You know, and I think that's added to a lot of the sort of market turbulence right now. Now you hear deals coming, but maybe it's not because they do this. And, you know, I mean, it's it's listen, if you know, you could make a really good case that he probably should have done.

And this is me speaking, you know, but a lot of people, smart people I know in the markets should have done deregulation, doge, tax cuts, and then went into this thing in a little more systemic way. Right. Maybe deal with the EU at first in China, deal with China first, then the EU, whatever. I mean, it start cutting deals that way one by one.

But he didn't do that because that's him. And by the way, he's the one who got elected on this, not me. Right. And there is a timing issue because if there are high tariffs and we're going to build in America, that takes time. From critics, it could take three, four, even five years. President Trump has said two years. But the tariffs...

Those are going to impact corporate earnings in literally seven hours. And then you'll probably consumer prices in weeks and maybe months after that. So there is a little bit of a timing thing there. And what if, Charlie, the reason that Vietnam has a trade surplus is because it has so much lower wages? And are we really... Are Americans...

Are wages going to be high enough from in a sneaker factory that that can be a viable economic model? Yeah, I mean, I'm sure we have a trade deficit with Ethiopia, right? They produce good coffee and we buy their coffee. All right. That doesn't mean that they're killing us. Right. And I think somehow I believe that Scott Besson has to know that these sort of nuances, they're not it's not rocket science. You know what I mean?

But, you know, they but, you know, trade is complex. And, you know, a lot of people say the Chinese build their plants to get around some stuff, build them in Vietnam. That's why we're we're so so onerous on Vietnam. So I've heard that argument as well. I would just say that we have to see what the negotiations are like and, you know, what is a fair deal?

And until we see that, it's just going to be much more volatile. I do think, though, if he's in a deal-making mode, we kind of come out of this kind of fast. I do believe that. I mean, it's set up that way. You could see it just the day there was a pause. I mean, the minute there was a pause, it was a 2,000-point rally in the markets. I mean, it's just waiting because we do have—

deregulation coming, tax cuts. We have an AI revolution, which is going to just reorder productivity in major ways, already has. I mean, there's a lot good with this economy. Do we have problems with working class people not keeping up? Is the gap between the rich and the poor increasing?

going to grow? Yes. I mean, there are working class people getting screwed. Did they get screwed in the last four years? Absolutely. The worst thing that could have happened to them was the Biden administration spending a ton of money, essentially propping up juicing markets and causing inflation. And, you know, not just inflated markets,

inflated asset prices on financial assets which helped rich people speculate around the regular inflation which is what killed them that's on food and things like that housing and you name it and that that is that that really did happen to working-class people and it's probably why it's not it's one of the major reasons why Kamala Harris is not president right now and Trump is

So there was a lot wrong with this economy going into this. Remember that. The other thing I would point out is that the markets were way overvalued by any traditional metric. I mean, what was the video trading at? Like 70 times earnings? I mean, this was wild stuff.

You know, as you know, the average corporate earning on an S&P 500 stock is something like 20 to 25. I mean, this was this this was pretty this was pretty bubble-licious, so to speak. So there was it was the markets tend to look for catalysts to change the herd mentality.

And trade was a good catalyst to do it. And by the way, I'm not saying it's a wrong catalyst. I'm just saying there is going to be a recalibration if there is these trade sanctions on corporate earnings. It's going to impact. Now, there's going to be another impact if you do deals. And that has yet to be inputted into the models. And earlier, you talked about the working class. And, you know, as everyone knows, in the election, the

Trump had victories in demographics in the working class that he didn't have last time. And many Republicans have not had. Talk about the transformation of the Republican Party, really the Trump voting base. Are they that concerned about a stock market crash? Maybe the Republican coalition of 20 years ago might have been severely deterred by stock markets falling a lot.

But but is it different? And also talk about the tensions within the Republican Party between the people who basically have the same views that, you know, George W. Bush had about trade and and the real MAGA coalition who are the new protectionists who their views specifically on trade might look a lot more like the Democrats 20 or 30 years ago or a Bernie Sanders. Yeah, it's a great question.

So a little background on me. My dad was an iron worker and a bartender and drove a cab. I grew up in Westchester County, very middle class, 1,000-foot house. My father plugged down 20%. He bought it in 1970 for like $16,000. Saved up and put down the 20%. And, you know, it's a house we lived in until Billy got sick and died, and we moved that into an apartment. But...

I come from this blue collar background. Traditionally, Democrats, my dad was a Reagan Democrat, so to speak. And that Reagan Democrat sort of lineage is kind of what propelled the MAGA movement. It was often shunned by party elites over the years. And I'm someone who grew up reading William F. Buckley, just so you know. I know a lot about the conservative movement.

I've studied it, I've reported on it, and I've been involved in it, so to speak, knowing exactly where this has gone. And the conservative movement, as envisioned by people like Buckley and Ronald Reagan as well, was a sort of big tent where there was something known as movement conservatism that was one part of the tent. Those are the real ideologues who kind of believed in free trade and low taxes and

um there were the reagan democrats there were less animated by that but more on cultural issues you know my old man saw you burning a flag god for god god help um and then there were these the um

the neocons who were sort of obsessed with globalism and global matters and expanding America's might overseas and foreign wars to project our might overseas to establish a new world order, as H.W. Bush put it. That coalition began to crack, I think, during the Obama years in particular. I mean, it just was not workable.

It just it's just it just it basically ignored the fact that that sort of vast changes that, quote unquote, free trade occurs. And it wasn't really free either. It was, you know, we were essentially we were the ones being free trading with the rest of the world. That wasn't that had an impact on middle America and working class America. I remember when.

the gm plant in tarrytown um closed down and i had two friends that worked there and they wasn't too long where they were both drinking like heavily um it hurt families and so this is this was forgotten by the republican party so they ignored that wing of the party and that wing of the party voted for obama in many ways those reagan democrats a lot of them voted for obama trump came in and filled that void and um

And in doing so, you know, picked up others, you know, picked up, you know, picked up Democrats that were tired of the sort of cultural progressivism that, you know, that involves DEI and ESG and all this crazy stuff. You know, have a trans day of visibility on Easter Sunday. I mean, who would have thought about that? And on top of that, he offered an economic renaissance. Trump did. And, you know, that was able to unite Democrats.

you know, the Republican Party firmly against Kamala Harris. I still think that if it was a different candidate, the Republican candidate probably would have beat Kamala Harris by a wider margin just because Trump brought his own baggage on January 6th. But be that as may, that's the coalition. And it's kind of back to that Reagan coalition, except for the movement conservatives aren't in the driver's seat. It's the MAGA conservatives, that old Reagan Democrat that's in the driver's seat.

And, you know, that's what is animating this administration. And I don't think you could go back to the other way. You know, it's never going to happen. You know, this is what the Republican Party is. Trump is maybe an imperfect vessel on many issues because of his baggage and just the way he comports himself. But he did create this. And it's in J.D. Vance is the natural successor to it. And and pretty eloquent one, too, when you hear him speak, he's a smart guy.

So I think that's where we are right now with the Republican Party. So trade in the Republican Party isn't about like we need free trade, free trade, free markets. We need open borders. It's like free trade to them is like, OK, let's see the deal. Let's make sure we're not getting screwed because we should be caring more about us than creating wealth around the globe.

And I think that's kind of where all this globalism lost its lost a beat or two. I mean, I sat through a lot of CEO meetings with people like Jamie Dimon, Larry Fink, you name it. Or I go to Davos. I was in Davos this year. There's a lot of talk about how do we get wealth, you know, wealth around the world.

There's not a lot of talk about the small town in America that got screwed over because the factory closed over globalism. I think that Trump wants all that to change, and that's the way he's going to act on every issue. I think it's manifesting itself right now on tariffs, but it'll be throughout his presidency.

And what's your current sense of many Republicans on terms of how much they are with it? You said you said MAGA is in the driver's seat. The free trade Republicans are in retreat. What's your general voters views? Have they changed really at all over the past week? Is it too soon to tell? And also Congress?

Well, the polling shows that Trump, you know, Trump, you know, traditionally doesn't poll great. I mean, his approval ratings usually kind of lowers, but it hasn't really changed that much. I mean, it's not it's not disastrous. I saw a few polls where they were way up. I saw a couple that he was down a little bit, but I don't think he's in the doghouse, so to speak, at least not yet. Where this will become interesting for him and maybe cause him to pause or do whatever is if there are massive layoffs.

if you notice we haven't heard anything about that really no doubt that business investment has been curtailed significantly but that's that was leaving leading up to this we haven't seen you know layoffs you know if there's an inflationary spike and layoffs if there's stagflation because of this stuff which a lot of people think could really happen um that might change his dynamic his approach i should say uh and you know but we haven't seen that yet

Now, it's also too soon to see it, right? And so, Charlie, so you think Trump is looking for a deal. Any sense on what a more permanent, more lasting, lower tariff level would be? Okay, you go to 54% on China for the deal. They retaliate. You say 104%. These are super, super high numbers.

But what would you know, have you heard any any whispered numbers of what once you have a deal, what those lower tariffs are going to be? The floor for the rest of the world is looking like it's going to be 10 percent. That has been in effect for a few days now. But what about on China, on the on the EU? Any idea what that might look like? I think the EU is the 10 percent number. You know, if we get a deal. Mm hmm.

You remember, we pay a lot for them, too. They you know, we protect them, so to speak. You know, Trump looks at it like, you know, why would protect you with no money? You know, you're not paying. You've got to pay for that protection. He's also looking at it like, you know, Americans, you know, what do we get from what do we get from it from France? Good cheese. I mean, I don't know what we what we really should get. You know what I'm saying? They they they tap into our markets a lot.

we should be able to tap into their markets. So I think he's looking for that with the EU. China, you got to take off the table right now. That's a more complicated dynamic. I mean, you know, there's a lot going on there, including the fact that, you know, Trump, while he likes Xi, he obviously understands that they want to take us out as a superpower of the world.

And they have global ambitions, both economically and militarily, including Taiwan. So you remember that that whole thing is is is a much more complicated matter matter. I don't think Trump wants war with China. I know he doesn't. That's not him. That's how he operates. But.

He understands their threat. He doesn't feel that way with Russia. I mean, one of the reasons why people say he cozies up to Putin is like he's trying to, like, disrupt the order here. He's trying to show China I can be friends with them, even though they're trying to be friends with you. I have a relationship here. I mean, so there's a game of chess being played here. But I think the other nations, probably that baseline number,

and some other stuff, you know, and go from there. But China, you got to, to me, if I'm looking at this logically, China is going to be a tougher negotiation. Charlie, my final question is, what would you say to, I'm going to call the haters, the people who are strongly critical of this tariff agenda? And Charlie, I'm not talking about the folks, the political folks who are on maybe MSNBC or CNN, people who oppose the

the Trump tariffs and the Trump tariff agenda because they hate Trump. I'm talking about maybe the people on CNBC or Bloomberg who, and there are a lot of them who oppose the Trump tariff agenda because they think it's going to be a very negative outcome for the economy and for markets. What's your message to them? Well, it might be. They also could be really wrong here. It depends on what Trump comes out. Is it the negotiator in chief?

Or is it the or is it a guy that's basically had his brains replaced by Peter Navarro and really believes that this stuff is going to change America for the better? If it's a negotiator in chief, I think there's a better than even chance. We this has a good outcome on a lot of levels. I mean, I don't think we should be allowing China to run roughshod on trade while they run roughshod and trade.

around the world, including militarily. You know what I'm saying? There's just no way they should be able to do that. I also would say that people at MSNBC and CNBC represent a very globalist viewpoint. You know what I'm saying? They believe trade. I mean, they're not looking at middle America. They don't care about some factory workers. They're looking at markets. And trust me, they're all my friends. Dinner with them in the Upper East Side of New York all the time.

you'll believe how little interaction they've ever had with with a working-class guy except for maybe the cab driver that they tip or stiff on the tip you know what i'm saying i'm just i just know these people um so uh they're they're more they're very sort of i and by the way the whole if you think about it we've had a finance over the last sort of 30 years

We've literally had a financialization of our economy. Right. I mean, by the way, I'm part of that. That's not my. Yeah. But I cover. Right. Literally, our business is all about the biggest business in the world. This banking business is all about how to turn everything into a financial product alone. Right.

a fucking mortgage becomes securitized that's the only way theoretically it can be made right you go down the line everything has been financialized um there's some good out of that there's a lot bad out of it you know what trump is saying is i i want to redirect the economy to you know let's start building stuff let's not you know when we need we need those masks like we needed during coven let's not lose our minds because we can't produce them here

I think there's some of that and some of that is right. But you're never going to convince the average reporter or or or guest on NBC, MSNBC or excuse me, CNBC and Bloomberg, because they don't care about that. They care about next quarterly earnings, you know, the ability to trade around the world. They probably have businesses in China.

You know, all these banks want to do businesses in China. I mean, think about it. Of all the things, the most woke company in the world was Disney. They literally did a movie where they thanked the Chinese agency or ministry that was responsible. They made a movie about China. It was called Mulan or something like that. In the credits, they thanked the agency in China that helped persecute the Uyghur minority.

I mean, think about that. Think about where your head's at to do something like that. Your head is purely up your globalist ass. Don't care about anything else. And I'm a globalist. I'm saying that. But we do have a country here. And I think Trump is sort of rearranging the thought process of globalism.

of everybody. So it's going to be, so if you're the typical MSNBC guest or host, it's going to be a couple of difficult couple of years here, I think.

Yeah, definite difference between MSNBC and CNBC, of course, but I think you're right. Yeah, yeah, that they have an agenda. I mean, CNBC and Bloomberg are almost solely focused on the economy and markets. Charlie, I think implicit in what you said is that tariffs will in some way be good for America in reordering global trade and promoting manufacturing and generating revenue, but that they will be bad for financial markets. So it seems like on that point that you kind of agree with the people on Bloomberg and CNBC.

Yeah, if that's what they're saying, I would say I don't like tariffs. I mean, I think nobody should have tariffs. Right. We should be dealing with each other freely. I mean, that's the perfect world. Right. You know, I think now they're a tool. And if Trump uses them as a tool, it would be great, by the way.

i the speak speaking about globalists muhammad el arian said the same thing i was on i was on fox news yesterday with martha mccallan and he came before me so i listened to him i heard everything he said it's basically what i'm saying if this is a negotiating tool it could be great larry fink told me exactly that a black rock talk about a globalist tell me exactly that this could be really great if there's an if it's a negotiating tool and i think i see signs that it is

All right. But I could be wrong, so don't hold me to it. All right, so you expect to see deals. You expect further negotiations. But of course, you know, who knows? Who knows? With Donald Trump, who knows? Who knows? It's writ large.

Charlie, thanks so much for joining Monetary Matters. People can find you on Twitter at C Gasparino. You were the author of Go Woke, Go Broke, the inside story of the radicalization of corporate America. So folks, check that out. Thanks again. And thanks, everyone, for listening. My pleasure. Had a great time. Thank you. Thank you. Just close the door.