President Donald Trump overruled a pair of his top economic advisers in deciding to move ahead with his tariff threat against Mexico over immigration. And as he faced a stock market slide and opprobrium from key Republican senators on Friday, the President held firm, tweeting:
Lighthizer, who has been working to build support for the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement in Congress, warned Trump the move would hamper ratification of the trade deal, while Mnuchin warned Trump the move would roil the stock market, multiple sources told CNN. And when the announcement came down Thursday, Vice President Mike Pence was on Air Force Two, returning from a trip to Canada to assure the prime minister the administration was all-in on the trade deal.
Among the sticking points on the new Mexico tariffs was the when they should be imposed, according to a senior White House official.
Some White House officials wanted the deadline to be more imminent, while others argued Mexico should be given more time to stem the flow of undocumented immigrants.
Ultimately, the June 10 date was settled on.
The deliberations pitted Lighthizer and Mnuchin against a trio of influential presidential advisers: senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, trade adviser Peter Navarro and acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, who all supported Trump’s tariff gambit, the sources said.
In a CNBC interview Friday morning, Navarro — who told Trump the move would get Mexico’s attention — hailed the tariffs as « brilliant » while a graphic showed the stock market falling.
But the rebuke from key lawmakers in the President’s own party made clear that concerns about the fate of the USMCA in the wake of Trump’s move were not unfounded.
In a blistering statement, Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, the chairman of the Senate Finance committee, called Trump’s move a « misuse of presidential tariff authority » and warned that following through « would seriously jeopardize passage of USMCA. »
The concerns were echoed inside the White House.
