China will make a deal with the United States "because they're going to have to" if they do not want to have to face the costs tariffs bring, President Donald Trump said Monday.
"Right now, China is getting absolutely decimated by companies that are leaving China, going to other countries, including our own, because they don't want to pay the tariffs," Trump told CNBC's "Squawk Box," after he called the network to respond to comments made in an interview by U.S. Chamber of Commerce Executive Vice President and head of international affairs Myron Brilliant.
The chamber official earlier on the program slammed the president's use of tariffs, saying Trump's "weaponization of tariffs" and the threats on the nation's economy and farmers will hurt the country and create "uncertainty with our trading partners."
"Well, I guess he's not so brilliant," Trump told CNBC. "Look, without tariffs, we would be captive to every country, and we have been for many years. That's why we have an $800 billion trading deficit for years. We lose a fortune with virtually every country. They take advantage of us in every way possible."
He accused the U.S. Chamber of being "right there with them" and said he will "maybe have to rethink" his own membership.
"The Chamber is probably more for the companies and the people that are members than they are for our country, because without tariffs, we would be absolutely, outside of something that I won't even mention, we would be absolutely in a competitive disadvantage, the likes of which you've never seen now."
Tariffs, he added, "are a beautiful thing when you're the piggy bank, when you have all the money. Everyone's trying to get our money."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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