Amid his escalating tariffs and a potential trade war, President Donald Trump is "going to know when to sit down," according to former Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn.
"I keep hoping the president is not going to let this grow into a trade war, because that could really hurt us and the Chinese and he's going to know when to sit and negotiate," Lieberman told "The Cats Roundtable" on 970 AM-N.Y. "In the end, I think, we're going to get a better deal with both Europe and China than we have now.
"He's negotiating. It sets us off. It's unconventional – it looks like it could develop into a trade war that would be terrible for us and them and the rest of the world – but I think he's going to know when to sit down. That'll be a good result."
Lieberman, who considers himself an Independent after being elected as a Democrat, rejected the polarization and "tribal" politics.
"Our politics have been in turmoil for too many years now," he told host John Catsimatidis. "It's gotten increasingly partisan. People treat their political party like it was a tribe. They have to be loyal to it. They decide what to believe about issues based on the tribe they belong to rather than what they think about the issue . . . And the result is very little is getting done in Washington.
"This is part of why Donald Trump was elected president."
The radicalization of the anti-Trump left has an Independent like Lieberman "upset," he said.
"Democrats are in a real battle, which is mostly taking the party to the left, that upsets people like me," he added. "We're in a very unsettled moment in American politics."
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