The Great America Show - The Great America Saturday Show： April 12, 2025

00:00:00.000 Hello, everybody, and welcome to The Great America Show.

00:00:04.960 It's great to have you with us today.

00:00:06.420 In just a few moments, we're going to be joined by the Executive Director for the Committee

00:00:10.060 to Unleash Prosperity, Tim Descher, to get his insights on what exactly is going on in

00:00:15.320 these markets, what's going on with inflation, what's going on with trade and tariffs and

00:00:19.440 everything in this country.

00:00:21.040 But today, we had a breakthrough.

00:00:22.620 For the last two days, if you guys have been following this market, the markets have been

00:00:26.580 up a little bit on the upside, a big fire sale happening last week.

00:00:31.480 The Marxist Dems were cheering.

00:00:33.420 They were so excited.

00:00:34.760 They thought they finally got Donald Trump.

00:00:37.020 Ten years they've been going after this man, indictment after indictment, impeachment after

00:00:41.300 impeachment, and they finally thought they got him.

00:00:43.820 They thought they got him to crash the economy.

00:00:45.840 Now, we're not out of the woods yet by any stretch of the imagination, but if you're listening

00:00:50.580 to guys like Jamie Dimon, who run J.P.

00:00:53.200 Morgan or some of these big-wig economists or big-wig politicians, they'll tell you that

00:00:58.200 we're doomed.

00:00:59.340 We're heading for trouble.

00:01:00.540 We're heading for trouble.

00:01:01.780 Donald Trump today making a massive deal, lifting the tariffs off of the countries who

00:01:08.320 agreed that they're not going to retaliate against the United States at this time.

00:01:12.260 He left the 10% baseline tariff in effect, but he pulled off any additional tariffs that

00:01:18.040 would go into any other nation as long as they agreed they wouldn't retaliate against

00:01:21.780 America.

00:01:22.100 Now, one of them decided to be a tough guy, and it's none other than Xi Jinping in the

00:01:26.920 CCP.

00:01:27.800 They decided they're going to come after America with extremely high retaliatory tariffs.

00:01:31.720 Donald Trump said, no problem.

00:01:33.740 Now, they have over 100% tariff on them.

00:01:36.080 Now, it's going to be very hard for them to sustain that.

00:01:39.240 It's an economy in deep, deep trouble to begin with in China.

00:01:43.300 That's a whole different episode.

00:01:44.540 We'll talk about that.

00:01:45.780 We can spend hours talking about that.

00:01:47.360 But Xi Jinping's in a lot of trouble, and he's losing the confidence of his country.

00:01:50.660 Donald Trump had some wise words from the Oval Office today about how we got into this

00:01:55.320 situation in recent times.

00:01:58.180 Take a listen.

00:01:58.800 I blame the people sitting right at this desk, right behind this desk or another desk.

00:02:03.240 You get your choice of seven.

00:02:05.640 I happen to pick the resolute. 1.00

00:02:07.980 But I blame the people sitting behind in this chair, behind this desk, for being stupid, 1.00

00:02:13.560 incompetent, or not having courage. 1.00

00:02:15.040 This should have been done years ago.

00:02:17.120 This should have been done before Obama, in all fairness.

00:02:21.340 Not only Biden, Obama.

00:02:23.600 This should have been done many years ago.

00:02:25.080 This started with the World Trade Organization, which was owned by China.

00:02:30.740 It was owned and paid for by China.

00:02:33.520 They didn't even have to do things.

00:02:34.800 They considered them a nation that was undeveloped.

00:02:39.840 They said they were a developing nation.

00:02:41.900 Well, we're a developing nation, too, if you think about it.

00:02:44.120 Look at our inner cities.

00:02:45.200 Look at what's happened.

00:02:46.660 I think we're starting from ground zero there, right?

00:02:49.720 So we're a developing nation, too.

00:02:51.880 Now, I don't...

00:02:52.800 I know it's a lot of people take heat for saying it, but I blame the people sitting at

00:02:59.160 this desk more than I blame China.

00:03:01.140 If China can get away what they got away with, with taking hundreds of billions and trillions 1.00

00:03:06.340 of dollars right out of our pocket because our people here were stupid, they were stupid 1.00

00:03:11.420 people. 1.00

00:03:12.320 Maybe corrupt.

00:03:13.220 I don't know. 1.00

00:03:13.740 I don't know how you can be that stupid. 1.00

00:03:15.340 How do you get to be president and you're stupid? 1.00

00:03:17.820 But they certainly weren't courageous. 1.00

00:03:20.260 And they allowed this to happen.

00:03:21.520 And with Japan and with many other countries that took advantage of us.

00:03:25.720 We had deficits with almost every country.

00:03:29.960 I used to read these things.

00:03:31.160 The first term, I'd read them.

00:03:32.140 I'd actually read the agreements and say, how could anybody agree to this stuff?

00:03:37.200 So certainly they were rough and they were tough and they were smart.

00:03:43.320 And you can blame them, but I really blamed the people that allowed them to do it.

00:03:47.420 Because, you know, if you could read first grade and you could read these agreements,

00:03:51.900 you'd say, these are terrible deals.

00:03:55.040 I actually used to say, who would allow deals like this to be made for our country?

00:03:59.560 Now, that's Donald Trump today in the Oval Office.

00:04:03.760 I want to take a trip down memory lane.

00:04:06.900 1980s.

00:04:07.380 Donald Trump had a very similar take on the very same situation we're in.

00:04:12.260 Now, you figure I'm not going to do math in public, but 1985 is a few years ago.

00:04:17.420 And Donald Trump almost like predicting this was going to happen.

00:04:19.800 Take a listen to Mr. President Trump in 1985, then just regular Donald Trump.

00:04:24.540 I couldn't believe this last auto deal is an example.

00:04:27.020 Here we are.

00:04:27.520 We're sitting there.

00:04:28.900 It's restricted in Japan.

00:04:30.340 Everything's restricted, restricted, restricted.

00:04:32.480 We're sitting.

00:04:33.020 They can't come in.

00:04:34.020 And all of a sudden, this country falls.

00:04:36.020 We do the old fold now.

00:04:37.200 I've never seen it.

00:04:37.800 That is the way the press reported it.

00:04:39.280 The press reported it that we had a deal.

00:04:42.580 And then all of a sudden it turned out that the deal turned out that it was not a good deal for us.

00:04:46.620 And we had all the cards.

00:04:47.640 I mean, it's not like we didn't have the cards.

00:04:49.500 It's like, keep your cars out of here until you open up.

00:04:52.000 That's all.

00:04:52.820 Keep your cars out.

00:04:54.140 And then the first hour was like, oh, we made this wonderful deal.

00:04:57.740 After about 15 seconds after that, people realized we got duped.

00:05:01.500 I just don't understand it.

00:05:03.240 What's wrong with us?

00:05:03.920 I mean, I guess they said, well, this would hurt American car dealers.

00:05:07.060 You know, what's wrong with us?

00:05:08.440 I don't know.

00:05:09.000 They're afraid politically to make a little bit of a tough stand.

00:05:11.660 That wasn't even a tough one.

00:05:12.660 That was a no-brainer.

00:05:13.400 You would have had the Japanese cars out for 19 and a half seconds, and you would have won every single point. 1.00

00:05:19.760 It's the most incredible failure in negotiation that I've seen.

00:05:23.660 But it happens all the time.

00:05:24.860 I just don't understand it.

00:05:25.800 So I would take a much harder stand.

00:05:27.980 I'd take a much more difficult stand, I would say.

00:05:30.980 Make a couple of enemies.

00:05:32.300 I think I'd make a lot of friends, ultimately.

00:05:34.120 If the United States government took a firmer stand with foreign countries, would we be better off, or are we so much now a part of the community of nations that we can't really afford to offend anybody?

00:05:45.880 I think we'd be better off, and I think we'd be far more respected.

00:05:48.160 I think the Japanese would respect us far more than they do. 1.00

00:05:50.580 I don't think they have any respect for us, and they shouldn't have any respect for us, because we are idiots when it comes to what's happening. 1.00

00:05:57.060 I mean, look at dealing with Japan. 1.00

00:05:58.980 I mean, just take a look at what's going on.

00:06:01.000 I mean, they make hundreds of billions of dollars a year, and we lose money in deficits, and nothing happens.

00:06:07.240 And they say, no, the Japanese are learning, and they're starting to open up.

00:06:10.260 In the meantime, every second goes by, we're losing.

00:06:12.880 I just think that people would have far greater respect for this country if we took a much tougher stand. 0.98

00:06:18.660 It's really quite pathetic. 0.78

00:06:20.860 So most politicians, you can get a video of them saying one thing and being on one side of the issue, 0.95

00:06:25.540 and then years later, you get them being on the other side of the issue, and it's why politicians are always right.

00:06:30.020 It's like weathermen, right?

00:06:31.500 They're either going to be right 50% of the time or wrong 50% of the time.

00:06:34.700 It's a pretty easy job, right?

00:06:36.020 You get paid to be wrong.

00:06:37.520 But Donald Trump has kept his stance pretty consistent on these whole issues.

00:06:40.980 Now, those of you who aren't tracking your 401ks or IRAs or anything like that have tuned them out for the last few days like myself.

00:06:48.040 The Dow rallied about 3,000 points today.

00:06:50.760 The S&P rallied about 500 points, and the NASDAQ rallied about 1,900 points.

00:06:56.000 The S&P had one of its best days since just past World War II, a 9.5% day for the S&P.

00:07:04.240 So like I said, we're not out of the woods yet.

00:07:06.020 I don't think by any stretch of the imagination there's a 90-day pause on those tariffs, those retaliatory tariffs,

00:07:11.460 for those nations who have taken advantage of America.

00:07:14.260 But Donald Trump giving them some time to get their act together and figure it out.

00:07:18.480 At least now they know that he's not playing games.

00:07:21.800 The masks are off.

00:07:23.120 The gloves are off.

00:07:24.000 You're not going to take advantage of America much longer.

00:07:28.140 I spoke with Jerry Stortz, the former CEO of Toys R Us, last week.

00:07:31.860 And for those of you who joined us, you had heard him say, everyone thinks America's rich.

00:07:36.520 We're not rich.

00:07:37.340 We're very poor.

00:07:38.280 In fact, if you look at the debt-to-income ratio this country has, we have growing debt like it's nobody's business.

00:07:44.300 And nobody's ever seemed to want to take care of it.

00:07:46.600 Nobody's ever wanted to seem to take care of the deficit.

00:07:49.780 Nobody's ever wanted to look at the fact that America, the number one GDP nation, the most powerful nation in this world, on this planet, is a deficit nation.

00:08:01.980 I mean, we import more than we export.

00:08:03.960 How is that even possible?

00:08:05.960 How do we get to this situation?

00:08:07.920 Who is responsible for selling America? 0.79

00:08:09.980 I want to bring in our guest today.

00:08:11.840 He's the executive director for the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, Tim Desher.

00:08:16.680 Tim, thanks so much for joining us today.

00:08:18.680 I appreciate it.

00:08:19.960 Hey, John.

00:08:20.660 Thanks for having me.

00:08:21.620 How do we get to this situation, Tim?

00:08:23.440 Well, it's funny because when I first came to Washington, D.C., you know, about however long ago, every time you talk about China or decoupling from China or anything like that, it was the, oh, well, we can't do that.

00:08:41.620 No.

00:08:42.220 Oh, God.

00:08:42.680 Well, we can't do that.

00:08:43.340 Do you want your prices at Walmart to go up?

00:08:46.080 Do you want that to happen?

00:08:47.280 And do you want the consequences in the midterm elections to happen where the prices go, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah?

00:08:53.440 And all of a sudden, this guy comes down an escalator in Trump Tower in 2015.

00:08:58.900 And 10 years later, this is the talking point that everybody is parroting decouple from China.

00:09:06.920 We have to watch China, China, China, China, China, China.

00:09:10.100 The president has completely, and citizen, completely changed the dialogue and discussion in this country to where we are now talking about going up against the world going up against China.

00:09:22.440 The world decoupling from China, not just the U.S., but the world as we saw today when Trump laid down the gauntlet and said, all right, if you don't retaliate against us, we're dropping the tariffs except on China. 0.65

00:09:37.460 So you're with us or you're against us.

00:09:39.660 And that is the message that he has said.

00:09:42.160 And I believe that most of D.C. in a matter of 10 years has completely changed their tune.

00:09:47.280 What an amazing turnaround, John.

00:09:50.300 Yeah.

00:09:50.780 It was almost like it was a test, Tim.

00:09:52.560 He put these tariffs on.

00:09:54.200 I guess they really started to hit last Thursday-ish.

00:09:57.380 So it's been about a week, just under a week.

00:10:00.080 And he puts them on, and he tested the waters a little bit.

00:10:03.360 Mexico came back and said, we're not going to do anything.

00:10:06.920 So-and-so came back and said, Australia came back and said, you know, we're not going to do anything.

00:10:10.800 Cambodia came back and said, please.

00:10:13.380 And then now, just a week later, Tim, he looks at it and he says, all right, well, I've got, you know, my experiment here.

00:10:19.700 They said they're coming for me.

00:10:21.320 Canada said they're coming for it.

00:10:22.440 The European Union says they've approved.

00:10:24.460 So-and-so says they've approved it.

00:10:25.800 Are you getting the same interpretation as me?

00:10:28.360 He was just feeling out the waters to see who's really serious about making change and who's serious about stealing, screwing America.

00:10:36.200 Well, look, Trump has made some bad business deals in his life.

00:10:39.020 There's no question about it.

00:10:40.500 We all have.

00:10:41.420 However, let me finish with that.

00:10:43.980 However, he's probably made, you know, a thousand times more business deals than the average leader around the world.

00:10:52.100 So what Trump, I believe, has done is he has made the art of the deal with the entire world.

00:10:58.840 He has called bluffs.

00:11:00.220 He has made his case saying, you've taken advantage of the previous leaders, of the leaders that came before me, and they let you get away with it.

00:11:10.080 But it's not happening anymore.

00:11:11.880 And so these tariffs are coming.

00:11:13.260 And next thing you know, you hear reports of 50 countries, 70 countries, however many countries saying, let's make a deal.

00:11:18.900 Let's make a deal.

00:11:19.600 And you know what?

00:11:21.120 This is exactly what we, me, as a free trader, by the way, I am a free trader.

00:11:25.700 I don't think tariffs are a good thing long term.

00:11:28.080 I think they are anti-growth.

00:11:29.400 I think they're a tax on the American people, 100%.

00:11:32.380 But tariffs were never the end game, I don't believe.

00:11:35.180 I don't believe for Trump.

00:11:36.540 Maybe for some of his advisors they are, but not for him.

00:11:39.260 He wants a deal and he wants growth.

00:11:41.140 And we're seeing that right now potentially happen.

00:11:44.320 My favorite thing, Tim, is when you hear people talk about Donald Trump's fails.

00:11:47.500 And this is not for you, but they talk about his failed business ventures.

00:11:51.860 They'll always mention his casino in Atlantic City.

00:11:54.460 For anyone from the Northeast who's been to Atlantic City, it's very hard to run a business there.

00:11:59.560 Donald Trump was probably one of the few people who made it out alive.

00:12:02.680 And by alive, I mean you take a loss on your tax statement.

00:12:05.300 And this is not a Donald Trump thing.

00:12:06.860 This is a U.S. tax code thing.

00:12:08.740 You take a loss on your taxes, you lose a few hundred million dollars, and you can write it off for the next 20 years.

00:12:13.200 Because he's probably one of the only people who's ever used that to his advantage because going to Atlantic City, which I spent a decent amount of time there.

00:12:20.600 I'm sorry.

00:12:21.760 I'm just kidding.

00:12:22.600 I'm kidding.

00:12:23.260 No, it's not a nice place by any stretch of the imagination.

00:12:26.940 But he's got like a 95% retention rate with his businesses.

00:12:30.680 And they'll talk about Atlantic City or Trump University.

00:12:33.640 Oh, well, why don't you talk about the other businesses?

00:12:35.440 Well, his dad gave him $4 million.

00:12:36.820 Yeah, but he turned it to $4 billion.

00:12:38.400 If your dad gave you $1,000 and you turned it to $10,000, I mean, like, it's hysterical.

00:12:41.800 Imagine how much you miss if you're afraid to lose.

00:12:46.080 And that is really the end goal here with the establishment here in Washington, D.C.

00:12:51.940 Well, you can't do that.

00:12:53.120 There's an order.

00:12:53.900 There's a global order.

00:12:55.060 Like I was saying, the people that would tell me, even at the Heritage Foundation, 10 years ago when I started working there, that was the narrative.

00:13:02.700 Now they are 100% on page with what President Trump is saying because it's the truth.

00:13:08.880 And it was a hard truth to tell.

00:13:10.920 And you take a risk.

00:13:12.180 And like you said, we are not out of the woods yet.

00:13:14.240 We've got to make these deals now.

00:13:15.880 We've got to cut the taxes now.

00:13:17.860 We've got to extend the Trump tax cuts.

00:13:19.820 We've got to continue with Doge.

00:13:21.140 We've got to codify Doge.

00:13:22.600 Make it the law.

00:13:23.960 We've got to stop spending as much.

00:13:25.460 Or else, as you know, we can't keep selling our debt.

00:13:29.360 We can't keep doing that.

00:13:30.960 It is a bad move.

00:13:32.260 So we actually have to go to work now.

00:13:34.560 But you cannot replace that actually trying and making sometimes it is the right thing to do in spite of the risk.

00:13:42.920 Yeah.

00:13:43.300 We're talking with Tim Desher.

00:13:44.480 He's the executive director for the Committee to Unleash Prosperity.

00:13:47.640 We return.

00:13:48.420 We're going to take a quick break here.

00:13:49.480 When we return, I want to take up what it's going to look like post-tariffs.

00:13:53.280 You had mentioned you're a free trader.

00:13:54.540 I'm a fair trader, so we're going to have a little debate when we come back here and see who wins.

00:13:58.940 Folks, stay with us. 0.87

00:13:59.660 We're coming right back with Tim Desher for the Committee to Unleash Prosperity.

00:14:03.760 Stay with us.

00:14:10.140 Folks, we're back with Tim Desher.

00:14:11.520 He's the executive director for the Committee to Unleash Prosperity.

00:14:14.360 Our good friend Steve Moore, Art Laffer, those good fellows over there, doing great work.

00:14:19.760 Tim, what does it look like post-tariff world now?

00:14:23.140 We've got a 90-day pause.

00:14:25.560 Are we going to see anything happen over these next 90 days?

00:14:28.200 Or is it just going to be another waste of time?

00:14:29.960 Or revisit this situation?

00:14:31.880 The markets take a tank.

00:14:33.340 We have no deal.

00:14:34.160 Tariffs back on.

00:14:35.080 Tariffs back off. 0.97

00:14:36.240 What's your opinion on what we see now in the next coming three months?

00:14:39.660 Well, there's a couple things that absolutely have to happen, and we hope it happens by no later than Memorial Day.

00:14:46.540 And that is, if they do not extend the Trump tax cuts from 2017, the average American is going to pay $3,000 more in taxes.

00:14:57.580 Absolutely.

00:14:58.480 So we can talk about what are the tariffs going to do if they stay on long term.

00:15:02.760 You and I can debate that.

00:15:04.060 We can say, oh, well, businesses are going to come back.

00:15:06.700 Well, here's what isn't going to happen.

00:15:09.520 We have had a corporate tax rate at 21% that has brought back a ton of business.

00:15:15.800 We cut the rate in 2017 from $35 to $21, and we had a trillion dollars move back in investment from that move.

00:15:26.140 All right, $0 has moved out of America since it came back because of the great business atmosphere that Trump created in 2017.

00:15:35.660 Imagine if we cut that, any revenue that we generate from tariffs, we use that to cut the corporate rate down to 15%.

00:15:43.500 Imagine what that's going to do to jumpstart businesses, even more businesses, moving back into America. 0.99

00:15:49.680 So a long way of saying is, post-tariff, post this deal, 90 days, we've got to get that tax cut extended.

00:15:57.500 We've got to cut the tax rate, and we've got to codify Doge and make sure that we're not only cutting taxes, but we're cutting spending and waste, fraud, and abuse in this government.

00:16:06.880 Before we get into free versus fair trade, I want to go a little bit further into something you mentioned, long-term tariffs.

00:16:12.060 In my opinion, I don't think that's something we have to worry about because the way that Donald Trump is using these tariffs, in my opinion, and by all indicators, it's to get an end result.

00:16:24.880 It's not to cripple these nations.

00:16:26.660 Maybe it is for China. 0.99

00:16:27.680 I'm not sure.

00:16:29.220 China deserves a lot of payback for everything they've done to this world, this country, a million people dead during COVID, millions globally. 1.00

00:16:35.420 That's a whole different story, but they need to pay the price for that, in my opinion.

00:16:38.840 They should have never gotten away with that.

00:16:40.880 That's one thing.

00:16:41.600 So the way I see him using these tariffs, Tim, is to level the playing field, and it's not – you mentioned long-term tariffs.

00:16:48.560 I don't think there is a long-term tariff play.

00:16:50.380 Now, there are tariffs that are long-term that are currently still on China from its first administration, but they're by no means 125% tariffs.

00:16:58.900 They're to level the playing field.

00:17:01.580 Are you of the same opinion as me that this is not simply to ruin countries, to ruin relationships?

00:17:08.300 It's to simply level the playing field short-term for a long-term deal.

00:17:12.960 Yeah.

00:17:13.480 You and I are in agreement there.

00:17:14.660 I think that that's been well stated by Trump saying that this is – we've got to go from them being up here, us being down here, to here.

00:17:25.680 Notice how it wasn't we want to be up here.

00:17:28.240 It's we want to be both down here.

00:17:31.060 That's reciprocal low or no tariff.

00:17:34.500 That's fair and free trade.

00:17:36.720 Those are the two things that we need.

00:17:38.280 We need fair and free trade.

00:17:40.260 We cannot forget the free trade part of it, though, because we want to continue to do business.

00:17:45.380 We talk about trade deficits all the time, and I know that's probably a buzzword here, but the trade deficit is what makes the dollar so strong around the entire world.

00:17:54.280 People are buying our products or they're paying us in dollars.

00:17:59.220 That is a huge deal.

00:18:00.500 They're buying dollars.

00:18:01.240 They're paying dollars.

00:18:01.980 All this stuff because we have products that – they have products that we want.

00:18:07.720 And so they're accepting dollars, and that means that keeps us at an advantage.

00:18:13.800 It keeps us – it's actually helped, in some ways, funder out-of-control spending, keeping the dollar strong, which is bad.

00:18:21.420 But it's also good because we can afford to have some wiggle room in the world.

00:18:26.180 So there are some positive signs to what you call the trade imbalance, trade deficits.

00:18:35.140 But, like you said, leveling that playing field with tariffs, which are a tax – which are a tax.

00:18:40.700 We have to agree on that.

00:18:42.160 They are a tax.

00:18:43.160 They do make things more expensive.

00:18:45.280 You can argue whether the countries will take the hit or not, but in general, they will make prices go higher.

00:18:51.500 No question about it.

00:18:52.920 It's just a matter of how long that is and what we do domestically here to attract businesses into this country to start manufacturing here.

00:19:01.900 Yeah, and I agree with you, but there's a line between – I mean, depending on what the product is, invoice, MSRP, suggested retail price or whatever.

00:19:11.200 And they're built in margins of profits along the way, whether it be from factory to retail.

00:19:19.320 Well, to suggest – and I'm not saying you're suggesting this, but some people have suggested if there's a 25% tax levied on something, it's going to cost the consumer 25% more.

00:19:29.240 That's nonsense.

00:19:29.960 It's not possible that you're going to be charging someone – I'll take, for example, cigars.

00:19:35.780 I smoke a lot of cigars.

00:19:36.900 It's probably why I'm sick as a dog right now.

00:19:38.480 I see today that they're putting a 10% tariff on cigars from Dominican Republic, 18% tariff on cigars from Nicaragua.

00:19:46.720 The average stick is not going to go up 18% to 10%.

00:19:49.220 It'll be built in along the way.

00:19:50.740 So will a cigar go up a dollar over the course of whatever six-month period, a $10 cigar go up a dollar, maybe, possibly, maybe 50 cents?

00:19:58.100 We saw in 2018 President Trump put tariffs and it made the prices of washer machines and dryers go up.

00:20:04.420 Nobody's sitting there complaining about it.

00:20:05.980 The things that the tariffs are going to hit long run, what they look like right now, is cars, luxury vehicles.

00:20:13.560 How often do you buy a car, Tim?

00:20:14.940 Now, I'm not saying it's to justify it, but how often do you buy a car?

00:20:18.880 How often are you going to buy a cell phone?

00:20:20.440 I buy a cell phone probably every five years.

00:20:22.180 I buy a car every five years.

00:20:24.740 You know, from what I see, luxury items, Porsche and Mercedes.

00:20:30.120 Mercedes said this week we're not going to let it hit the consumer because they can't.

00:20:33.700 They know that the consumers are going to sit home and not pay it.

00:20:37.220 The way I see it, most items that it's going to affect is luxury items, with the exception of things from China.

00:20:43.660 But that's for a long play.

00:20:45.340 Your thoughts?

00:20:47.160 Yeah.

00:20:47.460 And so what I'll say to this is we know we just we just did a study.

00:20:51.900 It's released on Unleashed Prosperity dot com.

00:20:53.500 You can see, look, if these tariffs stay on automobiles, you're going to pay four to five thousand more per car.

00:21:00.420 In addition, if you don't roll back the Biden regulations, the green regulations Biden have, that's an additional six to seven thousand on cars.

00:21:06.700 I'm sorry.

00:21:07.160 That's a big deal.

00:21:08.340 A lot of people buy cars.

00:21:09.400 I'm from the Motor City.

00:21:10.160 I'm from Detroit.

00:21:11.520 That is the that is the bread and butter of that city.

00:21:14.240 But it is dwindling.

00:21:15.540 It's not because it's not because of NAFTA.

00:21:17.820 It's not because of tariffs.

00:21:19.840 It's not or a lack of tariffs.

00:21:22.280 It's because Michigan has bad policy.

00:21:25.740 They have 50 percent renewable energy mandates.

00:21:28.860 They have unions that continue to to make business difficult for the auto manufacturers.

00:21:34.380 And guess what they do?

00:21:36.220 They move down to Tennessee.

00:21:37.400 They move down to South Carolina.

00:21:39.100 They move down to Louisiana.

00:21:40.500 They move down to Alabama and Mississippi.

00:21:42.440 You know why?

00:21:43.100 Because it's better to do business down there.

00:21:44.820 And so where you have Michigan going like this, you have the South rising again.

00:21:48.560 And that's only in an economic sense because they have better policy.

00:21:52.960 So it's easy to say, oh, it's because of this.

00:21:56.060 This one thing is what is hollowing out Detroit.

00:21:59.120 Well, I'm sorry.

00:22:00.220 If you're a business, you're trying to build a business in Detroit and you are forced to use union manufacturers or union workers and people based in the city of Detroit to build your building.

00:22:11.300 I'm sorry. That's a bad way of doing business.

00:22:13.620 And I'm going to choose somewhere else to do my business.

00:22:15.900 So so we got to be careful how we're talking about these tariffs and the impact that they're going to have.

00:22:21.040 Prices are going to rise.

00:22:23.300 No question about it.

00:22:24.740 It's part of the reason automobile prices continue to rise.

00:22:27.440 Bad union deals and more expensive production, which is why we got to be careful.

00:22:32.900 And I want to hear your thoughts on this.

00:22:34.460 Maybe everything's going to be done by robots in manufacturing in 20 years.

00:22:39.060 There's no question about it.

00:22:40.740 That's that's how this is going to be done.

00:22:42.760 So we say we're going to bring these manufacturing jobs back.

00:22:45.400 OK, that's good.

00:22:46.760 That's great.

00:22:47.480 That's wonderful.

00:22:48.740 But are they actually going to be building stuff anymore or are we reliving a dream from the past?

00:22:55.140 I'm curious.

00:22:56.700 Robots are here.

00:22:57.960 They're here and they're chief.

00:23:00.360 Yeah, for certainly for the car, the car industry.

00:23:02.440 Absolutely.

00:23:03.000 I mean, they're already in use.

00:23:04.140 I think Ford uses them a lot.

00:23:06.540 GM here in America.

00:23:08.240 Absolutely.

00:23:08.980 But there's still going to be jobs, Tim, that the American people are going to do.

00:23:12.200 Building air conditioning units.

00:23:13.980 Carrier was one that we heard about over the last few years.

00:23:17.780 You're still going to have things like that.

00:23:20.040 Yeah, but it's going to be across the board.

00:23:21.940 It's not just going to be in America where robots are taking over. 0.98

00:23:24.180 So are we going to are you going to let Chinese robots take over and still get raped? 1.00

00:23:29.680 Or are we going to let American robots take over and at least maybe get some of our money back?

00:23:35.340 Now, I understand there's going to be jobs, Tim, that we can't bring back to America. 1.00

00:23:39.060 I say this all the time and I get heat for textiles.

00:23:41.720 I understand we're not going to ever be able to bring textiles back to America because it's way too costly.

00:23:47.780 It's massive, massively pollutant into the environment.

00:23:51.160 OK, I understand all that stuff.

00:23:52.640 But let's let's ship our manufacturing down to South America. 0.94

00:23:56.080 Let's ship our manufacturing instead of China. 0.99

00:23:58.400 Why don't we go to Mexico?

00:23:59.940 Why don't we try to help these people build up?

00:24:01.980 And I get a lot of heat for saying this, but I don't care because it's just the truth of the matter.

00:24:05.940 If we can help these people build up their own countries, they won't want to come to America. 1.00

00:24:09.800 They'll be able to live a life down in their own country. 0.62

00:24:11.960 Why don't we ship our textiles and let them do it there? 1.00

00:24:14.200 Because like I said, let's be honest, it's never coming back to America and we can't. 0.80

00:24:18.560 So why don't we go to Honduras?

00:24:19.840 Why don't we go to El Salvador?

00:24:20.780 Why don't we go to Mexico?

00:24:21.660 Ship everything from China down to there. 0.99

00:24:24.180 And you know what?

00:24:25.060 The shipping routes will be a lot damn cheaper.

00:24:27.200 You'll be employing these people down in their own country. 0.99

00:24:29.420 And they won't want to come to here.

00:24:30.940 And we won't have to worry about 20 million illegals living among us. 0.98

00:24:33.480 Your thoughts?

00:24:34.340 Yeah, I think that America is the best place in the world to do business.

00:24:37.260 And as long as there's an America with a competitive tax rate, with low regulations,

00:24:41.940 how about a solid rule of law?

00:24:43.920 That's taken a hit over the last few years.

00:24:45.960 Oh, my goodness.

00:24:46.600 You know, if you have all of that in place, we are the crown jewel.

00:24:50.660 We are the alpha dog economy of the world.

00:24:54.080 Everybody wants to do business in America.

00:24:56.320 That's why they're choosing us versus China. 0.78

00:24:58.140 Would you rather go to court in CCP or would you rather go to court in, you know, Rochester Hills, Michigan?

00:25:04.640 Frankly, I'd rather go in Rochester Hills, Michigan.

00:25:06.300 Did you say court?

00:25:07.300 Yeah, court.

00:25:08.200 Yeah.

00:25:08.420 Like criminal court?

00:25:09.600 Yeah.

00:25:10.120 Yeah.

00:25:10.300 Or negotiating a business deal or a business deal that goes south with the CCP.

00:25:15.860 You don't get to go to America courts.

00:25:17.600 You know, you fight with the Chinese Communist Party.

00:25:20.160 And let me tell you something.

00:25:20.900 If you go to war with the Chinese Communist Party, you're going to lose.

00:25:25.020 I mean, you're going to lose.

00:25:26.380 That's why our IP is being stolen.

00:25:28.400 That's why that's why they cheat all the time, because there is doing business in China is a huge risk.

00:25:35.320 And and, you know, we've just developed a system where we've just taken it over time.

00:25:39.500 So, yeah, I agree.

00:25:41.500 We should build factories where it's where it's advantageous. 0.97

00:25:45.280 The comparative advantage.

00:25:47.060 I believe that.

00:25:47.800 I believe that it's a tale as old as time.

00:25:50.600 And I think that we should.

00:25:52.020 But we got to do it in the place that that is most advantageous to America.

00:25:56.380 And I think decoupling from an enemy, a military enemy like China and maybe going with with Mexico, who said, all right, we're here.

00:26:03.880 We're doing business.

00:26:04.680 Let's make deals.

00:26:05.440 Let's make the deals better is a good thing.

00:26:08.120 And one more thing, I know I'm going a little long here, but let me just say this.

00:26:12.560 I follow a journalist.

00:26:14.260 His name's Charlie LeDuff.

00:26:15.340 He's a he's a Pulitzer Prize winner, former New York Times journalist who moved to Detroit and just to cover the city because it was fascinating.

00:26:23.560 And he immersed himself in the culture there.

00:26:26.060 And he's been on the ambassador bridge reporting.

00:26:30.100 He got on the ambassador bridge to report.

00:26:32.700 And he's a center left guy.

00:26:34.380 He and I would disagree on most things.

00:26:36.040 But when he starts talking about, OK, well, we have decent tariff rates with Canada on most things, not dairy, as President Trump points out, that's that's good.

00:26:45.640 But what about the other stuff?

00:26:47.760 What about the non tariff barriers?

00:26:50.200 What about the fact that Canada has universal health care and and companies don't have to pay for health care?

00:26:56.860 And American companies think about the auto industry.

00:27:00.620 A lot of their burden is is health care and other benefits that we have to provide in this country because we don't have universal health care.

00:27:08.840 That right there are the kind of things that we should be looking at, that we should be talking about in how we renegotiate deals, how we get back to the table and say, we want to do business with you.

00:27:20.220 It's OK to have a factory in Canada.

00:27:23.080 It's OK to move things back and forth across the border 10 times in order to make a cheaper car for consumers and a better car.

00:27:29.680 That's fine. But we've got to make better deals.

00:27:33.700 And I think that President Trump is poised to do that.

00:27:36.920 Yeah. If anyone who wants to go test out the Canadian health care system, I invite you to go to Canada, become a citizen and break your arm there and see how long it takes you to get a surgery.

00:27:45.920 By no means is Tim, I think, advocating for universal health care in America.

00:27:52.160 Oh, but just pointing out how expensive health care companies and it's I mean, big part thanks to Barack Hussein Obama, who's made it impossible for health care companies to come in and bid.

00:28:03.580 When I left Fox News and I came to do independent journalism, Alou, for me to get my own health care, Tim, I was 27 years old.

00:28:11.620 It was eight hundred dollars a month, nine dollars a month on Cobra.

00:28:13.980 I was 27 years old with no preexisting conditions, nothing wrong with me.

00:28:17.940 A perfect bill of health, seven, eight hundred dollars a month.

00:28:21.280 I mean, these these people, these companies make it totally unaffordable.

00:28:25.440 And my favorite thing was during Obamacare.

00:28:27.400 You have to have insurance.

00:28:29.180 But if you don't have insurance, we're going to find you fifteen hundred dollars a year. 0.99

00:28:32.360 Well, if I had fifteen hundred dollars a year, I would have just paid for the damn insurance. 0.99

00:28:35.800 Like, what the hell world are these people living in? 0.98

00:28:39.180 Yeah, it was a it was an interesting time.

00:28:42.040 Try living in the UK.

00:28:42.860 I did for a year and I'm a type one diabetic.

00:28:45.660 Health care has always been a thing.

00:28:47.840 I had a serious medical problem.

00:28:49.680 They lost my test results three different times.

00:28:52.480 I was about ready to fly back to the United States when finally the situation worked itself out.

00:28:58.280 And that is the risk that they take.

00:29:00.620 That's the gamble that they take.

00:29:02.360 In the universal health care system.

00:29:04.280 So by no means am I advocating for that.

00:29:06.280 Just simply pointing out that there are big differences when we talk about other non tariff barriers.

00:29:12.840 And those are things that we should and can work out, I think, between our friends.

00:29:18.400 And it's great to see that our friends want to do that with us for sure.

00:29:22.640 Yeah, we'll get rid of that.

00:29:23.760 And you'd mentioned the dairy.

00:29:24.720 A lot of things people don't realize.

00:29:26.380 They have a quote.

00:29:27.140 They have this quota type, which I still truly don't understand.

00:29:29.700 But they have this quota type system.

00:29:31.420 So when they hit a certain amount of demand or supply, the quotas can hit up to 200% on this and 200% on that and 100%.

00:29:38.960 It's the craziest thing I've ever seen.

00:29:41.020 But I think it's made to mess with people's heads.

00:29:43.220 I want to take one more quick break here.

00:29:44.620 We're talking with Tim Desher.

00:29:46.000 When we return, I promise you we're going to take up that free versus fair trade.

00:29:49.160 The other thing I want to take up is the fact that we are at 25%, 26%.

00:29:56.520 We account for 25%, 26% of the world's GDP.

00:29:59.760 China is a distant second behind us. 0.84

00:30:02.120 Who really knows if that number is right?

00:30:04.220 We haven't had a trade surplus in this country for 50 years.

00:30:08.260 Think about how long this country has been going down the tubes.

00:30:10.880 People think it's maybe the last 20 years. 1.00

00:30:12.600 And a large part of it is Bill Clinton with the Belt and Road Initiative, as you heard President Trump say earlier in the show, to make these stupid, stupid deals. 0.99

00:30:21.460 Yeah, to give China, an emerging nation, all this power and free might to do whatever the hell they want. 0.99

00:30:28.400 But I think it's been going on a lot longer than that.

00:30:30.240 A trade deficit for the last 50 years.

00:30:33.120 Make it make sense.

00:30:34.220 Hopefully, Tim can make sense of it when we return.

00:30:36.400 We're talking with Tim Desher.

00:30:37.580 He's the executive director for the committee to unleash prosperity.

00:30:40.440 We're coming right back.

00:30:41.320 Stay with us.

00:30:42.600 Folks, we're back with Tim Desher.

00:30:49.300 He's the executive director for the committee to unleash prosperity.

00:30:53.100 Tim, before we went to break there, 26% of the world's GDP sits here right here in America.

00:30:59.440 China, a distant second. 0.94

00:31:01.240 We haven't had a trade surplus in this country for 50 years, which means we're offshoring everything.

00:31:06.820 We're relying on every nation for everything.

00:31:09.260 And we saw it during COVID. 1.00

00:31:10.640 We couldn't get something as stupid as masks and gowns. 0.99

00:31:14.340 Now that we know the masks don't work, I mean, the whole hysteria was so wasteful. 0.99

00:31:19.160 But pharmaceuticals, we offshore like 80% of our pharmaceuticals, China and India.

00:31:24.820 I mean, we're not a producing nation anymore.

00:31:27.860 And it's been like that, it seems, for the last 50 years.

00:31:30.840 What's your thoughts?

00:31:31.520 You mentioned pharmaceuticals, and you're correct.

00:31:35.760 I mean, but why?

00:31:37.360 Why aren't we?

00:31:38.300 Why did we offshore them?

00:31:39.740 I mean, a lot of our pharmaceuticals were made in Puerto Rico.

00:31:43.440 And we know about Puerto Rico, the mess that they're in down there domestically.

00:31:48.000 Again, it goes back to the point of what I was talking about earlier with it's not just the federal government.

00:31:53.320 It is also the states and the territories that have issues.

00:31:56.880 I mean, we know that they were just bankrupt and they were under a holding board to restructure the entire island.

00:32:03.380 They're hemorrhaging people, hemorrhaging employees, employers are hemorrhaging workers.

00:32:11.820 So they lost a lot of the pharmaceutical industry, kind of moved out there.

00:32:15.780 Another reason, what about the Jones Act?

00:32:17.920 You can't ship something from one American city to another American city without an expensive union ship.

00:32:25.040 You're having people go all the way to Australia, ship something to Australia,

00:32:29.820 and then Australia, ship it all the way back to California simply to avoid the Jones Act.

00:32:34.460 So, I mean, there's a lot of things there, especially if you're dealing with the pharmaceutical industry,

00:32:38.520 that you kind of shrug yourself and say, well, we're kind of doing it to ourself.

00:32:43.020 Yeah.

00:32:43.100 And so while we do have an imbalance, per se, we're doing that for a very specific reason.

00:32:54.040 It's to avoid the other costs to doing business here in America.

00:32:58.220 Yeah, you're absolutely right.

00:32:59.200 I want to turn to the free versus fair trade.

00:33:02.700 Now, I've been saying on the show for the last few days,

00:33:05.920 free trade is what I think has gotten us into this mess in the first place.

00:33:09.220 We've been so worried about protecting against unhealthy competition,

00:33:13.280 and we've been less worried about the actual trade barriers

00:33:18.140 and the protection for the people who are selling products in here in America

00:33:23.340 versus the people who are selling products over in Canada.

00:33:26.440 We can't compete with the dairy farmers over there, our farmers here in America.

00:33:30.880 We can't compete with some cattle farmers in Australia.

00:33:34.220 I mean, I saw an interview last week about the importing of meats from Australia

00:33:40.540 and folks not buying it from here in America where we have some of the best beef in the world.

00:33:45.280 I mean, that's the way I look at it.

00:33:48.400 Free trade has gotten us in a lot of trouble, if you think about it.

00:33:52.060 And fair trade is what is sort of saving us a little bit.

00:33:55.160 And this isn't for me.

00:33:56.320 I've gotten all my economics lessons from the great Lou Dobbs.

00:33:59.240 And anyone who came on his shows and talked about free trade, he was pissed.

00:34:03.640 And he'd say, we need fair trade.

00:34:05.560 And that's what Donald Trump, I think, has tried to intimate.

00:34:09.520 The floor is yours.

00:34:11.340 Yeah.

00:34:11.660 So, OK, so let's just let's just as you learn in law school,

00:34:15.540 one of the most important things you can do first before anything while you're preparing

00:34:20.920 is define your terms, stipulate meanings, stipulate terms.

00:34:25.320 OK, we agree that this means this.

00:34:27.440 All right.

00:34:27.720 We agree.

00:34:28.400 So we can move forward on that.

00:34:30.040 When you're talking about free trade, you're talking about the goal of free trade, which

00:34:36.620 has been free traders for the last, you know, 30 to 50 years or however long it's been the

00:34:41.720 goal of free trade.

00:34:42.680 And they've just used the term free trade through free trade is zero zero.

00:34:48.520 That's what true free trade is.

00:34:50.060 And we've never had that.

00:34:51.780 We have never had that.

00:34:53.100 It's always been some negotiation to work out this country's protection thing.

00:34:58.460 Oh, Swiss wants to protect protect their chocolate industry.

00:35:01.720 So so we'll hit them there and we'll hit them here and whatever.

00:35:05.560 It's just that the U.S. has has wanted to become the place that people invest in the most.

00:35:12.220 So we've lowered our tariffs as a goal of attracting that investment.

00:35:16.340 That's been the goal over time.

00:35:18.440 But the problem with that is that, like you said, we've used the term we've relied on the

00:35:23.360 term free trade to sell what we're doing.

00:35:26.640 But it should have been free ish trade.

00:35:29.740 And it's been kind of tumbling, tumbling, tumbling to the point where Australia has the

00:35:35.600 beef problem.

00:35:36.300 Remember, we're only talking about beef.

00:35:38.380 That's that's one issue.

00:35:39.420 And fine.

00:35:40.000 That's good.

00:35:40.520 We should renegotiate that.

00:35:41.840 That's fine.

00:35:42.560 But New Zealand has great deals with us.

00:35:45.320 And guess what?

00:35:46.760 They they they're sitting there.

00:35:49.200 I was just in I was just in Auckland.

00:35:50.640 They go, what what did we do to you?

00:35:52.740 And I said, well, you go, well, you gave us Lord of the Rings.

00:35:57.960 That was really cool.

00:35:58.720 And we really, really like that.

00:35:59.880 Thank you for that.

00:36:00.540 It was really, really wonderful.

00:36:02.360 Tara free.

00:36:03.840 But but there are things that you do here to protect your industries.

00:36:07.740 There are things that you do here to do that.

00:36:10.020 And that's what we're trying to change the narrative, change the narrative to actual true

00:36:14.960 free trade.

00:36:15.680 Let's let's try it out.

00:36:16.720 That's what Milton Friedman was talking about when he said free trade is going zero zero.

00:36:22.020 You want to try that out?

00:36:23.140 Let's go.

00:36:24.000 Let's do it.

00:36:24.700 And watch.

00:36:25.240 Watch how much growth we see through that.

00:36:28.500 I'm I'm a free trader.

00:36:30.540 That's what I want to see.

00:36:31.580 I'm an idealist.

00:36:32.340 I don't know if we'll ever see it.

00:36:33.300 I hope we do.

00:36:33.940 But what I'm really interested in is growth.

00:36:36.380 And I'll tell you one thing, our our economy and our wealth has grown as a nation.

00:36:42.160 No doubt about it.

00:36:43.160 Over the last 50 years, the middle class has risen.

00:36:46.180 I don't buy the narrative that somehow we have suffered and that and that we're at a

00:36:50.800 place of, you know, destitute poverty.

00:36:54.000 We're not.

00:36:54.920 That's just not the case.

00:36:56.600 A rising tide lifts all boats.

00:36:58.700 It's not perfect.

00:36:59.540 It's not perfect.

00:37:00.720 But we've we've we've mislabeled what we've had, which is the goal of free trade instead

00:37:08.040 of actual free trade.

00:37:10.000 So I get that.

00:37:11.040 And I understand the zero zero thing just doesn't work with some nations, though.

00:37:15.480 Correct me if I'm wrong.

00:37:16.520 If you look at I think Peter Navarro gave and I love to see Peter Navarro sparring with

00:37:21.380 Elon Musk over this issue.

00:37:23.300 Peter Navarro, a very good friend of mine, has the best interest of the country.

00:37:27.380 Now, sometimes I wonder if Elon Musk doesn't really have the best interests of our country

00:37:31.040 or his pockets.

00:37:32.260 And I think a lot of people wonder that same thing.

00:37:35.420 You know, the guy's got a lot of businesses across the world and he imports a lot of stuff

00:37:39.320 from China.

00:37:39.900 And Elon Musk pointed that out.

00:37:41.140 And Elon got very upset.

00:37:42.200 But it's the truth.

00:37:43.460 The truth is that Elon Musk can't run his business without China. 0.94

00:37:46.920 He has nowhere to get batteries from.

00:37:48.420 That's just one component of the car.

00:37:50.480 But I think the country mentioned was Cambodia.

00:37:52.700 And I may be wrong.

00:37:54.520 It was either Cambodia or Vietnam, where for every one dollar we spend, they spend, we 1.00

00:37:59.300 spend 15.

00:38:00.520 So a zero zero situation doesn't necessarily work there because they're not importing enough.

00:38:05.120 What do you do in a situation like that?

00:38:07.440 And to put it in layman's terms for folks, we're importing a lot less than they're exporting

00:38:13.320 to us.

00:38:13.860 So you have an imbalance there.

00:38:15.300 What do you do in a situation like that?

00:38:17.160 Well, first of all, Elon Musk, his cars are the most produced in America cars.

00:38:22.600 Most assembled and made cars in America.

00:38:25.440 We put a chart out in our daily email today that 100% Tesla is manufactured here in America.

00:38:32.580 That's the dream.

00:38:33.840 That is the dream.

00:38:34.960 You talk about batteries being made in China.

00:38:36.820 OK, well, we have $12 trillion of critical rare earth minerals under our feet here in

00:38:42.320 this country.

00:38:43.080 Let's start digging.

00:38:44.200 Let's start getting that out.

00:38:45.440 Let's start producing that ourselves.

00:38:46.980 We can decouple.

00:38:47.980 We can decouple.

00:38:48.920 But why aren't we digging?

00:38:50.760 It's because we won't give leases on the federal land to get this out of the ground.

00:38:56.480 So there's that problem.

00:38:57.540 Now, let me just talk about this because you talk about the trade deficit.

00:39:00.700 Did you know?

00:39:02.140 And this is just this is statistics.

00:39:04.860 Did you know that the more you raise tariffs on somebody, that's not going to fix the trade

00:39:10.680 deficit?

00:39:11.080 In fact, that's going to increase the trade deficit.

00:39:13.620 Because the more you increase, it's it's it's a fact every single time countries start

00:39:18.880 exporting less.

00:39:20.780 And that's because they're paying more.

00:39:23.140 And so so you have a you you're saying, you know, logically, you think, oh, we put slap

00:39:27.740 the tariffs on them.

00:39:28.460 They're going to send more back.

00:39:29.480 It's going to be better for us.

00:39:30.720 Well, in the end, no, it's not going to fix.

00:39:32.500 In fact, it's going to make that deficit even larger.

00:39:35.220 And so we, again, did an item on that today in our in our daily email.

00:39:38.540 You can read on it.

00:39:39.520 If you go to Unleash Prosperity dot com, it's called the hotline.

00:39:42.340 We do it every morning and you can see all the numbers worked out there that every single

00:39:46.740 time tariffs are raised, the trade deficit increases.

00:39:50.000 And so we got to watch out for that.

00:39:52.000 We got to define our terms, as I said earlier, and we got to be sure that we're ready to take

00:39:57.340 on the argument.

00:39:58.900 Now, if you want to say, well, hey, we we've we've operated under that for a long time and

00:40:04.120 we've had bad tariffs, bad trade deficits because of it.

00:40:08.020 OK, you can say that, but politically, you've got to be ready.

00:40:11.800 You've got to be ready to hit that in the midterms if prices are continuing to raise,

00:40:16.760 as as I believe they will, if tariffs stay on long term.

00:40:20.520 I don't think this goes into the midterms.

00:40:22.020 I mean, there are ways away and we have so much to look forward to.

00:40:25.880 The Trump tax cuts, the corporate tax cuts.

00:40:27.780 The first hold on, hold on, though, but I'm sorry to interrupt you, but but I'm sorry.

00:40:33.420 We are still under the Biden economy of high inflation.

00:40:37.520 We still have very high inflation from the Biden economy.

00:40:40.260 So we started at a loss and now we're even further down because because we are shaking

00:40:46.800 the world up.

00:40:48.200 We need to get back up from we need to recover fully from Biden before we even start going

00:40:54.920 even further to, quote unquote, fix another problem, which we can, again, argue whether

00:40:59.140 or not that's that's a long term solution.

00:41:02.080 But but Biden's Biden really screwed us over economically speaking.

00:41:07.020 And we haven't even begun to recover from that, as we saw with the last inflation number,

00:41:10.720 which ticked up a little higher.

00:41:12.260 I mean, the guy's he's been in office less than three months.

00:41:14.960 And this is what I tell everybody is that it's not going to get fixed in three months.

00:41:18.580 It's probably not going to get fixed in six months.

00:41:20.160 You know, you need a little bit of time to fix this thing.

00:41:23.100 But over the next six months to a year, we're going to have the corporate tax cuts renewed,

00:41:27.900 which is going to drive companies through the absolute roof, putting more monies in their

00:41:32.520 pocket, allowing them to hire more people, allowing them to reinvest in their companies

00:41:35.940 and so on and so forth.

00:41:37.620 OK, you're going to have no tax on tips.

00:41:40.980 You're going to have no tax on overtime proposed and probably signed into law.

00:41:45.300 Well, the ultimate thing, which Howard Lutnick slipped out in an interview and said, is that

00:41:50.060 Donald Trump ultimately wants no tax on people making less than one hundred fifty thousand

00:41:54.260 dollars a year.

00:41:55.740 I mean, what does that do for an economy when you're giving now?

00:41:59.660 I think the number it's like in the 80 to 80 percentile for people who are making less

00:42:05.440 than one hundred fifty thousand dollars a year across the country.

00:42:07.960 OK, if you take out, Tim, if you take out New York and California and now Florida, the

00:42:14.860 amount of people making one hundred fifty thousand dollars or less is is substantial.

00:42:18.340 So you give these people back now 20, 30 percent of their paychecks.

00:42:22.760 What's that going to do to an economy?

00:42:25.400 Well, OK, so let's take this.

00:42:28.000 Let's take it.

00:42:28.740 So it's a great it's a great idea.

00:42:30.760 And it would be very beneficial to families and to households making 150 or under.

00:42:37.240 However, the counter to that is I've heard to in order to enable that to happen, to pay

00:42:43.960 for it, they're talking about a quote unquote high income tax, like hiking the tax, hiking

00:42:51.040 the top tax rate to pay for that.

00:42:53.920 I haven't seen the numbers on this.

00:42:55.840 I have not I have not seen the numbers worked out.

00:42:59.120 But my sense is, is that those top earners we know are small business owners because people

00:43:04.640 file subchapter S and so they they their company may make, you know, two million dollars in

00:43:10.500 one year and they file their tax return and they're rich because they file it as individual

00:43:15.060 because it's a pass through entity.

00:43:17.860 OK, well, if you're going to raise the taxes on that two million dollar business, that small

00:43:21.620 business, that's way less that that business has to invest to hire somebody to do all of

00:43:28.140 the work that small business, small business drives us, drives our economy.

00:43:31.040 No question about it.

00:43:32.240 It's the beauty of America is that a small business can be successful in America.

00:43:38.260 Look all around the world.

00:43:39.840 They do not have the small business atmosphere that we have here in America.

00:43:43.040 Thank God we are so so blessed by that.

00:43:45.600 But again, if you raise that rate, that's not going to hit just the millionaires and billionaires.

00:43:50.060 That's going to hit the small businesses. 0.97

00:43:51.660 And I want to make sure that we say, is it worth is it worth doing that, killing those

00:43:57.580 those pro growth tax rates that encourage business to invest in order to make sure that

00:44:05.300 somebody, you know, doesn't pay a tax rate?

00:44:09.360 You you you're going to have to, you know, maybe counter that point.

00:44:12.380 But I'm I didn't I haven't read that anywhere that that that's the case that it'll be on the

00:44:18.060 way I interpreted it from everything that I've read about it, it's going to be super high

00:44:22.420 wealth individuals who are making money, not the small business owners of the world making

00:44:27.040 two million dollars and two million dollars, folks, when you bring it on a business, it's

00:44:30.420 not a lot of money because when you boil it down to everything like a restaurant owner

00:44:33.940 who's grossing two million dollars a year is probably only taking maybe two fifty out

00:44:39.100 of a three hundred thousand dollars a year after taxes and everything they pay.

00:44:42.520 I don't think it's going to be hitting those folks.

00:44:44.940 I think it's going to be hitting the people who are making well, it's just just remember

00:44:48.460 that five percent of the entire population pays, you know, about 50 percent of the taxes.

00:44:53.240 Yeah, of course.

00:44:53.640 Right.

00:44:53.900 And that's in that.

00:44:54.960 And that is that that is way more than the small business owner.

00:44:59.180 That is way more.

00:45:00.360 And and so, look, I'm I'm not I am not a fan of raising taxes.

00:45:05.920 I will never be a fan of raising taxes.

00:45:08.740 I think that it's a good thing, a virtuous thing for people to, you know, have some skin in

00:45:14.860 the game.

00:45:15.460 I think all taxes should be lowered as few as possible, but we need low rates and broad

00:45:21.340 base.

00:45:22.120 That's that's what I believe is the most pro growth tax policy that we can have.

00:45:26.880 And look, if if you can exempt, maybe you use the tariffs to pay for tax relief for those

00:45:34.320 people.

00:45:34.900 Maybe maybe you do.

00:45:36.060 I don't know how much we're going to be bringing in because, you know, I've heard various numbers.

00:45:40.360 And now that you pause tariffs, we're not going to be, you know, bringing in that revenue.

00:45:44.380 So, again, we got to see the numbers.

00:45:47.580 But I'm very, very skeptical of hiking rates, you know, super high in order to pay, you know,

00:45:54.520 so fewer people have to pay taxes at the lower end.

00:45:58.500 I think that everybody should have some skin in the game.

00:46:00.700 I really do.

00:46:01.180 Yeah, but as Scott Besson put it, this is about Main Street, not about Wall Street anymore.

00:46:07.180 You know, the American.

00:46:08.220 Yeah, but I know a lot more people than Wall Street that would be taxes would be high. 1.00

00:46:12.820 That's not that's I don't think that's a fair.

00:46:15.020 I love Scott Besson, by the way.

00:46:16.260 He's he's an incredible treasurer secretary.

00:46:17.980 I think he's going to be credited for a lot of these deals.

00:46:21.120 I think he's behind the scenes being a power player in this.

00:46:24.700 But I just disagree with that narrative.

00:46:26.340 I don't think that this is just Wall Street.

00:46:28.000 I think that's a mischaracterization.

00:46:31.760 Well, I mean, there's nobody surrounded by more billionaires than Donald Trump in this administration.

00:46:35.760 So we'll see what happens.

00:46:38.000 But Scott Besson's one of them, by the way.

00:46:39.560 No, of course.

00:46:40.820 And it's not a bad thing.

00:46:42.100 I don't say it is a bad thing that someone is worth a lot of money.

00:46:44.360 It's a bad thing.

00:46:44.920 It's a great thing, especially coming from nothing and making it to everything.

00:46:48.320 I mean, you should be applauded for everything you've done to get there.

00:46:51.500 It's the American dream, as you said, to get to that position.

00:46:54.420 But there needs to be some sort of debt relief for the American people, the American, you know,

00:47:00.840 family, you look at debt numbers through the roof, debt numbers for the elderly through the roof.

00:47:06.360 I mean, there's no other way, you know, in my opinion, to get there without starting to cut back for some of these people and give them the relief they need.

00:47:14.600 Some of these people are paying 25, 30 percent on credit card debt, you know, credit cards maxed out across the board.

00:47:21.600 We need to give these people some sort of relief.

00:47:24.820 You know, that's what we can have a whole episode on on price controls.

00:47:28.880 I tend to I tend to be in the camp where where we shouldn't have price controls and and that we should be responsible.

00:47:34.800 I mean, I mean, people at home need to stop acting like the federal government and just kind of borrowing, borrowing, spending, spending, spending.

00:47:41.440 And what they need to do is they need to demand from their lawmakers lower taxes, less regulation.

00:47:48.400 Yeah. All the all this.

00:47:49.900 And by the way, not just federal state as well.

00:47:52.540 State as well.

00:47:53.260 I think that's what we need.

00:47:54.640 Yeah. I live in a state like New York and you have property taxes are through the roof for an elderly person to pay nine thousand, ten thousand dollars a year on a on a house that they paid 50 or 60 thousand dollars for that's now worth eight or nine hundred thousand dollars.

00:48:08.500 You've got them paying property tax to the roof.

00:48:10.300 I was talking with economist John Lonsky not too long ago.

00:48:15.040 You look at some of the things that people are racking up on their credit cards.

00:48:18.140 It's not Lululemon.

00:48:20.920 It's not expensive dinners.

00:48:22.560 It's utilities.

00:48:24.460 It's it's bare necessities.

00:48:26.540 And, you know, if you're living in a state like New York to tell someone to get up and move after they're, you know, 80, 90 years old, they have the doctors here.

00:48:33.440 They have whatever here.

00:48:34.780 You know, they're getting fifteen hundred bucks, two thousand dollars a month in Social Security and they're paying nine thousand dollars a year.

00:48:42.280 You know, that's not something that they can control.

00:48:45.040 You know, you can't ask somebody who's 85 years old to get up and move.

00:48:48.980 I mean, but they are.

00:48:50.340 I mean, they are.

00:48:51.200 I mean, two million people, over two million people have left New York over the last.

00:48:54.780 No, I get it.

00:48:56.160 It's it's a mass exodus out of there.

00:48:58.220 But but let me just respond to what to one thing that you said.

00:49:01.980 You know, look, I am in no way of, you know, saying that we need to, you know, be hard on people.

00:49:10.320 That's not what I'm saying.

00:49:11.340 What I am saying, though, is that we were not having this conversation in twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen and twenty twenty.

00:49:17.780 We were not having this conversation.

00:49:19.740 We are having this conversation now because President Biden spent and spent and spent.

00:49:25.060 Trump wasn't perfect.

00:49:25.860 He spent as well.

00:49:26.680 But Biden put us over, put us over the limit.

00:49:30.000 And and that caused rent to go up, that caused mortgages to go up, that caused groceries to go up, that caused energy to go up, that caused everything in this dang country to go up.

00:49:40.660 And now we are stuck talking about how much people are putting on their credit cards because of one man and one man alone.

00:49:47.120 That's Joe Biden.

00:49:48.300 And we cannot we cannot go like this to each other, who, you know, which we're on the same side on most things.

00:49:57.100 We have slight disagreements on things.

00:49:58.340 That's fine.

00:49:59.180 But we cannot lose focus of why we're in this position.

00:50:02.480 It's promising I'm going to burn down my car tonight, Tim.

00:50:05.440 Do you have a Tesla?

00:50:06.400 I don't.

00:50:10.660 I won't do it.

00:50:11.940 I'll spare your car.

00:50:12.900 But, you know, you know, I can't help myself if I'm walking down the street.

00:50:15.500 Just start burning people's cars down, you know, start keying it.

00:50:20.380 I'm not a hater on the electric vehicle.

00:50:22.300 I'm just not there yet.

00:50:23.280 You know, I'm not.

00:50:24.300 I drive a Jeep Wrangler that's all lifted up with the big tires.

00:50:27.600 I'm not at the electric car thing yet.

00:50:29.580 You know what I have to say?

00:50:30.840 Neither is America. 0.69

00:50:32.240 No.

00:50:33.020 I last year I was driving a very luxury car that I had gotten rid of.

00:50:39.500 And I was tired of it.

00:50:40.260 You know, an oil change was it was it was six hundred dollars to change the brakes on

00:50:45.500 it was four thousand dollars. 0.99

00:50:47.680 And I said, you know, enough is enough with this damn thing, man. 0.99

00:50:50.140 And I said to myself, you know, I'm going to go buy myself a damn American car. 0.99

00:50:54.360 And I was over at Lou's farm one day and I drove his Jeep Wrangler. 0.98

00:50:58.260 Lou drove an American car, man, all the money in the world.

00:51:00.860 And the guy was driving a Wrangler.

00:51:03.080 I used to joke.

00:51:03.980 I say, you know, you know, a man's American.

00:51:05.500 And he's got USA in his email handle.

00:51:07.740 And but I drove it. 1.00

00:51:10.720 I said, screw this shit, man. 1.00

00:51:11.700 I'm done with this. 1.00

00:51:12.560 I'm done paying five hundred dollars for an oil change. 0.98

00:51:14.880 I go to Porsche and I go take this damn thing back and I go, you know, I bought myself a 0.96

00:51:19.020 Jeep Wrangler. 0.98

00:51:19.560 And you know what?

00:51:20.380 My next car is probably going to be another American car.

00:51:22.760 Maybe a Cadillac.

00:51:23.540 I don't know.

00:51:23.860 And, you know, it was either made it was either made in Illinois or in Toledo, Ohio and with

00:51:31.400 parts from Mexico.

00:51:32.100 But, you know, hey, you know, like we said, they're making deals.

00:51:34.980 So, you know, that's good.

00:51:36.480 Yeah.

00:51:36.940 I you know what?

00:51:37.640 And I said to myself, I said, I can't come out here and preach America first every day

00:51:40.600 if I don't drive an American car.

00:51:42.780 I'm not there on American suits yet, but maybe we'll get there one day.

00:51:47.620 When you get when you get when you get a bigger contract for the Great America show, that's

00:51:55.240 when you could start having your clothes tailor made in the United States of America.

00:51:58.840 How about that?

00:51:59.800 I I'm guilty of not doing that right now in America.

00:52:03.060 They're made elsewhere.

00:52:04.380 You know what?

00:52:05.740 I don't I'm not too trusting of an American.

00:52:08.140 I don't even use an American tailor.

00:52:09.580 I'm not too trusting.

00:52:10.700 There's some things I'm not trusting of Americans. 0.83

00:52:12.480 I won't I won't eat Chinese food that's made by Americans and I won't buy suits. 1.00

00:52:17.620 It was great talking with you today.

00:52:21.700 You get the last word here as we wrap up.

00:52:23.580 The floor is yours.

00:52:25.580 You know, you're out.

00:52:27.700 Yeah, look, here's the bottom line.

00:52:29.680 I look, you know, as a as a free trader, you know, they talk about tariffs was always was

00:52:37.320 always a OK, well, we can't we can't go that far because if we're there long term, it's

00:52:41.580 going to affect growth.

00:52:42.180 But when I pause and I look back and we see.

00:52:47.260 You know, a dealmaker is a dealmaker, and I believe that President Trump is the best dealmaker

00:52:53.320 that has ever occupied an office of leadership around the entire world.

00:52:58.620 I believe that President Trump will make great deals that get us to freer trade, but also

00:53:07.240 fairer trade.

00:53:08.080 I believe that 100 percent.

00:53:10.420 And, you know, you said it at the very beginning.

00:53:13.040 We are not out of the woods yet.

00:53:14.660 We got a lot of work to do.

00:53:16.360 We got a lot of, you know, swabbling here in D.C.

00:53:20.420 Of course, we do.

00:53:21.560 As we always do.

00:53:22.460 We got to pass the tax cuts.

00:53:23.700 We got to deregulate.

00:53:24.600 We got to be very bold with those continue that.

00:53:28.500 But but I will say that this is going to be a moment where we look back and say things

00:53:33.880 changed because there was boldness and leadership.

00:53:37.760 And I just want people to to recognize that whether you agree or not, we follow the leader

00:53:43.600 here in America.

00:53:44.140 He's all of our president.

00:53:45.820 And and we want the best for America because this is the greatest place to do business.

00:53:50.120 This is the greatest place to live.

00:53:51.380 And we are blessed to be here.

00:53:52.440 So thank you, John.

00:53:53.820 Really great conversation.

00:53:55.380 And God bless you and the Great America Show.

00:53:59.220 I appreciate it.

00:53:59.820 And, Tim, thanks so much for coming on.

00:54:01.240 One last point.

00:54:02.080 I know I said you gave you the last word, but I had just written it down here before I forgot.

00:54:05.620 You mentioned Trump spending.

00:54:06.880 And it was no secret that Trump spent a lot.

00:54:09.440 Now, COVID had a big part to do with it.

00:54:12.380 It wasn't necessarily 100 percent his fault.

00:54:15.340 But, you know, COVID did play a big part.

00:54:18.080 You know, I I often wonder what would it be like if we never had COVID.

00:54:21.240 And I think things would have been a lot differently.

00:54:24.160 Trump would have probably stayed in power, you know, straight through.

00:54:26.960 But you know what?

00:54:27.960 We're here now.

00:54:29.040 And, you know, we play with the hand.

00:54:30.220 We're dealt, you know, not the one we choose.

00:54:32.420 Tim Dasher, he's the executive director for the Committee to Unleash Prosperity.

00:54:36.120 Tim, come back soon.

00:54:36.840 It was great talking with you.

00:54:38.500 Thanks, John.

00:54:38.920 Appreciate it.

00:54:40.240 Thanks, everybody, for being with us today here on The Great America Show.

00:54:42.680 Please be sure to join us back here tomorrow for The Great America Show, where our quest for truth,

00:54:46.760 justice, and the American way continues, and hopefully by tomorrow I'll be feeling a little bit better.

00:54:51.520 We'll see.

00:54:52.260 But pray for me, please.

00:54:53.720 We'll see you back here tomorrow, folks.

00:54:55.180 Until then, may God bless you.

00:54:56.880 May God bless America.

00:54:57.920 And may God bless the great Lou Dobbs.

00:55:00.520 See you tomorrow.

00:55:00.900 We'll see you tomorrow.

The Great America Show - April 12, 2025

The Great America Saturday Show： April 12, 2025

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