Vice President J.D. Vance touted the implementation of tariffs despite Thursday's massive stock market sell-off, telling Newsmax the Trump administration is "feeling good" while also reassuring one midwestern GOP senator that American farmers are going to be among those who "reap the rewards" in the end.
Vance joined "Rob Schmitt Tonight" to react to the Dow Jones tumbling 1,679 points on Thursday in reaction to President Donald Trump's tariffs. Vance asserted that "one bad day" in the stock market is going to render a "booming market for a long time."
"We're feeling good. Look, I frankly thought in some ways it could be worse in the markets because this is a big transition. You saw the president said earlier today; it's like a patient who was very sick. We did the operation, and now it's time to make the patient better. And that's exactly what we're doing," Vance said.
"Look, one bad day in the stock market compared to what President Trump said earlier today, and I think he's right about this, we're going to have a booming stock market for a long time because we're reinvesting in the United States of America," Vance told Schmitt. "And more importantly than that, of course, the people in Wall Street have done well; we want them to do well. But we care the most about are American workers and about American small businesses. And they're the ones who are really going to benefit from these policies."
Vance reminded that tariffs were not a surprise; Trump said months ago what he planned to do.
"[Y]ou had economic policies that rewarded shipping our jobs to China instead of investing in American workers. And that's what President Trump — he ran on changing it; he promised he would change it; and now he has," Vance said.
"Frankly, we could have gone a lot higher," he added about the tariffs. "But the president is trying to send a message that, you know, yeah, we're going to be a little kind. We're going to be a little discounted."
The vice president also addressed the concerns of Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who cosponsored a bipartisan bill Thursday that would bring the power over tariffs back to Congress.
"Now look, Chuck Grassley, I understand he's worried about farmers. But here's my message to Chuck Grassley: Do our farmers benefit when you have foreign competitors who send a lot of their farm products to the United States but refuse to let our great farmers send beef and send other exports to those countries? That's the whole problem here that we're trying to fix," Vance said.
"That unfairness is why the president implemented these reciprocal tariffs. And really, fairness is the name of the game," Vance added. "Chuck Grassley's a good guy. I know he's worried about our farmers, but the way to fight for American farmers is to tell foreign countries you can't stop what American farmers produce from coming in. You've got to open up your markets the same way that we've been open for business for decades."
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Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
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