Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., took to social media to dish some economic advice to President Donald Trump, saying that it "pays to listen" to cratering markets in their response to tariffs.
Paul made the comments in a post to X on Monday night after the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 890 points and Nasdaq saw its worst day of trading since 2022.
"The stock market is comprised of millions of people who are simultaneously trading. The market indexes are a distillation of sentiment. When the markets tumble like this in response to tariffs, it pays to listen," Paul said in the post.
Earlier Monday, Paul told The Hill he had "every major industry in Kentucky lobbying me against" tariffs, some of whom he said were still hurting from tariffs in Trump's first term.
"It shows the fallacy of believing in a policy of tariffs if you immediately have to borrow a bunch of money and give it to the people you hurt," Paul told The Hill. "There need to be Republicans who are still extolling the benefits of international trade."
The White House on Monday attempted to reassure investors, saying, "We're seeing a strong divergence between animal spirits of the stock market and what we're actually seeing unfold from businesses and business leaders," CNBC reported, adding, "The latter is obviously more meaningful than the former on what's in store for the economy in the medium to long term."
Another analyst said that Trump's answer about the possibility of a recession played a major part in unnerving the unnerved. Trump on Sunday called the weeks-long selloff a "period of transition" but demurred when asked if he expected a recession. "I hate to predict things like that," he added.
"President Trump's comments not necessarily taking a recession off the table unnerved investors who were already unnerved," Anthony Saglimbene, chief market strategist at Ameriprise, told CNN.
Trump last week announced 25% tariffs against Canada and Mexico, and then postponed some for a second time until April 2 in an apparent attempt to leverage concessions, namely their response and handling of fentanyl flowing into the U.S.
However, Trump on Tuesday announced that the U.S. will slap a 50% retaliatory tariff on Canadian steel and aluminum beginning Wednesday, in response to Canada’s 25% tariff on electricity.
Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.