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you don't know Robert lighthiser but his
00:00:04
influence with President Trump could
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change America's economy lighthiser was
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the top us trade negotiator in the first
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Trump Administration and he's an
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evangelist for tariffs taxes on imported
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goods yesterday the president declared
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an emergency and imposed unusually high
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25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada and 10%
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on China to coer them to stop the flow
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of the deadly drug fenel that's unusual
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because tariffs are normally used to
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balance trade and in ligh heiser's
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opinion America has little Choice he
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says China's 3:1 dominance in trade is a
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threat to our way of
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life the story will continue in a
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moment China to me is a an existential
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threat to the United States it is a a
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very very competent adversary China
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views itself as number one in the world
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and wants to be that way they view us as
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in the way they have the biggest army in
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the world and they're growing it the
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biggest Navy in the world and they're
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growing it they're spying on us they're
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taking our technology they've been
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waging an economic war against the
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United States and winning that war for
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at least the last three decades so your
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tariff regime for China would be what I
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believe in strategic decoupling I'm not
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saying no economic relationship with
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China that's not my position at all I
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think you want balanced trade and how do
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you get balanced trade you're going to
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get balance Trad by having large tariffs
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on most of what they send to us what's
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large you know the president has floated
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numbers 50 60% but I think there are big
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numbers like that wait a minute you're
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talking about decoupling from China what
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would that look like so it is strategic
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decoupling so we would still have trade
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so I would say we sell you 150 billion
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we buy 150 billion from you no more we
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don't allow investments in China except
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in circumstances where we believe that's
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in the interest of the United States we
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don't allow inbound investment so we
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begin to disentangle we disentangle our
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technology you can ask yourself what is
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China's policy towards us it is exactly
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a mere image of what I just said said so
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what I'm suggesting we do to China is
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what they do to us Ronald Reagan gave
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the young trade lawyer his first White
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House job and 77-year-old Bob ligh
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Heiser has been advising Republicans
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since in Trump's first term liser was in
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charge of negotiating trade agreements
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in Trump 2.0 he's an unofficial advisor
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but a passionate one we noticed when he
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apologized for chewing up time
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just because I I talk too much so it is
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60 minutes after all and we don't get
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all of it it's not 60 days is that what
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you're thinking it's not days but
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centuries that tariffs have been debated
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every US president has used them but in
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the 1930s tariffs deepened the Great
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Depression and after World War II
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America led a broken world to W free
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trade us manufacturing jobs were stable
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until around the year 2000 then in 10
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years a third of manufacturing jobs were
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lost nearly 6 million there was a modest
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rebound under Obama Trump and Biden that
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dip is covid but fewer than one and a
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half million jobs are back you don't
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know how much you love going to work
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until you can't go there anymore Stacy
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dah Michelle Lopez and Matt Franson are
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among 12200 workers laid off in
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2023 when the badier Illinois auto
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assembly plant shut
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down this is my
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home and when they told me that we were
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done it
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hurt it really
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did we've got a community of 24,000
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people and uh there's probably not a
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street you can't you can go down that
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somebody's not tied to this plant um
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we've been here since 19 65 it's a good
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job provides a great living and uh we
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would just like to see it come back come
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back from Mexico in 2016 car maker
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stellantis moved one of Bader's Jeep
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models South of the Border in 2023 beler
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closed we've lost Electronics we've lost
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textiles we've lost chemicals in a large
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way we invented the semiconductor now we
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make 8% of semiconductors of the world
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and none of the really high tech ones
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more than half of the car sold in
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America are now Imports Mexico Canada
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and China are America's largest trading
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partners but China Bob ligh Heiser says
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has an enormous Advantage because of the
00:05:16
trade imbalance and Chinese Espionage
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stealing us Trade Secrets you add it all
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up you can get to around a trillion
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dollars a year of of wealth
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from the United States being transferred
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to a geopolitical adversary it's insane
00:05:36
and it's working and then you ask
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yourself as a national security issue
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how do you fight a war if God help us we
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ever have a war with China when they're
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now four times more likely to be able to
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to produce what is needed in a war but
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isn't trade one of the ways we avoid a
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hot War the way you prevent Wars is by
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having the strongest biggest best army
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biggest best Navy uh best economy in the
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world best technology you do those
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things the Allies come to you they see
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you as the future already China's
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manufacturing sector is bigger than that
00:06:14
of the United States Germany and Japan
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combined isn't China too big to snub we
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should never have that attitude there
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are things we can do the genius of
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America combined with our allies we can
00:06:29
turn this around but what do we need we
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need to change the relationship with
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them we need tariffs in my judgment we
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need subsidies in certain areas and we
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need an economic policy and a military
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strategic policy that rises up to the
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challenge everyone will prosper every
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family will thrive on the campaign Trump
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proposed historic tariffs 10 to 20% on
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All Imports 25% on Mexico and Canada 60%
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on China
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he said America would grow wealthy
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collecting taxes from overseas a tariff
00:07:07
is a tax on a foreign country that's the
00:07:09
way it is whether you like it or not a
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lot of people like to say oh it's a tax
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on us no no no it's a tax on a foreign
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country it's a tax on a country that's
00:07:20
ripping us off and stealing our jobs but
00:07:23
most any importer or Economist will tell
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you the president is mistaken
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tariffs are not a tax on a foreign
00:07:32
country the tax is paid by the Importer
00:07:36
in the United States for example Walmart
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imports goods from China and when those
00:07:42
goods cross into the United States
00:07:44
Walmart pays the Tariff if Walmart
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decides to pass the cost to Consumers
00:07:50
then you paid the Tariff not China so if
00:07:54
you go to Walmart if you go to Target
00:07:56
you're going to see higher prices for
00:07:57
imported goods and IST Mary lovelyy
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studied Trump's proposals for the
00:08:03
Peterson Institute for international
00:08:05
economics a leader in non-partisan
00:08:08
research the argument is made that if
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tariffs are imposed American consumers
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will buy less of the foreign Goods more
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domestically produced goods and that's a
00:08:20
great thing for consumers and for jobs
00:08:23
well it's a great thing for consumers if
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you don't care about how much they are
00:08:27
able to buy because the prices of
00:08:29
everything they buy will go up will they
00:08:31
substitute toward domestic Goods let's
00:08:33
just take that to start yes to some
00:08:35
extent they will but the prices of those
00:08:37
domestic Goods will also rise because
00:08:39
they no longer have to compete with
00:08:41
imported goods lovely's research
00:08:43
estimates the tariffs Trump talks about
00:08:46
would cost an average household around
00:08:49
$200 a month Footwear toys HomeGoods
00:08:55
certain types of Machinery certain
00:08:57
active ingredients in Pharmaceuticals
00:08:59
certain types of chemicals we're still
00:09:01
very dependent in certain categories but
00:09:04
worse lovely says tariffs can kill jobs
00:09:09
she points to Trump's first-term tariffs
00:09:11
on imported steel as intended steel
00:09:15
prices Rose us Mills were protected but
00:09:19
the higher prices hurt steel buyers like
00:09:22
car makers economists estimate that the
00:09:25
tariffs created 1,000 jobs in steel but
00:09:29
but cost 75,000 jobs Among Us companies
00:09:33
overall this idea that it creates jobs
00:09:36
yes in a few places for a few people but
00:09:39
for the majority of us it's more
00:09:41
pressure on employers it's more pressure
00:09:43
on our wages it's more pressure on our
00:09:46
jobs and obviously more pressure on our
00:09:49
wallets when we go to the cash register
00:09:52
the argument is made that when you
00:09:54
increase the cost of parts and supplies
00:09:57
coming into the country you're hurting
00:09:59
Apple you're hurting Ford you're hurting
00:10:02
American companies will these very
00:10:05
highly paid CEOs have to figure out how
00:10:09
to how to make a profit uh in a new
00:10:11
environment one that helps workers and
00:10:13
helps Innovation and and it's more
00:10:15
American focused America first um the
00:10:18
answer is yeah they're going to have to
00:10:20
figure it out will they figure it out of
00:10:21
course they'll figure it out they're
00:10:22
going to learn how to make money one of
00:10:24
the ways they figure it out is by laying
00:10:26
people off well no you you see I don't
00:10:28
believe that's true too I
00:10:30
think to me the exact opposite will
00:10:33
happen you will see more production in
00:10:35
the United States you will see more jobs
00:10:39
better jobs more pressure upward
00:10:42
pressure on wages which is my objective
00:10:44
the way you paint it it seems like
00:10:46
tariffs are magic well I wouldn't say
00:10:48
magic so so remember the tariffs are
00:10:51
part of an economic policy the policy
00:10:54
has tax cuts it has it has spending cuts
00:10:57
it has energy production has regory
00:10:59
reduction and it has tariffs the
00:11:02
combination of that I think and tariffs
00:11:04
are an important part of it has the
00:11:06
potential to have this kind of
00:11:08
Renaissance we saw some of that
00:11:10
combination he talks about back in
00:11:13
badier where turbocharge tariffs have
00:11:16
been hitched to a big taxpayer
00:11:19
investment when you were putting that
00:11:21
t-shirt on Joe Biden did you think
00:11:24
that's it the plant's opening again in
00:11:26
2023 Matt fransen president of the UAW
00:11:30
Local welcomed President Biden to badier
00:11:34
with a union shirt I thought we were
00:11:37
well on our way you know baders always
00:11:40
fought for themselves and in this
00:11:44
scenario we
00:11:48
needed we needed everybody to fight for
00:11:51
us and they
00:11:53
did Biden did he increased Trump's
00:11:57
earlier 25% tariff on on Chinese cars to
00:12:01
100% for Chinese electric vehicles then
00:12:05
Biden gave car maker stantis a
00:12:09
$335 million Grant to convert badier to
00:12:13
electric cars we don't know how much
00:12:15
that helped but last month stellantis
00:12:18
said it would reopen in
00:12:21
2027 they need to realize that whether
00:12:24
you're Democrat Republican independent
00:12:27
we need to work on the middle class if
00:12:29
the middle class is strong that helps so
00:12:32
many different areas so it's not just
00:12:34
going to be the tariffs it's got to be
00:12:36
policy that's set for the middle
00:12:39
class but tariffs cut both ways Canada
00:12:43
and Mexico now say they will retaliate
00:12:46
against Trump's new tariffs with their
00:12:48
own tariffs on us Goods the opening
00:12:51
shots of a trade War the real fear that
00:12:55
I have is that we have real problems and
00:12:59
I'm afraid that tariffs have time and
00:13:01
time again proven to not deliver so in
00:13:04
the long run I'm afraid it will just
00:13:06
increase sinicism among the American
00:13:08
public about whether the government is
00:13:10
able to deliver and make their lives
00:13:13
better what are the chances that you're
00:13:15
wrong well once again we tried it the
00:13:19
other way Scott if we do this in 10
00:13:22
years it doesn't work we can go back and
00:13:24
always fail again the way we have in the
00:13:26
past
