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A Wall Street Soothsayer Translates the Tariffs

Other than the blanket pardons for the January 6 offenders, and Trump’s D.E.I. press conference after the horrific helicopter-jet collision, the donor class on Wall Street is generally happy with Trump II.

Donald Trump
Trump not only dismisses or misunderstands these obstacles, he also underestimates the resulting inflationary pressure, both from the tariffs themselves and any retaliatory actions by other countries—which are inevitable. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
William D. Cohan
February 5, 2025

Earlier this week, I was chatting with Larry Summers, the former Treasury secretary and president of Harvard University, from his home in Arizona. During our chat, I asked him to describe the game of tariff chicken that Donald Trump has been playing with China, Canada, and Mexico. “Surreal performance art would be the term that I would use,” Larry told me, without missing a beat, expanding on the opinion piece he co-authored last week in The Wall Street Journal with former senator Phil Gramm, urging Trump not to follow through with his tariff threats. (On Monday, Trump agreed to hold off for 30 days on imposing 25 percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada after extracting symbolic concessions from both countries.)