Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent saluted President Donald Trump’s ‘courage’ after the president suddenly paused ‘reciprocal’ tariffs on dozens of countries after markets lost trillions in value amid fears over the tariffs he imposed at midnight.
Bessent addressed reporters at the White House minutes after Trump announced his sudden tariff pause. He said it benefited more than 75 countries who opted to negotiate rather than hit back at the U.S.
‘It took great courage for him to stay the course until this moment,’ Bessent gushed about President Trump, whose moves set markets tanking before his sudden turnaround.
He said his own message to countries previously had been ‘do not retaliate and you will be rewarded’ – and that is what was happening.
‘Every country in the world that wants to come and negotiate: we are willing to hear you,’ Bessent told U.S. trading partners, while markets rebounded after fears of a new global recession amid a multi-pronged trade war.
Bessent singled out China, which Trump is hitting with a new 125 percent tariff. He said it happened ‘due to their insistence on escalation.’
Bessent didn’t say the turnaround came due to tanking markets, although Trump himself later acknowledged he had been watching the bond market.
Trump himself defended his move later at the White House and praised his own fortitude.
‘No other president would have done what I did,’ Trump said, in a statement that both MAGA supporters and Democratic critics might agree with.
‘I did a 90-day pause for the people that didn’t retaliate,’ Trump explained. ‘Some days you have to cut the bone, you have to do what you have to do,’ he said, adding that people were getting ‘yippy’ and ‘afraid.’
‘It’s a transition to greatness,’ Trump said.
He acknowledged that he had his eye on the bond market, which began tanking last night, raising fears of a recession amid higher borrowing rates.
‘I was watching the bond market … I saw last night where people were getting a little queasy,’ Trump said.
Trump took the wild swings in the market Wednesday as a win.
‘Over the last few days, it looked pretty glum – to, I guess they say it was the biggest day in financial history. That’s a pretty big change,’ Trump said.
‘Somebody had to pull the trigger. I was willing to pull the trigger,’ Trump said.
He also speculated that China wanted to make a deal, but claimed it didn’t know how.
One of Bessent’s predecessors, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, was less glowing in his own assessment of what happened.
‘The reason they took the step this morning is because of the damage they were doing to the country’s creditworthiness. They did a useful step. But make no mistake, it was a U-turn,’ he told CNN.
Also piling on was Connecticut Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy. ‘The tariff policy changes every ten minutes. What a joke. It’s nuclear grade incompetence that would be laughable except they’re ruining people’s lives for sport. Just shameful,’ he posted on X.
He posted a chart featuring a Trump cycle that begins with ‘I make a stupid & corrupt decision’ followed by ‘something really bad happens’ and culminating in ‘I reverse my stupid decision.’
‘He keeps changing things from day to day. His advisors are fighting among themselves, calling each other names, and you cannot run a country with such chaos,’ said Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer.
Trump gave one potential sign of what was to come Wednesday morning amid the turmoil. ‘This is a great time to buy!’ Trump wrote, using all caps. By Wednesday afternoon the Dow was up more than 7 percent.