GOP lawmaker leaves CNN host baffled when she blames Biden for Trump's trade wars

Pro-Trump Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) scrambled to try to deflect blame from the president for any potential recession that might happen in 2025 on CNN Monday morning, instead pinning the blame on former President Joe Biden while simultaneously confusing anchor Kate Bolduan.

"Given the uncertainty that President Trump's tariff approach is creating, and given that tariffs often prove inflationary, Donald Trump was asked over the weekend about a possible recession happening this year," Bolduan told Malliotakis, who represents Staten Island in Congress. "He was not 100 percent confident that he could stave off a recession in 2025. If that is the risk that he is running with this kind of whiplash and environment of business uncertainty while prices go up, is that a risk you think is worth it?"

"Well, there's been talk about a recession for well over the past year," said Malliotakis. "This is something that has been a threat going back to the Biden administration. We were anticipating some type of recession and slow, slow growth. Why? Because of a lot of the inflationary spending, a lot of the dismantling of energy policy in this country that really drove up the cost of doing business, I think, and also the regulations that the Biden administration have put in place. So I think that we have a real opportunity here to stop the recession that was supposed to be coming for the past year. and i think the most important thing right now."

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In fact, Malliotakis is not correct — there were recession fears from some analysts in 2023, but it had largely evaporated by the start of last year.

Bolduan was quick to point this out: "But Congresswoman, recession they're talking about now would be one induced by the actions of this president, not the past."

"You can't disregard the damage that the Biden administration did to our economy with their regulations, with their inflationary spending, with the the the interest rates that have skyrocketed because of his policies," insisted Malliotakis. "You can't, you can't negate that. What we're trying to do right now is rightsize government bureaucracy. We're trying to extend the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which is the reason probably why we never had the recession that was being predicted."

Actually, many analysts broadly credited the American Rescue Plan, the COVID relief stimulus passed under the Biden administration, with ensuring a recession was avoided over the last four years.

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