A boast by Donald Trump's Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick about the effectiveness of the president trade war led CNN's Dana Bash to correct him on Sunday morning.
Appearing on "State of the Union," Lutnick launched extensive explanations about the upside of Trump's tariff threats, and butted heads with the CNN host, repeatedly replying," No, no, no," when she attempted to fact-check him.
In one exchange, he asserted, "Look, we published our rates on Liberation Day, negotiate with us, bring those rates down by opening your markets to Americans who can export. So what's going to happen is we're going to have imports. Of course, our ports, we are the consumer of the world! I mean, we consume $20 trillion worth of stuff. The world wants to sell us stuff."
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"But it's not happening.right now because of the president's policies," Bash interrupted.
"No, no, no, it's only stopping," Lutnick protested.
"Look," he attempted, "We are in a negotiation with China, we agree. We're in. It has stopped 145 percent on China. Of course, that stops it, but that –– they're negotiating that right now, we are optimistic that that will open."
"But what the president's tariff policy is, is let's open all the markets in the world that have been closed to us. Let's get that opportunity for Americans to export to them, let's really, really help Americans export," he continued. "And of course, those people who import are going to have great businesses. We are the greatest economy in the world. Everybody wants to come here, as the president likes to say, everybody likes to shop here with our consumers and it's going to work out great. "
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