The Wall Street Journal’s conservative editorial board blasted Donald Trump on Thursday in a blistering opinion piece that urged the president to back off the feud he opened up earlier in the day with Fed Chairman Jerome Powell.
“President Trump’s tariff war isn’t going well, with market ructions and evidence of a slowing economy,” the Journal’s board wrote bluntly as it recapped Trump’s early morning reaction to Powell’s critical remarks of the administration’s tariffs – and refusal to lower interest rates.
The problem for Trump is that Powell “spoke the truth” about the MAGA leader’s massive set of tariffs, the editorial board added, calling the tariffs “the biggest assault on the world trading system” since the end of the Bretton Woods trading system in the 1970s.
“Tariffs are a tax, which means higher prices for tariffed goods,” the board concluded Thursday. “Mr. Trump has imposed a minimum tariff on the world of 10%, which is roughly four times the previous average U.S. tariff rate of 2.4%.”
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The conservative editorial board next went after Trump’s assertion that "Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!"
“The world is also paying attention,” they wrote, noting that Powell “wouldn’t go quietly” if Trump attempts to remove him. “This would tee up a protracted legal fight, with market turmoil to match as investors awaited a Supreme Court ruling on the legality of dismissal. That’s the last fight Mr. Trump needs now.”
The board closed their opinion piece by urging Trump to end his tariff campaign, “if the President wants faster growth and less market turmoil.”
“Then get Congress to move on a tax and spending cut bill, and press ahead with deregulation,” they added. “The main lesson from Trump vs. Powell is that the central bank can’t make up for economic policy errors of politicians.”
