White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller insisted that President Donald Trump shouldn’t be expected to predict possible recessions.
Trump has said that delayed tariffs against Mexico and Canada will likely result in “a little disturbance,” prompting concerns of a greater economic downturn. When asked about a possible recession, Trump defended the tariffs, saying they would be “the greatest things we’ve ever done for the country” and “make our country rich again,” though he largely avoided any recession forecast.
“His comments are exactly right,” Miller said on NewsNations’ The Hill on Monday. “It’s not our job to make these kinds of prognostications. It’s our job under President Trump’s leadership to fix the economy, to stop four years of bleeding. Joe Biden left us with an economic nightmare of inflation and joblessness that President Trump is fixing.”
Miller also avoided answering a question from host Blake Burman about how long the markets will be volatile.
“President Trump has inherited a country that was on the path to economic oblivion, $36 trillion in debt, unsustainable growth in government spending, and the shuttering of American energy,” Miller said. “He is, one by one, fixing each and every one of these crises, not to mention, as I said earlier, the fact that illegal aliens and foreign workers are consuming all the jobs, ramping up the deficit by consuming government benefits.”
HOWARD LUTNICK GUARANTEES ‘THERE’S GOING TO BE NO RECESSION IN AMERICA’
Meanwhile, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick expressed confidence in the president during an NBC News interview on Meet the Press Sunday, saying he “would never bet on recession. No chance.”
Lutnick explained that the “global tariffs” are negotiating tactics to lower tariffs on American goods. The commerce secretary previously said the United States has the upper hand in tariffs against China because the U.S. buys more products from China than China buys from the U.S.
According to an estimate from the nonpartisan think tank Tax Foundation, Trump’s latest tariffs against Mexico, Canada, and China could raise taxes by more than $1 trillion between 2025 and 2034.