Washington
CNN
—
Speaking to reporters Sunday on Air Drive One, President Donald Trump defended his new international tariffs with a well-known collection of false claims about tariffs and commerce.
As he has before, Trump wildly exaggerated the US commerce deficit with China — describing it as greater than 3 times increased than it truly is. He repeated his frequent false claim that China paid the tariffs he imposed throughout his first presidency on imported Chinese language merchandise; these funds had been made by US importers. And he as soon as once more falsely described commerce with Europe, wrongly saying the continent doesn’t purchase “something” from the US. In actuality, the European Union bought about $649 billion price of US exports in 2024.
Trump’s Sunday remarks additionally included inaccurate assertions about different topics, however we’ll persist with tariffs and commerce on this article. Here’s a reality examine.
Trump mentioned Sunday that the US has a commerce deficit with China of $1 trillion or extra.
“We now have an incredible deficit drawback with China. They’ve a surplus of a minimum of a trillion {dollars} a yr. I believe it’s like a trillion-one,” he mentioned.
As we’ve noted in earlier reality checks, these numbers usually are not near correct. In reality, official federal statistics present the 2024 commerce deficit with China in items and companies commerce was about $263 billion. Even if you happen to exclude the companies commerce, at which the US excels, and rely solely commerce in items, the 2024 deficit with China was about $295 billion.
The US has by no means approached a $1 trillion commerce deficit with China. The deficit in items commerce alone hit a record of about $418 billion below Trump in 2018 earlier than falling again below $400 billion in subsequent years.
Trump repeated his common assertion that China paid the tariffs he imposed on Chinese language imports throughout his first presidency, wrongly declaring, “I took in, throughout my 4 yr(s), lots of of billions of {dollars} from China.”
In reality, US importers, not international exporters like China, make the tariff payments to the US authorities, and study after study has discovered that Individuals bore the overwhelming majority of the price of Trump’s first-term tariffs on China. It’s straightforward to seek out specific examples of corporations that handed alongside the price of the tariffs to US shoppers.
Trump made a collection of false claims about commerce with Europe, all repeats from previous comments.
He mentioned Sunday: “They don’t take our automobiles. They don’t take our meals merchandise. They don’t take something. And we take their automobiles: Mercedes, Volkswagen, BMW. You realize, we take their hundreds of thousands of automobiles. They take no automobiles. They don’t take our farm product. They don’t take something. “
None of that is appropriate.
“They don’t take something” is way from the reality. Whereas the European Union definitely has some trade barriers that make it tougher for US corporations to export merchandise there, the official federal statistics present the US exported about $649 billion price of products and companies to the European Union in 2024.
It’s equally false that “they don’t take our farm merchandise.” Whereas the EU does have some trade barriers that impede US agricultural exports, the US Division of Agriculture says the EU purchased $12.8 billion price of US agricultural exports in 2024, making it the fourth-largest export marketplace for US agricultural and associated merchandise behind Mexico, Canada and China.
And whereas US automakers have typically struggled to reach Europe, Trump went too far when he mentioned, “They take no automobiles.” In line with a report final month from the European Vehicle Producers’ Affiliation, “164,857 US-made automobiles had been exported to the EU in 2024,” valued at about $8.4 billion at present change charges. (A few of these are automobiles made by European automakers at plants in the US.)
