In a Wednesday appearance on Fox Business Network's "Kudlow," U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Auburn) went to bat for President Donald Trump in his tariff war on China.
Trump raised the tax rate on Chinese imports to 145% this week.
Tuberville said he was in favor of "hammering China" with tariffs and making them "hurt." He emphasized the importance of getting manufacturing back in the United States.
"We got a lot of panicans here in the Capitol, but at the end of the day, President Trump holds the cards," Tuberville told host Larry Kudlow. "All those cards are the American taxpayers, Larry. They're behind President Trump. They understand what he's trying to do. This is going to be our last chance. We'll never have a President like him again—simply for the fact that he knows what he's doing. He's a business guy, and he knows that we cannot continue to let China steal, defraud us, do everything possible to build their country up while we're going south. We need to continue this. And again, we need to work with these people, you know, he's got them standing in line at the White House. I'm sure that's one of the reasons he has a 90-day pause [while] countries were just waiting to get in the door, but China's not coming. I'm for just hammering China. Keep putting tariffs on them. Make them hurt because they are building right and left their military—one day they think they're going to take us on. We cannot allow that to happen, Larry. You know that."
"Well, I think one of the offshoots of the discussion with China for Mr. Trump, look, 125% tariff. China's not going be able to sell into our market," Kudlow replied. "But selling all their subsidized manufacturing stuff with cheap wages, that's their whole economy. So, we are just cutting them off at the knees. I guess what I'm saying is, Trump has completely outfoxed Xi Jinping. Trump is the master of the chessboard, not Xi."
"Exactly," Alabama's senior U.S. Senator agreed. "Larry, China sends daily 300 container ships that have thousands of containers on each ship, 300 a day to the United States of America with mostly junk. OK? It should be made in the United States of America."
"Now, they make some […] car parts and things like that. But at the end of the day, we can do that here. And President Trump knows we have to get manufacturing back. Bill Clinton [and] NAFTA almost put us under. I go through small towns, Larry, in Alabama, and manufacturing's gone. Nobody lives there. The streets are closing down. If we don't get it back now, it'll never happen," Tuberville added.
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