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Trump Authorizes 90-Day Pause on Some Tariffs; Trump Orders 90- Day Pause on New Tariffs Except for China; China Lashes Out at Vance's "Chinese Peasants" Comments. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired April 09, 2025 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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[15:00:34]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: The breaking news we've been following all afternoon, President Trump taking a U-turn on tariffs. the President, just a short time ago, declaring a 90-day pause on nearly all of his new tariffs. In a blink, as you can see on your screen, the Dow surged enormous gains on Wall Street in all major indices. And obviously, the big question is, where does this go next?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Exactly. China, we should note, is still on the line. The President is intensifying his pressure there. Tariffs actually going up on China to 125 percent. There's also a number of other tariffs we just need to be clear that are in effect, including that 10 percent across the board on those so-called reciprocal tariffs, including for folks who have a trade surplus with the U.S.

We are standing by right now to possibly see the President this hour. There is an executive order signing that was on tap for this afternoon. He has another event at the White House as well. CNN's Richard Quest back with us now.

First, though, let's go to CNN's Alayna Treene at the White House.

Alayna, what are you hearing? It's been quite the day there.

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: It really has. And I mean, it's been a lot of whiplash, honestly, Brianna and Boris, on these tariffs, with the President now announcing that he's going to have a 90-day pause on the reciprocal tariffs that went into effect, I should say, less than 15 hours ago at 12.01 AM.

We heard the President say that for those countries that did not retaliate when he had announced that these tariffs would go into effect last week, those were the countries that will kind of see this pause and have this 90-day relief. China, for their part, though, is only going to have more of those tariffs as you laid out, 125 percent.

But what I find to be very interesting about this is how this all happened, because just a couple of days ago, we had heard top economic advisers at this White House say that these tariffs were not a negotiation, that these were going to be a long-term process. And then we heard them say, actually, these - we are going to have negotiations. We welcome having these different trade partners come to the table, and the President does want to deal with them. And then, of course, today, we are now seeing that he's actually pausing this.

Now, I did have a chance to ask Treasury Secretary Bessent about this. I essentially said, why this reversal. It seems like this is a change in plan from what you guys had originally laid out that you were going to do.

He argued that, essentially, this was the President's plan all along. I will note, as well, though, I actually asked Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt about this yesterday, and she told me, you know, roughly 24 hours ago that the President had no plans to move away from putting these tariffs into effect. All to say this has really been a massive back-and-forth. And, of course, we've seen that in the markets as well.

I do want to just note that we are - we're actually seeing the President now. He's meeting with racing champions. I believe he is speaking now, not yet exactly on tariffs, but something to keep an eye out for sure this hour.

SANCHEZ: Yes, Alayna. Trump, apparently, they're speaking to a number of racing champions. We're going to keep monitoring his event and listen in in case he starts talking about this 90-day pause.

Let's go to Richard Quest now.

And, Richard, something that we have to stress here is the volatility in the way that the White House is making these announcements. And to your point, this is 90 days of a stay of execution, as Brianna put it. But after those 90 days, we may very well see a re-ignition of high tariffs on some of our allies.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN BUSINESS EDITOR-AT-LARGE: Absolutely. You know, you used the phrase - excuse me - you used the phrase a stay of execution, but actually the execution happened last night at midnight. So, you sort of brought the body back in a sense and lifted the sort of Damocles or whatever parallel we want to use.

But here's the other thing to remember. Firstly, let me be absolutely clear, delighted that this has happened. Magnificent that he's put the 90-day clause in. It gives time for proper negotiation on tariffs and non-tariff barriers, which is exactly what the President said he wanted to do.

So, this is the way it should have been done in the first place. But don't forget, you still have 125 percent tariffs on China, which is the largest trading partner. You have a tripling of average tariff rates. They were 2.5 percent.

[15:05:00]

They're now 10 percent across the board for everybody. You still have the auto tariffs of 25 percent. You still have the steel and aluminum tariffs of 25 - of 20 percent. So there's still an enormous amount of tariff headwinds in the economy. The only thing we're missing, I say only, but is this sort of draconian reciprocal stuff. And even then, China's had it heaped upon it.

KEILAR: I'm not sure if you heard, Richard, we just had a small business owner who had moved her production from China.

QUEST: Yes, I did.

KEILAR: Okay, so you heard it. So, she's moved her production from China to Cambodia. And now she doesn't want to be on the hook necessarily for an order in Cambodia. She'd suspended that order. You know, how broad is that kind of sentiment with businesses and production as, like, maybe I shouldn't have said a stay of execution, let's call it a suspended sentence. What is the issue that they're facing because this is only a 90-day stay.

QUEST: Now, you know, very glad you mentioned this - about that small business. How great, what goodness these people do. She took advantage of going from China to Cambodia. She nearly got done over by Cambodia's 54 percent, I think it is and ...

SANCHEZ: Hey, Richard, sorry to interrupt, but President Trump ...

QUEST: Please. Please.

SANCHEZ: ... is taking questions. Let's listen in from the White House.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, I thought that people were jumping a little bit out of line. They were getting yippy, you know? They were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid, unlike these champions, because we have a big job to do. No other president would have done what I did. No other president. I know the Presidents. They wouldn't have done it. And it had to be done.

What was happening to us on trade, not only with, you know, if you look at it, not only with China, but China was by far the biggest abuser in history and others also. But somebody had to do it. They had to stop because it was not sustainable.

Last year, China made $1 trillion off trade with the United States. That's not right. And now I've reversed it and it's for a short period of time. But we made $2 billion. We're making now $2 billion a day and somebody had to do it.

Roger actually said it, that Charles Schwab was here a little while ago, one of the great financial people. And he said he's been waiting for 40 years for somebody to do what I did over the last month. And if you didn't do it, you wouldn't have a country. It wouldn't be sustainable. So, I'm honored to have done it.

And, you know, look, nothing's over yet, but we have a tremendous amount of spirit from other countries, including China. China wants to make a deal. They just don't know how quite to go about it. You know, it's one of those things, they know how - quite - they're proud people. And President Xi is a proud man. I know him very well. And they don't know quite how to go about it, but they'll figure it out. They're in the process of figuring it out. But they want to make a deal.

And we have other - we have many other countries, as you know. Many - more than 75 and they all want to come. They want to come here or they'll go to commerce or they'll go to Treasury. We have our great senators here and congressmen. They'll call John through somebody. They'll go through somebody. But they're all calling, how do we do this. They all want to make a deal.

Somebody had to do what we did. And I did a 90-day pause for the people that didn't retaliate because I told them, if you retaliate, we're going to double it. And that's what I did with China because they did retaliate. So, we'll see how it all works out. I think it's going to work out amazing. I think that our country is going to be at the end of a year or shorter. But I think we're going to have something that nobody would have dreamt possible.

A man like Roger Penske, I don't want to get him in trouble with China, so I won't. But he would know that you have to - someday you have to cut the bow and you have to do what you have to do. Right, Roger? And that's what I did and I'm very happy to have done it.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, was there anyone ...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, the Prime Minister of Greece just told Breitbart's Matt Boyle that he thinks absolutely the European Union and the United States could work out a trade deal that's win-win and, quote, "mutually beneficial" to both sides.

TRUMP: I agree.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you think about the Prime Minister's comments and do you think a deal could be struck with the European Union?

TRUMP: First of all, I know him. He's a good man. And I appreciate his comments. Yes. A deal could be made with every one of them. A deal is going to be made with China. A deal is going to be made with every one of them. And there'll be fair deals. I just want fair. They will be fair deals for everybody, but they weren't fair to the United States.

They were sucking us dry. And you can't do that, you know? We have $36 trillion of debt for a reason. We don't have a debt for fun. They have it for a reason. And people took advantage of our country and they ripped us off for a very - for decades. I've been thinking about this for decades. I've been - if you ever saw me on television, I was young like these guys and that was the good old days, I'll tell you, Roger. But I was like these guys, young and I was talking about it. Nothing changed and nothing was done about it.

[15:10:08] Then, I did it. In my first term I did it and did it well. We took in hundreds of billions of dollars from China and others. And I started the process, but then we had to fix up from the COVID mess caused by China. We had to fix up from that, and we did a good job of doing it.

And when we handed back the reins after a rigged election, and when we handed back the reins, the stock market was higher than it was before COVID coming in. So, you know, we did a great job, but we didn't have time to do the big thing, which we're doing now. And it's a - you know, it's like a patient, too sick. You have to do surgery. The patient is very, very sick.

And Joe Biden handed us over a country that was in very serious trouble, economically and in every other way. They let China run away with things. They let other countries run away with things. And maybe worst of all, in a certain way, is what they did at the border. We had people pouring into our country by the millions. Many of them were murderers and drug lords and thieves and people from prisons from all over the world. And there were people from mental institutions, insane asylums. They were taking their mentally insane and they were dumping them into the - into our country.

And I'll tell you, Tom Homan and Kristi Noem are doing a fantastic job in removing them. And now the courts - the Supreme Court just gave us numerous good rulings where we have to be able to get them out. You had other judges trying to take over the system. And think of it, they take over. They want these people coming back.

Tren de Aragua from Venezuela - the Venezuela jails that cut off the fingers of a man in Colorado. They cut off his fingers because he called the police looking for help. They said, did you call the police. He said, yes, I did. Put your hand down. And they cut off the fingers. This is what - they want to bring these people back, no.

And I want to thank the president of El Salvador for the job he's done, because that is - that's the way it has to be done (INAUDIBLE) --

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Yes, please.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, they've been talking about tariffs for decades. How come when these Democrat elites want tariffs, everything's hunky dory? But when President Trump wants tariffs, all hell breaks loose. Do you see this double standard?

TRUMP: I love this guy. Whoever the hell that is. That's really nice. I appreciate that question.

No, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi - everybody knew you had to do it, but they never had the guts to do it. It does take guts. It even takes guts for our country to go through it. That's why I say be cool. They were saying about - so just be cool. It's going to work out. It's going to work out and it's working out. I can tell you they're working out maybe faster than I thought. But I said it's going to take a little conditioning. It's a transition to - it's really - I think it's a transition to greatness. It's going to be greatness. Our country is going to be - there'll be nothing like it. And people investing in our country, they're going to do better than they've ever done before.

We have more car manufacturers, Roger, coming into our country. Now, speaking of cars, we've never seen anything like it. And they're coming in because of the election. But they're coming in because of the tariffs, because they don't want to pay 25 or 50 or whatever it may be. They don't want to pay that. They can't pay that.

We had three cancellations in Mexico building a plant. They're all coming into the United States. Canada, they're coming in from - China, they're coming. They're coming in from everywhere. And that's just cars. We have chip makers come. We have the biggest chip maker in the world from Taiwan coming in, spending $3 billion to build plants and a big - mostly a big plant. It's a hell of a plant when you spend the kind of money that - that they're going to go to $200- to $300 billion, not million.

You know, you'd say a million would be the right number, so $200 to $300 billion dollars, think of that. Three hundred billion dollars. If you look at Apple, Apple is going to spend $500 billion building a plant. They wouldn't be doing that if I didn't do this. They'd just keep building them in China and that's unsustainable. It's not a pleasant thing to do. But I appreciate the question.

And, you know, interestingly, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, crazy Nancy, they've wanted to do this for years, but they never had a president that had the guts to do it because it does take guts, believe me.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) What are the bond markets that persuaded you to reverse course?

TRUMP: No, I was watching the bond market. The bond market is very tricky. I was watching it. But if you look at it now, it's beautiful. The bond market right now is beautiful.

But, yes, I saw last night where people were getting a little queasy. I think everything had - well, the big move wasn't what I did today.

[15:15:03]

The big move was what I did on Liberation Day. We had Liberation Day in America. We're liberated from all of the horrible deals that were made. All of the horrible trade deals that were made. And I was helped by people just like this senator, congressman and friends, right?

And we had great help in the Senate. Well, Republican senators have been amazing. They stood tall. And likewise in the House. And John Thune has done an amazing job. Barrasso has done an amazing job. All of - I mean, I can't think of a senator. Really, we had tremendous support. We got a bill passed the other day with almost unanimous support in the Senate. And I think we're going to get that in the House, too. And I have to tell you that Mike Johnson is a great speaker. He's done a fantastic job. We had a majority of one. Now we have a majority of seven.

And you don't realize how big seven is until you have a majority of one. Seven sounds like so much. But we're doing well. But Mike Johnson and John Thune have done a really great job.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, (INAUDIBLE) influenced your decision? Did you speak with anyone - you know, Jamie Dimon? Did you speak with anyone about ...

TRUMP: Well, I watched Jamie Dimon on Maria Bartiromo show this morning, and he was very good. He said that - actually made the statement to effect that something had to be done with the tariffs and trade. He said that. He said, look - you know, at some point - but he said something has to be done with tariffs and trade.

He understood it. He's very smart and very genius financially. He's done a fantastic job at the bank and he knows that. Everybody knows that. Anybody that's even a little bit smart knows it. It wasn't sustainable what was happening. Somebody had to pull the trigger. I was willing to pull the trigger.

This should have been done long ago, just like Biden should have stopped the border long ago. I mean, allowed 21 million people-plus into our country - many of whom should never have been allowed out of prisons and jails.

They came out of prisons and jails from all over the world. And now we're getting them out, bringing them back to their countries. But it's - should have never been done.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Yes, go ahead, please.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, would you consider exempting some U.S. companies, maybe some larger companies, who have been hit hard in the markets the last few days during this 90-day ...

TRUMP: Well, I'll take a look at it. As time goes by, we're going to take a look at it. There are some that have been hard. There are some that, by the nature of the company, get hit a little bit harder. And we'll take a look at that, yeah.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How do you determine that in the 90 days?

TRUMP: Just instinctively, more than anything else. I mean, you almost can't take a pencil to paper. It's really more of an instinct, I think, than anything else.

(CROSSTALK) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) credibility like, because you said that these tariffs would go into effect on Monday. You said no pause. And today there is a pause, so how can people believe your words today, sir?

TRUMP: I think you have to have - it's - yes, it's not a question of that. You have to have flexibility. I could say, here's a wall, and I'm going to go through that wall. I'm going to go through it no matter what and keep going, and you can't go through the wall.

Sometimes you have to be able to go under the wall, around the wall or over the wall. These guys know that better than anybody, right? You've got to go around them sometimes. You're not going to go through them. So I consider, you know, I think in financial markets, because they change. Look how much it changed today.

We went from, you know, pretty moderate today, but over the last few days it looked pretty glum, to - I guess they say it was the biggest day in financial history. That's a pretty big change. And I think the word would be flexible. You have to be flexible. Like,

he's asking the question about some companies.

Some companies, through no fault of their own, they happen to be in an industry that is more affected by these things than others. You have to be able to show a little flexibility. And I'm able to do that.

I'm going to say hello to these champions, because they are great champions. I got to say hello to them.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you, Mr. President.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... to avoid more (INAUDIBLE) ...

KEILAR: All right. We're listening to President Trump there on the South Lawn of the White House. This is an event where he is greeting racing champions of NASCAR and IndyCar and others. But he took questions there after we've learned of a 90-day pause in tariffs. And he did say that he had been watching the bond market last night, as he said people were getting queasy.

That was an understatement. But clearly he was watching that. And he also - just to fact check a couple of things, he's saying that, you know, they're making - they've been making a fortune on tariffs, $2 billion a day. Hard really to back up that number. But that is just - that is his claim of $2 billion, just to put it into context, the tariffs have spurred - Wall Street - to shed nearly $11 trillion, or Wall Street has shed nearly $11 trillion in Trump's second term, several trillion of it in response to the tariffs.

And then he also said - he was commending Republican senators. He said he couldn't think of any who hadn't stood tall, really, when it came to tariffs.

[15:20:05] But we should note that there have been several ...

SANCHEZ: Yes.

KEILAR: ... who have joined multiple efforts with Democrats to try to rein in his tariff power, so that is significant.

SANCHEZ: Yes. I remember that the White House has cited a national emergency to install these tariffs. Notably there, the President, as the administration has come out and said that this was the plan all along, that this is part of art of the deal, the President comes out and says that he noticed that people were getting yippy and getting queasy and he was watching bond markets and that apparently weighed in the calculus of deciding to take this step and enact this pause, this 90-day pause on new tariffs.

The President was specifically asked about China. And I found some of his remarks really interesting. We have our panel back with us, including CNN's Jim Sciutto. And Jim, I wanted to ask you about the comments President Trump made regarding China, because he says China wants to make a deal, but they don't know how to go about it. He says the Chinese are very proud people. President Xi is a proud man. They want to make a deal, but they don't know how to go about it.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, there's no evidence of that, right, because China has ramped up its own tariffs on U.S. products. And they have other tools in the toolbox, as it were, because there are a great number of U.S. companies that depend on China, Apple with iPhones, Tesla with its cars. And beyond folks who make stuff there, the bases of a lot of things made in this country come from China. And these are screws that China can turn in response to, in effect, punish the U.S. back.

And I think the thing you have to know about China is that China looks at its economic interests as national security interests, right, much as the U.S. does to some degree. So, it's not just a business deal for China. This goes to its - it's an existential question, right? If the Chinese economy falters or weakens, that is - that goes right to the core of core Chinese interests, and certainly the interests of its leaders.

The legitimacy of Chinese leaders goes to its economic stability and growth, frankly, because that's the deal China's made with its people. You don't have political freedom, but I'm going to continue to make you rich. And then the other piece is nationalism.

China, you know, historically and in recent years, as it feels that it has rightfully regained its place on top of the world, or at least in competition with the U.S. at the top of the world, it has a long history of being looked down upon by the West from its perspective, right, going back to colonial times. It's a country that has nationalist tendencies like any other nation does.

And Chinese leaders, Xi Jinping, whatever the degree of the friendship is between him and Trump, they know that. They - he knows that and he speaks to the people. He's not going to be looking to kowtow to Trump any more than Trump is looking to kowtow to China. And that - the reason I bring that up in recent context are those comments that we heard from J.D. Vance over the weekend describing the Chinese people as peasants. I believe we have the sound. It's worth listening again, because I have one thought on the other side of it. Have a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We borrow money from Chinese peasants to buy the things those Chinese peasants manufacture.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: I mean, he's not wrong on the economics that we sell a lot of debt. China buys our debt and that's how we finance American consumerism, the economy, et cetera. But I was trying to think of the equivalent of calling the Chinese people peasants from an American perspective.

If a Chinese leader or a leader in another country called Americans a bunch of hayseeds, right, you know, a bunch of hillbillies, you know, that kind of thing, that's not going to sit well, right, with Americans to be identified in such a way by a foreign leader. And there's the President - the Vice President speaking in those terms.

So I just think that if President Trump imagines that China is going to bow down to his pressure, both for National Security reasons, its own legitimacy and nationalism, it has a strong incentive to look strong in response to this and that explains the tariffs we're seeing.

KEILAR: And what about other countries, including so many American allies? Because there's still this 10 percent tariff in place. There's still a number of other tariffs.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

KEILAR: And even though this has now been paused for 90 days, it is a pause. And two, it also happened. I mean, it has shaken all of these countries and damaged the trust they have with the U.S. What's the effect there?

SCIUTTO: Well, listen, you speak to Canadian leaders, for instance, and these are the public comments of the prime minister. I've spoken to the foreign minister. They say that the relationship with the U.S. has fundamentally changed because they can't trust the U.S. as a trading partner or even perhaps as a National Security partner, right?

I mean, this is a president who violated the trade agreement he negotiated with Canada and Mexico in his last term. But Canada as well. It's not just China - it's not just the Chinese people who love their country and are proud of their country. The American people, the Canadian people are, too. And that's why you have - I mean, Trump has arguably resurrected the four fortunes of the Liberal Party in Canada based in part on the perception there among Canadians that they're standing up to Trump.

And, you know, that's a thing we have to realize and remember. Or, I don't know, Greenlanders, right?

[15:25:00]

You know, they don't like to be told what their future is. They have their own sense of national identity. And that's part of this. That's part of this.

SANCHEZ: The point about credibility being fundamental to maintaining strong trade and trading partners is something that Richard Quest brought up earlier. And Richard, something that Jim mentioned that I think should be brought up in discussion is the fact that China does have an enormous amount of leverage in any potential dealmaking with the United States, specifically because they own so much American debt.

QUEST: So, let's go through, the Chinese put this into a document just earlier this week, where they - the people's daily, in which they basically said to the United States, oh, all right, you want to bring this on? First of all, there are some things you can only get from us, rare mineral or rare earth minerals. There's a whole host of them that come from China that go into various electronics here in the United States can only come from China.

Secondly, minor things, but still important, things like Christmas decorations. They only come from China. The majority come from them. Fine. You can make your own at home with a bit of plastic and paper. But what about shoes? I pretty much guarantee if I take my shoe off - I'm not going to do it, don't worry - done that one.

KEILAR: Do it.

QUEST: All right. You want to see where it's made?

KEILAR: Yes, I do.

QUEST: You want to see - all right, let's see where ...

KEILAR: I'm, going to look at mine.

QUEST: Let's have a look and see where it's made this particular one. Yep. Sure enough, made in China. Made in China. But 90 percent, 98 percent, I think, is the number. Jim will correct me if I'm wrong. His are probably made somewhere more expensive, but --

SCIUTTO: I can actually answer it. Well, 90 percent are made in China, Vietnam and Indonesia ...

QUEST: Right.

SCIUTTO: ... because we did an interview on that yesterday.

QUEST: Right. And so, you know, and by the way, the average U.S. tariff was two and a half percent overall. The average U.S. tariff was two and a half percent. It's now gone to 10 percent. So that in itself - oh, it sounds brilliant compared to what it was. But that means now everything that the U.S. - everything is importing is 10 percent more. And that from China, which is at 14 percent of imports or 17 percent of imports, is going to be 154 percent, I think it is now. It's like 125 percent, so stuff will not just come from China anymore. That's going to be the reality of it. No more Christmas decorations.

SANCHEZ: We'll make our own. Maybe we'll use some of our shoes to make Christmas decorations. I don't know. Richard Quest, Jim Sciutto, thank you both.

We still have much more on our breaking news ahead. Take a look at how the Dow Jones Industrial Average is responding. Enormous gains as a result of this move by the administration. We'll discuss more in just minutes.

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