President Donald Trump admitted his massive tariffs on China will trickle down to U.S. families—including their children’s toys.
During a largely sycophantic meeting with Cabinet officials on Wednesday, Trump dismissed concerns over empty store shelves in light of his levy on Chinese imports. He claimed the U.S. under former President Joe Biden overspent on items from China that the country didn’t need.
Now that the U.S. has imposed 145 percent tariffs on China, he said, families should watch their wallets.
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According to Trump, China “made a trillion dollars with Biden, selling us stuff. Much of it we don’t need.” He then added, “Somebody said, ‘Oh, the shelves are gonna be open.’ Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls, and maybe the two dolls will cost a couple of bucks more.”
Democrats and journalists promptly ridiculed Trump’s remarks. “Scrooge McTrump,” former CNN reporter Jim Acosta wrote on X.
“The man had the Oval covered in 24k gold,” Pod Save America co-host Jon Favreau wrote on X, referring to Trump’s admission to The Atlantic about his newly gilded Oval Office.
The striking comment comes as families and small businesses grapple with the Trump administration’s trade war with China. While most countries got a 90-day reprieve from Trump’s highest reciprocal tariffs, the U.S. has gradually increased its levies on China.
Trump claimed during his ABC News interview on Tuesday that China “probably will eat those tariffs.”
“At 145, they basically can’t do much business with the United States,” he said. “And, they were making, from us, a trillion dollars a year. They were ripping us off like nobody’s ever ripped us off.”
