{"id":53053,"date":"2025-08-07T22:25:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T22:25:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/53053\/"},"modified":"2025-08-07T22:25:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T22:25:09","slug":"scott-bessent-admits-americans-pay-for-trumps-tariffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/53053\/","title":{"rendered":"Scott Bessent Admits Americans Pay for Trump’s Tariffs"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tOn Thursday at midnight, steep retaliatory tariffs<\/a> Donald Trump<\/a> slapped on dozens of countries went into effect. \u201cIT\u2019S MIDNIGHT!!! BILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN TARIFFS ARE NOW FLOWING INTO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!\u201d the president wrote<\/a> on Truth Social minutes before the levies snapped into effect.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cTariffs are flowing into the USA at levels not thought even possible,\u201d he added in a subsequent post<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tHours later, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent<\/a> appeared on MSNBC<\/a>, where he was gently coaxed into admitting that while the government might rake in plenty from the new taxes, American businesses and consumers are the ones paying the penalties.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSo if someone here, an importer, wants to buy Brazilian products today or tomorrow and import them, they\u2019re going to pay 50 percent to the Treasury, and so who writes that check,\u201d host Eugene Robinson asked Bessent of the new tariffs leveled against the South American nation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBessent first stated that tariffed Brazilian imports could simply be replaced with \u201csubstitutes\u201d from other nations, before being pressed by Robinson to clarify \u201cwho writes the check to the Treasury,\u201d if the product does come from a tariffed nation like Brazil.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWell, the check is written to the person who receives it at the dock, in the U.S.\u201d Bessent replied.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe check is written by the person, the receiver. So the tariff is paid in this country by the importer. Is that right?\u201d Robinson pressed. Bessent then said that the exporter could lower their price to retain market share. Robinson pressed again: \u201cBut the check is written by the importer, at the dock?<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYep,\u201d Bessent said. \u201cAnd the importer can pass it on or not.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe economic reality is that tariffs are not taxes paid by exporters, they are an economic disincentive against the importing specific products that primarily burdens the purchaser. But much like President Trump thinks he can just fire<\/a> the nation\u2019s leading statistician to make his floundering economic metrics go away, the administration believes it can simply declare that centuries of economic theory and practice don\u2019t apply to them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n

\n\tThe pared down tariffs that have been in place for several months have already begun negatively impacting<\/a> the American economy. Job and GDP growth has slowed, consumer prices are on the rise, and inflation has begun to tick up. Some of Trump\u2019s advisers worry that not even dipping economic numbers will get the president to back off his chaotic tariff policy.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSometimes Trump can\u2019t stand prosperity,\u201d longtime Trump economic confidant Stephen Moore, told Rolling Stone this week<\/a>. \u201cMy advice to Trump is to stop with the tariffs. We don\u2019t need tariffs right now. \u2026 When I see him, he knows my position; every time he sees me, he says: \u2018There\u2019s Steve Moore! He doesn\u2019t like tariffs!\u2019 This will hopefully get the administration to back off of the tariffs.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tRolling Stone reported that Trump fulfilled a long-held dream by firing<\/a> Erika McEntarfer, the Commissioner of Labor Statistics, after the agency released a weak job report on Monday. He is continuing to do what he can to avoid the reality of his economic agenda as the new round of tariffs went into effect last night.<\/p>\n

\t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cBILLIONS OF DOLLARS, LARGELY FROM COUNTRIES THAT HAVE TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF THE UNITED STATES FOR MANY YEARS, LAUGHING ALL THE WAY, WILL START FLOWING INTO THE USA,\u201d he wrote<\/a> on Truth Social.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tHe can put it in all caps, he can post it 10 times a day, but by the admission of his own Treasury secretary, it\u2019s American businesses who are writing the check for those billions. Consumers are already feeling the squeeze, and it stands to get a lot worse.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Thursday at midnight, steep retaliatory tariffs Donald Trump slapped on dozens of countries went into effect. \u201cIT\u2019S…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53054,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[45,49,48,1376,12400,4992],"class_list":{"0":"post-53053","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-donald-trump","12":"tag-scott-bessent","13":"tag-tariffs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53053\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}