President Donald Trump’s exclusive interview with NBC News’ Kristen Welker – his first network TV since winning the election – was a mixed bag. At times, he tried to sound measured: Trump told the “Meet the Press” host that he would work with Democrats to find a way to preserve the Dreamers’ legal status. He said he would not ban abortion, fire Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell or order impeachment of political opponents.
But as always, Trump’s angry thoughts got the better of him. Not long after promising not to go after his enemies, Trump said members of the House of Representatives on January 6 “have committed serious crimes and should go to prison.” He told Welker he would pardon the rioters from the Capitol attack on his first day in office. And echoing Robert F. Kennedy Jr., his choice to run the Department of Health and Human Services, he toyed with the debunked theory that vaccines are responsible for increasing autism diagnoses.
Fortunately the most important moment of all, however, came near the beginning of the extensive interview. During the campaign, Trump proposed tariffs of 10-20% on all imports – and 60% on goods from China. Welker asked if he could “guarantee” that Americans would not pay higher prices under these tariffs.
“I make no promises,” Trump replied. He noted (correctly) that his first term saw low inflation, even as he used new currency. But those taxes were on a very small scale. Many studies project his new proposal would cost Americans hundreds or thousands of dollars a year.
The importance of inflation is not lost on Trump. “I won on two counts,” he told Welker later in an interview. “I won at the border, and I won at the grocery store.” And yet even Trump, who has built a career of bluffing and promising the impossible, couldn’t pretend that his plan to avoid inflation would work. Inflation indicators show an annual increase of less than 3%, below the spike during the presidency of Joe Biden. But companies ranging from Walmart-sized conglomerates to small businesses are already warning they may raise prices. And since Trump got credit for inflation in his first term, he will take the blame for inflation in his second.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com