Scott Bessent Asked: 'What Is The White House's Ultimate Objective' With Tariffs?

At a White House press briefing, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was questioned about the goals of tariffs.

Transcript

00:00I have a question for Secretary Besson on tariffs the president said over the

00:06weekend that we are hoping that maybe tariff revenues could replace income tax

00:12but we also keep hearing about the deals the administration is pursuing so my

00:17question is what is the White House's ultimate objection objective here do you

00:23want to have long-term tariff revenue or deals that might reduce those tariffs I

00:29think it's a combination of both so we're going to take in long-term tariff

00:33revenue we put a process in place we have 18 important trading relationships

00:38we will be speaking to all of those partners or at least 17 of them the over

00:45the next few weeks many of them have already come to Washington what President

00:50Trump is referring to is the ability for tariff revenue to give income tax relief

00:56and I think there's a very good chance that we will see this in the upcoming

01:00tax bill the president campaigned on no tax on tips the tax on Social Security no

01:06tax on overtime and the restoring interest deductibility for autos for

01:12American-made autos so tariff income could be used for tax relief on all those

01:19immediately so you think that there is a role for significant tariff revenue in

01:25US fiscal policy I think that it is something that got put away a long time

01:32ago and I think that tariffs will bring back American manufacturing and generate

01:39substantial revenues