During less than a month in office, President Trump has pursued more trade actions against adversaries and allies than all the trade measures he took in his entire first four-year term. There is one man guiding it all: his trade adviser Peter Navarro.Ana Swanson, who covers trade and international economics for The Times, explains why Mr. Navarro thinks tariffs will usher in a new age of American prosperity.Guest: Ana Swanson, who covers trade and international economics for The New York Times.Background reading: Mr. Navarro, a loyalist in Mr. Trump’s first term, was a thorn in the side of Wall Street.Mr. Trump’s tariffs are threatening to upend the global economic order.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Chapter 1: Who is guiding Trump's new trade actions?
From The New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams. This is The Daily. President Trump says he's going to announce so-called reciprocal tariffs on every country with duties placed on the U.S. With less than a month in office, we're just hours into a new trade conflict.
President Trump has pursued more trade actions against adversaries and allies than all the trade measures he took in his entire first term. Tariffs ordered by President Trump went into effect at midnight. Canada and Mexico will be among the hardest hit by these tariffs.
These tariffs more than triple what was done during the first term.
And there's one man guiding it all.
President-elect Trump choosing Peter Navarro for a top economic position in his next administration.
Today, my colleague Ana Swanson on how Peter Navarro rose to become one of Trump's key advisors and why he thinks tariffs will usher in a new era of American prosperity. It's Tuesday, February 18th. Hi, Ana. Hey, how are you? Good. Thank you for being here. I wanted to talk to you because you covered President Trump in his first term and you focused a ton on international trade.
So I figured you would be the right person to talk to and help me understand this key advisor, Peter Navarro, who's been advising Trump on all of these tariff policies that we've been hearing about recently. Okay.
Right. So I met Peter Navarro when I was covering trade policy in Trump's first term. And he's an interesting person because he had a very unusual journey to the White House. And he had views about trade in China that were considered pretty unconventional and unpopular. But over time, these views have become one of the driving forces of Trump's trade policy. Exactly.
So I'm pleased to see you after four long years of exile.
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Chapter 2: How did Peter Navarro become Trump's key trade advisor?
And they didn't anticipate, I think, that this transition was a lot more disruptive and painful. And the pain was really localized and vivid and sharp, particularly in the industrial Northeast and Midwest, where people now are really hurting because they don't have factory employment anymore. And economists have found that then other problems follow, like drug addiction.
And these are all things that Peter Navarro was focused on, too, actually.
When I did my Death by China movie I went to Dayton and I saw the people who would otherwise be in factories walking around with shopping carts, stealing copper out of homes and buildings, whatever they could, and then going and using the money to get high.
It really does sound like Peter Navarro is ringing the alarm bell on China kind of well before a lot of other people are. How does he actually get attached to Donald Trump, though?
So Trump at this point has been complaining about China and its trade practices for a really long time.
President Trump, the way we intersected was through an interview, interestingly enough, that he did for the Los Angeles Times in 2011.
At one point, Trump is asked by the L.A. Times, what are some of your favorite books on China?
And he proceeded to do something I'm not sure I could even do. He listed his top 10 books by title and author. And I was number six, the Coming China Award.
And he mentions one of Peter Navarro's books. So they start corresponding and... One thing led to another. Ultimately, then candidate Trump decides to bring Navarro on to his campaign.
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Chapter 3: What is Peter Navarro's background and his views on trade?
Instead, he talked about how Chinese companies would absorb some of the cost of the tariffs to keep prices low. Your goal is to help U.S. factories. But a lot of U.S. factories do buy components and parts from abroad. And, you know, I've talked to a lot of manufacturers who say that would raise their costs. It would make them harder, you know, harder for them to make things.
Does that kind of backfire on your agenda?
So here's one of the iron laws of manufacturing. If manufacturing goes abroad, the supply chains follow and vice versa. Okay.
I also asked him about U.S. manufacturers who are buying parts from abroad and whether tariffs would hurt their business. And he didn't seem all that concerned with what I've been hearing from some American manufacturers. He just kept coming back to the idea that ultimately tariffs will incentivize both American and foreign companies to build factories in the U.S.,
You can have a domestic investment come quickly.
Which he believes will then lead to higher wages for Americans.
You see wages go up, and that gives consumers more spending power and offsets any rise in prices. If real wages rise faster than any other types of inflation, people are still better off.
And he said these tariffs aren't happening in a vacuum.
When I was a campaign advisor in 2016, I had a mantra. It was tax cuts, deregulation, strategic energy dominance, fair trade. Those were the four components, the tires on the car towards economic prosperity.
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