Donald Trump has trouble has a huge problem of keeping people on his staff. Instead, there is a revolving door of people entering, seeing the disaster surrounding the president, and heading back out as fast as they can.
The president’s pick for the eleventh Director of the National Economic Council in the White House and Chief Economic Advisor to President only lasted from 2017 to 2018. Gary Cohn talked about leaving the White House:
‘.@Gary_D_Cohn on leaving the White House: “At the end of the day, he was going a different direction on some of the trade negotiations than I would have gone. I agreed fundamentally on what the issue was. I just didn’t agree on how to solve the issue”‘
He said that he thought the president’s tariff plan with Beijing, China did not assist the U.S. in getting any other result” when he appeared on CBS’s Sunday morning Face the Nation show:
‘I don’t think the tariffs helped us get to any different outcome.’
This new deal covered “intellectual property protection and enforcement” and ended “forced technology transfer” and “currency manipulation.” In addition, the agreement increased American farm purchases, such as soybeans exports. However, it has been too late for the many family farms that went bankrupt. Trump’s fixes have gone primarily to the larger corporate farms.
These deals will remain in place until America and China move on to the “Phase Two” agreement.
The commander-in-chief has held his beliefs about tariffs for decades, and nicknamed himself “tariff man.” Trump was trying to force China to negotiate with the U.S., but the tariffs have hurt the nation, regardless of America’s “strong economic growth’ and “period of low unemployment.” Cohn said:
‘I think it’s totally hurt the United States. Look, the U.S. economy is very strong, very solid. Employment growth is great. But we’re missing a big component. We’re missing the capital expenditures from companies in the United States.’
Cohn did not agree with the president about tariffs. He resigned after Trump insisted on “double-digit duties on steel and aluminum” close to two years ago. He called these tariffs not “helpful to our economy:”
‘The minute a company is thinking about spending capital, what do you go out and buy? You go out and buy steel and aluminum. That’s how you build factories. That’s how you build property, plant equipment. So all of the sudden, the advantages that we were trying to give companies to help stimulate the economy — to build facilities, to go out and hire people, to drive wages — we took away that advantage by taxing the input that they needed to build.’
When questioned about why he decided to resign, Cobh said:
‘At the end of the day (Trump) was going a different direction on some of the trade negotiations than I would have gone. I agreed fundamentally on what the issue was. I just didn’t agree on how to solve the issue.’
The economist noted that understanding Donald Trump was a matter of “what you see on TV is exactly what you get in private:”
‘What you see on TV is exactly what you get in private with the president. The president is the same person behind closed doors as he is out in public, which is a unique feature. You know, it’s not like he turns it on or turns it off when he walks outside. So you’ve seen everything the president has. That’s exactly what you see when you’re in a private meeting with him.’
Twitter world blew apart with Cohn’s news. Check out some of our favorites below:
The Mueller Report Adventures: In Bite-Sizes on this Facebook page. These quick, two-minute reads interpret the report in normal English for busy people. Mueller Bite-Sizes uncovers what is essentially a compelling spy mystery. Interestingly enough, Mueller Bite-Sizes can be read in any order.
