Report: Free-Traders Gary Cohn, Steve Mnuchin Trying to Weaken Trump’s Expected Tariffs on China

The avid free trade-wing of President Trump’s administration is trying to convince him to weaken his economic nationalist agenda, which is expected to include harsh tariffs on potentially hundreds of imported Chinese goods.

White House advisers Gary Cohn, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Kevin Hassett, and Everett Eissenstat are pushing Trump to water down his actions against China’s helping to ruthlessly globalize the American economy, according to an exclusive report by Axios’ Jonathan Swan.

Trump is seeking to follow up on recommendations made by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, wanting a 24 percent tariff on all imported steel and a ten percent tariff on imported aluminum.

Specifically, with regards to China, according to Swan, Trump is looking to impose tariffs on possibly hundreds of imported Chinese products, a move that has the globalist, free trade-wing of his White House upset.

Swan reports:

The free traders — think Steven Mnuchin, Gary Cohn, Kevin Hassett, and Everett Eissenstat — only want tariffs on Chinese products that many other countries also produce (including uranium, consumer electronics and LED light bulbs.) They’re trying to blunt any impact on American consumers. [Emphasis added]

The move against China would be a watershed moment for Trump’s economic nationalist agenda, which is focused primarily on using trade to increase the number of goods made in American and bring back blue-collar manufacturing jobs that have been outsourced to foreign countries by multinational corporations.

Ross’s recommended tariffs that Trump is likely to impose are designed to increase domestic steel production to 80 percent from its current rate of 73 percent, while also increasing the American production of aluminum to 80 percent from its current rate of only 48 percent.