Bulwark Takes - Trump Surrogates Implode Live on TV Over Moronic Tariffs

Episode Date: April 6, 2025

Trump’s surrogates went on TV this weekend to defend his disastrous tariffs—and it went exactly as you’d expect. Tim Miller takes on the most embarrassing appearances from Trump’s cabinet discussing the plan to “reset global trade.” Buckle up, America. It’s getting bad out there.

Hey guys, it's Tim Miller from The Bulwark. The Trump surrogates were out on the Sunday shows this weekend desperately just grasping for anything to defend the Trump tariff regime that has sent the market tanking and the economy into flux. And I want to break down for you the lowlights, the worst clips from the Trump cabinet members. Just trying desperately to find anything that might sound reasonable for why their irrational mad king seems hellbent on single-handedly destroying the economy. But first, make sure to subscribe to The Bulwark right here on YouTube. Really, really appreciate it. Tell your friends. Okay. Up first, you know he's my least favorite cabinet secretary. It's a surprise position.

I thought it was going to be Cash isn't in the cabinet. I thought it was going to be Tulsi. I thought it might be Hegseth. Sam Stein wanted me to make it RFK. That was never going to be the least favorite for me. Not an RFK man, of course. We're picking the worst of the worst here. Man, maybe it could be Rubio, maybe christy gnome a chance turns out scotty besant is the one that i have found to be the worst uh because he is out there in a just very affected

condescending way defending the stupidest policy this country has put in place since iraq probably um anyway okay here it is scott besant uh let's play the first clip from him on meet the press markets lost more than six trillion dollars in value was this disruption always part of the plan mr secretary look Secretary? Look, the markets are organic, the animals, and you never know what the reaction's going to be. One thing that I can tell you as the Treasury Secretary, what I've been very impressed with is the market infrastructure, that we had record volume on Fridayiday and every everything is working very smoothly so the american people they can they be very uh take great comfort in that and in terms of the market reaction look we get these short-term market reactions from time to time the market consistently the under estimates donald

trump okay a couple things to point out there uh first he's he's talking about how happy is that everything's working smoothly like what what is this belarus are we in libya right now like we it is something that we think is nice if the markets don't totally crash or not work or as long as people can make their trades are we living in a trade and barter system are we returning to autarky we're like what what yeah in the united states the fucking stock market should work all right that's not really like a pat yourself on the back type situation but okay you're looking for something i get it uh the the line at the end there though was the one that most struck stood out to me scott besant wants you to think the market underestimates donald trump that trump is going to surprise them and and turn everything

around that's the opposite of what happened in the stock market this week i thought that you were a an investor i thought that you were an expert uh I thought that you were an expert from hedge fund world. I thought you understood the market system and capitalism and stocks and bonds and buying and selling. I thought you understood this. The fact that the market crashed this week was a reflection of the fact that the market overestimated Trump. They didn't think you all were going to be this fucking stupid because if they had already if they realized like i did i mean if they'd been listening to the bulwark if the you know wall street poobahs had been listening to the bulwark

they would have known that this was going to be a disaster and uh you know the market would have priced that in between november and and april But they were hopeful that, I don't know, cooler heads would prevail, that their man Scotty Besant in there would be able to talk Trump off the ledge. Nope. They were wrong. So the market overestimated Trump, actually. That's why it crashed. So there's Besant.

Probably, actually, the worst cabinet secretary is not Scott Besson but it's Howard Lutnick he's next but he's so stupid that it's hard for me to kind of get my dander up about him and he's like a clown I don't know about you guys but I'm much more agitated by somebody who seems like they know better who's nefarious where I put Besset in that category versus somebody who is a moron putting on clown makeup and just trying to get attention for themselves i don't you know it's like it's kind of why the dan crenshaw's of the world may are you know rile me up more than the marjorie taylor greens okay anyway letnick is in the latter category. I have two clips from him. Face the Nation on CBS. Let's play the first bit. Mr. Secretary, the campaign's over. You won. So I'm asking what

the plan is. So the Treasury Secretary said on another network, we're going to hold the course. It's not the kind of thing you can negotiate away in days or weeks. That makes it sound like the tariffs are staying in place at least for days or weeks. Is that correct? Or is the president considering postponing implementation to negotiate? There is no postponing. They are definitely going to stay in place for days and weeks. That is sort of obvious. The president needs to reset global trade okay so here he's just laying the groundwork there's not gonna be any postponing there's still some wish casting out there i'm seeing it among my old traditional conservative friends oh he's just gonna negotiate he's just gonna negotiate we're even seeing it from elon i'll get to that in a different video

um you know this is all part of some 40 chess strategic plan and letnick is just the blunt force instrument that's like nope no postponing no matter how bad it gets no matter how stupid it is we are pedal to the metal then he goes on to say we're gonna reset global trade reset global trade wow Reset global trade. Wow. Is that really what people have signed up for? Is that really what people want? Donald Trump, who bankrupted a casino, resetting the global trade order.

Are we sure that's going to turn out how people want? This is like the scene some, a couple of populist left people got mad at me on social media over the weekend because they still like tariffs and trade protectionism. And it's like, I guess if that includes you, I guess I would say to you guys, be careful what you wish for, all right? There's certainly some flaws in the American-led global order that included much easier transfer of goods around the world. There's certainly been some issues related to that, for sure. But just because one thing isn't perfect doesn't mean what replaces it is going to be better. In fact, usually it's going to be worse.

It's the shitification of our society. And so Donald Trump resetting global trade, that should set a chill down your spine. That's what the Secretary of Commerce said today. All right. I got one more funny one from Clown Lutnick. Someone sent me nut lick on social media. I know I'm a child, but I have to admit that made me laugh. Here's Lutnick. Great American workers.

You know, we are going to. The armies of millions of people. Well, remember, the army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little, little screws to make iPhones. That kind of thing is going to come to America. Okay. So, the army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones. That kind of thing is going to come to America. That is a bad quote. Okay. I mean, that is a

quote of somebody who has not met a human that works with their hands and many, many years. Is there anybody out there who's like, boy, I'm really dying for a job screwing in little screws into the iPhone. That's going to be real high quality work that's gonna i'm gonna find a lot of dignity in that job i i mean that is just an insane quote it's so stupid that i think maybe if you kind of like listen to the whole clip and you try to understand what he's trying to say and you're generous to nutlick then what you'll see is as maybe he's trying to say that those we're going to get rid of those jobs so sorry if you're a poor vietnamese person that is screwing in little screws we're getting rid of your job we're going to bring it to america we're going to build factories that's going to

take a long time but eventually we'll have an automated system that does the screwing and the little screws and that there'll be more jobs for Americans to like oversee that and troubleshoot and engineer. I guess that's the generous pitch. There's some problems with that, including the fact that currently right now in America, we actually have a shortage of people

who work in manufacturing. there are more manufacturing job openings than there are people that want those jobs so you know you might remember the whole haitian migrant thing like the reason why springfield had to import a lot of haitian migrants is because there has been a renaissance of manufacturing in springfield and there weren't enough americans to do the job so a lot of holes there does make you chuckle the idea that the army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iphones is going to come to america i mean that is a classic quote all right next up my favorite she's a sleeper she is a sleeper for worst case it's hard to make the secretary of agriculture the worst cabinet secretary, but she's trying. She's Brooke Rollins. Let's let's watch Brooke Rollins with Jake Tapper on CNN. tariffs were going to be imposed. And you're imposing a 10 percent tariff on the herd in

McDonald Islands. The herd in McDonald Islands have zero human inhabitants. They have zero exports. They have zero imports. They do have a lot of penguins. Why are you putting import tariffs on islands that are entirely populated by penguins. Well, I mean, come on, Jake. Obviously, here's the bottom line. We live under a tariff regime from other countries. We have too long-seated the idea that America goes first. I mean, come on. Whatever.

Listen, the people that are leading this are serious, intentional, patriotic, the smartest people I've ever worked with. I did not come up with the formulas. I'm the Ag Secretary. I studied agriculture at Texas A&M. Hookie there. She's struggling. She is struggling.

Why are we putting import tariffs on penguins? She doesn't have a good answer. But she will tell you this. She studied ag at Texas A&M, and these are the smartest people she's ever been around. Not exactly the best advertisement for Texas A&M. Just saying that, go Tigers. Not exactly the best advertisement for Texas A&M

that Howard Lutnick's the smartest person she's ever been around. But, yeah uh this is a person that is i mean she is grasping have you ever seen anybody humming a humming a humming like that i'm jake dapper giving her the jake dapper face not a lot of answers from brooke rollins so i don't think it's going to be the secretary of agriculture that uh makes the best case for these tariffs maybe though it will be the economic expert that they brought in the uh trump administration did bring in kevin has it now kevin has said i don't know if you know him uh but he's an old he's a bushy he's an online he's

a heritage foundation guy um and uh you know he's a classic He was an anti-tariff guy, obviously, in the past and nerd, but just a nerd who wants to be famous. He's a very ambitious nerd. Bad combo. Kevin Asset, now the director of the National Economic Council. I'll save you watching the whole pencil-headed defense of the tariffs, because it wasn't really any better than the other guys. But there was one clip I did find funny. He was pushed by George Stephanopoulos about why Russia was cut out of the tariffs.

And it's curious. Let's take a listen to his answer. Why did the president not include Russia on the list of countries that are facing tariffs? There's obviously an ongoing negotiation with Russia and Ukraine, and I think the president made the decision not to conflate the two issues. It doesn't mean that Russia, the fullest of time, is going to be treated wildly different than every other country. But Russia is one of the only countries, one of the few countries that is not subject to these new tariffs, aren't they? They're in the middle of a negotiation, George, aren't they? Well, I'm asking a different question. And I just want to know why Russia is...

Would you literally advise that you go in and put a whole bunch of new things on the table in the middle of a negotiation that affects so many American and Ukrainian and Russian lives? Not wise to introduce new issues into these negotiations midstream hmm that's interesting we're doing a lot of negotiations though right we're in some negotiations in the middle east they they weren't exempt we're apparently doing negotiations with panama and greenland and den. Denmark wasn't left out. You know who else we're doing negotiations with? This may be the more apt comparison, though.

Ukraine. You know, the other party at the negotiation table? The one that got invaded? The one that is still suffering from bombings every night from their neighbor is trying to conquer them. You know, those guys, I know this administration doesn't really like to think about them very much unless they're demanding that they ask for thank that they give thank yous. But Ukraine is also part of that negotiation. Sometimes, you know, easy to forget if you're a putinista but um what was the i'm trying to remind myself what was the tariff put on ukraine let's look yes actually it was 10 tariff

placed on ukraine so the it's not wise to introduce new issues into these negotiations midstream thesis seems to only imply for the bad guys in the negotiation the people who are ostensibly on our side we're going to tear off them fuck you throw that on the table good luck just like we're giving away your territory we're going to steal some of your rare earth and uh yeah we're also going to tear a few um the area is expected to bend over and take it uh but the russians wouldn't want to make pootie mad wouldn't want to make putin mad not great guys you know there's much to laugh at with howard lutnick and kevin has it um but uh booker allen's lot to laugh at all around really uh but it's pretty bad the reordering

of global trade these are the guys that group trump asset besant lutnick rollins you want them reordering the global trading system buckle up good luck america subscribe to the feed we'll see you soon