‘It’s a nightmare’: Michael Medved slams Trump’s tariffs, claims markets have lost trillions

Stock markets worldwide responded to the Trump administration’s rollout of tariffs with its single worst day since COVID-19 wrecked the global economy in 2020.

China retaliated by raising its own tariffs against the U.S. in what many are calling “an escalating trade war.”

“It’s a nightmare,” commentary Michael Medved said on “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio. “Of all of the stupid things that Trump has done, and there are a lot of them, this is the top. I mean, look at the markets. It’s unbelievable. And this is people’s life savings. They depend on it. I think the anxiety that’s going around in the country right now, including from many, many Republicans, is very sad and very scary, and I can’t think of anything like this, other than wars and terrorist acts.”

The S&P 500 was down 3.8% in midday trading Friday, after earlier dropping more than 5%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 1,349 points, or 3.3%, as of 8:30 a.m., and the Nasdaq composite was 3.8% lower.

Have tariffs ever worked for the U.S.?

Have tariffs ever worked the way that some thought it would?

“No, this was part of the big lie that on Liberation Day that Trump was promulgating to the whole world: Tariffs have not worked,” Medved said. “They have only worked to slow economic growth. And, of course, because it’s a tax. What is amazing to me, if there is one thing that seems to have united conservatives in the past, it was the idea that economies will do better if they are not saddled with the cost of big government making all kinds of decisions that ought to be private. I don’t understand how people with conservative values can be behind this scheme, which has already tanked the market. It’s probably more than a trillion dollars already of wealth that has just disappeared because of the collapse in the markets worldwide.”

Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.