Summary:
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent may be planning to cut and run after Donald Trumpās disastrous āreciprocal tariffā announcement earlier this week.
During an appearance on MSNBCās Morning Joe Friday, contributor Stephanie Ruhle reported that the key Cabinet member is already looking for an escape hatch.
āMy sources say that Scott Bessent is kind of the odd man out here and, in the inner circle that Trump has, heās not even close to Scott Bessent or listening to him,ā Ruhle said. āSome have said to me, heās looking for an exit door to try to get himself to the Fed, because in the last few days heās really hurting his own credibility and history in the markets.ā
To be sure, Trumpās tariff policy represents a sort of defeat for Bessent, a former hedge fund manager who entered office under the delusion that he might actually succeed in stopping Trump from wrecking the economy. Should he flee the administration now, he would likely forfeit what little credibility remains.
Bessent warned other countries Wednesday not to make any rash decisions in reaction to Trumpās sweeping āretaliatory tariffā policy, which included a 10 percent baseline tariff on almost every country in the world.
āMy advice to every country right now is: Do not retaliate. Sit back, take it in, letās see how it goes. Because if you retaliate, there will be escalation. If you donāt retaliate, this is the high-water mark,ā he warned.
Bessentās warning came off particularly clueless given that democratically elected foreign leaders are likely beholden to their electorate, who wonāt take lightly to Trumpās blatant bullying.
Ruhleās sources told her Bessent must understand just how ridiculous Trumpās tariff policy is because he āactually understands how the markets work, and whatās happening right now is only going to hurt markets,ā she said.
And it already has: The Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq Composite experienced their single worst sessions since 2020 on Thursday. Bessentās nomination had received strong Republican support because of his experience with financial markets.
I experienced considerable extremely violent bullying at one stage in my life.
Here is what I learned: turning the other cheek doesnāt work. A baseball bat does. Escalation wasnāt a risk, it was the solution. It just depends on whoās doing it and how decisively.
For sure, but all the other vulnerable kids kept their heads down and were just grateful that they werenāt getting the same attention you were