This is a big deal, isn't it? Because
the tariff is is fundamental to the very
razet of President Trump. He loves them.
>> Absolutely. His favorite word in the
English language. He has said time and
again is the word tariffs. And I think
it's really important, as you've done,
Vanessa, to underscore that this is not
just simply a pillar of Donald Trump's
trade policy. He is using tariffs as uh
leverage in foreign policy as well. It
goes way beyond simply regulating uh
trade between the United States and its
trading partners all over the world. So
this is a big setback for the White
House. It's not the end of the story
because it certainly means that the
issue will now be resolved at the United
States Supreme Court where of course uh
the ninemember bench includes six
justices who were appointed by
Republican presidents and three of them
placed on the court by President Trump
himself during his first term in office.
So he will be hoping for a different
outcome at the Supreme Court. But if he
doesn't get it, if the justices there
agree with the appeals court uh which in
a 7 to4 vote on Friday said that Donald
Trump had broken the law by using
emergency powers to sideline Congress
and act unilaterally to uh unveil those
liberation day reciprocal tariffs. We
all remember, you know, those images in
the White House Rose Garden when he was
holding up signs almost looked like he
was reading the Eurovvision Song Contest
results for every particular country and
what tariffs he was going to apply to
them. The courts are saying you didn't
have the right to use emergency powers
to do that because there was no trading
emergency at the time. Uh so they're
going to have their work cut out for
them. White House lawyers uh pushing
back against that argument. But
President Trump and his lawyers uh are
both arguing that if these tariffs get
undone, it's going to create uh what his
lawyers said was economic chaos. And
what the president said on social media
last night would be a total disaster for
the country. So the stakes very high for
him and of course very high for uh
British exporters among many many other
uh exporters around the world who want
to sell their product into the United
States and want to overcome the tariff
barriers that President Trump has put
into place. Is there any suggestion that
if the court um continues to rule or
rules in the next uh the next hearing
that the tariffs are illegal and were
imposed under illegal circumstances that
people will be and countries nations
will be able to recover monies that
they've already spent or is once a
tariff paid a tariff is paid and that's
that.
>> Yeah. Well, not yet but that day may be
coming. So the uh federal appeals court
yesterday, even though it said that the
tariffs were illegal, also said they can
remain in place and the government can
continue collecting all of those tariff
revenues until October the 14th. Well,
by the time October the 14th rolls
around, the White House absolutely will
have filed with the Supreme Court. And
at that point, the assumption is that
the deadline will automatically get
extended until the Supreme Court rules
on the case, which could take several
months. But if the Supreme Court says
absolutely this was illegal, strikes the
tariffs down, at that point the US
government would uh likely be required
to refund all of the billions of dollars
in tariffs that it has collected and
about which President Trump boasts
continually. Now, that may not be the
end of the story because Donald Trump
could say, "Okay, well, I wasn't allowed
to impose these tariffs through through
declaring a state of emergency. We'll
now work with Congress and do it that
way." But but there is the real
possibility that billions of dollars of
refunds would be made. And of course,
they go to the importers. Uh they don't
go to the the manufacturers of the
goods. I mean, they would then have to
uh have a negotiation with the
importers. uh that bring their goods
into the United States, assuming they're
using uh another party to do that. So,
it would get unbelievably messy, and it
would also create a hole in the public
finances here based on Donald Trump's uh
continuing insistence that he's bringing
billions of dollars into America uh that
can shore up the economy and create
opportunities uh here at home. If I
asked you for your hit parade of the
most dramatic ways in which tariffs or
threats of tariffs or impositions of
tariffs have influenced foreign policy
rather than trade under Donald Trump,
what would you say? So which are the
most kind of swinging ways in which his
tariffs have been brought to bear on the
world picture, would you say?
>> Well, look, I think there's no question
that you would immediately focus on on
countries like China uh and India. I
mean the Indian Prime Minister Narendra
Modi is traveling to Beijing next week
to meet President Xiinping. A historic
Thaw in what has been a very very chilly
bilateral relationship between Delhi and
Beijing. And the reason it's taking
place is because of the swinging tariffs
that Donald Trump has used against India
partly to punish them for buying Russian
oil. uh but also to uh push back at what
Donald Trump argues is a massive trade
deficit that the Indians have with the
United States. So he's absolutely
shocked the prime minister of India who
thought he had a really cozy close
relationship with Donald Trump and
instead has been propelled into the arms
of China. Uh there are all sorts of
other countries around the world uh
including of course the EU that have
been very uh dramatically hit by uh
Donald Trump's tariff policies which to
some extent have been used as a tool to
try and influence the outcome of the
Ukraine conflict. Uh one country that he
doesn't seem terribly keen on tariffing
uh certainly to the extent that he's
tariffed others is Russia which is uh a
beneficiary perhaps uh unexpectedly of
Donald Trump's laress when it comes to
tariffs. So he this is not just an
economic tool. It is a central lever of
foreign policy that he uses to punish
countries uh that he doesn't like. And
while we have the pleasure of your
company, can I ask you to have a quick
look for us at the barometer of Donald
Trump's popularity at the moment, just
so we can gauge how he's going over in
the US? I think we've got an idea of how
he's going over here, but how is he
going over there?
>> Yes. I I thought for a second, Vanessa,
you were going to ask me if I if I had
any uh thoughts on the rumors sweeping
social media earlier today that Donald
Trump may have passed away because he
hadn't been seen in public. He hadn't
been seen in public since Tuesday's
cabinet meeting. And every single day,
we've been getting these notes that say
no uh no no appointments on the
president's schedule, nothing planned.
Well, he has shown up today. He's gone
and played golf. He's out playing a
round of golf. So, you can all
>> uh stop panicking and relax. I
>> In terms of approval ratings, he's
underwater on all of his signature
issues. immigration, uh, the economy,
inflation, uh, across the board. He has
lost ground, and he's in a worse
position now in terms of approval
ratings than either Joe Biden or Barack
Obama were uh, during the course of Joe
Biden's first and only term in office
and Barack Obama's second term uh, in
office. And yet, you know, he still has
very solid support among his grassroots
supporters. And there is evidence that
the Republicans are registering new
firsttime voters at a much greater clip
than the Democrats. And that is really
freaking out the Democratic party. 4
million more Republican voters have
registered across the country than
Democrats since January. And that's a
barometer uh of the challenges that the
Democrats now face uh in trying to
restore their own credibility even as
Donald Trump's approval ratings start to
slide.