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Why tariffs? Because Trump thinks America's trading partners are pickpockets who must be punished

Ellsworth Toohey
Apr 07, 2025
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Donald Trump (Jimwatson / Shutterstock.com)

Donald Trump's latest tariff war emerges from a decades-long personal belief that America's trading partners are "pickpockets" who must be punished, rather than from conventional economic strategy.

As Bloomberg's Timothy L. O'Brien explains, searching for rational policy goals in Trump's tariffs misses the point…

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