President Donald Trump campaigned for a second term on pledges to lower prices, create jobs and impose tough tariffs on imports, especially from China. 

Dubbing himself the «Tariff Man» last fall, he told an audience at the Economic Club of Chicago, «To me, the most beautiful word in the dictionary is tariff.» However, in his first months in office, it is unclear whether Trump can, or should, implement the harsh reciprocal tariffs he announced in April against dozens of countries.

Now, 100 days into his second term, economists told Fox News Digital they see these proposed reciprocal tariffs as politically motivated, unnecessary and failing to secure the benefits from U.S. trading partners that Trump had been hoping for.

CHINA IS ‘CAVING’ TO TRUMP’S TRADE WAR STRATEGY, EXPERT SIGNALS

Instead, they warned, Trump’s tariffs could grind billions of dollars in trade to a halt between the world’s two largest economies, disrupt global supply chains and risk torpedoing the U.S. economy into a major slump or recession.

When Trump took office, chances of recession «were probably about 10%,» Justin Wolfers, an economist at the University of Michigan, told Fox News Digital in an interview. «Now, they’re up to around 55%.» 

It is unclear whether Trump will continue to push through with these unpopular tariffs, which are slated to take force in early July. In the near-term, uncertainty and volatility remain.

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in New York City on March 28, 2025 amid President Donald Trump’s escalating trade war. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Short-term tariff impact

Trump announced tariffs on April 2, dubbed «Liberation Day.» The announcement included both a 10% universal baseline tariff and plans to enact larger tariffs on dozens of other countries, including China.

These new import taxes immediately sent stock markets into free-fall, triggering one of the largest single-day S&P 500 losses since World War II, and prompting deep and unyielding uncertainty over possible next moves.

«The only thing that’s happened that has pushed the odds of a recession up so high, so fast, is chaos coming from out of the White House,» Wolfers said.

Trump subsequently paused the reciprocal tariffs for 90 days to encourage the administration to make «deals» with countries on trade and encourage more investment in U.S. manufacturing. Even so, some prices have already risen in anticipation of higher costs under the new tariff regime.

Uncertainty has also played a role. Trump’s tariff announcement in April prompted a number of large container ships to abruptly halt their shipments to the U.S. earlier this month and turn back to their original ports. This means that more consumers will see a price hike for everyday products, likely at certain big-box retailer stores like Walmart or Target, as early as next month. 

These price hikes are «not showing up tomorrow, but will show up over the next few months, as scarcities develop and American retailers have to find other sources – that might take a while,» David H. Feldman, an economist and professor at William & Mary College, said in an interview.

TRUMP’S ULTIMATUM TO FEDERAL WORKERS: RETURN TO OFFICE ‘OR BE TERMINATED’

President Donald Trump arrives for a presentation ceremony in the East Room of the White House on April 15, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

While Trump says tariffs will target foreign competitors and reduce the trade deficit, the costs will fall mostly on working- and middle-class Americans who buy the bulk of imported goods.

Wolfers said Trump’s focus on the trade «deficit» is based on a common misconception.

«What that means is we sell China a small amount of stuff, and they sell us a large amount of stuff,» he explained. However, for every dollar bill that goes to China, the U.S. gets something for it that Americans want to buy, like T-shirts. 

«We have a dollar deficit – but we have a stuff surplus.» 

Potential for deescalation 

There are few signs that Trump’s tariffs will deliver the gains he sought, such as onshoring U.S. production or securing better trade deals, particularly with Asian countries.

Instead, experts warn these countries are likely to circumvent U.S. markets and supply chains over time.

«If these tariffs stay in place, there will be hardly any trade between the U.S. and China,» by the second half of the year, Gary Clyde Hufbauer, a senior non-resident fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said in an interview.

Roughly $650 billion in annual trade between the two countries is at risk, along with knock-down effects on global commerce in the long term.

 WORLD LEADERS REACT AS TRUMP RE-ENTERS THE WHITE HOUSE

President Donald Trump, left, and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

Trump’s tariffs also discard decades of international understanding that has depoliticized trade disputes, Feldman said.

The U.S. is «moving from a system that at least was based on mutually acceptable rules of behavior to a system that does not have that as its anchor,» Feldman, whose research focuses on global trade policy, told Fox News Digital. That shift allows the government to target foreign nations individually and offer selective tariff relief to firms and industries «if they do ‘our’ bidding,» he argued. 

«America is now master of the shakedown.» 

President Donald Trump gestures to members of the media before boarding Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House on April 3, 2025 in Washington, D.C. Trump spoke a day after announcing sweeping new tariffs targeting goods imported into the U.S. on countries including China, Japan and India. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

Next steps 

After market backlash, Trump appears to be warming to the idea of easing his proposed 145% reciprocal tariffs on China, which has vowed to impose its own retaliatory measures on U.S. goods.

Economists say he is more likely to do so if the economy sours, or he sees a major drop in poll numbers, if the past is precedent. 

Still, any path to deescalation remains uncertain. Just last week, China denied Trump’s claim that the two countries were negotiating a tariff deal, after he asserted in an interview that he had reached «200 deals» on trade.

Economists believe Trump will at least partially scale back the tariffs before July but warn he is playing a high-stakes game of brinkmanship that could hit U.S. consumers and businesses hardest.

«What I worry about is that the immediate impact of uncertainty is on business investment in trade-exposed industries, leading to a recession,» Feldman said. «But it could get worse, if it transmits into a financial panic. And  if everyone starts to say, ‘geez, I got to get into gold and cash, I can’t be in Treasury bills.’ If we move into a flight to cash, all bets are off.» 

Should that happen, he said, «We could slide into 2008 all over again.»

A television broadcasts market news on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in New York on Friday, April 4, 2025. (Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Trump has refused to concede that his early days have been anything but a major success.

In a recent interview with Time magazine, he touted his first 100 days as «very successful,» saying «people [are] writing that it was the best first month, and best second month, and really the best third month» for a U.S. president.

He dismissed stock market volatility and rising inflation as temporary «market fluctuation,» calling it a «transition period» that would level out.

When asked if he would consider it a win if tariffs remained as high as 50% on imports a year from now, Trump said he would.

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«Total victory,» he said. 

«Everybody is going to benefit.»

Israel’s foreign minister slammed the United Nations on Monday as the organization’s court opened a hearing on Israel’s legal responsibilities in Gaza.

Gidon Sa’ar said that the U.N. is a «rotten, anti-Israel, and antisemitic body,» which ought to be on trial for covering up terror affiliates within the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), who he said participated in the attacks of Oct. 7 2023. «The U.N. must answer for these crimes,» Sa’ar said.

He told reporters that Israel had decided «not to take part in this circus,» which is intended to deprive Israel of its «most basic right to defend itself.»

OFFICIALS IN BIDEN ADMIN WORKED TO UNDERMINE NETANYAHU AFTER CEASEFIRE TALKS COLLAPSED, FORMER AIDE SAYS

«Secretary-General [Antonio] Guterres is personally accountable. He knew what was going on in UNRWA. He knew very well and he knows very well. Israel repeatedly warned him. He did nothing. He went out of his way to whitewash UNRWA. He continues to cover up the crimes of UNRWA and its terrorist employees.»

Jewish News Syndicate reported that Sa’ar later presented evidence that 25% of UNRWA staff «were implicated in terrorist activity» prior to Oct. 7, 2023.  Sa’ar said that UNRWA is a proxy of the terror group Hamas.

Fox News Digital reached out to Guterres’ spokesperson seeking comment on Sa’ar’s accusations, but did not get a response.

In a statement to the press on Monday, Guterres’ spokesman, Stéphane Dujarric, told a reporter that he didn’t «think the Secretary General is a big fan of a circus.» Calling the presentation to the ICJ «extremely detailed and very clear and very legal,» he also said that Guterres was «very clear [and] straightforward» when the U.N. «first revealed the Israeli allegations against UNRWA.» Dujarric said that UNRWA Commissioner-General Phillipe Lazzarini «took extremely quick action» responding to the complaints. 

HEAD OF UN WATCHDOG SAYS UNRWA HIRED PEOPLE ‘WHO WERE SUPPORTING TERRORISM’

Photos released by the Israeli Defense Force show three individuals that the Israeli military claims are Hamas terrorists inside an UNRWA compound in Rafah. (IDF)

Lazzarini terminated the appointments of some of the UNRWA staffers who participated in the Oct. 7 attacks.

Dujarric also noted the «depletion of critical stocks» in Gaza since Israel blocked all aid to Gaza in March in an attempt to force a ceasefire with Hamas. Not only is food running out, but Dujarric said that trauma-related medical supplies, surgical supplies, therapeutic milk, medicines, and other important items are in short supply. 

In a statement regarding the ICJ hearings on April 28, U.N. Legal Counsel Elinor Hammarskjöld outlined the U.N.’s concerns about Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories. Referencing the Israeli Knesset’s law banning UNRWA’s operation, passed in October 2024, she stated that Israel cannot deny impartial humanitarian organizations from providing relief, and that concerns about the impartiality of such organizations may not be made unilaterally by an occupying power.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres delivers a statement at UN Headquarters on the situation in the Middle East following the terrorist attack by Hamas on Israel. He reiterated his concern for civilian lives to be protected, he thanked Egypt for its help via Rafah crossing into Gaza and stated that humanitarian aid should be delivered to people of Gaza.  (Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Hammarskjöld also said that U.N. premises are «inviolable,» per the Geneva Convention, and «immune from search, requisition, confiscation, expropriation, or any other form of interference.» 

In February, however, the State of Israel’s statement on the ICJ’s proceedings noted various incidents that demonstrate how UNRWA has violated the guiding principles of «neutrality, impartiality, and independence» mandated by the U.N.

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A military parade of the Hamas terrorist organization before the transfer of four Israeli female hostages to the Red Cross on January 25th, 2025. (TPS-IL)

Israel’s statement also lays out a variety of times when terrorist organizations «use and exploit UNRWA installations as hideouts and places of refuge» and claims agency staff «have assisted or closed their eyes to terrorists seeking refuge at those sites.» The U.S. suspended aid to UNRWA after learning that some of its members participated in the Oct. 7 attack. 

On April 24, the U.S. Justice Department determined that UNRWA, as a specialized agency of the U.N., is not entitled to diplomatic immunity in the U.S. In a lawsuit filed in June 2024 in the Southern District of New York, 100 victims of the Oct. 7 attack are seeking $1 billion in damages from UNRWA. Lazzarini is a named defendant in the suit.

La actividad manufacturera en China registró en abril una caída, en medio de un repunte de las tensiones comerciales con Estados Unidos, según datos oficiales publicados este miércoles por la Oficina Nacional de Estadística (ONE).

El índice gerente de compras (PMI) del sector industrial descendió a 49 puntos, marcando el inicio de una fase de contracción, después de alcanzar los 50,5 puntos en marzo, su mejor dato en un año.

El dato de abril quedó por debajo de las previsiones de los analistas, que esperaban una cifra más moderada de 49,7, y situó la actividad del sector por debajo del umbral de 50 puntos, que separa el crecimiento de la contracción.

El estadístico de la ONE Zhao Qinghe atribuyó el descenso a un “alto punto de partida por el crecimiento rápido anterior” y a un “drástico cambio en el entorno exterior”, en alusión al deterioro en las relaciones comerciales con Washington.

Desde comienzos de abril, entraron en vigor aranceles de hasta el 145 % impuestos por Estados Unidos a productos chinos, mientras que Beijing respondió con tarifas del 125 % a importaciones estadounidenses. Estos gravámenes comenzaron a reflejar su impacto en los indicadores económicos del mes, afectando especialmente a la confianza del sector manufacturero.

El PMI manufacturero incluye cinco subíndices clave, de los cuales producción, nuevos pedidos, inventario de materias primas y empleo descendieron por debajo de la marca de 50. Solo el subíndice de plazos de entrega se mantuvo en terreno positivo. La caída en los nuevos pedidos es especialmente relevante, ya que refleja un debilitamiento de la demanda, tanto interna como externa.

La actividad en los sectores no manufactureros, que incluye servicios y construcción, también se desaceleró. El PMI correspondiente descendió desde los 50,8 puntos en marzo a 50,4 en abril, con un retroceso más marcado en la construcción, que pasó de 53,4 a 51,9 puntos, mientras que los servicios cayeron a 50,1.

El PMI compuesto, que agrupa los sectores manufacturero y no manufacturero, se situó en 50,2 puntos, bajando desde los 51,4 del mes anterior, lo que confirma una desaceleración generalizada de la actividad económica.

En paralelo, el PMI alternativo elaborado por Caixin e IHS Markit, que se considera un referente para inversores internacionales, también mostró un retroceso, aunque menos acusado. Este índice cayó de 51,2 en marzo a 50,4 en abril, manteniéndose en zona de expansión.

Aun así, el economista de Caixin, Wang Zhe, señaló que “los nuevos pedidos de exportación cayeron nuevamente, a menudo atribuidos al impacto de los aranceles”, y advirtió que “la confianza empresarial cayó al tercer nivel más bajo desde abril de 2012”.

La economía china, la segunda del mundo, sigue mostrando señales de debilidad estructural tras la pandemia de COVID-19. La demanda interna no logra repuntar y el sector inmobiliario continúa en crisis. A pesar de los múltiples estímulos aplicados desde el año pasado, incluyendo rebajas de tipos de interés y facilitación de créditos hipotecarios, la reactivación sigue sin consolidarse.

El Gobierno central mantiene un objetivo de crecimiento del 5 % para 2025, una meta que varios economistas consideran difícil de alcanzar. Según Zichun Huang, de Capital Economics, “aunque el gobierno está aumentando el apoyo fiscal, esto probablemente no compensará completamente el arrastre del entorno externo”, y estima que el crecimiento se limitará al 3,5 % este año.

Las autoridades chinas han prometido la creación de 12 millones de empleos urbanos en 2025, pero el deterioro de los indicadores clave sugiere que los efectos del enfrentamiento comercial con Estados Unidos podrían continuar agravando la desaceleración económica del régimen.

(Con información de EFE y AFP)