Trump Twice Refuses to Answer Easy Question About Recession

Trump is soft-launching a recession. 

The president has now twice refused to rule out a recession in the wake of his own policies, including reckless tariff wars and massive cuts to the federal government. 

“Look I know that you inherited a mess,” Fox’s Maria Bartiromo asked him on Sunday Morning Futures. “But are you expecting a recession this year?”

“I hate to predict things like that. There is a period of transition, because what we’re doing is very big. We’re bringing wealth back to America, that’s a big thing. And there are always periods of.… It takes a little time, it takes a little time. But I think it should be great for us,” Trump responded, completely avoiding the question.

“A lot of people said ‘Oh, this is the business president,’” Bartiromo continued. “And now we have tariffs and the market has been going down.”

“Well not much, in all fairness.”

“You said ‘Look, we’re gonna have disruption but we’re OK with that.’ Is that what you meant; the stock market going down was the disruption?” 

“Look what I have to do is build a strong country. You can’t really watch the stock market.… What we’re doing is we’re building a tremendous foundation for the future.”

Bartiromo pressed even further. “The public companies wanna make sure that we have clarity. After April 2, when those reciprocal tariffs go in, is that it? Are you gonna change anything after that? Will we have clarity?”

“You’ll have a lot. But we may go up with some tariffs, it depends. We may go up, I don’t think we’ll go down, but we may go up. They have plenty of clarity.… They always say that,” Trump said.  

Trump continued this economic dismissiveness later that same day. 

“Are you worried about a recession?” a reporter asked him on Air Force One Sunday evening. “Maria Bartiromo asked you, and you kind of hesitated.”

The president shrugged. “I’ll tell you what, of course you hesitate. All I know is this: We’re gonna take in hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs and we’re gonna become so rich you’re not gonna know where to spend all that money, I’m telling you, you just watch! We’re gonna have jobs, we’re gonna have factories, it’s gonna be great.” 

The businesses and farmers Trump claims to be doing this for might not survive the incoming recession that these tariffs—10 percent on China for now, with tariffs on Canada and Mexico to be determined later—will surely bring. It’s obvious now that Trump couldn’t care less about the American people’s economic suffering as long as it serves his spiteful political goals of sticking it to our allies and kneecapping the federal government.

While speaking to the press in the Oval Office Friday, Donald Trump got upset when a reporter asked him about “clashes” between Elon Musk and members of his Cabinet, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, during a Thursday meeting.  

“No clash, I was there. You’re just a troublemaker, and you’re not supposed to be asking that question because we’re talking about the World Cup,” Trump replied, referring to an executive he had just signed to prepare for the 2026 games. “Elon gets along great with Marco, and they’re both doing a fantastic job. There is no clash.” 

When the reporter tried to follow up, Trump asked him, “Who are you with?” The reporter replied, “NBC,” to which Trump said, “No wonder. That’s enough. NBC.”  

In the Cabinet meeting, Musk had reportedly complained that Rubio hadn’t fired anyone from the State Department, despite recommendations from Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, according to The New York Times. Rubio fired back at Musk, noting that 1,500 officials had taken the government’s deferred resignation “buyout” program. Trump finally stepped in to defend Rubio, saying he was doing a “great job.”

Musk also reportedly argued with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy over the purge of federal workers, with Duffy complaining that Musk tried to fire air traffic controllers. Musk accused Duffy of lying, and the two argued, with Musk claiming that air traffic control towers were staffed with so-called DEI hires. The Times reported that Trump ended the argument by saying that Duffy should hire air traffic controllers who were “geniuses” from MIT.

Trump has long had a contentious relationship with the press, and in his second term, has sought to take action against media outlets he doesn’t like, taking over control of the press pool that covers the White House from the White House Correspondents’ Association and shutting out the Associated Press for not adopting his name change of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. Who knows if he’ll now punish NBC for simply asking questions.

Republicans have censured Representative Al Green and petitioned to strip him of his committee assignments for interrupting Donald Trump’s speech to Congress. But by Friday, Representative Lauren Boebert had decided to sling some mud on the situation for good measure.

“For him to go and shake his pimp cane at President Trump was absolutely abhorrent,” Boebert, who was caught on surveillance footage fondling her date during a showing of Beetlejuice in 2023, told Real America’s Voice.

Boebert was referring to the 77-year-old Texas Democrat’s walking cane.

When Trump claimed during his Tuesday night speech that he had been given a “mandate” by the American people to radically reimagine the federal government, Green interrupted the president by yelling, “You have no mandate to cut Medicaid!”

That got Green ousted by House Speaker Mike Johnson, who called on the sergeant of arms to remove the 77-year-old from the chamber against a backdrop of jeers from Republicans.

“I did it from my heart, and I will suffer whatever the consequences are,” Green told reporters the next day. “But truthfully, I would do it again.”

Senate Republicans are working to pass a budget that even party members have recently admitted will result in a $880 billion cut to Medicaid, much to the chagrin of their own constituents. The multibillion-dollar cut is a trade-off for conservatives who were tasked by Donald Trump to extend his 2017 tax plan, which will overwhelmingly benefit corporations and is projected to add as much as $15 trillion to the national deficit.

Green’s protest was practically the only noticeable rejection of Trump’s agenda that Democrats could muster Tuesday night. Other liberal lawmakers were torched for flipping paddles that read “False,” “Musk Steals,” and “Save Medicaid” in a silent protest in the face of the administration’s apparent oligarchy and its systemic dismantling of the federal government.

And viewers watching live at home would never have known that a handful of Democrats stood up and walked out of the chamber in protest, as TV cameras never bothered to pan to their mute, “dignified” spectacle. Others, such as Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Patty Murray, opted to not show up at all.

Donald Trump is continuing to crack down on free speech by threatening to revoke a program that forgives the student loans of federal and non-profit employees, teachers, police, and pastors, among others.

Trump signed an executive order Friday barring individuals who engaged in “improper” activities from receiving relief under the government’s Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, a Bush-era policy that cancels student loans after 10 years of payments.

This move is clearly intended to have a chilling effect on the work of non-profits, which operate in some of the policy spaces most affected by Trump’s agenda, such as immigration. Under Trump’s order, loan forgiveness could be stripped away from individuals who provide legal support, advocacy, or education work on behalf of undocumented immigrants.

In addition to targeting work on illegal immigration, the White House said that the order would exclude individuals whose work had been tied to foreign terrorist groups. This is a clear sign they intend to continue cracking down on pro-Palestinian advocacy and activism.

The Trump administration previously threatened to revoke federal funding from any schools that allow large protests, and on Thursday announced it would cancel $400 million in grants to Columbia University for “inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.” Meanwhile, earlier this week, the university once again sicced police officers on its own peaceful student protesters, and has begun investigating students over speech critical of Israel.

As of December, more than two million Americans had eligible employment and open student loans, according to the Associated Press. While only a small percentage of claims are eligible for relief through PSLF, the work of hundreds of groups may be affected by Trump’s order.

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, wrote on X Friday that Trump’s order was “shockingly unlawful and a clear First Amendment violation.”

“The PSLF program provides the president no authority to restrict it to only those people who work for nonprofits whose work he supports,” Reichlin-Melnick wrote. “Expect lawsuits within short periods of time.”

DropSite News’s Ryan Grim sarcastically quipped that he’d heard from the Supreme Court that “the president can’t change the terms of student loans,” a dig at the high court blocking President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness efforts.

The Trump administration is canceling $400 million in grants to Columbia University over what it says is “the school’s continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.”

In reality, the president is clamping down on pro-Palestine protests that began in late 2023, when Israel responded to Hamas’s attack on the country with a brutal military campaign that human rights organizations have called genocide. Columbia had some of the highest profile protests of any American college campus at the time, setting up an encampment and briefly occupying a university building.

On Thursday, the administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, made up of staffers from the Justice Department, Health and Human Services Department, Education Department, and the General Services Administration, told Columbia that it would soon be conducting a “comprehensive review” of their federal grants and contracts. That review seems to have taken all of one day.

In a statement, Education Secretary Linda McMahon implied that Columbia did not comply with federal laws against discrimination.

“Since October 7, Jewish students have faced relentless violence, intimidation, and anti-Semitic harassment on their campuses — only to be ignored by those who are supposed to protect them,” the statement read. “Universities must comply with all federal antidiscrimination laws if they are going to receive federal funding. For too long, Columbia has abandoned that obligation to Jewish students studying on its campus. Today, we demonstrate to Columbia and other universities that we will not tolerate their appalling inaction any longer.”

Left out of the statement was the fact that the university is facing a lawsuit from three students alleging civil rights violations, breach of contract, negligence, unlawful eviction, and other Title VI violations over Columbia’s harsh crackdown on pro-Palestine student protesters.

In recent months, the university’s new disciplinary committee, the Office of Institutional Equity, has brought several cases of discriminatory harassment against students who expressed criticism of Israel. “Infractions” include writing an op-ed in the student newspaper calling for divestment from Israel, sharing social media posts supporting the Palestinian people, or joining “unauthorized protests.”

These actions appear to have been for naught in the eyes of the Trump administration, which appears to be trying to make an example out of Columbia and suppress criticism of Israel and support for Palestine. Trump is fulfilling a threat he made on Tuesday, when he said in a Truth Social post that “All Federal Funding will STOP for any College, School, or University that allows illegal protests” and threatened to deport foreign students who take part in such protests.

The notion of “illegal protests,” particularly in places like colleges and universities which have a long legacy of protesting going back decades, seems to be a massive violation of the Constitution and the First Amendment, and contradicts Trump’s own claim that he “stopped all government censorship and brought back free speech in America.” But Trump has never been consistent on any principles, and seeks to punish anyone who goes against his views.