Trump Adviser Flails When Asked About Effect of Tariffs on iPhones

White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett dodged an important question Tuesday about Donald Trump’s latest threat to place a 25 percent tariff on foreign-made Apple products.

During an appearance on CNBC’s Squawk Box, a chipper Hassett was asked if there was an off-ramp to prevent an American-manufactured iPhone from costing up to $3,500.

“What is Tim Cook supposed to do?” asked co-host Joe Kernan.

“Right, well, you know, we’ll see how it works out,” Hassett replied. “The bottom line is that what we’re trying to do is onshore as much as we can in the U.S. and make it so the U.S. is not hyper-dependent on imports from China.”

Hassett insisted that an increase in U.S. equipment investments was a sign that supply chains were already adjusting to the president’s sweeping tariffs on foreign-made goods. In reality, Trump’s vacillating tariffs have resulted in uncertainty for the U.S. manufacturing sector and a dip in orders placed with U.S. factories for business equipment.

“In the interim, you know, then we’ll see how things work out,” Hassett repeated, providing no actual answer for how they planned to offset major price hikes for consumers. While Cook could placate Trump by announcing his intention to shift assembly to the U.S., shifting wholesale production could take years.

Hassett downplayed concerns over soaring prices, claiming that CEOs were simply overstating how disastrous the tariffs would be as a negotiating tactic. “Everybody is trying to make it seem like it’s a catastrophe if there’s a tiny little tariff on them right now, to try to negotiate down the tariffs,” he said. “And so, in the end, we’ll see what happens, we’ll see what the end game is, but we don’t want to harm Apple.”

It looks like Donald Trump is seeking to further cash in on cryptocurrency while he’s president. 

The president’s social media company, Trump Media & Technology Group, announced Tuesday that it plans to sell $1.5 billion in stock and $1 billion in convertible notes to buy bitcoin. The company will hold bitcoin as one of its assets along with cash and investments that were worth $759 billion at the end of March. 

“This investment will help defend our Company against harassment and discrimination by financial institutions, which plague many Americans and U.S. firms, and will create synergies for subscription payments, a utility token, and other planned transactions across Truth Social and Truth+,” said the company’s CEO Devin Nunes in a press release. 

Trump is making tons of money off cryptocurrency. On Thursday, he held a dinner at his Virginia golf club for the top buyers of his  $TRUMP meme coin, earning a tidy $148 million from the contest, with the “winners” getting a crappy steak dinner for their efforts, aside from the blatant pay-for-access scheme. 

Indeed, everyone who paid to attend the dinner admitted that they were doing so to try to influence the president. It’s corruption taking place right out in the open, with Trump raking in cash from anyone willing to pony up, whether they’re foreign governments or shady businessmen.

There’s no hope of oversight, either, as the White House has unceremoniously ended cryptocurrency investigations and Trump administration staffers scoff at the idea that the convicted felon president could ever be involved in anything unethical. It seems for the next few years, Trump will continue to make bank in questionable ways, despite supposedly having more important duties as president.

While the Trump administration extends its long leash on Russia, Republicans are running out of rope for dealing with the White House.

In reaction to a Wall Street Journal editorial note demanding change in America’s negotiating strategy, Senator Lindsey Graham said that the Senate is “prepared” to do what the president has not, and slap severe sanctions on Moscow.

“I have coordinated with the White House on the Russia sanctions bill since its inception,” Graham penned Tuesday. “The bill would put Russia on a trade island, slapping 500 percent tariffs on any country that buys Moscow’s energy products. The consequences of its barbaric invasion must be made real to those that prop it up. If China or India stopped buying cheap oil, Mr. Putin’s war machine would grind to a halt.

“The sanctions bill has 82 co-sponsors,” he continued. “As [Senator John] Thune said last week, if Mr. Putin continues to play games, the Senate will act. I’m hoping for the best, but when it comes to the thug in Moscow, we should all prepare for more of the same.”

Graham further claimed that Ukraine had been a ready and willing negotiating partner, unlike Russia, and that the Senate would know “which course to take” once Putin provided a “term sheet outlining the requirements for a cease-fire.” But since Donald Trump has taken office, the White House has repeatedly bent to Kremlin demands that prior administrations would have interpreted as outrageous requests.

The U.S. president has claimed that Russia has offered major concessions toward a possible peace deal, although the “concessions” have included staking a Russian flag in Crimea, a deal that would effectively reward Russia for falling short of conquering the entire country.

Senior officials in the Trump administration—including the president himself—have verbally recognized Crimea as a part of Russia, a remarkable reversal of long-standing U.S. policy that made Kremlin propagandists on state-sponsored television laugh at the downfall of American power.

But rising frustration over the ongoing conflict—and Putin and Zelenskiy’s deep hatred for one another—has flustered Trump. Trump has since tried to backtrack his initial promises over the war. In a 100-day retrospective with Time magazine, Trump claimed that his campaign pledge to end the war “on day one” was little more than a joke.

Graham isn’t the only senator going on the offensive against the Trump administration when it comes to Putin. On Memorial Day, Senator Chuck Grassley practically begged the president to do something about the situation in Ukraine.

“I’ve had enuf of Putin killing innocent ppl,” Grassley posted on X Monday after Russia attacked Ukraine with a new volley of drones. “Pres Trump Take action AT LEAST SANCTIONS.”

Federal Judge Brian Murphy lambasted the Trump administration for “manufacturing the very chaos they decry” in a scathing Monday evening order. 

This comes after the Department of Homeland Security deported six men to South Sudan in a hurried move that Murphy identified as a clear violation of his previous preliminary injunction, which required DHS to give “meaningful” notice before deporting someone to  an unfamiliar country, particularly an “unstable” one, without due process. 

“Defendants have mischaracterized this Court’s order, while at the same time manufacturing the very chaos they decry,” Murphy wrote in his Monday order.

“The court recognizes that the class members at issue here have criminal histories,” he continued “But that does not change due process.… The court treats its obligation to these principles with the seriousness that anyone committed to the rule of law should understand.”

Murphy noted that he initially accepted the administration’s own recommendation to keep the men at a U.S. military base in Djibouti rather than send them to South Sudan. But days later, Trump lied about the judge’s order, making it seem as if Murphy had required the men to stay in Djibouti. 

“A Federal Judge in Boston, who knew absolutely nothing about the situation, or anything else, has ordered that EIGHT of the most violent criminals on Earth curtail their journey to South Sudan, and instead remain in Djibouti,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday. “He would not allow these monsters to proceed to their final destination. This is not the premise under which I was elected President, which was to PROTECT our Nation. The Judges are absolutely out of control, they’re hurting our Country, and they know nothing about particular situations, or what they are doing—And this must change, IMMEDIATELY!” 

This was a complete lie, according to Murphy. 

“The court never said that defendants had to convert their foreign military base into an immigration facility,” he wrote in the memo. “It only left that as an option, again, at defendants’ request.”

Donald Trump announced Tuesday he was perfectly content to levy massive tariffs on goods from the European Union, while his economic advisers maintained that a lower rate is likely to stay in place no matter what.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump wrote that he was “extremely satisfied” with his outlandish threat to place a whopping 50 percent tariff on European goods, if the bloc failed to work out a new trade deal with the United States. He accused the nations of “slow walking” negotiations, though over the weekend, he had agreed to extend the deadline for that deal to July 9.

“Remember, I am empowered to ‘SET A DEAL’ for Trade into the United States if we are unable to make a deal, or are treated unfairly,” Trump wrote.

“I have just been informed that the E.U. has called to quickly establish meeting dates. This is a positive event, and I hope that they will, FINALLY, like my same demand to China, open up the European Nations for Trade with the United States of America. They will BOTH be very happy, and successful, if they do!!!” he added.

The EU agreed to fast-track tariff discussions Monday, according to a spokesperson for the European Commission. The U.S. currently applies 25 percent tariffs on steel, aluminium and cars from the EU, in addition to a blanket 10 percent tariffs on all European imports.

Meanwhile, White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett told CNBC Tuesday that countries that come up with “good-enough offers” were likely to keep a 10 percent tariff rate, “or perhaps even below.”

“But if they come in with retaliation and they don’t open their markets to U.S. goods, then it will go the other way,” Hassett said.

Hassett also said that the EU remained indecisive about how to respond to Trump’s threats. Last month, the European Commission greenlit tariffs of up to 25 percent on cigarettes from Florida, beef from Kansas and Nebraska, chicken from Louisiana, car parts from Michigan, and most importantly, soybeans.