Peter Navarro is the nut-case liberal economist who was one of the key architects of Trump’s trade war strategy in his first term. Yesterday he explained to Politico that the administration’s new plan is to stop the U.S. government’s reliance on the IRS (i.e., taxes paid by citizens), and instead make it dependent on a proposed External Revenue Service, i.e., on foreign tariffs. “If President Trump succeeds like he wants to succeed, we are going to structurally shift the American economy from one over-reliant on income taxes and the Internal Revenue Service, to one which is also reliant on tariff revenue and the External Revenue Service,” Navarro stated.
Even Politico felt obligated to note that “tariff payments are not paid by foreign countries, as Trump and his aides have suggested, but by the companies importing the products subject to the tariffs.” Trump hasn’t actually established the ERS yet, Navarro stated, but he has “signed an executive order asking officials to study the feasibility of creating such an agency,” which Navarro noted was due on April 1.
Politico added that “even some of Trump’s Republican allies have expressed unease about relying on tariffs as a source of revenue, including the top Republican on the influential Ways and Means trade subcommittee, Rep. Adrian Smith (R-NE). Speaking prior to Navarro, Smith said at Tuesday’s event that he didn’t want the U.S. `to become dependent on tariff revenue, because that speaks to the fact that it’s just another tax.’”
