Amid turmoil over tariffs, Bessent rises in Trump trade world

WASHINGTON: Minutes after President Donald Trump announced a 90-day pause on a tariff plan that triggered a stock market rout and global upheaval, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent strode out of the White House to explain the abrupt turnabout.

“President Trump created maximum negotiating leverage for himself,” Bessent told reporters. “This was his strategy all along.” It was the clearest sign yet of the larger role Bessent has taken this week in articulating Trump’s trade policies to the financial markets, even though his messaging has sometimes contradicted the president and business leaders.

Multiple sources close to the White House said Bessent, a former hedge fund manager, was seen as the proverbial adult in the room, giving the president the best counsel among a team of advisers on trade that includes tariff hawk Peter Navarro and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

“The president is the one who ultimately ... altered his strategy,” said Stephen Moore, a longtime Trump adviser and economist at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. “But I think it was Scott who was always trying to take on the protectionists in the White House, who were always pressing Trump to go big on the tariffs.”

One White House official told Reuters Bessent had favoured lower levies while Navarro had favoured higher ones, though the whole trade team backed the decision Trump announced on April 2 in the Rose Garden.

The multi-nation reciprocal tariffs plan wiped trillions of dollars off global stock markets and sparked fears of a recession. Stock markets zoomed higher on Wednesday after the reprieve, with the S&P 500 posting its biggest daily gain since 2008.

Bessent publicly stuck to the administration’s script in defending the original tariffs policy. But in private conversations, he moved the president towards negotiating with other countries, according to one source with close ties to the White House.

His interventions eventually won the day, at least temporarily. In an X post on Wednesday, Lutnick said he and Bessent were with Trump as the president wrote his social media post announcing the 90-day pause.

“There’s been a pecking order change,” the source said of Bessent’s elevated role on Trump’s trade team. Former Representative Charlie Dent, a Republican from Pennsylvania, described Bessent as a “real adult in this room” who understood the economic implications of Trump’s actions.

“I think it’s important that his voice has been elevated in this conversation,” said Dent, while noting that uncertainty remained. Marc Short, Trump’s legislative affairs director in 2017-2018, was less enamoured.

“He’s been out on the airwaves championing the strategy of global tariffs for the last few weeks,” Short said of Bessent. “While I’m relieved to see the reprieve, I’m not sure that ... anybody in the White House looks like a victor right now. It appears as if they’re in retreat.”

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The scope of the tariffs announced last week stunned virtually everyone from private sector economists, who rapidly slashed their US economic projections, to adversaries including China’s leadership, which forcefully retaliated, as well as allies at home and abroad.

Normally loyal Republican lawmakers directed sharp criticism at Trump and his lieutenants, while titans in the world of finance such as Larry Fink and Jamie Dimon balked. Even Elon Musk, the billionaire leader of Trump’s efforts to gut the federal government, lobbed insults at Navarro on social media.

Over the weekend, Bessent flew from New York to Florida, where Trump was golfing, and then travelled back to Washington with the president to discuss their message about tariffs for the markets, the White House official said. The Treasury secretary emphasized the need to stress a willingness to make deals, the official said.

Bessent told reporters on Wednesday that he and Trump had had a long conversation on Sunday. “In my 35 years in the market, I always wanted certainty, so I think we’ve got more certainty,” he said.

White House rhetoric about the tariffs shifted this week, with press secretary Karoline Leavitt telling reporters on Tuesday that Trump was open to “tailor-made” agreements with other nations. The president tasked Bessent and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer to kick off talks with Japan.

Bessent’s elevated perch might not last in an administration in which open warfare has raged between advisers such as Navarro and Musk. And even as he appeared to gain influence, Bessent’s message hasn’t always aligned with what Trump was saying.

Speaking to reporters outside the White House on Wednesday, Bessent said the president had planned on the pullback all along, with an eye toward bringing countries to the bargaining table. But Trump later indicated the near-panic in markets that had built since last week factored into his decision to change course.