Senate Republican leader expresses wariness over tariffs ahead of Trump’s joint address

Senate Majority Leader John Thune expressed wariness Tuesday over some of President Donald Trump’s recent policies, including new tariffs from the administration that threaten to raise the prices Americans pay for a wide array of goods.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune expressed wariness Tuesday over some of President Donald Trump’s recent policies, including new tariffs from the administration that threaten to raise the prices Americans pay for a wide array of goods. Thune, who represents South Dakota – a state that relies heavily on trade with Canada, said while he thinks the president is attempting to secure “an outcome that addresses a concern that the American people have” with his recently imposed tariffs on the country along with Mexico and China, the economic impacts are an issue. “That’s an issue in my view. I mean, I think you have to think about the economic impacts through inflation,” Thune told CNN’s Dana Bash when pressed on whether the tariffs, and potential cost to every day Americans, are good policy. “I think you have to look at growth in the economy and how that’s impacted by all this. Those are, those are real issues. And so the administration is going to have to take, in my view, as they, as they evaluate some of these policy decisions the macro-economic impacts of these,” he continued on “Inside Politics.” The comments from the top Senate Republican come ahead of the president’s first address to a joint session of Congress in his second term. Trump will deliver his “The Renewal of the American Dream”-themed remarks just hours after the 25% tariffs against Mexico and Canada took effect, causing a volatile morning on the markets and raising alarm among some red-state senators about the impact. But the Republican leader did not go so far as to write off Trump’s move entirely, saying, “I think this is a president who has used that authority in ways that have gotten outcomes and results,” and adding that he thinks “the markets, in time, will stabilize.”