Abu Dhabi: United States President Donald Trump’s trade war against China has been wholly mismanaged according to former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci, who says that the ongoing trade dispute between the world’s two largest economies is not in the interest of either countries.
“It’s not in the interest of the Chinese or the Americans to be fighting like this, I do recognise from a political perspective that the American establishment — both Republicans and Democrats — have for 35 years left China unchecked [in their trade policies],” he said on the sidelines of the SALT Leadership Conference, of which he is also the founder.
“[China have this] programme of finishing goods and delivering finished goods at a very low price and using a very depreciated currency and I think the Americans should have been more on watch for that,” he added, acknowledging the need for action against China on trade.
Scaramucci said that President Trump’s tariff policy could have been implemented in a more gradual and smarter process, hitting out at the way Trump unveiled the tariffs.
“If we’re going to use tariffs the recommendation of the president was a gradual process, meaning two per cent a quarter for 10 quarters. This would have given the supply chain the time to make adjustments.
“Business leaders large and small around the world would have had the opportunity to adjust their supply chain or move their manufacturing,” he added.
“By doing it the haphazard way, Trump has wholly mismanaged the process. I’m not a big fan of tariffs, but if we’re going to be using them we could have used them in a way more strategic way than they have been used so far. And again, that’s the president’s ego centrism and so he’s literally a case study in mismanagement,” Scaramucci said.
Scaramucci didn’t hold back in his assessment of Trump’s presidency, saying he believed the current impeachment hearings were justified.
“I mean the impeachment is obviously justified, the president has broken the law. The American system was set up so that every person in the system is subordinate to the rule of law, there’s nobody above it and the people in leadership are there to serve,” he said. “That’s why there is this love affair globally with the US and it’s system,” he added.
Looking ahead to next year’s US elections, Scaramucci said he was confident Trump could lose the presidency against a moderate democratic candidate.
“It depends who the democratic nominee is, if there’s a moderate democrat they’ll beat Trump, so that would include somebody like Joe Biden or mayor Mike Bloomberg.
“Candidates like Elizabeth Warren would lose to Trump, and I think that would be a terrible choice for a candidate quite frankly. The right candidate can beat him, the people are exhausted from him,” he added.
