Trump Advisers Privately Tell Maggie Haberman They Worry About ‘Confusion’ From Tariff Moves

CNN commentator and New York Times White House correspondent Maggie Haberman told anchor Kaitlan Collins that advisers to President Donald Trump tell her they worry about the legality and the confusion stemming from his trade moves.

Despite Trump’s frequent rage at press leaks, Haberman continues to derive insights into Trump that are informed by deep experience reporting on the subject and an extensive network of Trumpworld sources.

Haberman was a guest on Thursday night’s edition of CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins, during which she dropped an insider nugget — that Trump advisers are still talking and they’re not happy with the boss and his scattershot trade maneuvers:

COLLINS: Well, and then with the — what’s happening with Brazil. Obviously, there’s a massive surplus that the United States has with Brazil, when it comes to trading. There’s already questions about, if this 50 percent tariff actually goes into place, what that’s going to mean.

But I think what we’re seeing here is different, in terms of the tariff battles he’s having with other countries, and that he is drawing a very straight through line between the investigation and trial of an ally of his, that was a former leader of Brazil, into whether or not the current leader is going to have to deal with 50 percent tariffs from the United States.

HABERMAN: What you’re seeing, Kaitlan, is the fact that the President, who has talked about tariffs on and off, for many years, mostly in earnest, over the last decade and slightly plus, does not view tariffs the way economists view tariffs. He views tariffs, and he would talk about this privately with people during the 2024 campaign, as a source of immense power.

He discovered just how much power he might be able to have, when he was president in the first term. And now, he has advisers who are letting him do that in a way that he felt like he was stymied before. There are a lot of advisers who also worry he is taking an approach that is raising legal questions, and that is maximalist in a way that is creating confusion.

But it’s not an economic tool, or solely an economic tool. It’s just a tool. It’s an instrument to try to get what he wants.

COLLINS: That’s interesting that you’ve heard from advisers who have questions about the process here, because that is the biggest difference that we’re seeing.

Watch above via CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins.