Donald Trump stood behind his ambitious tariff plans, lavished praise on Elon Musk’s controversial DOGE effort, vowed to end a Biden-era chips subsidy law, and pledged to look for rare earth minerals in the US during a 90-minute joint address to Congress Tuesday night.
“It has been nothing but swift and unrelenting action,” Trump said of his early weeks in office, adding: “And we are just getting started.”
It was a speech marked by culture war standoffs which saw one Democratic member removed from the chamber by the House sergeant at arms in a night that appears unlikely to calm uneasy markets this week.
The president even acknowledged economic discomfort when discussing tariffs, saying, “there’ll be a little disturbance, but we’re OK with that. It won’t be much.”
Trump offered his message at a crucial time for investors after two days of stock market losses led to the lowest close of the S&P 500 since Nov. 4, 2024, the day before his election victory.
President Donald Trump addresses a joint session of Congress at the U.S. Capitol on March 04. (Win McNamee/Getty Images) ·Win McNamee via Getty Images
The implementation of new tariffs on America’s top three trading partners has driven much of the selling in recent days, but a range of Trump moves have also sown chaos in Washington and unsettled investors during his first 43 days in office.
Those actions, which Trump often touted Tuesday night, include the courting of new geopolitical instability in Ukraine as well as Musk’s rapid fire moves through the federal government firing federal workers as he searches for cost savings.
Trump also took time Tuesday night to slam a Biden-era program for semiconductors that has sent billions to the sector, saying the CHIPS Act is “horrible horrible thing” and again calling for it to be repealed.
Trump also continued to blame ongoing inflation worries on the Biden administration, saying he wanted to make America affordable and that Biden is responsible for the recent surge in egg prices.
“Joe Biden especially let the price of eggs get out of control,” Trump claimed as Democrats in the audience hooted, “and we’re working hard to get it back down.”
Here’s some of the other key lines from the address for markets:
Democrats held protest signs as President Donald Trump spoke during an address to a joint session of Congress at the US Capitol on March 4. (WIN MCNAMEE/POOL/AFP via Getty Images) ·WIN MCNAMEE via Getty Images
The topic of the night for markets was, of course, tariffs.
Trump offered a forceful defense of this week’s tariffs as well as a broader array of reciprocal tariffs that could come next month, even as he acknowledged there could be some pain.
Tariffs are not just about protecting American jobs, they’re about protecting the soul of our country. Tariffs are about making America rich again and making America Great Again, and it’s happening and it will happen rather quickly. There’ll be a little disturbance but we’re OK with that. It won’t be much.
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The speech came hours after the president imposed 25% duties on Canadian and Mexican imports on Tuesday morning over issues, he says, of illegal drugs and migration. He also implemented a second round of 10% duties on Chinese imports to increase the blanket tariffs on that nation to 20%
The moves drew fast retaliation from all three countries and led to days of market instability.
In a Fox Business Network appearance on Tuesday afternoon, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick teased the possibility of tariff reductions with Canada and Mexico. He said of Trump: “I think he’s going to work something out with them [and] somewhere in the middle will likely be the outcome, the president moving with the Canadians and Mexicans, but not all the way.”
But in his speech, Trump again touted those particular duties and didn’t offer much signal that a retreat was in the offing even acknowledging they could bite farmers, some of his most ardent supporters, saying “there may be a little adjustment period.”
When it came to Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Trump continued his embrace of the world’s richest man and called him out by name early in the speech.
Elon Musk as he is recognized by President Donald Trump during Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress at the US Capitol on March 4. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images) ·SAUL LOEB via Getty Images
Musk was in attendance, seated in the first lady’s box.
To further combat inflation, we will not only be reducing the cost of energy, but we’ll be ending the flagrant waste of taxpayer dollars. And to that end I have created the brand new Department of Government Efficiency. DOGE, perhaps you’ve heard of it. Which is headed by Elon Musk who is in the gallery tonight. He’s working very hard. He didn’t need this. He didn’t need this. Thank you very much. We appreciate it.
Perhaps the largest reaction during that section of the speech came when Trump charged extensive fraud in the Social Security Administration, the latest agency in Musk sights, and repeated very questionable claims that significant numbers of checks are being directed to people over 160 years old.
Overall, Trump claimed Musk’s moves would help lower inflation and eventually balance the federal budget even as the evidence is that overall federal spending has continued unabated
On the subject of Ukraine and a rare earth mineral deal in limbo, Trump promised to make peace in Ukraine but also announced that he would turn his attention to minerals not in Ukraine, but in the US.
Later this week, I will also take historic action to dramatically expand production of critical minerals and rare earths here in the USA.
The comments came following an Oval Office yelling match between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last Friday that was supposed to mark a key minerals deal. Instead, Trump said at one point “it’s going to be very hard to do business like this.”
Trump then suspended the delivery of US military aid to the country after the confrontation affecting more than $1 billion in arms as Zelensky reached out this week to try and get talks back on track.
Later in Tuesday’s speech, Trump said he would be the one to achieve peace in Ukraine and accused Democrats of wanting the war to continue.
He also said that Zelensky had send him a thankful note indicting he wanted to sign the mineral rights deal at Trump’s convenience.
Trump didn’t indicate whether he would be taking Zelensky up on up on his offer, saying he had just received the letter.
On taxes, Trump offered his support for more expensive permanent tax cuts and reiterated his additional tax ideas that could add additional trillions to the national debt and rely on an accounting maneuver called a gimmick by budget hawks to pay for it all.
“We’re seeking permanent income tax cuts all across the board and to get urgently needed relief to Americans hit especially hard by inflation.” he said. “I’m calling for no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and no tax on Social Security benefits for our seniors.”
A few hours before the speech, the question was how much market friendly rhetoric Trump would offer and how much would be less well received.
PIMCO head of US public policy Libby Cantrill said in an interview with Yahoo Finance on Tuesday afternoon: “We’ve had a lot of vegetables recently, I think the market wants some dessert.”
Trump’s tax commentary was perhaps the “dessert” portion of the speech for markets.
Ben Werschkul is Washington correspondent for Yahoo Finance.
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