Trump Takes Combative Tone with Reporters While Facing Backlash for Being ‘Out on the Golf Course’ While People’s Retirement Savings Are On Fire
When things aren’t going well with Donald Trump, it’s not uncommon for the president to deflect, often picking a fight with the mainstream media.
His implementation of tariffs couldn’t be going much worse. The stock market tanked at Thursday’s open, plunging nearly 1,700 points by close — before China even announced its retaliatory measures. By Friday, the selloff deepened, with the Dow shedding another 2,200 points. Global markets and futures tumbled through the weekend, setting the stage for more panic on Monday after he took to his social media platform, to threaten, “If China does not withdraw its 34% increase above their already long term trading abuses by tomorrow, April 8th, 2025, the United States will impose ADDITIONAL Tariffs on China of 50%, effective April 9th.”
Amid the chaos, Trump saw it fit to attend a LIV Golf dinner at his Doral club. He then participated in a club championship at his Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter on Saturday and Sunday.
Democratic lawmakers expressed disapproval of Trump’s activities during this economic downturn. Senator Adam Schiff remarked on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” “I think people have seen their retirement savings on fire. And there he is out on the golf course.”
Upon his return, Trump addressed reporters aboard Air Force One Sunday evening, facing repeated questions about the economic fallout triggered by his tariff announcement and his response was less than presidential.
Bloomberg’s Chief Political Correspondent Annmarie Hordern received the brunt of Trump’s impatience.
“Is there a Trump put, though, is there a mark– is there pain in the market at some point you’re unwilling to tolerate, this idea of a Trump-put? Is there threshold?” she asked.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think your question is so stupid. I mean, I think it’s a, I don’t want anything to go down.
But sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something. And we have such a horrible, we have been treated so badly by other countries because we had stupid leadership that allowed this to happen.
They took our businesses, they took our money, they took our jobs, they moved it to Mexico, they moved to Canada, they move a lot of it to China, and it’s not sustainable, we’re not gonna do it.
Now we have hundreds of billions of dollars that’s pouring into our country on a monthly basis. It’s pouring, it’s already started because they put tariffs on it. And eventually it’s gonna straighten out and our country will be solid and strong again.
Reporters didn’t fare any better last week when Trump was questioned Thursday about the Pentagon’s investigation into Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over his use of the Signal app to discuss top-secret war plans.
During a press conference on Air Force One, a reporter asked Trump, “On Pete Hegseth and this [inspector general] investigation, do you want to weigh in on that?”
Trump asked, “What is it?” Apparently the country’s No. 1 consumer of cable news missed last week’s biggest story.
“There’s an I.G. investigation into the secretary of defense’s use of the Signal app,” she said.
Trump replied, “Oh, you’re bringing that up again? Don’t bring that up again. Your editors probably. That’s such a wasted story, so what else?”
The reporter pivoted and asked Trump about Chinese ownership of American farmland.
On Thursday, acting Pentagon Inspector General Steven Stebbins informed Hegseth that an investigation would take place into his “use of an unclassified commercially available messaging application to discuss information pertaining to military actions in Yemen.”
“The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the Secretary of Defense and other DoD personnel complied with DoD policies and procedures for the use of a commercial messaging application for official business,” Stebbins explained. “Additionally, we will review compliance with classification and records retention requirements.”
On Monday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that the Signal case, commonly referred to as “Signalgate,” had “been closed.”
“This case has been closed here at the White House, as far as we are concerned,” she said. “There have been steps made to ensure that something like that can obviously never happen again, and we’re moving forward.”
Later, during the same press gaggle, Daily Mail senior White House correspondent Emily Goodin started to ask the president about people “upset” about their rapidly diminishing retirement accounts when Trump interrupted her to ask the name of her outlet — a frequent ploy during his second term.
EMILY GOODIN: A lot of people were upset about how they’re–
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Who are you with?
EMILY GOODIN: The Daily Mail.
EMILY GOODIN: A lot of people were upset today about how their 401(k)s were doing. Do you have investments? Were you looking at them?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: No I think–.
EMILY GOODIN: Are you worried?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I think our markets are going to boom. Got to give it a little chance.
But we’re taking in jobs and we’re taking in industry and we are taking in trillions of dollars. I think, I think our market is going to boom. Got to give it little bit of time.
But they’ve already started construction on numerous plants. Soon there will be many, many plants. All over the country they’re going —.
REPORTER: Have you both been checking your 401(k)?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: So you got to give, you got to give that, you got to give that a little time. (LAUGHS) I haven’t checked my 401(k).
While Trump insists market correction will occur, panic continues in real time. U.S. markets plunged Monday. The Dow dropped as much as 1,679 points in early trading, the S&P 500 fell nearly 5 percent, and the Nasdaq tumbled 6 percent, marking the worst day for markets since the early pandemic.
