'I Hate To Predict Things': Trump On Whether US Will Face Recession This Year

President Trump declined to predict a recession this year despite stock market concerns over tariffs on Mexico, Canada, and China.

File photo of US President Donald Trump.

Source : PTI

US President Donald Trump declined to predict whether the country could face a recession this year amid stock market concerns about his recent tariff actions on Mexico, Canada and China.

In an interview with Fox News Channel’s 'Sunday Morning Futures,' Trump defended imposing and then quickly halting 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada.

"I hate to predict things like that," he told the interviewer when asked if a recession was coming in 2025. "There is a period of transition, because what we're doing is very big — we're bringing wealth back to America," he said. "It takes a little time." “April 2nd, it becomes all reciprocal,” Trump said, “What they charge us, we charge them.”

AFP reported that when asked later on Sunday to clarify his remarks on whether there could be a recession, Trump told reports on Air Force One, "Who knows?"

What Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick Said?

However, Trump's commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, was more confident in dismissing the concerns about the possibility of a recession. When asked whether Americans should brace for a downturn, he told NBC's 'Meet the Press', "Absolutely not."

“There’s going to be no recession in America. ... Global tariffs are going to come down because President Trump has said, ‘You want to charge us 100%? We’re going to charge you 100%,’” Lutnick told NBC News.

Lutnick said that Trump plans to 'unleash America out to the world' and 'grow our economy in a way we’ve never grown before.' “So, if Donald Trump is bringing growth to America, I would never bet on recession, no chance,” the commerce secretary added.

What Trump's Economic Adviser said?

In an interview on Sunday on ABC News' 'This Week', Trump’s economic adviser, Kevin Hassett, said that the Trump administration was using tariffs to launch 'a drug war, not a trade war,' with Canada and Mexico.

The tariffs are 'part of a negotiation to get Canada and Mexico to stop shipping fentanyl across our borders,' Hassett told ABC News'. "As we've watched them make progress on the drug war, then we've relaxed some of the tariffs that we put on them, because they're making progress."