The Wall Street Journal‘s editorial board has shot down multiple boasts President Donald Trump made about his tariffs in the paper just days earlier.
The Rupert Murdoch–owned newspaper had allowed the 79-year-old president free rein in its opinion section to hit back at “countless so-called experts, including those featured frequently in The Wall Street Journal,” who warned his sweeping global tariffs would be an economic disaster.
“Given the results of the past year, and the spectacular economic numbers coming out every single day, perhaps it is time for the tariff skeptics at the Journal to consider putting on one of my favorite red hats—the one that reads, ‘TRUMP WAS RIGHT ABOUT EVERYTHING!’” he wrote in a Jan. 30 op-ed.
On Wednesday, the Journal’s editorial board fired back, rebuking numerous claims Trump made about his tariffs and why they must be considered a success.
“We thought we owed him the opportunity after our criticism of his tariffs, and we’ll pay him the additional compliment of parsing his claims,” the board wrote.
“Mr. Trump starts by torching a straw man—to wit, that critics were wrong to say tariffs would produce a recession. We can only speak for ourselves, but we never predicted that,” the board added. “We said tariffs are a tax that would hurt growth, but their overall impact would depend on whether tax reform and deregulation outweighed the tariff harm.”
The Journal questioned Trump’s insistence that the bulk of the cost of tariffs “has fallen overwhelmingly on foreign producers and middlemen,” even as prices for items for U.S. consumers have risen sharply.
“Americans pay one way or the other—via higher prices or less choice. Mr. Trump admitted as much when he said last year that tariffs mean Americans might have to buy fewer dolls for their children at Christmas,” the board wrote.
The Journal’s board did agree with Trump’s boast that the stock market has soared since he announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs in April 2024. However, the market typically rises when the “TACO” president backs off a tariff threat and falls when he issues a new one, most notably when he announced a pause on steep tariffs against China.
Trump also made the dubious claim that his tariffs have boosted U.S. manufacturing, even though manufacturing employment fell by around 63,000 jobs in 2025. Last month, Volkswagen CEO Oliver Blume warned the company would not move forward with plans to build an Audi factory in the U.S. unless Trump’s automotive tariffs are reduced.
“You can’t blame him, when his supply chain would be vulnerable to willy-nilly tariffs,” the Journal editorial board wrote.
“Voters elected Mr. Trump to revive economic growth and tame inflation. His biggest successes have come despite his tariffs, not because of them. He isn’t going to repeal them. But if he froze them in place now and declared victory, he’d have a better chance of persuading Americans that he’s fulfilling his promise.”
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
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