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President Trump on Wednesday demanded that the media report that as his administration had pulled down the value of the U.S. dollar in order to reduce the price of Chinese and Mexican goods in America.
“This stuff is all totally made up,” he told Fox News. “There’s no question about it, it’s nonsense.”
Read a transcript here.
The President repeatedly demanded Wednesday that the media report that as his administration had pulled down the value of the U.S. dollar in order to reduce the price of Chinese and Mexican goods in America.
“This stuff is all totally made up,” he told Fox News. “There’s no question about it, it’s nonsense.”
Mr. Trump did not elaborate on how the sharp drop in the dollar would hurt American consumers, though such effects are largely speculative. A weaker dollar pushes up prices by increasing the cost of imported goods.
“We’re going to put it back up so fast,” he said.
The dollar had fallen by more than 7 percent against the basket of the currencies that make up the euro, the British pound, the Japanese yen and the Canadian dollar since the end of February. Earlier this month, Trump administration officials said the weaker dollar “has not been a bad thing for us.”
In March, a Treasury Department spokesman, Mark Luschini, noted that “factors with a more pronounced effect on our trade balance than a weaker dollar include productivity growth and labor productivity growth,” adding that “there does not appear to be direct evidence that weaker dollar has acted as a drag on trade results.”
But the dollar has fallen more than 20 percent against major emerging market currencies in the last year, driven in part by concerns that the United States is headed toward a trade war with major economies around the world, including China and Europe. The steep decline has made it easier for a government to exploit currency depreciation to its advantage.