Trump gets a trade win; America gets a pope

PRESIDENT TRUMP ON THURSDAY announced the first trade deal since enacting his “Liberation Day” tariffs that have roiled economies at home and abroad.

The details are still being finalized, but Trump and his team unveiled the broad contours of a deal with the United Kingdom that will open up billions of dollars in market access in Britain, the sixth largest economy in the world and the U.S.’s fourth largest trading partner. The deal will also reduce non-tariff barriers and fast-track American goods through the customs process.

“There won’t be any red tape,” Trump said. “Things will move very quickly both ways.”

Trump made the announcement in the Oval Office surrounded by Vice President Vance, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and senior members of his trade and agricultural teams.

He dialed up British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and put him on the speaker phone in front of the cameras.

“This is a really fantastic, historic day,” Starmer said.

“This is going to boost trade between and across our countries,” he added. “It’s going to not only protect jobs, but create jobs, opening market access.”

The deal will increase U.S. access to the U.K. markets, primarily for beef, ethanol and other agricultural products. The U.S. will make it easier for the U.K. to import luxury vehicles. The reciprocal tariff rate of 10 percent on products coming into the U.S. from the U.K. will remain in place.

Lutnick also said a separate deal is in place for the U.K. to purchase $10 billion worth of Boeing airplanes.

It’s a broad agreement with limited details at the moment, The Associated Press reports.

On the same day the U.S. and U.K. struck a trade deal, the European Union outlined its $95 billion retaliatory response to Trump’s tariffs on items such as alcohol, fish, aircraft, automobiles and machinery.

“We’ll be dealing with them,” Trump said. “We are dealing with them currently.”

Later, Trump's trade adviser Peter Navarro said:

"Any country which retaliates against the United States, which is simply trying to get fairness, is making a grave mistake. For them to publish stuff like that, I don't think it's in the interest or the spirit of negotiations that are going to be as affective as they otherwise would."

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer are traveling to Switzerland on Thursday to begin negotiations with their Chinese counterparts.

“I think they want to make a deal very badly,” Trump said.

Also on Thursday, Toyota announced that tariffs would cost them more than $1 billion over two months.

Trump on Thursday continued his pressure campaign against Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell after the central bank once again declined to lower interest rates over fears of inflation due to tariffs.

On social media, Trump called Powell a “fool.” In the Oval Office, Trump said talking to Powell is “like talking to a wall.”

National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham that Powell’s moves are political, rather than economic, and meant to sabotage the Trump administration.

“To have the Fed out there jawboning against the president's policies, you know, they didn't do that when Joe Biden was printing money and spending it and creating 20 percent inflation,” Hassett said. “And so, it just makes me wonder about, like, what's wrong with their models or what's wrong with their politics?”