The White House says “countries are falling over themselves” to find deals with the U.S. to get around President Donald Trump’s new tariff regime — acknowledging that negotiations could be coming while indicating that the administration won’t move easily.
“The president’s message has been simple and consistent from the beginning to countries around the world: Bring us your best offers, and he will listen,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters in the White House briefing room on Tuesday. “Deals will only be made if they benefit American workers and address our nation’s crippling trade deficits.”
But there’s been some shifting messaging from the White House — initially, senior administration officials said these tariffs were explicitly not a negotiation. When NOTUS’ Jasmine Wright asked Leavitt to explain the White House’s evolution on the tariffs from specifically not a negotiation to asking countries to pitch negotiations, she doubled down on Trump’s statements Monday that both things could be true.