I remember very well that day in 2015, Donald Trump came down that golden escalator in Trump Tower to announce that he was running for President of the United States. He had run before; some of us remember his 2000 run on the Reform Party ticket, which he abandoned in February of that year. In 2015, he was serious, and he won, in no small part because of his slogan, which became his campaign theme. Like all good political slogans, it was pithy, packed a punch, was easy to shout at rallies, and it sparked a connection with millions of Americans: Make America Great Again.

We all know the history after that. His 2020 re-election campaign faced serial impeachment efforts by vindictive Democrats, in addition to being hampered by the COVID-19 scare, and very likely plagued by election shenanigans. But he wasn't done; the Democrats made the mistake of installing the befuddled and corrupt Joe Biden in the White House, backed up by a vice president who had all the personal appeal and political acumen of a celery stick. Trump won the 2024 election in a rout. Now he's back on course to make America once more great, and he clearly sees the way to do that is by rebuilding our industrial base, and by doing that, rebuilding our middle class. These are, after all, the people who made America great in the first place: the people who grow our food, the people who build the roads and railways on which we drive the trucks and rail cars that transport not only our food but all of our goods. I've always loved seeing a train or a truck full of cargo moving along; that's the lifeblood of our economy. But generations of offshoring, of overregulation, have damaged our middle class - we were once a nation of ironmasters, auto manufacturers, of shipbuilders; of welders, pipe-fitters, electricians, farmers, truck drivers, railroad workers.

Fixing America's manufacturing sector and our middle class means addressing the bad policies that got us to this point: bad trade deals and bad trade balances. Our global balance of trade - imports vs. exports - is on the order of $122 billion, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. And a strong plurality of Americans have historically favored reciprocal tariffs as a way to balance trade. Donald Trump ran for president, promising to fix that. He's working to address that trade imbalance, he's working to strike better trade deals with other countries, and he's addressing the elephant in the room - China. And it's working. Trump has China hanging over a tariff cliff. 

First, Trump's tariff program. Many on the right are free-trade advocates; many of us, including me, have not favored tariffs as a matter of general principle. However, too many nations have placed significant tariffs on American goods. Free trade is only free if both sides have truly open markets with no trade barriers, but that's not the case today. So, the president has levied some heavy reciprocal tariffs, most notably on China. And the result? Over 70 nations have approached the Trump administration, in one way or another, looking to make a deal. In reply, the president dropped tariffs to 10 percent on those nations - while leveraging China's tariffs up to 125 percent.

Second, China. China is the economic elephant in the room that politicians haven't wanted to talk about. They steal American intellectual property, they steal American designs, they have stolen much of our industrial base, replacing American jobs with Chinese subjects earning low wages - sometimes nothing. But if the United States could make a trade deal with enough other nations to bring China to the table, all that could change, and that looks increasingly like what's happening. Capital management firm Pershing Square CEO Bill Ackman put it better than I could:

A thought experiment.

Imagine if:

Within the next 89 days, the US, Europe, and Japan agree to go zero/zero on tariffs and remove all trade barriers.

Then Europe and Japan join the US in raising tariffs on China to 145%.

Then the US, Europe and Japan as a united front…

— Bill Ackman (@BillAckman) April 11, 2025

The message to China is clear: The rules are changing; the United States won't be your chump anymore. America is committed to this; we elected a president who promised this. We're willing to suffer some short-term downside, if required, to see our middle class come back.

Third: Leverage. Despite the efforts of generations of Democrat politicians, the United States still has the most powerful economy in the world. All the modern, developed and developing nations of the world want access to our markets. We have the advantage in this matter: Not China, not the European Community, not any other nation. We're still the big kid on the block, but if we want to keep it that way, we have to use our power while we still have it. We can afford not to buy their products more than they can afford not to sell them to us. It's time to use that. The rest of the world seems to be figuring this out.

See Also: China's Trade Overture Snubbed: Aussies Refuse to Make 'Common Cause'

Tit-For-Tat Continues: China Hikes Tariffs on US Imports to 125 Percent, Calls Trump's Policies 'a Joke'

If the United States is to survive as a global power, a power for good in the world, we have to address these things. We have to restore our industrial base. We have to incentivize domestic production. We can't afford to rely on other nations for manufactured goods. We can't survive for long without a strong middle class. If the United States is to survive into the next century, we have to fix our trade policies, fix the over-taxation and over-regulation of our industry, and become, once more, a nation of builders and doers.

As Ronald Reagan famously said, "If not us, who? If not now, when?"

Donald Trump has had a storied career: Real estate mogul, celebrity, television star, and now President of the United States. He may be just the right man to apply the Art of the Deal to international trade, and he's sent a clear message to the rest of the world: It's in your interest to come to the table, to make a deal. And they are coming to the table. 

If President Trump does what he said he would - if he brings back America as an industrial power, brings back our vibrant middle class, and makes America great again - he will have painted his masterpiece.

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