Trump has an 'easy solution' for Apple to get around his 'massive' tariffs on China

President Trump
(Image credit: Pool/Getty Images)

Apple will have to raise prices in response to President Trump's escalating trade war with China, the company said in a letter Friday, with hikes affecting products including the Apple Watch, AirPods, Apple Pencil, HomePod, and a number of chargers and other accessories. Trump responded on Twitter Saturday morning with an idea for an "easy" fix:

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The president made clear the previous day he has no intention of backing away from his aggressive protectionism despite, as the Apple letter put it, concerns "that the U.S. will be hardest hit, and that will result in lower U.S. growth and competitiveness and higher prices for U.S. consumers."

A new package of tariffs targeting another $200 billion in Chinese exports to America "could take place very soon depending on what happens," Trump said Friday, as could an additional set of taxes on $267 billion in goods. "That totally changes the equation," Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One.

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.