President Donald Trump, celebrating the 100-day mark of his second term with his Cabinet, admitted his tariffs could mean higher prices for Americans, but appeared to dismiss the impact on American families, including on children’s toys.
“You know, somebody said, ‘Oh, the shelves are going to be open.’ Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls,” Trump said on Wednesday.
“You know, and maybe the two dolls will cost a couple of bucks more than they would normally,” the president continued. “But, we’re not talking about something that we have to go out of our way.”
Trump went on to claim Americans didn’t “need” many of the products that are imported from China, the world’s second largest economy and the United States’ third largest trading partner.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, who joined press secretary Karoline Leavitt at a special briefing Thursday morning, argued Americans would be willing to pay more for American-made dolls.
“He was making the point that I think almost every American consumer agrees with, which is if they had a choice between a — and I’m a parent of young children — a choice between a doll from China that might have, say, lead paint in it, that is not as well constructed as a doll made in America, that has a higher environmental and regulatory standard, and that is made to a higher degree of quality, and those two products are both on Amazon that yes, you probably would be willing to pay more for a better made American product,” Miller said.
President Donald Trump speaks during a cabinet meeting at the White House, April 30, 2025, in Washington.
Evan Vucci/AP
Trump’s comments on dolls came a day after he pushed back on economic anxieties in an exclusive interview with ABC News.
“Hard times are ahead?” ABC News anchor and Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran asked the president.
“I don’t think so,” Trump responded. “I think great times are ahead.”
Trump’s defended his tariff plan — which includes product-specific levies on steel, aluminum and cars, a baseline 10% tariff on virtually all trade partners and a whopping $145% tariff on China — as necessary to combat unfair trade deficits with other nations.
He’s also argued the taxes will bring a boost in manufacturing as companies will invest to make their products in America instead.
But the administration’s bumpy tariff rollout wiped away trillions in wealth as markets tumbled. Businesses continue to warn of possible price hikes and potential product shortages due to the levies. Trump said on Wednesday night, during a town hall with NewsNation, that he was in no rush to negotiate trade deals.
Trump’s message for Americans who may have concerns at the prospect of higher prices and other economic impacts was they voted for it — despite his repeated promises on the campaign trail to bring down prices on Day 1 of his administration.
“With the economy, the number one issue for so many people, for just about everybody. It — it’s one of the main reasons that you’re back in this office. And now we have this trade war with China that — that Moody’s and other analysts say is gonna cost American families thousands of more dollars per year. And there is a lot of concern out there. People are worried, even some people who voted for you, sayin’, ‘I didn’t sign up for this.’ So how do you answer those concerns?” ABC’s Moran asked Trump.
“Well, they did sign up for it, actually. And this is what I campaigned on,” Trump responded. “I said that we’ve been abused by other countries at levels that nobody’s ever seen before … I could’ve left it that way, and at some point, there would’ve been an implosion like nobody’s ever seen. But I said, ‘No, we have to fix it.’ I’ve — I’ve wanted to do this for many years.”
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller speaks next to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt during a press briefing at the White House in Washington, May 1, 2025.
Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters
The president’s also repeatedly insisted that China will be hit harder in the trade war.
“You don’t know whether or not China’s gonna eat it,” Trump told ABC on Tuesday.
On Wednesday morning, the Commerce Department reported the U.S. economy shrank at an annual rate of 0.3% during the first quarter of 2025.
Trump sought to deflect blame by pinning the contraction on his predecessor, former President Joe Biden.
“This is Biden’s Stock Market, not Trump’s,” he posted on his conservative social media site. (In January 2024, when Biden was still president, Trump took credit for positive stock markets and cited poll numbers that showed him ahead of Biden).
Trump even preemptively blamed Biden for second quarter data as well.
“This is Biden,” he said. “And you could even say the next quarter is sort of Biden because it doesn’t just happen on a daily or an hourly basis,” he said during his Cabinet meeting on Wednesday.
