Saturday, March 29, 2025
Washington, October 1, 2025 – U.S. President Donald Trump has once again defended his controversial trade policies, declaring that “tariff” is my favorite word in the English language and crediting tariffs with making America “rich again.”
Speaking at the Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Trump claimed that for years, foreign countries had been exploiting the United States, but his tariff measures restored fairness to global trade.
“I love tariffs. It’s the most beautiful word, but now I’m told I’m not supposed to say it. Tariff is my favorite word. I love the word tariff. We are getting rich like hell,” Trump said.
The president went further, claiming that his tariff policy has already earned the U.S. “trillions of dollars”—enough, he said, to buy “a lot of warplanes.”
“We’ve taken in trillions. We are rich again. By the time we finish, the wealth we have will be something we’ve never seen before. Other countries have been taking advantage of us for years… Now, we’re treating them fairly. The money that’s coming in is unbelievable. Just the other day, we had $31 billion coming in—that’s enough to buy a lot of warplanes,” he added.
Trump’s remarks came just weeks before the U.S. Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in early November on whether the president’s use of emergency powers to impose global tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) was legal.
Last month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld a lower court ruling that found Trump’s broad tariff powers under IEEPA unlawful. The administration has appealed to the Supreme Court.
Even as the case heads to the highest court, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer reportedly warned that the Trump team intends to keep imposing tariffs on trading partners—even if some levies are struck down.
According to a report by the Financial Times, Greer expressed confidence that the administration would ultimately prevail in court but said that, if not, alternative legal pathways would be used to maintain tariffs.
“We have a lot of confidence in this case… We believe the Court will give the president the authority to use tariffs under this law in the context of an emergency,” Greer said.
He added that tariffs would remain “a permanent part of the policy landscape” regardless of the court outcome, citing the reciprocal tariffs imposed in August as a model of what future trade policy would look like.
