GOP senator on Trump tariffs: He is making America ‘1929 again’

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) blasted President Trump’s reported plan to provide billions of dollars in emergency aid to U.S. farmers grappling with hefty retaliatory tariffs on their products, warning that the Trump administration was “going to make it 1929 again.”

Sasse’s remark was a reference to the year that the Great Depression hit the U.S. and spread across the world as countries sought to safeguard their economies with protectionist trade policies and tariffs. 

The Nebraska senator slammed the trade war being waged by the Trump administration, saying that it is “cutting the legs out from under farmers” and that the White House is now poised to “spend $12 billion on gold crutches.”

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“America’s farmers don’t want to be paid to lose – they want to win by feeding the world,” Sasse said in a statement. “This administration’s tariffs and bailouts aren’t going to make America great again, they’re just going to make it 1929 again.”

Farmers have been caught in the crosshairs of an escalating global trade war. Agriculture groups and lawmakers from farm states have been calling on the administration to stop imposing the tariffs because their products are being targeted for retaliatory tariffs by top U.S. trading partners.

Reports surfaced on Tuesday that the Agriculture Department was preparing a plan to send as much as $12 billion in federal aid to farmers amid growing concerns over the trade war.