‘He Told Us This Was Going to Happen’

As the stock market reeled from Donald Trump’s tariffs against trading partners Canada, China, and Mexico, and the U.S.’s national anthem is booed in (former?) allies’ arenas, the cohosts of The View had some finger-pointing to do on Monday’s (February 3) live show.

“I’ve never seen anything like that in my life,” Whoopi Goldberg said after reviewing the footage of fans at the Toronto Raptors NBA game booing “The Star Spangled Banner.” And I have to say, even the conservative media is warning about the price Americans are going to pay for this…. Everybody said, ‘This is a bad idea. This a bad idea. This a bad idea.’”

Alyssa Farah Griffin, the resident Republican of the panel, was the first to respond. “So Republicans have long been against tariffs, and there’s a reason The Wall Street Journal, Rupert Murdoch’s [newspaper] is calling this ‘the dumbest trade war in history.’” She went on to wonder whether the tariffs are a “bargaining chip” and noted that there are reportedly ongoing negotiations with the North American nations involved.

She then went on to slam the Trump administration’s (specifically, Elon Musk’s) decision to shutter the U.S. Agency for International Development, an aid agency, saying, “I’ve traveled all over the world as part of delegations and diplomacy in my previous capacity, and what makes America the most powerful nation on earth is that we have friends and allies, and it’s because we engage in international trade. We don’t bully our friends. We show up and give international aid. And if we stop doing that, which is what I feel like Trump is leaning into … we’re seeding our role of global superpower to China, because they will step in, they will show up, and they will be friends to the people that we’re giving not a nice signal to in Canada and elsewhere.”

Ana Navarro then said that Trump’s decision is a dangerous signal to allies. “We are treating them like trash. We are bullying them,” she said. “I look at this thing in Mexico and I’m thinking, ‘Okay, as if deporting good, hard-working immigrants wasn’t enough, as if emboldening the racial profiling and bigotry of Latinos wasn’t enough, as if revoking temporary protective status for half a million Venezuelans wasn’t enough, as if bullying Panama wasn’t enough, now he’s going to tax our tequila and avocados.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Sunny Hostin said in agreement with her cohosts. She then went on to explain how the dueling tariffs will raise the cost of everyday items, like coffee. “You have a coffee store, and you’re going to sell a cup of coffee, and your coffee is $5… Now the coffee beans coming in from some from Mexico are now $5 more. You think if I own that shop, I’m going to eat that $5? No, your cup of coffee just costs $10.”

Sara Haines then pointed out that it’s not people like the panelists themselves who’ll really feel the pain from price hikes. “Those were the two leading things we talked so much about. Well, what happened? Why aren’t the price of eggs getting better? This was the other part he promised, which was tariffs. So in some ways, sometimes you get what you voted for, which is the people that voted for him. He told us this was going to happen, and he won. Anyone making under $50,000, he won in spades. So people with the least are the people that will feel this the most. Sunny, you speak of your $5 now, $10 cup of metaphorical coffee…. everyone is gonna feel this. But there’s a lot of people, I would argue, at this table, who are going to feel it less. The people that put him into office and voted for this were warned in bold letters. This was what he was going to do, and he’s doing it.”

Goldberg closed out the segment on a strong note, saying, “I don’t know what’s going to happen with these tariffs and what it means tax-wise for people… You know, the American people are not wallets. They are hardworking people. This is their money. And if you’re making it hard for them to eat when you said you were going to fix it. It’s really annoying.”

The View, weekdays, 11 a.m. ET, ABC