Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary didn’t mince his words.
He wanted the incoming administration to make its boldest move yet.
And Kevin O’Leary asked Donald Trump to start one war that no one expected.
Kevin O’Leary wants Trump to wage a trade war against China
President-elect Donald Trump is ready to play hardball against China when he returns to office next year.
He announced that he would put a 10% additional tariff on consumer goods from China for not cracking down on illicit fentanyl that’s smuggled into the United States through Mexico.
“Representatives of China told me that they would institute their maximum penalty, that of death, for any drug dealers caught doing this but, unfortunately, they never followed through, and drugs are pouring into our Country, mostly through Mexico, at levels never seen before,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Until such time as they stop, we will be charging China an additional 10% Tariff, above any additional Tariffs, on all of their many products coming into the United States of America.”
Trump also threatened to hit any of the BRICS countries, including China, that they could face a 100% tariff if they try to create a currency to compete with the dollar.
O’Leary Ventures chairman Kevin O’Leary – one of the stars of ABC’s Shark Tank – wanted Trump to go even further hammering China with tariffs.
He argued on CNN’s NewsNight that Trump should drop the hammer on China with a 400% tariff.
“China is at the forefront of this fentanyl thing. And I think the real tariff war is not going to be on Mexico or Canada,” O’Leary explained. “It’s focused on a cheater, a liar, a stealer since 1999 when they came into the [World Trade Organization].”
O’Leary said that his businesses had been burned by the Chinese government cheating them.
“This is a country, not the people, but the leadership, that just doesn’t want to play by the rules,” O’Leary stated. “And I live it in my businesses every day.”
O’Leary wants to bring China to its knees with tariffs
The Shark Tank star urged Trump to put the screws on the Chinese government with tariffs.
“I would like to go to DEFCON One with China — tariffs 400%. I brought it up,” O’Leary said. “Bring the supreme leader to Washington or crush his economy until he has riots in the streets for food. This is a time to really put the screws in.”
O’Leary predicted that punishing tariffs would cause a revolt against the Chinese government.
“What you have to do is target parts of their economy where there’s a lot of workers. Let’s just say, for an example, let’s say yoga mats. Let’s say we import a million yoga mats a month,” O’Leary explained. “All the yoga mat factories have 400 percent tariffs on yoga mats. They all get unemployed. They go to the streets, they scream at Supreme Leader, ‘I’m starving’ — riots. That’s when he wakes up and says, ‘Wow, I can’t sustain my supreme leadership.’”
Donald Trump has massive leverage over China that he can use to his advantage in negotiations with the communist nation.
