Ted Cruz: Trump Tar­iffs On Cana­da, Mex­i­co A ‘Huge Vic­to­ry’ If They Fol­low Through On Com­mit­ments

Sen. Ted Cruz (R‑TX) sig­naled this week that the moves that Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump made imple­ment­ing tar­iffs on America’s neigh­bors proved to be a “huge vic­to­ry” because of the changes they result­ed in.

Cruz made the remarks dur­ing the most recent episode of his “Ver­dict” pod­cast with co-host Ben Fer­gu­son while talk­ing about the 25% tar­iffs that Trump imposed on Mex­i­co and Cana­da.

“If this ends up being a rel­a­tive­ly short-term tar­iff, and the effect is to pro­duce a mas­sive change of behav­ior from Mex­i­co espe­cial­ly, but also Cana­da, to help secure the bor­ders and to help stop the fen­tanyl flow, it will be a huge vic­to­ry,” Cruz said. “But that is depen­dent upon Mex­i­co and Cana­da now step­ping up and act­ing, and I think the pain inflict­ed, what will accel­er­ate that process.”

“And lis­ten, I think it says a lot that these tar­iffs were announced right at the same time that Trump sent his Sec­re­tary of State, Mar­co Rubio, down to Pana­ma,” he con­tin­ued. “I think these tar­iffs are speak­ing very clear­ly to Pana­ma. I think these tar­iffs are speak­ing very clear­ly to Green­land and to Den­mark. And these tar­iffs are speak­ing to peo­ple around the globe that Trump is per­fect­ly will­ing, when he says he’ll impose tar­iffs, he’ll do that.”

Cruz said the tar­iffs have an “enor­mous­ly valu­able” deter­rent effect when deal­ing with oth­er coun­tries.

“If the Cana­da and Mex­i­co tar­iffs are a mat­ter of weeks or a month or so, and it induces a sig­nif­i­cant change in behav­ior that secures the bor­der and results in a lot less mur­der­ers and gang bangers and rapists com­ing into this coun­try and a lot less fen­tanyl com­ing into this coun­try, that’s an unam­bigu­ous win,” he said. “I think the Mex­i­co and Cana­da tar­iffs are very, very dif­fer­ent from the Chi­na tar­iffs. I expect the Chi­na tar­iffs to stay in place all four years of the Trump admin­is­tra­tion, and I think they’re serv­ing a very dif­fer­ent func­tion.”