A Republican lawmaker questioning President Donald Trump’s trade liaison during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Tuesday bluntly asked who would be at fault if the White House’s sweeping tariff strategy fails the United States.
“Whose throat do I get to choke if this proves to be wrong?” Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., asked U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
Tillis told Greer that he previously worked in management consulting and that there was a tagline for determining accountability in cases where consultants’ plans for customer organizations succeed or fail.
“In other words, when you’re finally taking a look at a strategy, someone has to own it, and you can’t say that it’s the president or the vice president.”
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Tillis described a management platform that came out in the 1990s that promised to transform the industry through an “alla prima approach,” ripping the proverbial Band-Aid off and executing the necessary tasks in a blanket fashion.
“It proved to be hugely unsuccessful,” he said.
Tillis suggested that Trump’s tariff plan – affecting dozens of countries, friend and foe – has a similar look to it.
“I’m not a trade expert, and I’m going to question it at this point,” he said, adding that in consulting there is a mantra of “one throat to choke.”
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Greer responded that Tillis could always come to him, but he answered in the negative when asked if he was the “tip of the spear” when it came to the idea of the alla prima approach. He said pharmaceuticals and semiconductors are exempt from the tariffs, as well as goods covered by the USMCA that have no non-North American presence in their supply chain, showing that it was not truly “alla prima,” in Tillis’ words.
Tillis went on to ask about the lack of exemptions for aluminum and goods produced in China that have no other possible domestic sourcing, saying North Carolinians are keen on both concerns.
Offering a timeline of 14 months, Tillis asked whether there will be more certainty in the term length of such tariffs by February 2026: “[So] the people in the trailer park that I grew up in, who are going to bear the brunt of some of these short-term cost increases, maybe some job displacement for a period of time, how are they going to be feeling?”
He also questioned the effect tariffs have played on retirement plans, noting about 11,000 people turn 65 every day as the tariffs continue.
Earlier in the hearing, ranking member Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., announced he would put forward a purportedly bipartisan “privileged resolution” – one requiring a Senate vote – to claw back the latest round of tariffs and restore what he called Congress’ role in the process.
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