'The hammer he has': Trump uses tariff threat on Brazil to help his buddy

The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle

NBC News

Politics, Washington, News, President, Policy, Government, Senate, Congress, Msnbc

4.5 • 3.6K Ratings

🗓️ 10 July 2025

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Trump sets off a new wave of tariff threats against more countries, major and minor U.S. trade partners alike. Then, the administration opens a criminal investigation into former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan. Plus, new concerns over whether federal agencies can effectively handle disasters despite significant budget cuts. Allan Smith, Dan Nathan, and Isaac Arnsdorf join The 11th Hour this Wednesday.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Tonight, Trump fires off a new round of tariffs, including one on a critical element,
0:07.0	using everything from cars to drugs to your phone.
0:10.0	Then the DOJ puts the former heads of the CIA and the FBI under criminal investigation.
0:17.0	Both men once led probes into Donald Trump.
0:20.0	And after the floods, new concerns about whether federal agencies can handle disasters after drastic cuts as the 11th hour gets underway on this Wednesday night.
0:33.6	Good evening once again. I am Stephanie Ruhl and welcome to the midweek nightcap. It is a 171 of the second Trump administration. And here's what we saw earlier. Donald Trump escalating his new strategy of trying to define global trade with another letter campaign. This morning, he posted letters to more countries to inform them of the new
0:55.6	tariff rate on their goods if they do not make a deal with us by August 1st. Those countries
1:01.2	were the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Moldova, Brunei, Libya, Iraq, and Algeria. For the record,
1:08.2	none of those countries are among the United States's top 30 trading partners.
1:13.9	This, while the White House still needs to make deals with many, many crucial countries.
1:19.2	But what are they doing? Sending letters to Moldova and Brunei.
1:23.6	But then this afternoon, Trump did address a major U.S. trading partner, Brazil.
1:27.9	He plans to hit Brazil with a whopping 50% tariff rate.
1:32.5	Trump says it is partly because of how the country has treated its former leader.
1:37.0	Former president and dear Trump ally Bolsonaro is facing charges that he plotted to overturn his election loss back in 2022.
1:44.8	Trump called for an end to that trial and ordered an investigation of Brazil's trade practices
1:50.5	towards the U.S.
1:52.0	Earlier at the White House, Trump was asked if there was a formula he used to come up with these tariffreets.
1:58.0	And I want to share his response.
2:00.9	The formula was a formula based on common sense, based on deficits, based on how we've been
2:09.6	treated over the years, and based on raw numbers. They're based on very, very substantial
2:16.2	facts and also past history. You look at the past history.
	...

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