https://brucebartlett.substack.com/p/reagan-did-not-love-tariffs
Reagan Did Not Love Tariffs
Trump Is a Liar
NOV 01, 2025
In response to tariffs on Canadian goods imposed by Donald Trump, the Canadian Province of Ontario ran an advertisement on American television with video of Ronald Reagan strenuously denouncing tariffs and protectionism, and supporting free trade. Trump was incensed by the ad and in response immediately added an additional 10 percent tariff on Canadian goods to those already in place, while canceling trade talks with Canada.
The ad was announced on October 14, 2025 and began running on October 23, 2025. On October 25, 2025, Trump claimed that the ad distorted Reagan’s policy on tariffs, and that it was in fact the same as Trump’s. Trump told a gaggle of reporters:
Canada lied. They made up a fake statement by President Reagan. Reagan was a big supporter of tariffs when needed. We need tariffs for national security and they totally turned it around because they’re getting hurt by tariffs, and we’re gaining by tariffs. They’ve used tariffs on us when we’ve had different presidents very successfully. They’ve taken a lot of money out of our country and now we’ve taken it all back. So they went out and they made a fake commercial. The Reagan Foundation went crazy with it because it was the opposite.
Reagan liked tariffs and when necessary, he would use tariffs. It’s made us a very rich country. It’s also made us, when it was used against us, not good for us. But we’ve used them very successfully. We have the highest stock market we’ve ever had. We have great national security. I’ve settled wars because of tariffs, and a president has the right to use tariffs especially when it comes to national security. We need it for national security even including our own wealth and paying down debt. We’re in very good shape with that but they took a commercial saying the exact opposite, so I’m very disappointed in Canada. They lied. It was a fraud what they did. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/pool-reports-october-25-2025
This was not the first time Trump compared his trade policies favorably to Reagan’s. During the 2016 campaign he announced a litany of trade measures he would take immediately as president. “President Reagan deployed similar trade measures when motorcycle and semiconductor imports threatened U.S. industry,” Trump said in a June 28, 2016 speech (https://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/full-transcript-trump-job-plan-speech-224891).
Trump supporters claimed that the video of Reagan speaking in favor of free trade was edited or doctored. But the raw video and a transcript is easily available from Reagan’s radio address on April 25, 1987. (It was Reagan’s custom to give a weekly radio address on various topics, as he had been a radio announcer early in his career.) The heart of Reagan’s philosophy was clearly articulated.
Now, that message of free trade is one I conveyed to Canada’s leaders a few weeks ago, and it was warmly received there. Indeed, throughout the world there’s a growing realization that the way to prosperity for all nations is rejecting protectionist legislation and promoting fair and free competition. Now, there are sound historical reasons for this. For those of us who lived through the Great Depression, the memory of the suffering it caused is deep and searing. And today many economic analysts and historians argue that high tariff legislation passed back in that period called the Smoot-Hawley tariff greatly deepened the depression and prevented economic recovery.
You see, at first, when someone says, “Let’s impose tariffs on foreign imports,” it looks like they’re doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs. And sometimes for a short while it works-but only for a short time. What eventually occurs is: First, homegrown industries start relying on government protection in the form of high tariffs. They stop competing and stop making the innovative management and technological changes they need to succeed in world markets. And then, while all this is going on, something even worse occurs. High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliation by foreign countries and the triggering of fierce trade wars. The result is more and more tariffs, higher and higher trade barriers, and less and less competition. So, soon, because of the prices made artificially high by tariffs that subsidize inefficiency and poor management, people stop buying. Then the worst happens: Markets shrink and collapse; businesses and industries shut down; and millions of people lose their jobs.
The memory of all this occurring back in the thirties made me determined when I came to Washington to spare the American people the protectionist legislation that destroys prosperity. Now, it hasn’t always been easy. There are those in this Congress, just as there were back in the thirties, who want to go for the quick political advantage, who will risk America’s prosperity for the sake of a short-term appeal to some special interest group, who forget that more than 5 million American jobs are directly tied to the foreign export business and additional millions are tied to imports. Well, I’ve never forgotten those jobs. And on trade issues, by and large, we’ve done well. In certain select cases, like the Japanese semiconductors, we’ve taken steps to stop unfair practices against American products, but we’ve still maintained our basic, long-term commitment to free trade and economic growth. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/radio-address-the-nation-free-and-fair-trade-6
It should be noted that Reagan was very consistent in his rhetoric and always supported free trade in principle. His guru on matters of trade was the staunch free trader Milton Friedman, a Nobel Prize-winning economist. For example, in remarks to business leaders on September 23, 1985, Reagan said:
I certainly don’t have to explain the benefits of free and open markets to you. They produce more jobs, a more productive use of our nation’s resources, more rapid innovation, and a higher standard of living. They strengthen our national security because our economy, the bedrock of our defense, is stronger. I’m pleased that the United States has played the critical role of ensuring and promoting an open trading system since World War II. And I know that if we ever faltered in the defense and promotion of the worldwide free trading system, that system will collapse, to the detriment of all.
But our role does not absolve our trading partners from their major responsibility: to support us in seeking a more open trading system. No nation, even one as large and as powerful as the United States, can, by itself, ensure a free trading system. All that we and others have done to provide for the free flow of goods and services and capital is based on cooperation. And our trading partners must join us in working to improve the system of trade that has contributed so much to economic growth and the security of our allies and of ourselves. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-white-house-meeting-with-business-and-trade-leaders
In another radio address on November 26, 1988, Reagan even went so far as to anticipate the sort of disingenuous, faux nationalist arguments Trump now makes for his protectionist policies. Said Reagan:
Part of the difficulty in accepting the good news about trade is in our words. We too often talk about trade while using the vocabulary of war. In war, for one side to win, the other must lose. But commerce is not warfare. Trade is an economic alliance that benefits both countries. There are no losers, only winners. And trade helps strengthen the free world.
Yet today protectionism is being used by some American politicians as a cheap form of nationalism, a fig leaf for those unwilling to maintain America’s military strength and who lack the resolve to stand up to real enemies—countries that would use violence against us or our allies. Our peaceful trading partners are not our enemies; they are our allies. We should beware of the demagogs who are ready to declare a trade war against our friends—weakening our economy, our national security, and the entire free world—all while cynically waving the American flag. The expansion of the international economy is not a foreign invasion; it is an American triumph, one we worked hard to achieve, and something central to our vision of a peaceful and prosperous world of freedom. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/radio-address-the-nation-the-canadian-elections-and-free-trade
This was not a new theme for Reagan. He made a similar point in a 1982 radio address, saying:
When governments get too involved in trade, economic costs increase and political disputes multiply. Peace is threatened. In the 1930’s, the world experienced an ugly specter—protectionism and trade wars and, eventually, real wars and unprecedented suffering and loss of life.
There are some who seem to believe that we should run up the American flag in defense of our markets. They would embrace protectionism again and insulate our markets from world competition. Well, the last time the United States tried that, there was enormous economic distress in the world. World trade fell by 60 percent, and young Americans soon followed the American flag into World War II. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/radio-address-the-nation-international-free-trade
Trump supporters respond that Reagan imposed tariffs on various occasions, such as for semiconductors, which is true. But those who knew the historical record noted that he only did so under enormous congressional pressure that might have led to more severe protectionism, and against his better judgement. In an editorial, the conservative Wall Street Journal defended Reagan’s trade policy from Trumpian critics.
Mr. Trump is wrong about the Reagan speech, and he was wrong when he said on social media that “Ronald Reagan LOVED tariffs for purposes of National Security and the Economy.” The Gipper was a free trader. In the 1987 speech, Reagan was trying to explain why he was making an exception to his free-trade policies on semiconductor imports from Japan.
We remember that speech well, and its purpose was to head off a protectionist surge in Congress. The Gipper delivered it as fear of Japanese economic dominance was reaching its political peak in the U.S. “Japan as Number One” was the title of a popular, and misguided, book of the time.
Democrats in Congress, led by soon-to-be presidential candidate Dick Gephardt, were threatening new tariffs. Reagan wanted to instruct the country about the damage from protectionism in the past, especially from the Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930 and how it contributed to the Great Depression.
Reagan’s semiconductor tariffs proved to be a mistake. Intel Corp., which lobbied for the tariffs, innovated with its 386 and 486 chips that surpassed the commodity memory chips made by Japan. The U.S. attempt at computer-chip industrial policy at the time, focused around the Sematech consortium, was a bust, as T.J. Rodgers, the former CEO of Cypress Semiconductor, has explained on these pages. By the way, whatever happened to Japan as Number One?
It’s a shame to see the Reagan Foundation, of all places, indulging Mr. Trump’s pique with its statement saying the speech was taken out of context. Anyone who reads the whole speech can see the Gipper favored free trade, with rare exceptions for political pragmatism and national security. Reagan also backed, long before Nafta, a North American free-trade area.
To its shame, the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation posted a statement on social media on October 23 defending Trump and throwing Reagan under the bus on free trade. Following is the statement.
https://x.com/RonaldReagan/status/1981524620265046408
Fact checkers looked at the ad, parsed Reagan’s words from the original radio address and concluded that the ad did make extremely minor edits but was nevertheless faithful to the point Reagan was making. They also looked at Reagan’s record on protectionism and concluded that his was quite different, philosophically, from Trump’s. Reagan used tariffs only as a last resort to enforce existing trade agreements or to get countries to the negotiating table, whereas Trump believes that tariffs are a sources of strength that should be used re-emptively and aggressively.
Fact checkers have also noted that while Reagan occasionally imposed strategic protectionist measures, he simultaneously pursued a number of measures to open trade and reduce trade barriers. As Politifact noted in 2016:
Reagan did take a number of notable actions that are widely considered protectionist. However, Reagan’s record was more mixed than Trump lets on. In fact, it included strong support for international trade negotiations that ultimately produced the North American Free Trade Agreement and the World Trade Organization – two international agreements that Trump has sharply criticized.
Indeed, Reagan was always adamant that Canada is America’s most important ally and trading partner, which is why he pushed so strongly for a free trade agreement between the two countries. When signing legislation establishing such an agreement in 1988, Reagan said this:
The U.S.-Canada Free-Trade Agreement, which recognizes the similarities between our economies and our political systems, also respects our different histories, aspirations, and densities—the reality that Canada and the United States are two distinct variations of a common theme of freedom, democracy, and human rights. As leaders of the free world, Canada and the United States are pointing the way toward the future. Canada’s visionary Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney, and its able Ambassador, Allan Gotlieb, understand well that free trade is an idea whose time has come. One of the signs of this change is the very passage of this bill. We must make sure the freedoms we enjoy include the freedom to choose at home and the freedom to be chosen abroad. This nation, which was born to nurture human freedoms, must take the lead in establishing the principle that one of the most important human freedoms is free exchange. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-signing-the-united-states-canada-free-trade-agreement-implementation-act-1988
Prof. Douglas Irwin of Dartmouth, a trade historian and a staffer on the Council of Economic Advisers for Reagan, said that in evaluating Reagan’s record on trade it’s important to look not just at what he did as what he didn’t do. Political support for protectionism, especially against Japan, was strong in the 1980s, and Reagan vetoed protectionist legislation and efforts by some on his staff to grant import relief to various industries. As Irwin wrote:
Mr. Trump’s supporters and allies seek to portray Reagan’s presidency as a precursor to an America First trade agenda. “Ronald Reagan loved tariffs,” Mr. Trump said. It’s true that Reagan negotiated limits on imported goods to protect domestic producers of cars and steel from foreign competition. But he would not have embraced Mr. Trump’s protectionist trade wars.
In countless speeches, radio addresses and policy actions, Reagan assailed the costs of protection and hailed the virtues of free trade. He concluded free-trade agreements with Israel and Canada; vetoed protectionist congressional legislation; denied import relief for the copper, steel and shoe industries; and helped launch the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade talks, which led to the creation of the World Trade Organization. As Mr. Trump has also said, Reagan was “very bad on trade.”
Among prominent Republicans who have defended Reagan’s trade policy against Trump’s mischaracterizations are these.
https://x.com/Mike_Pence/status/1982635761611514348
https://x.com/JohnKasich/status/1982925793291632715
https://x.com/DA_Stockman/status/1982120290843779235
Being a competent diplomat, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney apologized to Trump for the ad on October 31, although he did not retract its substance, which is true. Rather, the apology was meant to smooth Trump’s ruffled feathers—as all foreign diplomats know, Trump’s enormous ego must be constantly assuaged even at the cost of national dignity. Ontario Premier Doug Ford, whose province actually produced and ran the offending ad, however, remains adamant that it accurately portrayed Reagan’s philosophy toward trade in general and trade with Canada in particular. In a letter to the conservative Wall Street Journal, Ford said:
Our government ran an ad featuring the words of President Reagan because we all benefit from being reminded of his wisdom. As the Gipper said, “protectionism” is “destructionism,” and the “way to prosperity for all nations is rejecting protectionist legislation and promoting fair and free competition.”
In 1987, President Reagan celebrated the new Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement by saying that it would “strengthen the bonds between our nations and improve the economic performance and competitiveness of both countries.” The pact, he added, would “provide an enduring legacy of which both nations can be proud.”
Rather than tarnish that legacy, let’s build on it. Mr. Trump called our ad a “hostile act,” but it was meant as an encouragement to embrace what has made our nations great. Together the U.S. and Canada can usher in a new century of shared economic prosperity by dropping tariffs, rejecting protectionism and promoting free and fair trade.
References
Reagan Statements
Ronald Reagan. “Radio Address to the Nation on International Free Trade.” American Presidency Project (November 20, 1982).
Ronald Reagan. “Memorandum on Import Relief for the Specialty Steel Industry.” American Presidency Project (July 5, 1983).
Ronald Reagan. “Statement on the Denial of Import Relief for the Non-rubber Footwear Industry.” Ronald Reagan Presidential Library (August 28, 1985).
Ronald Reagan. “Remarks at a White House Meeting With Business Leaders and Trade.” American Presidency Project (September 23, 1985).
Ronald Reagan. “Letter to the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate on Copper Production Restraints.” American Presidency Project (October 30, 1985).
Ronald Reagan. “Radio Address to the Nation on Free and Fair Trade.” American Presidency Project (April 25, 1987). Note: There is video at this link of Reagan delivering his address.
Ronald Reagan. “Remarks on Signing the United States-Canada Free-Trade Agreement Implementation Act of 1988.” American Presidency Project (September 28, 1988).
Ronald Reagan. “Message to the House of Representatives Returning Without Approval the Textile Apparel and Footwear Trade Act of 1988.” American Presidency Project (September 28, 1988).
Ronald Reagan. “Radio Address to the Nation on the Canadian Elections and Free Trade.” American Presidency Project (November 26, 1988).
Trump Actions (chronological order)
“Full Transcript: Donald Trump’s Jobs Plan Speech.” Politico (June 28, 2016).
Louis Jacobson. “Donald Trump Cites Ronald Reagan as a Protectionist Hero. Was he?” Politifact (July 1, 2016).
“A Timeline of the Ad That Led to Trump Terminating Trade Talks With Canada.” CBC (October 24, 2025).
Vipal Monga, Gavin Blade, and Alex Leary. “How One Ad Sent U.S. Canada Trade Talks into a Tail Spin.” Wall Street Journal (October 24, 2025).
Rob Gillies. “Ontario Premier Says He’ll Pull Ad That Upset Trump So Trade Talks Between Canada and US Can Resume.” Associated Press (October 24, 2025).
Bill Barrow and Thalia Beaty. “Reagan Foundation Becomes the Latest US Institution Drawn Into Donald Trump’s Controversies.” Associated Press (October 24, 2025).
“Pool Reports of October 25, 2025.” American Presidency Project (October 25, 2025).
“Reagan vs. Trump on Tariffs.” Wall Street Journal (October 26, 2025).
Gavin Bade, Vipal Monga, and Natalie Andrews. “Trump Says He Will Raise Tariffs on Canada by 10% Over Ontario Ad: The Measure Was in Response to What the U.S. President Called ‘Misrepresentation’ of Ronald Reagan’s Comments.” Wall Street Journal (October 26, 2025).
“Ontario Premier Brags About Anti-Tariff Reagan Ad That Prompted Trump to Cancel Trade Talks.” Associated Press (October 27, 2025).
Robert Farley. “Reagan’s Words on Tariffs.” FactCheck (October 28, 2025).
Doug Ford. “Why Ontario Ran the Reagan Ad.” Wall Street Journal (October 28, 2025).
Douglas A. Irwin. “The Canadians Are Right About Reagan and Free Trade.” New York Times (October 29, 2025).
Ian Austen. “Carney Says He Apologized to Trump Over Ad Reviving Reagan’s Tariff Criticism.” New York Times (November 1, 2025).
Scholarly Articles
Conti, Delia B. 1995. “President Reagan’s Trade Rhetoric: Lessons for the 1990s.” Presidential Studies Quarterly, 25:1 (Winter): 91-108.
Friedman, Milton, and Rose Friedman. 1997. “The Case for Free Trade.” Hoover Digest(October 30).
Han, Lori Cox. 2006. “New Strategies for an Old Medium: The Weekly Radio Addresses of Reagan and Clinton.” Congress & the Presidency, 33:1, pp. 25-45.
Jones, John M., and Robert C. Rowland. 2000. “The Weekly Radio Addresses of President Ronald Reagan.” Journal of Radio Studies, 7:2, pp. 257-81.
Martin, Howard H. 1984. “President Reagan’s Return to Radio.” Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 61:4 (December): 817-21.