Trump Proves Tariffs Are Friendship Bracelets

President Donald Trump met Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum at Sunday’s World Cup final, conclusively proving that tariffs are friendship bracelets nations exchange when ordinary diplomacy becomes insufficiently expensive. Sheinbaum attended at Trump’s invitation and briefly discussed trade with him and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney as the three countries prepared for another round of USMCA negotiations. Months of tariff threats and retaliatory warnings made a crowded soccer stadium the obvious place to address trillions of dollars in commerce, particularly because no one can hear the phrase “rules of origin” over 80,000 screaming fans.

“Nobody has ever used tariffs to create friendship like me,” Trump said. “Americans pay more, Mexico gets blamed, Canada becomes nervous, and then everybody negotiates with me. It’s beautiful free trade because it has much less freedom and considerably less trade.” Administration officials declared the meeting an economic breakthrough after Trump and Sheinbaum occupied the same building without placing import duties on each other’s beverages. The White House also credited the president with preserving continental trade, an agreement he had endangered so effectively that its continued existence now qualified as a rescue.

Sheinbaum later reiterated that Mexico wants a productive relationship with Washington without subordination, a position White House advisers interpreted as enthusiastic consent delivered in Spanish. Negotiators then gathered in Mexico City to determine which parts of the free-trade agreement could survive being repeatedly threatened by the government responsible for defending it. Carney completed the diplomatic triumph by remaining Canadian throughout the conversation, thereby reassuring markets that at least one national identity had not been reopened for negotiation. Officials said the encounter confirmed Trump’s trade doctrine: destabilize an agreement, demand gratitude for discussing it, and describe whatever remains as a historic personal achievement. Tariffs are friendship bracelets nations purchase for one another with their own consumers’ money.

* None of the quotes in this article were spoken by an actual person. More info.