On Sunday, Trump hinted that the United States might renege on some of the $36.22 trillion that it owes on the national debt. Speaking to reporters Sunday on Air Force One about Elon Muskās review of government spending, Trump said:
Weāre even looking at Treasury. There could be a problemāyouāve been reading about that, with Treasuries, and that could be an interesting problem because it could be that a lot of those things donāt count. In other words, that some of that stuff that weāre finding is very fraudulent, therefore maybe we have less debt than we thought of. Think of that!
āFor those not familiar with how financial markets work,ā Paul Krugman later explained on BlueSky, āU.S. Treasuries are the ultimate safe asset, used as collateral for everything. Even a hint that some Treasuries might not be honored could bring everything to a screeching halt.ā
The bond marketās initial reaction to Trumpās comments was to shrug them off. āTrumpās veiled threat is so insane that it wonāt happen,ā Harvard economist Jason Furman assured me. Politicoās Victoria Guida quoted an administration official saying that Trump was talking about unspecified Treasury payments, not Treasuries, prompting some of the business press (for instance, Bloomberg) to report that Trumpās meaning was unclear. Trumpās meaning was not unclear, and that administration official was lying when he or she said Trump was talking about unspecified Treasury payments. Go back and look at what Trump said. Itās on video, for Christās sake. (Fast forward to 21:15.) He said, āTreasuries.ā You arenāt imagining things. Your president is not a well man.
The bond marketās calm wonāt last if Trump repeats his threat once or twice more, as he tends to do until he gets a reaction. Or it may react with even greater alarm than expected when Trump and congressional Republicans reveal their deficit-busting tax plan. (The bond market has for some time been freaking out about the budget deficit.) āThe political world needs to appreciate the fact that heās playing with fire that will burn everyone,ā MSNBCās Steve Benen observed Monday. I second that.
āThatās too insane for him to actually doā is exactly the sort of complacency that got us into this mess.
Mainstream media is also saying that flagrantly ignoring court orders would be too extreme for Trump while his administration is engaged in this very action.
And exactly what he and his lackeys did the last time they were in power.
I canāt think of a time they did something this blatantly illegal in term one but itās been a while so I may have forgotten.
They did a lot of this. Several Trump staffers straight up ignored court subpoenas.
The question I would be asking is what is this revlation a smoke screen for?