Takeaways: Some of Trump's Davos declarations could divide Republicans

President Donald Trump put friends and foes alike on notice Thursday, using his first major speech since reclaiming power to shake up the global order with some comments that could splinter congressional Republicans.

The once-and-again U.S. president virtually addressed the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, as leaders from across the globe have spent months bracing for his return to the White House.

“My administration is acting with unprecedented speed to fix the disasters we’ve inherited from a totally inept group of people and to solve every single crisis facing our country,” Trump told the assembled world leaders and leading economic figures after sending them a clear message during his Monday inauguration address.

In his inaugural remarks, Trump had made clear that his “America first” philosophy would once again drive U.S. economic and foreign policy as he called for an immediate overhaul of the U.S. tax and trade system.

“Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens,” he said at the Capitol. “For this purpose, we are establishing the External Revenue Service to collect all tariffs, duties and revenues. It will (bring) massive amounts of money pouring into our treasury, coming from foreign sources.”

Later Monday, Trump said his administration was contemplating “25 percent” tariffs on products from Canada and Mexico, telling reporters he is considering applying those on Feb. 1. No final order has come so far from the Oval Office, however.

Here are four takeaways from Trump’s virtual return to Davos — and a bonus from his wide-ranging interview with Fox News that aired Wednesday.

Confidence in Congress

Close watchers of the 118th Congress know that Republicans, especially in the House, were not always, to borrow a Trump 1.0 term, a “well-oiled machine.” Since returning to the White House, however, Trump has said that GOP members in both chambers are “unified” and should vote that way all the time.

That has not always been the reality. As recently as last month, House Republicans bickered among themselves as they struggled to avert a partial government shutdown.

No matter to Trump. He told the Davos summit Thursday that House and Senate Republicans soon “are going to pass the largest tax cuts” in U.S. history, which he said would be “massive” for workers, families and domestic producers.

But his confidence is not limited to Republican members, with the Trump saying Thursday that his team is working with Democrats on legislation that would extend the tax cuts from late 2017.

In fact, taxes — and tariffs, of course — were big parts of his message to the WEF.

If foreign-based companies “come make your product in America, and we will give you among the lowest taxes of any nation on earth,” Trump said onscreen, speaking from behind the familiar blue presidential lectern. He vowed to lower the corporate tax rate from 21% to 15%, contending: “The 15 [%] is about as low as it gets” anywhere on the globe.

His harshest words on potential tariffs and economic matters were for the European Union. Echoing his first term rhetoric, he said: “From the standpoint of America, the E.U. treats us very, very unfairly, very badly. They have a large tax that we know about … and it’s a very substantial one. They … essentially don’t take our farm products, and they don’t take our cars. Yet they send cars to us by the millions. They put tariffs on things that we want to do.”

Trump has, at times since returning to the White House, sounded less combative, including on Thursday. “I’m trying to be constructive because I love Europe,” he told the forum.

Delaware Democratic Sen. Chris Coons, a Biden ally and member of the Foreign Relations and Small Business committees, warned Trump in an op-ed published Monday that “the two policies you advocated most consistently on the campaign trail were your proposals for widespread tariffs and mass deportations. But these won’t help Americans deal with everyday costs — at all. They’ll actually raise prices.”

Gross domestic problem

Some congressional Republicans during Trump’s first term got on board with his calls for NATO member countries to devote more of their annual spending on defense. The alliance’s charter calls for members to spend 2% of their respective gross domestic products on military matters.

Both Trump and former President Joe Biden have taken credit for member countries boosting their defense spending. But, in true Trump vs. Europe form, he upped the ante Thursday.

“I’m also going to ask all NATO nations to increase defense spending to 5% of GDP,” he said, “which is what it should have been years ago.”

There’s only one problem: The U.S. has not spent that much on its own defense as a percentage of GDP since 1992, when Republican George H.W. Bush was in the White House, according to data compiled by the World Bank. What’s more, the U.S. level since approached 5% under Democratic President Barack Obama, hitting 4.9% of GDP in 2009 and 2010.

Under Trump’s first term, the level was 3.3% in 2017 and 2018; 3.4% in 2019; and 3.7 in 2020.

Expect hawkish congressional Republicans, eager for bigger annual Pentagon budgets, to latch on to Trump’s latest transatlantic tough talk. And that could cause further splintering inside the House GOP Conference on the same old issue: federal spending — with a debt ceiling deadline quickly approaching.

‘It’s time to end it’

Trump’s time addressing the powerful economic group also hit on another global issue that has, at times, upended Republican politics: the bloody Russia-Ukraine war.

Efforts to, finally, bring both sides to the negotiating table are “hopefully underway,” Trump said, calling parts of both countries an “absolute killing field,” with soldiers “laying dead all over the flat fields.”

The war-averse U.S. commander in chief stated clearly of the brutal conflict: “It’s time to end it.” That likely will land flat with global interventionists and Russia-skeptics within his own party; many in that camp view a Russian victory, or even Ukraine giving into some of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s territorial demands, a hindrance to U.S. interests.

“When you see the pictures of the fields that I see, nobody wants to see it — you’ll never be the same,” Trump said in a sobering moment.

Mo’ MBS money?

No one was safe from Trump on Thursday — as often is the case.

He called on the powerful Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, to drop oil prices, adding that if that happens, he would demand interest rates be lowered.

Biden had stressed the independence of the rate-setting Federal Reserve, but Trump believes he should have a say on interest rates.

He even prodded Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, to whom he spoke earlier Thursday in his first foreign leader call since returning to the Oval Office. Trump said the crown prince intends to invest $600 billion into the United States, but the president intends to press the man known simply as “MBS” to invest closer to $1 trillion.

Prosecuting foes?

Trump’s Davos speech was not his only forum for potentially eyebrow-raising comments over the past 24 hours.

Asked by Fox News in an interview that aired Wednesday night about his administration possibly seeking criminal charges against political and legal foes, Trump would not rule out some prosecutions.

“I spent millions of dollars in legal fees, and I won. But I did it the hard way. It’s really hard to say that they shouldn’t have to go through it also,” he said.

Notably, his comments contradicted part of Monday’s inaugural address.

“Never again will the immense power of the state be weaponized to persecute political opponents, something I know something about. We will not allow that to happen,” he said inside the Capitol Rotunda. “Under my leadership, we will restore fair, equal and impartial justice under the constitutional rule of law. And we are going to bring law and order back to our cities.”

The remark was just another reminder that no matter what the former reality show host says today, he might go hard in the other direction a few days later.

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