CNBC’s Jim Cramer Warns New Trump Tariffs Would Be “Horrendous For The Economy”​on April 2, 2025 at 3:13 am

“Speaking as someone who’s not a fan of free trade, I have to be honest here: A 20% across-the-board tariff on almost all imports, that would be horrendous for the economy,” Jim Cramer said on his CNBC show this evening.

Cramer was referring to a Wall Street Journal report that predicted Trump’s promised April 2 tariff package would include “a potential 20% global tariff on virtually all imports.”

The host then invoked the ghost of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, widely seen as a major contributing factor to the Great Depression.

“The blanket universal tariff is a disaster for the consumer. Google it,” he said.

Cramer said the train that Trump is trying to lay tracks for already left the station long ago.

“The truth is the jobs that were supposed to be protected by tariffs were automated out of existence a long time ago…We don’t have the capacity to make this stuff anymore. If you want to buy American to avoid the tariffs, you’re going to pay through the nose to do it.”

Despite the doomsaying, it was a relatively subdued performance for the usually-animated Cramer who, after all, yesterday threw out what might be the worst possible insult for Trump: Cramer compared him to Jimmy Carter.