U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with the media aboard Air Force One as he flies from West Palm Beach, Florida en route to Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, on May 4, 2025, returning to the White House after spending the weekend in Florida.
Saul Loeb | Afp | Getty Images
President Donald Trump again is downplaying the threat of supply shortages from his tariffs, even if it means fewer toys for American children.
“All I’m saying is that a young lady, a 10-year-old-girl, 9-year-old girl, 15-year-old-girl, doesn’t need 37 dolls,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday.
“She could be very happy with two or three or four or five,” Trump said.
The comments are the third time in less than a week that the president has brushed aside concerns about the effect on U.S. consumers from his new steep tariffs on China, and suggested that Americans should be comfortable with fewer things.
“I’m just saying [Americans] don’t need to have 30 dolls, they can have three,” Trump told NBC News’ “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker during an interview that aired Sunday.
“They don’t need to have 250 pencils,” he said. “They can have five.”
Days earlier, Trump acknowledged during a Cabinet meeting that Americans could see emptier shelves because of his tariffs.
But he insisted that China would still struggle more from the 145% tariff he imposed on imports from that nation.
“Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls. So maybe the two dolls will cost a couple bucks more than they would normally.”
Trump’s comments have drawn strong pushback from critics who have painted a picture of a billionaire as out of touch with everyday Americans.
“Billionaires like Trump and [Elon] Musk and do not have a clue about what it means for a working-class family trying to buy presents for the kids or to take care of the basic necessities,” Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said on CNN last week.
“It’s an incredible arrogance and ignorance on the part of these people,” Sanders added.
Republican strategist Karl Rove told Fox News on Sunday that Trump sounds like “Mr. Scrooge” when he talks about the possibility of fewer toys for Americans because of his tariffs.
Trump fired back at that later Sunday, writing on Truth Social: “I don’t need to have Karl Rove of Fox News to tell me what to do.”
Read More: Trump defends doll comments amid China tariffs
