Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno advised Americans reeling from a plunging stock market Thursday to ignore their losses and invest new money in it.
The Ohio lawmaker told reporters there were “lots of opportunities” to profit in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s tariffs plunging the market, reported Business Insider, even as some companies’ suffer their worst day on the market in years.
“I would go out and buy stocks today,” he said. “Lots of opportunity, lots of companies that have great valuation. There’s no reason that Apple stock should be down.”
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Apple’s stock price plummeted nine percent by lunchtime Thursday, Forbes reported, which equates to a $301 billion loss in market cap. Companies who manufacture or source materials from overseas, like many in the apparel and tech sectors, appear to have suffered the brunt of Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs so far.
Nike and Lululemon, who have a large manufacturing presence in hard-hit countries China and Vietnam, each tanked more than 13 percent on Thursday, The New York Times reported. It is the lowest Nike’s stock price has been since 2017.
Moreno’s enthusiasm about Trump’s tariffs, and his encouragement to buy dips, has been shared by other Republicans in Congress. Sen. Rick Scott, of Florida, said Thursday he is still “really excited” about a tax on essentially all U.S. imports.
Midwest manufacturing workers are likely less pumped. It was announced Thursday morning that Stellantis NV—formerly Fiat Chrysler—laid off 900 from a plant in Michigan as a result of the new tariffs.
Trump declared a national emergency Wednesday to give him broad power to put at least a 10 percent tariff on imported goods from any corner of the Earth—even two penguin-filled islands in the Indian Ocean that have no inhabitants. Trump levied even higher tariffs on automakers and nations he says treat the U.S. particularly bad.
The Colombia-born Moreno, 55, ran several car dealerships around Cleveland after he graduated from the University of Michigan in the early 2000s. This, he suggested in a CNN appearance Wednesday night, made him uniquely qualified to discuss how tariffs will impact car sales and price.
“The person who’s buying a $500,000 car... if it’s a little bit more expensive, they don’t care,” he told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, claiming Democrats should embrace there being higher prices for higher earners. “And like I said, it’s an ultimate tax on rich people.”
Foreign supercars are not the only vehicles being imported from overseas, however, and experts warn that cars produced by Honda, Subaru, Toyota, and others will see their prices spike by the thousands for everyday Americans.
Moreno defended tariffs on these automakers by claiming Americans will simply purchase an American-made Ford or a Chevy instead of a foreign-manufactured one, ignoring the possibility U.S. manufacturers may also raise their prices as they had less competition at their current price point.
“You’re talking about the mainstream cars—a Honda, Toyota, Subaru, a Ford, a Chevy,” Moreno said. “If one car goes up in price because there’s a tariff, that person would just buy the other one that doesn’t have a tariff, which is your American-made automobile. And places like Ohio benefit because your neighbor is employed as a result of that car being made in the United States.”
