In a startling new pronouncement today, Donald Trump’s press secretary proposed what many analysts have long suspected – Americans, not the government of Mexico, would pay for building a wall along the U.S. southern border. “Trump spokesman Sean Spicer added a stunning new detail about the proposed wall project later Thursday, saying that Trump intended to pay for it by imposing a 20-percent tax on all imports from Mexico,” reported the Washington Post. The comments came after Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto canceled a trip to meet with Donald Trump over the controversy of the wall and who would pay for it. “Of course, the 20% tax/tariff would get passed along to American consumers in the form of higher prices for Mexican products. So it’s an economic reality that it will be Americans (consumers and producers) who will pay for the tariffs and will therefore pay for the wall, if that’s how the tariff revenue is allocated.”That is not the only problem: Tariffs are set by Congress, which means members of Congress would have to sign off on this idea, including using it to pay for a wall.

Source: Forbes January 27, 2017 02:05 UTC