‘Cleaning up a self-made mess’: Adam Kinzinger calls out Trump for making a ‘deal’ to pause the tariffs he started in the first

It’s not every day you see a Republican calling out another Republican for a faceplant so grand it should be in the Guinness World Records.

Adam Kinzinger, ever the maverick of the GOP, did not hold back when Donald Trump decided to pat himself on the back for cleaning up a disaster he himself created. Kinzinger, who has been one of the few Republicans with the guts (and, honestly, the patience) to call Trump out on his nonsense, took to X (formerly Twitter) to deliver a snarky reality check:

Now, that is the kind of energy we love to see.

Kinzinger, for better or worse, has become the guy in the GOP who’s not afraid to point out when the emperor is parading around without clothes—or, in Trump’s case, without a shred of coherent policy. He’s been outspoken, and not just in a “let me write a strongly worded letter” kind of way. Kinzinger has called out his own party’s hypocrisy, stood up against Trump’s election lies, and, in general, refused to drink the MAGA Kool-Aid.

Trump’s latest “deal” with China—a 90-day pause on the tariffs he so gleefully imposed—has everyone scratching their heads. Remember when he slapped those tariffs on Chinese imports, claiming it was all part of his genius plan to stick it to Beijing? Well, those tariffs quickly escalated into a full-blown trade war, with the U.S. and China playing a game of “who can out-stupid the other” by imposing higher and higher duties on each other’s goods.

At its peak, Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports hit a mind-boggling 145%. China, of course, wasn’t going to take this lying down. They fired back with their own tariffs, hitting U.S. farmers and manufacturers where it hurt. And now? Trump is dialing the tariffs back to 30%, and China is doing the same, dropping theirs to 10%. It’s a temporary truce, a 90-day pause, and the stock market is, predictably, thrilled. The Dow Jones surged, the S&P 500 climbed, and the Nasdaq shot up like someone handed it a double espresso. But let’s not get carried away. This isn’t a “win.” It’s damage control. Trump hasn’t solved the problem; he’s just stopped making it worse for a little while. And yet, the man is acting like he just negotiated world peace. Cue the eye roll.

Kinzinger’s jab—calling this a “capitulation”—hits the nail on the head. Trump didn’t outsmart China or pull off some grand strategy. He started a fire, let it burn out of control, and then threw a bucket of water on it while yelling, “You’re welcome!” And the worst part? The underlying issues in the U.S.-China trade relationship remain unresolved. Intellectual property theft, forced technology transfers, and Beijing’s state-subsidized industries—all the things Trump claimed he was going to fix—are still very much a problem.