Rand Paul recently suggested the United States is in grave danger if President Trump pursues a trade war. On Fox News yesterday, Paul outlined his criticism on Trump’s trade proposals.

“A tariff is a tax, and typically Republicans, conservatives, have not been for more taxes. So, I’m against new tariffs. They’re simply a tax on the consumer.” Paul stated. He went on to argue that the tariff plan is “the wrong thing to do.”

“If you look at steel use in our country, there are 60 people purchasing steel for every person making steel in the country. So, there’s a lot of people who purchase steel that are going to be hurt by this.” the Senator explained. “My state alone exports $20 billion worth of products, including a lot of farm and agricultural products. And if there’s a trade war, we stand to lose in a big way.”

Ironically, Trump signaled last week that he will seek to impose tariffs of 25% on imported steel and 10% on imported aluminum. The President believes it will help him to recoup billions of dollars lost each year.

Paul also said he has spoken with Trump on government access to American’s personal information.

“I think that nobody — nobody in law enforcement — should be looking at American’s information without first getting a warrant. That’s what I fought for, and we’re very close to winning that battle, and getting the bill and getting reform for FISA.” Paul declared.

Later, the Senator raised the possibility of auditing the Federal Reserve. He mentioned an amendment he has recently added to the Senate Banking Bill.

“The Federal Reserve is incredibly powerful and what they’ve done for decades is to keep interest rates really low so government can keep borrowing and borrowing and borrowing money and that’s why we have this enormous twenty trillion dollar debt.” Paul said.

“When they keep interest rates low they prevent a useful signal from being distributed to the economy, and the economy gets into a boom and then ultimately a bust because of the Federal Reserve manipulating interest rates and keeping them below the market rate.” Paul went on. “So I think the Federal Reserve ought to be audited I think their power needs to be restrained and I think we should try to maintain value in the dollar instead of trying to destroy the dollar.” the Senator wrapped up.

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