U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent speaks at the Milken Institute Global Conference 2025 in Beverly Hills, California, U.S., May 5, 2025.
Mike Blake | Reuters
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday sketched out the roadmap of President Donald Trump’s “America First Vision” in a pitch to a roomful of global investors on the future of the United States economy.
“We have uprooted government waste and harmful regulations. We have planted the seeds of private investment. And we have fertilized the ground with fresh tax legislation. Next, we harvest. And we want you to harvest with us,” Bessent said in a speech at the Milken Institute Global Conference.
The Cabinet secretary highlighted tariffs, tax cuts and deregulation as the three core components of Trump’s economic agenda, echoing his op-ed published in The Wall Street Journal earlier Monday morning.
But where that piece prioritized boosting Main Street alongside Wall Street, Bessent’s remarks to the private-jet crowd at the Milken conference were an explicit appeal to a tiny group of ultra-wealthy investors and entrepreneurs.
“The administration’s goal is to make it even more appealing for investors like you,” Bessent said.
Bessent’s remarks came as markets eagerly await developments about the high-level negotiations with numerous trading partners that the administration insists are proceeding apace behind the scenes.
In an interview on CNBC’s “Money Movers” after the speech, Bessent said he believes the U.S. is “very close to some deals.”
“As President Trump said last night on Air Force One, maybe as early as this week,” he said.
He added that there could be “substantial progress in the coming weeks” with China, even as the U.S. maintains embargo-level tariffs on the top exporter.
Trump’s claim that dozens of countries were eagerly seeking to make deals with the U.S. was used to justify his decision on April 9 to abruptly scale back his so-called reciprocal tariff plan just hours after it took effect.
He placed a 90-day pause on most of the high tariff rates that had been unveiled a week earlier on what he touted as America’s “liberation day.” Instead, Trump swapped in a 10% tariff across the board, though he raised the import duty on China to an effective 145%.
Since implementing the tariff pause, the Trump administration has consistently signaled that a slew of revamped trade deals with individual countries are in the pipeline.
Trump in an April 22 interview said he has “made 200 deals,” and that his administration would be “finished” negotiating in as little as three weeks. His top trade advisor, Peter Navarro, repeatedly said that the U.S. could strike 90 deals in 90 days.
More than three weeks after Trump pulled back on his sweeping tariffs, no deals have been announced. But administration officials strongly hinted that a deal was quickly shaping up with India, whose prime minister, Narendra Modi, has close ties with Trump and recently met with Vice President JD Vance to discuss trade.
This is a developing story, please check back for updates.