 "Trump grilled his team for not informing him about TACO trend: Report")
US President Donald Trump was caught off guard when a reporter earlier this week asked him about a new term coined over his tariff policy— TACO—and later vented his anger to his team for failing to apprise him of the new trend, CNN has reported citing sources in the White House.
Trump in response said he has “never heard” about the term, while calling the TACO question “nastiest”.
“He thought the reporter was calling him a chicken,” the source said.
“It clearly bothered him, primarily because it demonstrated a lack of understanding about how he actually utilizes those threats for leverage,” said another source. “But obviously he’s not a guy who looks kindly on weakness, so the idea anyone would think that with respect to his actions isn’t received well,” they added.
TACO, or ‘Trump Always Chickens Out’ term was first coined in May by a Financial Times columnist and is now used to describe the US president’s tendency to back off after imposing massive tariffs on nations.
Instances when Trump ‘chickened out’
Interestingly, the TACO term was introduced to bring relief to the markets as Trump’s tariff crusade upended the global economic outlook.
For example, Trump last month went all-out against China and imposed a 145 per cent tariff on imports from the country. Later, the two sides reached a temporary agreement in Geneva, leading Trump to bring the tariffs down to 30 per cent in May.
Just last week, Trump threatened to impose a 50 per cent tariff on the European Union.
Earlier in April, Trump unveiled his much-anticipated reciprocal tariffs on the USA’s trading partners, only to pause them for a 90-day period.
Impact Shorts
View AllTrump’s explanation
Trump on Wednesday (May 28) appeared to dismiss the TACO narrative, arguing sometimes he sets “a ridiculous high number” for tariff rates and then relents if other nations give in to his demands.
But Robert Armstrong, a Financial Times commentator and the father of the TACO term, highlighted a pattern of Trump resorting to walking back.
The acronym turned into a running gag on finance Twitter, the insightful and typically lighthearted part of X where financial experts and analysts discuss the day’s most compelling, market-shifting, or occasionally obscure topics.
Within weeks, the TACO trade became a staple of Wall Street buzz and began popping up in client notes from analysts and economists.
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