I am extremely skeptical that a president and a party that massively increase the national debt every time they hold unified control, and whose single legislative goal this year is to do exactly that once again, is engaging in a sophisticated conspiracy to lower interest payments. If Trump and the GOP actually cared about the debt payments they wouldn't be arguing about how many trillions of dollars to add to it this year.
The much more likely scenario is that this is exactly what it looks like: an incompetent and corrupt president flailing around. Tariffs are an excellent tool for soliciting bribes since there are any number of ways various groups can be exempted, and this type of abuse has often happened historically. The ham-fisted way they have been implemented has done a great job of getting Trump attention. I've never seen anything to make me think that Trump cares more about the long term health of the country over getting bribes and attention for himself.
The much more likely scenario is that this is exactly what it looks like: an incompetent and corrupt president flailing around. Tariffs are an excellent tool for soliciting bribes since there are any number of ways various groups can be exempted, and this type of abuse has often happened historically. The ham-fisted way they have been implemented has done a great job of getting Trump attention. I've never seen anything to make me think that Trump cares more about the long term health of the country over getting bribes and attention for himself.