“Fox & Friends” host Brian Kilmeade asked President Donald Trump by phone Tuesday if his latest tariff hikes will “hurt the economy,” and Trump’s answer went a little off course.

“No, because it’s bringing hundreds of billions of dollars,” the president began. He also called it “a shame” that he has to “go a harder way for the tariffs because the Supreme Court, in a very close decision, ruled against me.”

Trump’s newest round of tariffs — ranging from 10% to 12.5% on imports from dozens of countries — came late Thursday. That was the same day Trump’s 10% global tariffs announced in February were set to expire after being struck down by a 6-3 Supreme Court decision.

“Now, I have other ways of doing the same thing, but it’s a more cumbersome way of doing it,” Trump said. “But the tariffs have made this country a fortune. It made the country rich.”

The Associated Press reported in February that Trump’s tariffs produced mixed results for the U.S. economy. And last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that his new tariffs could lead to continued “sudden policy shifts, scrambled supply chains and higher prices on imported goods.”

But Trump’s answer didn’t end there.

The president added: “And I stopped eight wars — I would say five of them because of tariffs, a threat of tariffs.”

He said that tariffs “stopped India and Pakistan from going into a nuclear war.”

Trump has long claimed that he has ended eight wars, but an Associated Press fact-check noted in 2025 that he had not actually resolved any full-scale active wars. Trump has also previously claimed that tariffs led to de-escalation between India and Pakistan. India has denied that Trump helped end the conflict, though Pakistan has supported the claim, per Bloomberg.

Calling his tariffs “the greatest thing” during his Fox appearance, Trump said that “only the really smart people, or the people that are non-political and that get it, talk about it.”

Watch part of Trump’s conversation with Kilmeade below:

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