Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent tried in vain to spin the country’s astronomical $40 trillion debt on CNBC Thursday.
Speaking to the network’s Sara Eisen, Bessent admitted that he didn’t know when the Iran war would end, but that things were otherwise going well with the economy despite the soaring national debt and increasing deficit.
“This Iran conflict, we will get on the other side of this. We don’t know when,” Bessent said, failing to inspire much confidence.
Bessent was even less inspirational when it came to the national debt, telling Eisen, “There’s nothing magic about the 40 trillion number, and we can grow our way out of that,” before blaming tariff refunds for the poor GDP and rising deficit.
“One of things that’s temporary here that’s influencing the deficit has been these tariff refunds, and we won’t have to do that again,” Bessent said, adding that the administration was reinstituting tariffs. “I would expect that our 2026 tariff income is going to be roughly what it was in 2025.”
Bessent downplays the national debt: "There's nothing magic about the $40 trillion number. We can grow our way out of that." pic.twitter.com/ATQv5pMwid
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 20, 2026When Eisen asked if “we have seen peak deficit during this administration,” Bessent replied, “I think there’s a very good chance we have.”
“We are going to be laser-focused, as I said. [Office of Management and Budget] Director Vought, myself, the president; that combined with the vice president’s fraud task force, where I think we could save several hundred billion dollars,” Bessent said.
Suggesting that the deficit isn’t going to increase beyond current levels doesn’t make sense with how President Trump is spending money on everything from the Iran war to his pet construction projects. There’s no guarantee that Trump’s new tariff approach will survive court challenges either. And Bessent couldn’t help but admit that the Iran war shows no sign of ending anytime soon, meaning that his positive forecast is just a lot of wishful thinking.
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