“As tariffs on other countries go up, taxes on American workers and businesses will come down, and massive numbers of jobs and factories will come home,” Trump said at a gathering of House Republicans at his Doral resort in Miami, during a speech in which he praised the tariff-heavy U.S. approach at the turn of the 20th century.

“Remember, again, the word ‘tariff.’ We’re going to protect our people and our businesses, and we’re going to protect our country, with tariffs,” Trump added. He’s said to have earlier mused about tariffs of up to 20 percent.

Copper declined on Trump’s warning of sectoral tariffs on imported metals, and the dollar rose against its major peers on wider concerns about U.S. import barriers. The greenback had been trading weaker in recent days, after Trump refrained from starting any immediate trade wars during his first week in office.

The remarks Monday to lawmakers are the latest sign that Trump sees tariffs as a pillar of the Republican push to remake the tax system. He repeated a call for Republicans to cut the corporate tax rate to 15 percent, from the current 21 percent, for companies that make their goods in America. Taken in tandem, Trump wants to add costs on imports through tariffs and lower taxes on domestic production, though the fine print is unclear—U.S. manufacturing relies heavily on imported parts and materials.

Trump’s threat of semiconductor tariffs also comes hours after investor concern about Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup DeepSeek rattled markets and erased billions from Nvidia Corp.’s market capitalization. Trump has argued that tariffs will help keep and build U.S. manufacturing of the advanced chips compared with a subsidy program championed by former President Joe Biden. The latest DeepSeek model caused shockwaves when independent tests showed it as competitive with OpenAI and Meta Platforms Inc.’s more resource-intensive models.

Trump’s remarks Monday ran in stark contrast to market speculation that his abstention from immediate tariffs last week, when he took office, was a sign that he might soften his stance. “If you want to stop paying the taxes or the tariffs, you have to build your plant right here in America. That’s what’s going to happen at record levels,” he said.

Trump’s speech came after a weekend in which he threatened tariffs of as much as 50 percent on Colombia when that nation’s government initially declined to accept migrants being deported by the U.S. on military planes. Trump agreed to hold off on penalizing Colombia only after the South American government backed down. The president reiterated to House Republicans that any countries that refuse his deportees will be subject to the same tariff-and-sanction threat Colombia narrowly avoided.

A top Trump economic aide signaled Monday that Trump’s tariff push is part of a broader agenda. National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett pointed to the Colombia example—as a sign that Trump is considering several streams of tariffs which could add up to a higher overall levy in some sectors or countries—even as the president is still considering across-the-board tariffs.

“Whatever tariff that might be is going to be in addition to whatever President Trump does in the future when he’s thinking about an overall tariff,” Hassett said Monday in an interview with Fox Business host Larry Kudlow, who held Hassett’s current role during Trump’s first term. “If you look at tariffs as part of an overall strategy, you’re going to see, as President Trump says, a golden age and it’s going to be the biggest supply-side reform that America’s ever seen.”

Trump singled out several sectors in his speech to lawmakers. He complained at length about auto imports both from Canada and Mexico. “They send us millions of cars; we don’t need them for that,” he said of Canada, America’s top export market. “We want to have the cars made in Detroit or South Carolina or many other locations.” Trump then added: “The auto workers voted for me, and I have an obligation to do what’s right, and I’m going to do that.”

He sang the praises of steel tariffs that he implemented in his first term and said he’d be “placing tariffs on steel, aluminum and copper, and things that we need for our military,” without elaborating. “We have to bring production back to our country.”

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