President Donald Trump is using tariffs to apply heavy pressure on China, but the president remains open to negotiations with China, according to Tucker Carlson.

“Well, of course he is,” Carlson said when asked if Trump is willing to negotiate with China. “I mean, the question is, who needs the other more? Does the U.S. need China more or China need the US? I can't answer that,” Carlson told The Daily Signal.

Only hours after new tariffs went into effect on about 90 countries around the world, Trump announced a 90 day pause on the “reciprocal tariff,” but an increased tariff on goods from China.

“Based on the lack of respect that China has shown to the World’s Markets, I am hereby raising the Tariff charged to China by the United States of America to 125%, effective immediately,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, Wednesday.

China and the U.S. “need each other,” Carlson said. “The deal has been for the past 30 years, we’ll buy your underpriced consumer goods, you buy our overpricing debt. And you know, in some ways that's worked great, in other ways it hasn't worked at all.”

Carlson was at the White House last week when Trump stood in the rose garden and announced his plan to increase tariffs on nations around the world. Despite knowing Trump for years and the president’s interest in tariffs as a negotiation tool, the conservative news commentator and former Fox News host said he was “shocked” by Trump’s new tariffs.

“I wasn't against what Trump was saying, but I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, that's shocking that he said that. You can't erect trade barriers.’ ... It's like all the childhood orthodoxies were still rattling around in my head.”

Carlson sits down with The Daily Signal at The Heritage Foundation’s Annual Leadership Conference to discuss Trump’s recent use of tariffs and what the results may be.

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