US India Trade Deal & Rubio Revamps State Dept | 4.23.25

The White House is making early progress on trade deals with India, hoping to ease economic tensions caused by Trump's tariffs.

Both of our governments are hard at work on a trade agreement built on shared priorities.

How are Fortune 500 CEOs and investors reacting?

I'm Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe.

It's Wednesday, April 23rd, and this is Morning Wire.

Marco Rubio announces a major overhaul of the State Department, cutting staff and offices.

Over the past 15 years, the department's footprint has had unprecedented growth and costs have soared.

But far from seeing a return to investment, taxpayers have seen less effective and less efficient diplomacy.

And tech stocks rebound and egg prices drop.

What's the latest on the U.S.

economy?

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The U.S.

and India are reportedly closing in on a trade deal.

Meanwhile, President Trump met with top CEOs to assuage their trade war concerns.

Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to talk about the Trump administration's latest moves on trade.

Hey, Tim.

So potentially significant meeting in India.

Let's start there.

When can we expect a trade deal with India?

Well, that's still up in the air, hopefully for not too much longer since President Trump only paused tariffs for 90 days.

Vice President Vance represented the administration in India.

Here's some of what he said on Tuesday.

In our meeting yesterday, Prime Minister Modi and I made very good progress on all of those points.

And we are especially excited to formally announce that America and India have officially finalized the terms of reference for the trade negotiation.

I think this is a vital step toward realizing President Trump's and Prime Minister Modi's vision because it sets a roadmap toward a final deal between our nations.

I believe there is much that America and India can accomplish together.

Vance was in India for four days and met with top government officials, including Prime Minister Modi.

India is a big trading partner with the United States.

Last year, trade between the two countries was nearly $130 billion.

Since trade deficits are what Trump cares about, that's also big.

U.S.

imports from India were bigger than exports by about $45 billion last year.

Under Trump's new tariff regime, India is under a flat 10% tariff right now with carveouts for tech products such as iPhones.

But if Trump and Modi don't strike a trade deal within the next couple of months, that tariff rate could jump up to 26%.

All right, so a major spike looming there, but some positive signs with India.

Now, there are dozens of other countries interested in striking new trade deals with the White House.

What about these other countries?

Yeah, India is obviously a big player here.

So yesterday's announcement was important for the White House, but there has been progress with others as well.

White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt said during the White House press conference yesterday that the Trump administration is moving forward trade negotiations with nearly 20 countries.

Well, I spoke to our entire trade team this morning.

There is a lot of progress being made.

We now have 18 proposals on paper that have been brought to the trade team.

Again, these are proposals on paper that countries have proposed to the Trump administration and to our government.

You have Secretary Bessett, Secretary Luttnick, Ambassador Greer, NEC Director Hassett, and Peter Navarro, the entire trade team, meeting with 34 countries this week alone.

We are moving at Trump speed to ensure these deals are made on behalf of the American worker and the American people.

This is a relatively positive day for trade news for the White House.

It looks like the administration lately is putting more of an emphasis on negotiating new trade deals to tamp down concerns that these tariffs might be long-lasting.

Yeah, about that.

What signals are we seeing that the Trump administration is actively working to tamp down, as you're saying, concerns over these trade issues?

Well, there were a couple stories this week about top business leaders and the White House.

On Monday, the CEOs of Walmart, Target, and Home Depot met with the president about trade.

Those are obviously big names, and each has really complex supply chains that are being hit hard even now by the tariffs.

The president met with the CEOs personally to hear their concerns about trade and tariffs.

And then CNBC reported that Treasury Secretary Scott Besson met with top investors on Tuesday about trade with China.

Besent reportedly said he expects, quote, there will be a de-escalation in the very near future.

He added that no one thinks the current status quo is sustainable.

Those headlines, along with the news of new potential trade deals, boosted markets.

According to CNBC, stocks rose about 2.5% across the Dow Jones Industrial Average, SP 500, and the NASDAQ after Besant's meeting with top investors.

A lot of welcome movement on the market.

We'll be interested in seeing how long that boost lasts.

Tim, thanks so much for joining us.

Thanks for having me.

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Secretary of State Marco Rubio just announced a sweeping overhaul of the U.S.

State Department, aiming to streamline operations and align diplomacy with the Trump administration's America First agenda.

The plan includes significant staff cuts and the closure of numerous offices.

Here with the details is Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham.

So, Megan, what do we know so far about Rubio's changes and what's motivating them?

Well, I'll tell you, Georgia, Rubio is not being shy in billing this as an aggressive reform plan.

In a department-wide email, he called the State Department bloated and beholden to a radical political ideology.

And he said that because of this, he aims to reduce the agency's U.S.-based staff by 15% and cut the number of offices from 734 to 602.

That's a 17% reduction.

State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce addressed the cuts in a press conference on Tuesday.

Secretary Rubio is announcing a comprehensive reorganization plan that will bring the department into the 21st century.

This approach will empower the department from the ground up, from the bureaus to the embassies.

Region-specific functions will be consolidated to increase functionality.

Redundant offices will be removed.

And non-statutory programs that are misaligned with America's core national interests will cease to exist.

Under President Trump's leadership, we have a Commander-in-Chief committed to putting America and Americans first.

As his Secretary of State, Secretary Rubio announces that he is in fact confident a reformed State Department will meet the moment and help make our country great once again.

Now, there's also one addition in this plan.

Rubio proposes a new Bureau of Emerging Threats, and that's going to focus on cybersecurity and artificial intelligence.

As far as implementation goes, Deputy Secretary of State Chris Landau said an internal working group is going to develop thoughtful plans by July 1st.

But we do want to note that there are some hurdles here.

Some of these changes may require congressional approval.

And a preliminary budget proposal from the White House Office of Management and Budget that bolsters Rubio's plan by cutting the State Department's funding by 15%.

Well, that isn't likely to pass Congress.

So some significant changes potentially.

Do we have any idea what specific offices would be targeted for closure?

Yeah, we do.

Primarily, it's offices like the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, which Rubio has criticized for promoting left-wing agendas in countries like Poland and Hungary.

Specifically, he's argued that they advanced LGBTQ and gender-related initiatives, often undermining the democratic will of more conservative people in those countries.

And he's also targeting the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration.

There, he's arguing that it funneled taxpayer dollars to NGOs that facilitated mass migration, including at the U.S.

southern border.

Rubio said in in a new State Department substack that these bureaus have been misused to push policies misaligned with national priorities.

And he says that for the sake of efficiency, the goal is to refocus diplomacy on greater power competition and consolidate those region-specific functions of the embassies into regional bureaus.

And all of this, you have to say, is very much in line with President Trump's America First foreign policy vision in that it follows the administration's efforts to downsize these federal agencies and keep resources in the U.S.

During the press conference Monday, Bruce said that abolishing and absorbing USAID into the State Department was the first step in this kind of streamlining.

And now they're simply moving forward in the same spirit.

So how are the diplomats and staff inside this agency reacting?

I would say that's developing.

There hasn't been a lot of chatter so far.

Some analysts are saying this is going to alienate career diplomats.

Some Democrats are saying that these moves will diminish the U.S.'s influence abroad.

But we're also hearing that some are breathing sighs of relief because they were expecting even deeper cuts after a draft executive order circulated last weekend.

That document proposed slashing entire bureaus like African Affairs and closing embassies across sub-Saharan Africa.

But Rubio said that was all fake news, so the current plan is less drastic than that was.

And Bruce stressed that no one is being fired immediately and they're going to be carefully looking at the best ways to cut.

Well, we will continue to follow this story and see how these cuts develop.

Megan, thanks for reporting.

My pleasure.

Consumers could soon see relief on egg prices.

Daily Wire investigative reporter Mairead Alordi has the latest on the domestic economy.

So, Mairead, this has been a dynamic week for the markets.

What are we seeing economically?

Hi, Georgia.

Well, the market has been all over the place amid uncertainty over these tariffs.

The Dow plummeted on Monday, but then, as Tim mentioned, spiked again on Tuesday.

Investors are more hopeful after the Trump administration said it made significant progress on trade with India this week, and Treasury Secretary Scott Besson said he expects a de-escalation of the trade war between the U.S.

and China.

Now, meanwhile, back at home, we have some good news on egg prices, correct?

That's right.

Daily Wire White House correspondent Mary Margaret Olihan spoke to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins.

They've been working hard on a plan to get egg prices down from their high point under Biden, and Rollins told us their work is paying off.

Here's Rollins.

A couple months ago, we rolled out our big five-point egg plan.

And at the time, the eggs were, I think, the highest they've been perhaps since President Trump left office.

I know under Joe Biden, they increased 237 percent.

So while the cost of groceries has skyrocketed, nothing has skyrocketed more than eggs.

So the president asked us to be bold and think big.

And right here at the White House, almost seven weeks ago, we laid that plan out.

But what is amazing is since we rolled that plan out, which included money for biosecurity, locking the barns down, repopulation, the hens that we lost due to the virus, getting them back, the new hens back laying quickly, deregulation, so getting the government off the back of our egg layers, importation of eggs from other countries for the short term, and then a significant effort at vaccine therapeutic research for future avian flu issues, which is what's caused a lot of this.

And since then, the cost of wholesale eggs has gone down 58%.

Rollins also told us that part of Trump's plan with tariffs is working on correcting the agriculture trade deficit that widened under Biden.

Here's Rollins again.

There's now a $50 billion agriculture trade deficit that was zero four years ago.

So that means that all of that product, sorghum, wheat, corn, beef, that we were moving out in Trump 1, somehow that market disappeared and we've got to get it back.

And that's part of the president's sort of big vision with this trade and tariff discussion is realigning the American economy around putting America, American producers, American manufacturers first, and then holding accountable partners around the globe that have not treated our products fairly.

So again, lots of factors affecting the economy from egg prices at home to tariffs abroad.

In a sign of how unpredictable this situation is, the International Monetary Fund warned on Tuesday that the global economy could be hit hard by tariffs and slashed its forecast for U.S.

growth to 1.8% this year, down from the 2.8% it had predicted in January.

But even they acknowledged that the tariff situation is unpredictable due to the Trump administration using tariffs as a negotiating tactic.

Right.

Well, it's a very unpredictable international system, but the Trump administration says they're trying to make long-term changes for the better.

Mairead, thanks for reporting.

Thanks, Georgia.

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