Washington. President Donald Trump has long supported tariffs. He says they help bring in money, punish countries he believes treat the US unfairly in trade, and give him leverage to get what he wants. Even close allies like Canada and Mexico have faced steep tariffs.

On April 2, Trump announced sweeping new tariffs on nearly all US trading partners. But after the stock market dropped, he reversed most of them on April 9.

Still, Trump insists tariffs are generating billions of dollars a day. Speaking at a Republican dinner on April 8, he said, “We’re making a fortune with tariffs. Two billion dollars a day. Do you believe it? I was told two billion dollars a day.”

However, according to fact-checking by the AP, that claim is false.

Trump began raising tariffs in February. That month, about $7.247 billion in customs duties were collected, or $258.82 million per day. In March, the most recent monthly figure available, a total of about $8.168 billion in customs duties was collected, or approximately $263.48 million per day. A customs duty is a type of tariff.

US Customs and Border Protection said in an April 8 statement that as a result of 13 tariff-related presidential actions taken by Trump, it was collecting each day “over $200 million in additional associated revenue.” The agency is responsible for collecting tariffs.

Those numbers are in line with what the US has taken in thus far during fiscal year 2025, which started Oct. 1 under the Biden administration. According to the latest Treasury Department numbers, $56.215 billion in customs duties and certain excise taxes have been collected, or $283.91 if broken out per day. An excise tax is also a type of tariff.

The US has collected approximately $3.076 billion in customs and certain excise taxes so far this month, coming out to about $180.94 million per day, according to the Treasury Department’s data.

Economists suggest that Trump’s number is likely based on the value of imported goods from fiscal year 2024, disregarding the impact higher tariffs will have on supply and demand.

“It’s almost certainly the case we’re collecting less than that," said Robert Johnson, an associate professor of economics at the University of Notre Dame, of Trump's $2 billion per day figure.

The U.S. imported about $3.3 trillion worth of goods in fiscal 2024, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Applying a 20 percent tariff, the average rate Trump proposed on April 2, to that figure would yield about $660 billion in tariff revenue, or roughly $1.8 billion per day.

But economists caution that this assumes no change in behavior. If tariffs make products less profitable, importers may stop bringing them in. If prices rise, consumers may cut back on purchases.

“That’s the most optimistic scenario, because that won’t happen,” said Felix Tintelnot, an associate professor of economics at Duke University, of Trump’s $2 billion figure. “You can’t do a calculation of expected tariff revenue off past trade flows and then multiply it with a currently applied tariff and expect that the past trade flow remains the same.”

Ryan Monarch, an assistant professor of economics at Syracuse University, agreed.  “It’s a very bad assumption to assume that purchases are just completely unchanged.”

Not to mention, it is US importers or American companies that pay tariffs, not foreign governments. That money goes to the US Treasury, and those companies, in turn, typically pass their higher costs on to their customers in the form of higher prices.

Still, tariffs can hurt foreign countries by making their products pricier and harder to sell abroad. Foreign companies might have to cut prices, and sacrifice profits , to offset the tariffs and try to maintain their market share in the US.

Add as a preferred source on Google +