The Biden administration is raising tariffs on $18 billion worth of imports from China. It includes raising the tariffs on electric vehicles from 25% to 100% and on semiconductors from 25% to 50%.

In an exclusive interview with Yahoo Finance, President Biden says, "China is fundamentally underwriting their entire industries" and will "pay whatever it takes" to saturate a market with their own goods. Biden argues that the new tariffs are aimed at saving American jobs. When it comes to EVs, for example, Biden tells Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi that China is trying to "flood the market with EVs that are incredibly cheap. They're not making any money on them [and] deliberately doing it to put other people out of business." Ultimately, he says, the new tariffs are about "being fair."

Biden expects China to talk about retaliation, but he thinks the actual response will be minimal. "They'll probably try to figure out how they can raise tariffs, maybe on products that are unrelated."

One thing Biden has been struggling with is the fact that Americans are still frustrated with stubbornly high inflation, which has risen nearly 20% since he took office. Biden acknowledges that "people are just uncertain" about the economy right now, but he plans to "be steady, stay the course," adding it's "going to take a little more time."

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