Trump’s Tariff Tango: From 100% Drug Taxes to Friendly Pharma Deals
On Sept. 25, during Taylor Budowich's farewell party (because White House chaos needs a soundtrack), Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, fresh from heavy trucks and furniture tariff talks, slid into the Oval Office to pitch a 100% tariff on imported drugs. At 7:24 p.m., Trump dropped the bombshell on Truth Social, blindsiding Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and surgeon-turned-Medicare-Oz who, without a heads-up, screamed internally 'What the f**k?'. Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, who’s auditioning for referee of this tariff rumble, made Lutnick eat his mistakes faster than Pfizer and AstraZeneca can say 'most favored nation pricing.' Meanwhile, the UK’s AstraZeneca agreed to open a plant in Virginia well before Trump’s tariff tantrum, proving tariffs are like bad party favors—useless but memorable. Lutnick’s awkward boasting about Jeffrey Epstein, calling him ‘the greatest blackmailer ever’, was the cherry on top of Trump’s unpredictable pharma soap opera.
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Trump’s 100% tariff on imported drugs was less a policy and more a Twitter temper tantrum causing panic among Kennedy, Oz, and Pfizer—because nothing says ‘Prime Time Governance’ like blindsiding your own pharma negotiators mid-farewell party.
Howard Lutnick playing pharma gatekeeper while bragging about Epstein? White House stability is now a Walmart shelf in a hurricane.
Tariffs? Tariff-uhs? More like Tariff-you-did-what? Trump’s pharma plan pivot involved more plot twists than a daytime soap opera.
Source: Axios | Published: 10/12/2025 | Author: Marc Caputo
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