The extent of Trump's trade war disaster really came to light yesterday, as his promise of "90 deals in 90 days" is nowhere near fruition.
Trump's trade problems are multi-layer, starting with the obvious: he applied a 10% tariff on all imports and then said FROM THAT POINT he'd negotiate. The rest of the world is not willing to accept his 10% mulligan, and so every negotiation starts off with our trade partners already upset.
It gets worse from there. Trump is basically wanting every concession he can get while offering zero concessions in return to the other countries. For some reason, he thinks he can force his will onto these other nations, and he doesn't seem to understand that these other countries are not about to sacrifice their own internal businesses and GDP to make Trump look like a good negotiator.
When another country tries to install a retaliatory tariff, Trump screams and throws a tantrum, insisting there is no trade deal will occur. Most of the time, this leads to the other country backing off, or offering Trump a trade bone, but regardless, to reverts all the trade discussion between the two countries back to square one.
And then there is the fact that Trump can't keep his mouth shut. Trump has repeatedly bragged about being the chief negotiator in a conflict resolution between Pakistan and India. Fun fact, he wasn't, but it hasn't stopped him from claiming to be the wheeler-dealer. The problem is that this resolution between Pakistan and India seems pretty thin to begin with, and Pakistan is happily touting Trump's claims. Pakistan knows the people of India are not fans of Trump, and if Indian Prime Minister Modi keeps making excuses for Trump and keeps trying to work with him, Modi looks pretty bad to his citizens. Modi has, in pretty blunt terms, repeatedly said Trump had nothing to do with the resolution, but Trump's continued claims have made India move further away from a proposed trade deal.
India was going to be Trump's first success story, but Trump's irrational need to be the hero of EVERY story has stalled this trade agreement, and there seems to be a real question on whether it will ever happen.
On top of that, there are demands from the Trump Administration that certain agricultural products from the USA that are banned in other countries because of health, chemical, GMO, or quality concerns be accepted. Foreign trade representatives have pointed out that most countries would need a legislative agreement to lift the protections they have in place, something which will not happen, but these obvious roadblocks are being ignored by Trump's team. It sounds like at least three major trade deals would be on their way to ratification, but Trump doesn't want to be perceived as being the person conceding.
In conclusion, Trump is an idiot, and his foolish trade war has been a disaster for the United States.
