Considering that my last sentence contains the world "likely", of course it is speculation. I didn't suggest otherwise. We also don't know if the tariffs "worked" with Mexico as we haven't seen if their actions will result in actual longterm progress in reducing illegal migration through their country into ours. It may or may not, only time will tell. At this point I see no real reason to believe that Trump's tariffs have gotten us into a better position against China than what we had with the TPP, which of course was far from perfect. We haven't secured a deal with them (as of yet), we haven't strengthened our trade positions with other Pacific nations, we haven't brought back American-based companies from China in large numbers (as of yet), we haven't solved the issue of IP theft, and we haven't substantially reduced our trade deficit with them. Last month the trade deficit hit a 5 year low, which is cool and all, but it is a highly volatile number...our trade deficit with China hit all time highs in 2018 and there is no telling if the recent dip will continue to fall or if it is just statistical noise.

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I'm not technically against the tariffs but in the end he made a big fucking stink over the TPP and promised that his approach would be better. I'm still willing to wait because the economy hasn't tanked under him like many predicted but I'm also not going to pretend that his approach has been working like gangbusters, because it hasn't.