Anabel Gonzalez

President Trump's tariff war with China appears to have been a bust, at least according to one economist.

Anabel Gonzalez, a World Bank consultant who served as the bank's senior director for global practice on trade and competitiveness from 2014 to 2017, tells the Wall Street Journal that the Trump administration's decision to slap tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese goods was "largely in line" with the bank's advice at the time.

"It was not a decision that was based on economics," she says.

"It was based on a lot of emotion, a lot of fear and a lot of uncertainty."

Gonzalez, who was Costa Rica's minister of trade from 2010 to 2014, says Trump's move is a sign that the US will no longer be a world leader in trade deals, the New York Times reports.

She says Trump's move is a sign that the US won't be able to keep up with China's free-trade deals, which have hit China hard in the last few years.

She says the tariffs will hit small and medium-sized companies that rely on Chinese labor.

"They will no longer be able to compete," she says.

"They will no longer be able to create jobs.

They will no longer be

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