US Chamber of Commerce urges Trump to act to 'stave off recession' While we wait for the briefing to get under way at the White House, the US Chamber of Commerce is calling on the Trump administration to immediately implement a "tariff exclusion process". They say that's needed in order to keep the US economy from inflicting "irreparable harm" on small businesses and to "stave off a recession", our US partner network NBC News reports. The US Chamber of Commerce says it represents three million small business owners. It comes the day after it was announced that the US economy shrank 0.3% from January to March, its worst performance for three years.