The way Trump and his crew operate is to create a massive side show that distracts everybody's attention generally so they can steal from somewhere while everybody is watching the circus. Now, his "defense team" was recently exposed as a bunch of morons, so we could think maybe the tariff timing was used to get people to forget about that BUT I don't think that is the case because he had already been planning the tariff mess and talking about it before that came out. So, while it does conveniently distract people from Signal-gate with crashing markets and people raging about the destruction being brought on with the tariffs, I don't think that was the plan. 

I do get this intense feeling though that the tariffs are meant to keep us looking in that direction while he/they are doing something else they prefer we not see. 

Also, with the tariffs there is all this talk he could pause them for 90 days, he could suddenly end them, he just wants world leaders to call him and make a public show of asking him for help and then he will suspend the tariffs on the countries that call making it appear he made some sort of amazing deal out of a problem he created. Which is another way Trump operates, he creates a problem, then he uses that problem to make it appear he is working to solve a problem that never existed until he caused it. 

So, the tariffs can be used, over and over as distraction for any number of moments when he/they don't want us paying attention to whatever else they are doing. The tariffs are a way to make everyone go nuts at once, because they serve no purpose but that, and destruction of the economy. They are so senseless and stupid, it just feels like it is meant as a distraction.