I've heard Bob Murphy try to explain this position (no his). The TLDR is that tariffs do not always in all situations cause price inflation that is equal for all people...

Basically if a market is large enough in comparison and companies have more incentive to eat the tariffs than pass it along then prices may not be effected. Tariffs can pretty easily be defended as good for some individuals in an economy. That makes them great for politicians.

My bigger beef is this false idea that "trade deficits" are inherently bad. Its just incredibly dumb. Now, it can also be dumb for a geographical area to be completely at the whims of another one but that is nailing down specifics. Not a generalization.