Tag: Trump tariffs

WATCH: Larry Kudlow wilts under barrage of questions about Trump’s conflicting trade war comments

AlterNet logoLarry Kudlow, who appeared to have been drinking before his FOX News appearance last Sunday, probably wished he was drinking this Sunday after his stammering performance on CNN where he faced a barrage of questions from “State of the Union” fill-in host Brianna Keilar.

Speaking from France where he is attending the G7 conference with Donald Trump, Kudlow was put on the spot over the president’s comments where he seemed to express regret over launching a trade war with China.

According to the president’s economic adviser, Trump failed to hear a reporter’s question over whether he had any “second thoughts” about launching a trade war with China.

View the complete August 25 article by Tom Boggioni from Raw Story on the AlterNet website here.

New data challenges Trump’s economic narrative

The Hill logoPresident Trump has repeatedly said the U.S. economy under his watch has been extraordinary.

His tweeted descriptors have included “BOOMING,” “GREAT,” “stronger than ever” and “perhaps the greatest ECONOMY and most successful first two years of any President in history.”

But a slew of recent data suggests the Trump economy has fared no differently than other expansions at this stage. And those same numbers indicate the president’s economy may be headed toward a downturn.

View the complete August 25 article by Niv Elis on The Hill website here.

‘I Hereby Order’: Internet Mocks Trump’s China Tariff Tweeting

President Donald Trump is being mocked right now for his insane Twitter meltdown in response to China’s announcement it is imposing $75 billion on tariffs on U.S. goods.

But it was not only Trump’s meltdown, but his insistence that he can dictate how private American companies operate that added to the hilarity.

After saying China has “stolen our Intellectual Property at a rate of Hundreds of Billions of Dollars a year,” and claiming “We don’t need China,” Trump made this fascist declaration:

“Our great American companies are hereby ordered to immediately start looking for an alternative to China, including bringing your companies HOME and making your products in the USA.”

The President of the United States does not have any authority to do that.

View the complete August 21 article by David Badash from the New Civil Rights Movement on the National Memo website here.

A Gyrating Economy, and Trump’s Volatile Approach to It, Raise Alarms

New York Times logoBIARRITZ, France — President Trump has again tossed out the economic and political playbook that guided other occupants of the Oval Office for generations as the United States dominated the flow of goods and services across the world.

In the space of a few hours, he declared that his own central bank chief was an “enemy,” claimed sweeping powers not explicitly envisioned by the Constitution to “order” American businesses to leave China and, when stock markets predictably tumbled, made a joke of it.

Mr. Trump’s wild and unscripted pronouncements on Friday renewed questions about his stewardship of the world’s largest economy even as he escalated a trade war with China before heading to France for a high-profile summit with the leaders of many of the world’s other major industrial powers.

View the complete August 23 article by Peter Baker on The New York Times website here.

Trump Says He Will Raise Existing Tariffs on Chinese Goods to 30%

New York Times logoWASHINGTON — President Trump said he would increase taxes on all Chinese goods and demanded that American companies stop doing business with China as his anger toward Beijing and his Federal Reserve chair boiled over on Friday.

Twelve hours after China said it would retaliate against Mr. Trump’s next round of tariffs by raising taxes on American goods, Mr. Trump said he would bolster existing tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods to 30 percent from 25 percent on Oct. 1.

And he said the United States would tax an additional $300 billion worth of Chinese imports at a 15 percent rate, rather than the 10 percent he had initially planned. Those levies go into effect on Sept. 1.

View the complete August 23 article by Alan Rappeport and Keith Bradsher on The New York Times website here.

Trump again undercuts his administration’s messy tariffs rhetoric

Washington Post logoOne of the problems with evaluating claims made by President Trump’s administration about the tariffs imposed on products from China is that it can be hard to determine how much misdirection is built in.

Consider the crux of the issue: who is paying for the tariffs. It is certainly the case that very, very few American consumers are paying for the tariffs directly; Americans aren’t sending checks to the Treasury to cover increased import costs. Instead, they’re paying for the tariffs indirectly, through higher prices of products that are imported from China or that use components imported from China. A bad-faith representation of the situation could say, with accuracy, that consumers are paying very little, if any, of the tariffs simply based on that distinction.

A broader problem, though, is that the president’s rhetoric on the issue is all over the map and internally inconsistent — and also not the argument his team is making publicly.

View the complete August 19 article by Philip Bump on The Washington Post website here.

Angry Minnesota farmer bashes ‘insulting’ Trump comments that ‘we’re great patriots’ during his trade war

President Donald Trump has insulted at least one Minnesota farmer with his claim that farmers are “great patriots” who want him to continue his trade fight against China.

“This wound is self-inflicted, by our president,” said Gary Wertish, who is the Minnesota Farm Bureau president. “We definitely agreed with it in the beginning. But it doesn’t appear that there’s a plan B. Some of the callous comments come, especially from the president, you know, that farmers are ‘winning,’ we’re ‘great patriots,’ that’s very insulting. That’s coming from someone who never has faced the challenges of a family farmer. I go into the bank and tell the lender I can’t make the payment because we lost our market? The banker is not going to tell me you don’t have to make your payment because you’re a patriot.”

He’s not alone, fellow farmer Cindy VanDerPol admitted that she sometimes can’t sleep at night because she’s worried.

View the complete August 18 article by Sarah K. Burris on the Raw Story website here.

How Trump’s Trade Bailout Greased Fatcats And Screwed Small Farmers

Donald Trump loooooves farmers. We know this because he says so. “Farmers, I LOVE YOU!” he declared in December. And we’ve learned that whenever The Donald says something, it’s true — even when it’s not.

These days, he’s loving farmers to death. Trump has ignored the obvious need to get monopolistic price-fixing bankers, suppliers and commodity buyers off their backs. And he’s ineptly playing tariff games with China and other buyers of U.S. farm products, causing exports and farm prices to tumble. The result is that our ag economy is tumbling into a deep ditch, slamming farm families and rural America with a rising tsunami of bankruptcies.

Adding crude insult to economic injury, Trump’s doofus of an ag secretary, Sonny Perdue, laughed at farmers, branding them “whiners” for opposing his majesty’s disastrous policies.

View the complete August 17 commentary by Jim Hightower on the National Memo website here.

Trump finally acknowledges his tariffs could hit consumers

Washington Post logo‘We are doing this for the Christmas season,’ Trump said as he announced a delay on his latest import taxes

President Trump has repeated the same mantra for months: The Chinese are paying the full price of his tariffs. It’s a line that the overwhelming majority of economists and business owners say is false, but Trump kept saying it — until Aug. 13.

The White House announced Tuesday that the president’s latest tariffs on China would be delayed on many popular items like cellphones, laptops and strollers. The 10 percent tax would not go into effect until Dec. 15, effectively ensuring retailers can import goods for the holidays before the tariffs take effect.

Trump himself told reporters the delay is to ensure consumers don’t face higher costs this Christmas. Here are his full remarks:

View the complete August 13 article by Heather Long on The Washington Post website here.

Recession warnings pose 2020 threat to Trump

The Hill logoFears that a recession could hit the U.S. next year are growing on Wall Street, creating a potential headache for President Trump as he seeks to highlight the economy in his bid for a second term.

Economists at Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Moody’s Analytics in the past few days all raised concerns that a recession between now and next year’s elections is becoming more likely. And they all pointed the finger of blame at Trump’s trade policy.

“I think recession is increasingly likely,” Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, said on Monday. “I’d put the odds at just over even for a recession between now and the end of 2020, assuming the president follows through on his tariff threats.”

View the complete August 13 article by Niv Ellis on The Hill website here.