Trump risks it all, takes on the world with tariffs and puts America first

Everyone is angry at Donald Trump. He keeps snatching away the honey pot; our NATO allies are incensed they have to provide more for their own defense, DOGE is axing taxpayer monies flowing illicitly to Democrats, and the president’s tariff broadside has exposed trading imbalances that benefit everybody but the United States.

Trump hasn’t just stirred the pot – he’s turned it over and stomped it into smithereens. He is putting America first and is the first president in history to risk his presidency and legacy for working-class families. For that, he deserves much credit.

Here’s a fact: with $37 trillion in federal debt, up from $23 trillion in 2019, the United States can no longer act as global Sugar Daddy, giving out treats to the entire world. 

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For decades our western allies relied on America to defend them against hostile totalitarian regimes while they spent their money on their own citizens, stitching together costly safety nets which included free healthcare and generous pensions. 

In his first term, Trump called out the freeloaders like Germany which had perennially failed to meet their NATO obligation to spend 2% of GDP on defense. Europeans were horrified, as they so often are by crass American bluntness. But slowly, begrudgingly, they have upped their outlays; the Ukraine war has driven home the necessity of greater self-sufficiency, as has more pressure from President Trump. It’s about time. 

At home, the DOGE team is exposing not only hundreds of billions of dollars of wasteful government spending, but also the billions of taxpayer dollars craftily sent to innocent-sounding NGOs which then funnel those funds to Democrat-aligned activist groups.  Moreover, DOGE is promising to modernize our antiquated federal government; good for them. 

And now, the tariffs. 

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Donald Trump has railed about the U.S. being unfairly treated by our trading partners for decades. Thanks to him, 10 years ago the country’s view of trade deals changed. Democrats had promoted them until Hillary Clinton ran against Trump in 2016, even as the number of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. shrank from a peak of almost 20 million in 1979 to only 12 million.  

Donald Trump is putting America first and is the first president in history to risk his presidency and legacy for working-class families. For that, he deserves much credit.

At that time, the trade deal under consideration was the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which involved 11 Pacific Rim countries and was sponsored by the Obama White House, in which Hillary Clinton served as Secretary of State.  As Politico noted in 2016, "Clinton raved about Trans-Pacific Partnership before she rejected it;" even leftist Politico described Clinton’s hostility to the deal appeared a "campaign pose." The New York Times reported that the TPP became "a symbol of failed globalism and the loss of United States jobs overseas." On his first day in office, Trump formally abandoned the trade agreement. 

Trump believes that trade pacts like the TPP and the original North American Trade Agreement (signed into law by Bill Clinton) had pushed millions of jobs overseas to low-wage countries like Mexico and China. In 2016, he ran on redoing those deals; in office, one of his major accomplishments was passing the USMTA, a new deal with Mexico and Canada about which Vox wrote, "Trump’s new trade deal is better for workers than NAFTA was." 

Now, in his second term, President Trump wants to go further, much further, in revising our trade arrangements. His goal is to bring manufacturing back to the U.S, and to that end he has announced draconian tariffs. Markets have swooned as investors and business leaders try to calculate the impact of Trump’s moves. 

The tariffs, and especially how they were calculated, are controversial. While demanding reciprocal tariffs seems fair – why, for instance, should the EU charge a 10% duty on U.S.-made cars and we tax them only 2.5%? – basing the levy on the trade deficit we run with any given country, which appears to have been the approach, does not seem to make sense.  

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In recent days, numerous countries have asked to negotiate better terms. This is not surprising since the U.S. is, and will remain for the indefinite future, the world’s largest consumer. We have the cards; it is essential that Trump plays them well. 

Unhappily, one of the dealers, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro, took to the airwaves Monday to shoot down Vietnam’s offer to go to zero tariffs, demanding further concessions to account for "nontariff cheating." By that he meant, "Chinese products being routed through Vietnam, intellectual property theft and a value-added tax." Those are legitimate issues but for those hoping that President Trump will soon announce some agreements that lower tariffs and calm markets, Navarro’s comments were disappointing.

After all, President Trump is known as a smart negotiator. In his book the "Art of the Deal" he explains the virtue of leading with an exaggerated demand, which allows for compromise. Presumably that is what he is doing now.  

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The White House is under pressure to bring the public on board. Trump’s agenda, including extension of the 2017 tax cuts, could be in jeopardy if voters lose confidence and if the GOP loses control of Congress in the midterms.

Their several rationales for tariffs – righting unfair practices that have disadvantaged American workers, bringing in revenues and onshoring manufacturing - are all reasonable. To those who challenge the need to rebuild U.S. manufacturing, consider the national security implications of having a country providing mainly entertainment and financial services. Movies and IPOs do not win wars. Trump is right – we need to make steel, ships and weapons.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent promoted the president’s tariffs over the weekend, telling Tucker Carlson: "I have a high confidence ratio, it's going to work."  

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He also said this: "Summer of 2024, Americans took more European vacations than they had in history. Summer of 2024, more Americans were using food banks than they ever have in history." 

That says volumes about our two-tier economy; far too many Americans are barely getting by. Let us hope that Trump’s tariffs make a difference. 

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