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inflation
Trump Follows Through With High Tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China
"It's 'tariff-ying' and nauseating to watch President Trump and his Republican allies in Congress celebrate as they impose tariffs that will raise costs for the rest of us," one advocate said.
Feb 01, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump signed three executive orders on Saturday following through on his promise to impose 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada and 10% tariffs on goods from China, a measure that targets the nation's three largest trading partners.
The tariffs are set to go into effect on Tuesday, according toThe Associated Press. The orders contained no language allowing for the negotiation of exceptions; however, Canadian energy products including oil and gas will only face a tariff of 10%.
"Tariffs are an important strategic economic tool, but Trump's desire for a trade war with Canada and Mexico won't protect jobs, keep Americans safe, or bring down costs for families," Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said on social media in response to the news.
"Instead of using tariffs to protect U.S. jobs, Trump is on an ego trip and is using tariffs to pursue petty fights with other nations while raising prices on Americans."
A White House Fact Sheet announcing the tariffs said that the crossing of undocumented immigrants and illegal drugs—including fentanyl—over the Mexican and Canadian borders "constitutes a national emergency under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act."
"President Trump is taking bold action to hold Mexico, Canada, and China accountable to their promises of halting illegal immigration and stopping poisonous fentanyl and other illegal drugs from flowing into our country," the fact sheet said.
However, it is unclear exactly what actions the targeted countries could take to lift the tariffs.
U.S. voters' frustration with inflation has been cited as an important reason why Trump won the 2024 presidential election. Yet broad tariffs are expected to raise the prices of a variety of goods including Mexican produce, Canadian lumber, and car-making supplies that often cross both borders several times in the construction of a vehicle, according toNBC News. Companies that import goods or supplies will have to decide whether to swallow the costs or pass them on to consumers.
"Small business owners like me are working hard to keep up with high costs, provide for our families, and keep the economy running," Alex Bronson, who owns a construction business in Mount Clemens, Michigan, said in a statement shared by Unrig Our Economy. "But after promising to lower our costs, Republicans seem set to deliver the opposite. Because of these tariffs, we'll be paying higher costs for construction among just about everything else just to help Republicans in Congress and Donald Trump gift bigger and bigger tax breaks to their billionaire friends and big corporations. It leaves us all wondering: Who are our leaders in Washington really working for?"
Warren also warned that the tariffs could give unscrupulous actors the chance to engage in greedflation.
"I'm concerned that Trump will give cover to giant corporations to use his tariffs as an excuse to raise prices on working families—while doling out waivers to his buddies," she wrote. "We will hold him accountable."
Other Democratic lawmakers also spoke out against the tariffs and the way they were imposed.
Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) pointed to a new study finding the tariffs would cut into disposable income by approximately $1,250 per household.
"Trump's tariffs are a clear overreach of executive power, misusing authorities never intended for this," Beyer wrote. "The Constitution delegates trade authority to Congress. Trump's abuses of trade powers make it clear that Congress must act to restore the constitutional balance of power."
Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) said, "Instead of developing a comprehensive worker-centered trade policy that will bring jobs back to the U.S., President Trump is using the threat of across-the-board tariffs not on behalf of American workers and consumers but to advance his own extremist policy agenda."
The Peterson Institute for International Economics found in a recent analysis that tariffs would harm the economies of the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and China, but would be "catastrophic" for Mexico and could ironically increase the number of people who would want to cross the border into the U.S.
"Instead of using tariffs to protect U.S. jobs, Trump is on an ego trip and is using tariffs to pursue petty fights with other nations while raising prices on Americans," Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas) said in a statement.
"Everything Trump has done these last few days—from trying to shut down Medicaid to blanket tariffs and sanctions—has all been about helping himself and his billionaire friends. House Republicans will own increased prices for Americans, increased migration driven by sanctions, and an overdose crisis made worse by taking away the addiction treatment and healthcare people need," he said.
Labor and public welfare groups also criticized the tariffs.
"It's 'tariff-ying' and nauseating to watch President Trump and his Republican allies in Congress celebrate as they impose tariffs that will raise costs for the rest of us," Unrig Our Economy spokesperson Kobie Christian said. "Every time Americans pay more when they buy clothes, electronics, or shop at the grocery store, they should remember they're paying for the cost of tax breaks that Republicans in Congress and Donald Trump plan to give to billionaires and corporations. It turns out 'America First' means America's Billionaires First."
President of the United Steelworkers (USU) David McCall said in a statement, "The USW has long called for systemic reform of our broken trade system, but lashing out at key allies like Canada is not the way forward," adding, "These tariffs don't just hurt Canada. They threaten the stability of industries on both sides of the border."
Mexico and Canada have both threatened to retaliate in the case of Trump-imposed tariffs. The executive orders signed by Trump included a provision to respond in the case of retaliation. However, if the countries do retaliate, this could also impact U.S. businesses that sell products in the two countries, such as vehicles; electronics; and agricultural, energy, and industrial products, as NBC explained.
"No one—on either side of the border—wants to see American tariffs on Canadian goods," Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wrote on social media on Friday. "I met with our Canada-U.S. Council today. We're working hard to prevent these tariffs, but if the United States moves ahead, Canada's ready with a forceful and immediate response."
On Saturday, Trudeau added that he had met with his cabinet and the premiers of Canadian provinces once the tariffs were announced and would speak with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum and address the nation later in the day.
Speaking on Friday from Mexico's National Palace, Sheinbaum said her government had a "plan A, a plan B, a plan C, for whatever the United States government decides."
Once the tariffs were announced on Saturday, she wrote on social media: "I instruct the secretary of economy to implement Plan B that we have been working on, which includes tariff and non-tariff measures in defense of Mexico's interests. Nothing by force; everything by reason and right."
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You Don't Help Seniors by Cutting Medicaid, Social Security, or Medicare
And you don’t lower prices by giving giant tax cuts to billionaires and price gouging corporations.
Jan 29, 2025
Editor's note: The following is the prepared opening statement by the author as part of testimony for a hearing before the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging—titled “Making Washington Work for Seniors: Fighting to End Inflation and Achieve Fiscal Sanity”—on Wednesday, January 29, 2025 .
Good afternoon, Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Gillibrand, and distinguished members of the committee.
As executive director of Social Security Works, I travel across the country speaking with legions of primarily older Americans. Almost to a person, they are concerned about rising prices. These rising prices hurt older adults, endangering their ability to afford food, housing, and prescription drugs. They want Congress to take action.
Across the country, there is widespread bipartisan agreement on what people want: cracking down on corporate price gouging, improving Social Security’s annual cost-of-living adjustments, which keep up with rising prices and currently under-measure seniors’ cost of living, and reducing the price of prescription drugs by expanding Medicare’s power to negotiate. These are actionable policies that will help older adults adjust to inflation caused by global supply chain shocks and greedflation—which has contributed to rising costs over the past few years. In fact, Federal Reserve research found that corporate profits accounted for all the inflation in the first year of the pandemic recovery and 41 percent of inflation overall in the first two years of the post-pandemic recovery.
There is bipartisan agreement across this country about what people don’t want in response to rising prices: Republicans, Independents, and Democrats all agree that not one single penny of cuts to Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits should be made. There is absolute bipartisan agreement among people everywhere across the country.
Despite this, the House Republican majority announced proposals to slash trillions from Medicaid, our country’s largest provider of long-term care. Over 9 million Americans over 65 rely on Medicaid.
Cuts to Medicaid would force these seniors, and their families, to pay enormous out of pocket costs for long-term care—money they don’t have. It would also force millions of caregivers, most often women, out of the workforce. This would make it far harder for American families to pay their monthly bills. In addition, these proposals also include cuts to SNAP benefits, which 4.8 million older Americans rely on to put food on the table.
Just last week, the new Trump Administration repealed an Executive Order from President Biden that directed the federal government to find ways to lower drug prices. The Trump administration is already favoring Big Pharma at the expense of seniors and working families.
There have also been calls by Republicans to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act, which gives Medicare the power to negotiate lower prices on key prescription drugs. This could force many seniors to cut their life-sustaining medications in half due to higher costs. Many others would face a terrible choice between buying food, filling their prescriptions, and paying their heating bills.
Even Social Security, the most popular and effective program in America, is not safe. Last month, a Republican representative, who is a member of the DOGE Caucus, told me personally that “there will be some cuts” to Social Security and Medicare.
Let me be clear: these proposed cuts will do nothing to lower costs for average Americans or older adults; these cuts are being proposed to offset the cost of tax handouts for billionaires and corporations, who have already been shown to be responsible for rising costs. This Congress should value the interests of older adults above the wealthiest, and I hope that the Aging Committee will lead that charge.
Consider this: If an older adult can’t afford their drugs and groceries at the average Social Security benefit of $1900 a month, it is absolute fiscal insanity to think the solution is to cut their income! To take away their health care! To destroy Medicaid and force them to pay the average long-term care cost of around $100,000 per year! If they can’t afford the price of eggs, it is absolute fiscal insanity to believe they can afford them better without SNAP benefits.
I’m here to deliver a message to the members of this committee from older Americans across the country: You don’t lower prices by stealing health care. You don’t lower prices by giving giant tax cuts to billionaires and price gouging corporations. And you absolutely don’t lower prices by reducing the Social Security and other benefits that adults have worked their entire lives for.
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Six Ways the Democrats Elected Trump... Again
It didn't have to be this way. And yet the Democratic Party's failures were easy to see every step of the way. Let us count the ways.
Jan 16, 2025
As the MAGA troops dine, dance and saunter into the White House, we have to ask how one of the most unpopular presidents in U.S. history triumphed yet again. Yes, Trump is a gifted entertainer with an incredibly loyal base. But he could not have won without Democratic Party malfeasance. Let us count the ways:
1. Biden’s Ego
You don’t get to be president without an enormous ego, so large that it’s very hard to imagine not getting exactly what you think is your due. Even though Biden told his advisors in 2019 that he would serve only one term, he changed his mind, or rather his ego demanded four more years. Biden liked the job he had spent his life pining for, and damn anyone who thought he wasn’t up to it.
The combination of ego and power meant that those around Biden were loathe to suggest that maybe, just maybe, he shouldn’t start a second term at age 82. The closer his advisors were to power, the less likely they were to risk losing their access by pointing out that Biden looked his age and then some, and that an overwhelming majority of voters thought he was too old to serve again. That Biden was having difficulty putting forth coherent sentences in public was studiously ignored. Biden was told exactly what he wanted to hear. Run, Joe, Run!
2. Liberal-Left Complicity
Everyone who was awake, except Biden and those dependent upon him, knew that he was too old to run again. On November 20, 2023, Biden’s 81st birthday, I wrote , “Happy Birthday Joe: Please Don’t Run!” I took a good deal of criticism, even from close colleagues. Didn’t I know that there was no way he would agree to step down? Didn’t I realize that if someone challenged him the Democrats would lose, just as in 1968 when Lyndon Johnson was forced out? Didn’t I realize that Biden was the best president for workers since FDR, maybe even better, and had therefore earned a second term?
I was stunned especially by the FDR claim. That one only works if you live in the Washinton bubble and are blind as a bat (without a bat’s stunning radar.)
- FDR, through his fireside chats, was an enormously gifted communicator. Biden during his presidency has been one of the worst.
- FDR’s massive public works programs engaged millions of people in highly visible ways each day. Biden’s infrastructure programs were nearly invisible, and severely hampered by his inability to promote them.
- FDR’s changes in labor law legalized unions and led to an explosion of successful organizing, full of posters with FDR saying, “If I went to work in a factory, the first thing I’d do is join a union.” While Biden did go on a picket line and put pro-labor appointees into key regulatory offices, union density barely budged on his watch.
The voters of Mingo County, West Virginia could tell the difference. FDR in 1936 got 66.1 percent of their vote. Biden received only 13.9 percent in 2020. (See Wall Street’s War on Workers for a closer look at Mingo County and the collapse of the Democrats.)
By 2024, the rise of inflation and Biden’s feeble demeanor, during the rare times he was let out in public, augured for a sizable Trump triumph. Democrats who feared a second Trump term should have demanded that Biden step down long before he fell flat on his face during the June 2024 debate.
Where were AOC and Sanders? In Biden’s pocket. As late as the middle of June 2024, AOC said:
Joe Biden is our nominee. He is not leaving this race. He is in this race, and I support him.
Even after the worst debate performance in presidential history, Bernie Sanders chastised Biden’s critics:
Enough! Mr. Biden may not be the ideal candidate, but he will be the candidate and should be the candidate.
No doubt AOC and Sanders saw what I saw a year earlier--- that Biden really was too old to serve a second term. But they kept silent. They were not about to give up their influence over Biden’s agenda, an agenda they can kiss good-by during the coming four years of Trump.
3. The legal cases
If you’re going to put a former president on trial, one who desperately wants to run again, you had better do it long before the next election. Instead, Attorney General Merrick Garland fumbled around for two years before appointing a special counsel to investigate Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election and his hiding classified documents in his bathroom. The delay allowed Trump to run out the clock and avoid any punishment, despite 34 felony convictions in the New York State business records case involving the adult film star Stormy Daniels and campaign finance laws.
Clearly, Trump’s legal woes didn’t wound his election chances and may even have helped to solidify his base. While progressives were titillated (me included) by each new legal revelation about Trump’s malfeasance, the public at large cared much more about leadership, change, inflation, and the economy.
4. Anointing Kamala Harris
Kamala Harris was a very poor candidate in 2020. She withdrew after polls showed her at 3 percent. Yet, by waiting until after the 2024 debate debacle, Biden ensured that the Democrats had no choice but to rally around Harris. She was the incumbent vice-president and not doing so would have been viewed as a slap in the face to women and people of color.
But they had a choice if they had acted sooner. Had party leaders forced Biden out in early 2024, later than they should have, there was time to hold at least two primaries that would have put Harris to the test—primaries that would have let voters register their preferences, perhaps finding the best candidate and giving more legitimacy to whomever was selected.
Taking away that vital phase of the democratic process, the Democrats neutered their own claim that Trump was an enemy of democracy. Whether or not those acts are parallel in anti-democratic gravity is irrelevant. More than a few voters thought that Democrats did not have the high moral ground on democracy issues.
And blaming the Harris loss on racism and sexism is a poor excuse for a party desperate to prevent Trump from stomping all over democracy. If the Democrats really believed that racism and sexism would defeat Harris, why nominate her?
In the end she could not compete with Trump on two key issues—leadership and change. On the exit poll question of the candidate's "ability to lead,” Trump received 66 percent to Harris’s 33 percent. On “Can bring needed change,” it was 74 percent for Trump to 24 percent for Harris.
5. Anti-working-class campaign
Nevertheless, Harris was a much stronger campaigner in 2024 than in 2020. She exuded energy and certainly was far more coherent than Biden. The spark needed to attract support was there. But by that point the problem was substance, not style. Harris is a corporate Democrat, and she wanted to gain the support of Wall Street as much if not more than she wanted to be the party of the working class.
While independent polls, like those from the Center for Working Class Politics, showed that the Democrats needed to campaign on a strong anti-corporate populist message, especially in Pennsylvania, Harris chose to emphasize her opponent’s threat to democracy. Further, she went out of her way to raise money from Wall Street, to campaign with Republicans, and to make her campaign palatable to them both.
For me, the defining moment came in the response to the John Deere and Company’s announcement moving 1,000 jobs from the Midwest to Mexico. In June 2024, right here on the pages of Common Dreams, I repeatedly begged the Biden administration to stop the carnage. Deere was the poster child of a greedy corporation that was using job cuts to move money to Wall Street through stock buybacks, an artificial means of boosting the share price to enrich a company’s richest investors. In 2023, Deere logged $10 billion in profits, paid its CEO $26.7 million, and conducted $12.2 billion in stock buybacks. As I pleaded then: “Come on Joe, go to bat for these workers and show the working class that you’re tougher than Trump when it comes to saving American jobs.”
The greatest president for labor since FDR did nothing. When more layoffs were announced in the fall, Trump jumped on it, calling for a 200 percent tariff on John Deere imports from Mexico.
Here was the chance for Harris to strut her pro-working-class stuff. Instead, her campaign committed political malpractice. They recruited Mark Cuban, the TV star billionaire, former principal owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team, to attack Trump’s plan. He called the proposed Deere tariffs, “insanity.” He criticized Trump’s worker-friendly proposal rather than Deere’s attempt to kill workers’ jobs. Cuban is on record saying stock buybacks are bad for employees, but he said not a word about Deere’s abuse of them. And most importantly, neither he, nor Harris, nor anyone else in the campaign said a word about the 1,000 jobs that would be lost.
That’s because they are corporate Democrats who refuse to interfere with corporate decision making. Job loss is inevitable and necessary, they believe, and only can be confronted by the vague promise that new jobs will be created elsewhere within the prosperous “opportunity society.” Instead of stopping needless mass layoffs, the Democrats prefer to shower corporations with public money to “encourage” them to create jobs, which are nearly always for someone other than those who are losing theirs. It’s not hard to see why workers like those at Deere might think Trump would fight harder for them.
6. Inflation
The rise in prices negatively affected the vast majority of voters and it happened on Biden’s watch. To say it was not as bad as in the rest of the world was a feeble response, as was blaming Covid supply chain transformations. Whatever truth there was to these claims, what voters wanted to see were actions to stop prices from rising and attempts made to lower as many as possible.
This would prove to be a heavy lift for Harris. She needed to attack the major corporate cartels that jacked up prices, which would mean breaking with the Biden administration (something she pointedly refused to do). She would have to call for investigations about price gouging, and even demanding price controls to prevent the food and drug producers form profiteering. It would also mean proposing new laws to prevent Wall Street and private equity firms from buying up millions of homes, a practice that was putting upward pressure on home prices and hurting even workers with decent-paying jobs. In short, it would mean breaking from Wall Streeters and turning public ire against them. She early on made some noise about price controls, but as the campaign proceeded, a populist message didn’t happen and realistically could not have happened given the Democrats’ immense entanglement with their Wall Street financiers.
Of the voters who said inflation has caused their family “severe hardship,” 76 percent voted for Trump according to exit polls. Of those who said inflation caused “no hardship,” 78 percent voted for Harris. So why would you do anything serious about inflation if your real base of support, upper income voters, don’t feel any pain?
Chuck Schmer enthusiastically summarized the new class politics in 2016:
For every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania, we will pick up two moderate Republicans in the suburbs in Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin.
Now, didn’t that turn out to be the perfect strategy for four more years of Trump?
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