Dear Weekend Jolter,
The only thing more confusing than trade policy is trying to sift through the bad arguments put forward to justify an arch-protectionist version of it.
With "liberation day" in the rearview — along with, perhaps, affordable prices once global 10 percent tariffs, steeper rates on so-called worst offenders, and 25 percent tariffs on foreign cars all take effect — writers here have spent the better part of the week (also, year) tracking a spring pollen-storm of specious arguments about trade in an effort to give the full picture.
Let's dive right in.
President Trump, at the Rose Garden on Wednesday, called these "kind reciprocal" tariffs, since the higher rates are supposedly just half of what those trading partners charge us. Not really. They’re more like a penalty applied to foreign trade, Noah Rothman writes. Dominic Pino breaks down the fuzzy math behind Trump’s tariff table. NR's editorial explains what actually went into the administration's calculated rates:
These numbers are far in excess of the tariffs that countries impose on U.S. goods — because the formula used to calculate them has nothing to do with tariffs. Instead, it is the trade deficit divided by the amount of imports. The tariffs levied are either 10 percent or half of that trade deficit ratio, whichever is higher. If the U.S. has a trade surplus with a country (and the U.S. has a trade surplus with over 100 countries), it is set at 10 percent automatically.
In effect, it's a 10 percent minimum tariff for all imports, with many top U.S. trade partners facing much higher rates. There's no consideration given to alliances. Taiwanese goods are taxed at 32 percent, South Korean goods at 25 percent, and Japanese goods at 24 percent.
Trump said chronic trade deficits constitute a "national emergency that threatens our security." Rich Lowry explains why “emergency” doesn’t remotely apply. NR's editorial, once more:
If trade deficits were inherently bad, we'd expect poor countries to have trade deficits and rich countries to have trade surpluses. In the real world, there's basically no relationship, which is why economists don't pay much attention to it. The United Kingdom, Japan, Egypt, and Uganda have trade deficits; Australia, the Netherlands, Russia, and Angola have trade surpluses.
Veronique de Rugy addresses some of Trump's other Rose Garden claims here.
Vice President JD Vance suggested that arguing for free trade is like arguing "it should be illegal for the United States to control our borders, because that makes it impossible for employers to buy and sell labor at the price they choose." But Dan McLaughlin counters that things and people are not the same: "Regulation of immigration, and limits on its scale, are mostly about the noneconomic factors. . . . A lot of those factors have no parallel in trade policy. Cars don't take citizenship oaths. Two-by-fours don't deal drugs or commit rape. Maple syrup doesn't hijack airplanes. Aluminum doesn't have babies. Computer chips don't vote."
A White House fact sheet says "studies have repeatedly shown that tariffs can be an effective tool for reducing or eliminating threats to impair U.S. national security and achieving economic and strategic objectives." Dominic looks at those studies and finds that one of them is an article on the website of a lobbying group, one of them determined tariffs on China hurt the auto-parts industry, and another was . . . also from the lobbying group, using a model "based on misreading multiple economics papers that end up finding the opposite of what the authors suggest."
Trump said last weekend he doesn't care if foreign automakers raise prices over tariffs, "because people are going to start buying American cars." Peter Navarro says the president's 25 percent tariff on imported cars and car parts will bring in billions to the U.S. Treasury, with minimal or manageable impact on automakers and consumers. Noah examines historical precedent as well as the reality that no matter how much automakers might respond to pressure to keep prices low, consumers could not be entirely shielded:
Consumers would experience shortages, fewer available options, and lower quality: all conditions that induce some predictable behaviors from consumers and producers alike.
"Automakers may spread that cost between U.S.-produced and imported models, cut back on features, and in some cases, stop selling affordable models aimed at first-time car buyers, as many of those are imported and less attractive if they carry a higher price tag," Reuters reported. In the short term, carmakers that are less exposed to foreign supply chains may suffer lower revenue to crowd upstarts out of the market. In the long run, "major automakers would have to decide whether to ride out tariffs on a bet that they won't last," the dispatch added. But because most car and parts-makers will have to shift at least some additional costs onto consumers, "tariffs will cause annual U.S. vehicle sales to fall to a range of 14.5 million to 15 million in coming years from 16 million in 2024."
To be fair: Even if Trump's trade war is enormously economically risky, Jim Geraghty acknowledges that the president "does have a point that a bunch of our biggest trading partners have higher tariffs on our goods than we charge on theirs." You can review the various rates that other nations impose on our goods here. (Jim follows up to note that the rates announced Wednesday "bear no resemblance" to the rates identified by the International Trade Administration.) Sharing the cover with Dominic's free-trade manifesto, Michael Brendan Dougherty argued in the latest issue of NR that free-traders should make an exception, where China is concerned.
Whether the sought-after correction is worth the chaos — that's the $100 billion question. Projecting calm amid the storm, Michael Strain argues in these digital pages that our strong economy can absorb the damage likely to come from tariffs — and that "the laws of political gravity have not been suspended." That is, related price increases can be expected to hurt Trump's approval rating, causing lawmakers to push back and perhaps Trump to pull back, in time.
Then again, Trump has defied the laws of political gravity before.
* * *
Before this newsletter moves to the customary bounty of links, I'd like to thank everyone who's contributed so far to our spring webathon. You've probably gotten the message by now that we rely on our readers' support, both in terms of donations and subscriptions, to produce this publication, every day, every week. If you haven't donated but are looking to put some spare change to much good, well, please do consider chipping in to our fundraising drive.
NAME. RANK. LINK.
EDITORIALS
The tariff editorial, again, is here: Americans Will Pay the Price for Reckless Tariffs
On the state supreme court results: A Disappointment in Wisconsin
A good start: The University of Michigan DEI Walkback Is Worth Celebrating
Deflate the trial balloon, if it is one: Republicans Should Squash Tax Hike Talk
ARTICLES
Dan McLaughlin: The Suicidal Impulse in American Politics
Brittany Bernstein: Democrats Demand Accountability for Signal Leak After Giving a Pass to Biden, Clinton
Brittany Bernstein: Illinois Homeschoolers Brace for Assault on Parental Freedom
Jeffrey Blehar: Where Do You Draw the Line?
Haley Strack: California Democrats Reject Bills to Ban Male Athletes from Girls' Sports, Spaces
Audrey Fahlberg: Republicans Win Two Crucial Special Elections in Florida
Rich Lowry: In Defense of Allies
Ryan Mills: Border Safe Houses See Fewer Trafficking Victims amid Trump Immigration Crackdown
Stanley Kurtz: Tim Walz and the Marxist Comic Book
Jay Nordlinger: Radios and Lifelines
Michael McCaul & Arthur Herman: The U.S. Has a Game Changer in the Struggle for High-Tech Supremacy
Mike Coté: Yes, Recognize the Unique British Contribution to Slavery — Ending It
Abigail Anthony: Major Infant-Mortality Study Was Edited to Preserve Racial 'Perspective'
Jack Butler: The Internet Has Killed April Fools' Day
CAPITAL MATTERS
Douglas Carswell, on a fortuitous blunder: Helped by a Typo, Mississippi Is on the Way to Eliminating Its Income Tax
LIGHTS. CAMERA. REVIEW.
Brian Allen breaks down why the Trump administration is going after ideological content at the Smithsonian: After Years of Woke Shows, MAGA Comes for the Smithsonian
Armond White finds a hidden message: Introducing a New Genre: The Post-Covid Movie
JUST LIKE THE CHERRY BLOSSOMS, BEHOLD: EXCERPTS IN PEAK BLOOM
Rich Lowry, on why we maintain alliances:
The tone of the first couple of months of the Trump administration has been overwhelmingly one of disregard at best, or contempt and hostility at worst, for our longtime allies.
Perhaps all of this can be chalked up to establishing leverage for better deals in negotiations — taking Greenland, or at least getting functional control of it, from Denmark; forcing the Ukrainians to accept an unsatisfactory peace deal in the war with Russia; and extracting . . . whatever it is that we decide we ultimately want from the Canadians.
But there is a deeper sense of suspicion and even animus. . . .
Responsible allies are clearly a benefit to our deterrence and war-making. Whatever can be added to our effort in terms of military forces, intelligence, or territory is a net plus.
Even if allied forces aren't as capable or large, as [Hal] Brands and [Peter] Feaver point out, they still may have particular military strengths that augment our forces (e.g., Japanese anti-submarine capability) and better intelligence about their own region or parts of the world where they've traditionally had influence.
It was an obvious advantage to us in confronting the Soviet Union that we had the combat power of allies to add to our own, and allies have contributed fighting forces to all of our conflicts since the end of World War II.
There has been great annoyance from the right and the Trump administration about Europe not doing enough to support Ukraine in a war that directly impacts Europe much more than us. There is justice to this complaint. Yet, by some calculations (there are arguments over the numbers), Europe altogether has spent more than we have, and it is the Europeans who are talking — we'll see what comes of it — of sending troops to secure an eventual deal.
Ryan Mills reports on an under-covered aspect of the Trump administration's border crackdown — that is, the trafficking that's not happening because of it:
At her safe houses in northwest Mexico, Alma Tucker has seen first-hand the horrors of human trafficking — the teen girls forced to have sex with their smugglers, the victimized boys who suffer in silence, the young migrants made to serve as drug mules.
Tucker's nonprofit, the San Diego-based International Network of Hearts, provides shelter and care for young victims of human trafficking, particularly in Mexico's Baja California region. There was no shortage of victims amid the Biden administration's border chaos.
But things have slowed drastically in recent months, particularly after President Donald Trump resumed office in January. "The Invasion of our Country is OVER," Trump declared on his Truth Social platform in early March touting his early success at the border.
Amid Trump's border crackdown, illegal crossings have plummeted — U.S. Border Patrol agents reported just over 8,300 apprehensions of unlawful border crossers in February, fewer than 300 per day, the lowest number in decades. By comparison, Border Patrol agents stopped at least 130,000 illegal border crossers every February in 2022, 2023, and 2024, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.
During the Biden administration, the 22 beds at Tucker's three safe houses were typically filled with young victims, including kids that traffickers used as props to get adults across the border. In addition to food and shelter, the children they serve receive health care, mental-health therapy, and religious instruction, if they want it, Tucker said.
Under Trump, she said, about half of their shelter beds are empty on a typical night.
"Definitely it is better to contain the borders, mainly because organized crime is using these people," Tucker told National Review. "That's my concern, that organized crime is using the need, the desperation of the people trying come for a better life to this country."
Andi Buerger, a sex-trafficking survivor and founder of Voices Against Trafficking, an anti-trafficking information hub, agreed that the slowdown at the border is a positive step.
Anything that legally "plugs the hole in the dam of human trafficking" is good, she said, adding that combatting human trafficking shouldn't be a partisan issue.
"Human trafficking isn't about right versus left, it's about right versus wrong," she said.
Haley Strack, with yet another reason to doubt Gavin Newsom's sort-of conversion on the issue of trans athletes:
California Democrats voted down two bills on Tuesday that would have banned biological men from participating in women's sports and entering girls' locker rooms.
Assembly bills 844 and 89 sought to restore sex segregation for school athletics in the California education code and ban male athletes from competing on girls' interscholastic sports teams, respectively. The two bills, authored by Assemblyman Bill Essayli and Assemblywoman Kate Sanchez, failed 2–7 along party lines at a committee hearing on Tuesday.
Republicans hoped they might find an ally in California Governor Gavin Newsom, who called male participation in female sports "deeply unfair" on a recent podcast. Although Secretary of Education Linda McMahon urged the governor to support AB 844, or risk losing federal funding if transgender-identifying males continue to compete in girls' sports, Newsom did not comment on or announce public support for the legislation.
"Assembly Democrats are so committed to allowing biological boys into girls sports and locker rooms rather than protecting our daughters," Essayli said in a statement. "The vast majority of Californians and Americans agree: keep boys out of girls sports. Assembly Democrats are radically out of touch with commonsense Californians and the voters will hold them accountable to restore justice and fairness in girls sports."
CODA
Perhaps surprisingly, I've never really explored Steve Vai's music — not in any serious depth. Satriani is more my speed in that space. But this song, off Passion and Warfare, is one I started listening to again after a long period of inadvertent neglect. It's just so good.
Enjoy, and thanks for reading. Hope the warm weather is hitting your area, too.
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