Free Republic

Trump's tariffs are a bad idea. President Donald Trump deserves applause for boosting the prospects for this country’s forgotten manufacturing workers, particularly in the steel and aluminum industries. Democrats lately have neglected these Americans. Hillary Clinton barely campaigned among them in Michigan during the 2016 general election, and she thoroughly ignored them in Wisconsin. Alas, President Trump is doing this all wrong. He likely will hurt the very middle class that he has championed since his escalator ride onto the political stage. Trump aims to protect U.S. metal makers with new taxes of 25 percent on foreign steel and 10...

Europe’s top monetary official criticized U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposal to put tariffs on steel and aluminum imports as a “dangerous” unilateral move. Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, said that the “immediate spillover of the trade measures … is not going to be big.” But he said such disputes should be worked out among trade partners, not decided by measures initiated from one side. “Whatever convictions one has about trade … we are convinced that disputes should be discussed and resolved in a multilateral framework, that unilateral decisions are dangerous.” “There is a certain worry or...

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) said on Thursday that he will introduce legislation to nix President Trump's tariffs on steel and aluminum imports just minutes after they were announced. "I will immediately draft and introduce legislation to nullify these tariffs, and I urge my colleagues to pass it before this exercise in protectionism inflicts any more damage on the economy," Flake said in a statement. Trump announced that he would levy the penalties — a 25 percent tariff for steel and 10 percent on aluminum — during a White House event. Canada and Mexico are exempted amid larger trade negotiations, Trump...

Former CIA chief John Brennan made a rare appearance on Twitter Wednesday to lash out at President Donald Trump over “ignorance” that threatens U.S. prosperity. The commander in chief’s recent talk of possible steel and aluminum tariffs prompted a social-media jab by Mr. Brennan this week. The post — 1 of 18 total tweets, with the vast majority related to Mr. Trump or the U.S. Russia probe — questioned the president’s economic acumen. “You show an amazing albeit unsurprising ignorance of how technology, automation, and the attendant evolution of economics and societies have transformed the world,” Mr. Brennan, who served...

Full Trump speech.

March 8 (UPI) -- President Donald Trump on Thursday, joined by steel and aluminum workers at the White House, imposed his promised industrial tariffs -- 25 percent on imported steel and 10 percent on foreign-made aluminum. Trump signed the tariff proclamations Thursday afternoon in a meeting with industry workers and officials -- ushering in fiscal penalties that have drawn ire from world leaders and sparked fears of a possible trade war. "A nation that does not protect property at home cannot protect its property abroad," Trump said. The White House said Canada and Mexico will initially be excluded from the...

In a surprising turn of events, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has taken to social media to make a case for President Trumps recently proposed tariffs. President Trump published a tweet yesterday stating that China was asked to develop a yearly plan for the One Billion Dollar reduction in their trade deficit with the United States. President Trump was well received during his visit to China earlier this year and notes this by saying that U.S. relations with China are very good and that he looked forward to seeing what ideas they came up with. But, President Trump urged that the...

GREENSBURG, Pa. (AP) — Fighting to stave off another special election embarrassment, the White House is strengthening its final-days offensive in western Pennsylvania. President Donald Trump has long been scheduled to rally voters on Saturday behind Republican congressional candidate Rick Saccone, a state representative whose underwhelming campaign has some Washington-based Republicans fearing the worst. It will be the president's second visit to the district on Saccone's behalf. Daughter Ivanka Trump appeared with Saccone in a separate visit last month as well and praised him as "a champion" for Republican priorities. The national GOP confirmed late Wednesday that Trump counselor Kellyanne...

SANTIAGO, Chile — A trade pact originally conceived by the United States to counter China’s growing economic might in Asia now has a new target: President Trump’s embrace of protectionism. A group of 11 nations — including major United States allies like Japan, Canada and Australia — signed a broad trade deal on Thursday that challenges Mr. Trump’s view of trade as a zero-sum game filled with winners and losers. Covering 500 million people on either side of the Pacific Ocean, the pact represents a new vision for global trade as the United States threatens to impose steel and aluminum...

The European Union on Wednesday released its target list of retaliatory tariffs on American exports worth $3.5 billion if President Trump pushes ahead with his steel and aluminum tariffs. This is how Mr. Trump’s trade irruptions could imperil American exporters and become a destructive spiral. The EU is acting with some restraint—for now—in crafting a narrow list of items on which to impose tariffs, including bourbon, orange juice, corn, ladders and motor boats. None are vital to European industry, but they are politically shrewd in targeting exports from states represented by Republicans on Capitol Hill. The point is to punish...

I like free trade – I just don’t like snooty ideologues who won’t take their own country’s side in a trade fight. The ideal market means a willing buyer and a willing seller paying a mutually agreed price for goods or services with minimal government interference. That’s called “capitalism,” and as a business owner and someone who digs prosperity, I really like it. So why am I not wetting myself about Donald Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs? Cue the True Conservatives™ to tell me it’s because I’m stupid and terrible and awful. I know how they work. It was only...

When President Trump announced he would protect American jobs by imposing tariffs on foreign-made steel and aluminum, naysayers of both parties rushed to the nearest microphone or TV camera. Pundits and politicians alike pretended to be “shocked, shocked” that Trump meant what he said as a candidate, and that he actually means to deliver what he promised during the campaign. The Swamp, in short, is not happy. But cheers rose from the manufacturing belt that runs through the states that put Trump in the White House: Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Iowa. “This is a good thing for...

The company plans to call back about 500 employees United States Steel Corp. X +4.25% said it would restart a blast furnace in Illinois to handle the higher demand it expects from President Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs on foreign steel. The steelmaker said it also plans to call 500 employees back to work at the Granite City mill. U.S. Steel idled its blast furnaces there two years ago as a flood of cheap imports pushed down domestic steel prices. Steel producers have been hurt in recent years by increasing competition from foreign competitors, particularly China, that have ramped up production...

Maria Bartiromo interviews Treasury Secretary Mnuchin to discuss Gary Cohn’s departure from President Trump’s National Economic Council (NEC). {Deep Dive Here} Secretary Mnuchin talks about the larger MAGAnomic objectives, and the transition of the administration into ‘policy phase-2’ with all attention now focused on Main Street. Great Interview: ♦Economic Patriotism – ‘America First’: √ Unleash energy development. Drive down energy costs. Lower cost-of-living. √ Eliminate regulatory stranglehold. Unleash free market entrepreneurial expansion. √ Lower corporate tax burden. Position business investment ‘best bet’ domestically. √ Generate investment expansion. Create: jobs, jobs, jobs. √ Generate higher labor demand. Jobs, Jobs, Jobs =...

HERE'S A HUGELY winning issue for President Donald Trump that would deal with a gross trading abuse and simultaneously advance his goal of reducing the prices of prescription drugs: Insist that foreign buyers of American pharmaceuticals--almost without exception government agencies--pay their fair share of the research and development costs of these medicines. Currently, Americans are subsidizing overseas users of our drugs. Here's how that works. The average price of successfully bringing a new medicine to market in the U.S. is about $2.4 billion. The entire approval process takes some 12 years before a drug receives its final green light. The...

President Donald Trump has had a splendid first year in office. He has the economy moving again and at a healthy pace, some 2.6 percent in the most recent quarter. Unemployment is down, the stock market is up and the economic signs are mostly healthy. Well, for the stock market that was until last week. That was the week in which the President announced his intention to slap a 25 percent tariff on steel imports and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum. The market tanked, and more problems are said to be coming internationally. It appears the world does not...

ary D. Cohn, President Trump’s top economic adviser, plans to resign, becoming the latest in a series of high-profile departures from the Trump administration, White House officials said on Tuesday. The officials insisted there was no single factor behind the departure of Mr. Cohn, who heads the National Economic Council. But his decision to leave came after he seemed poised to lose an internal struggle amid a Wild West-style process over Mr. Trump’s plan to impose large tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. “Gary has been my chief economic adviser and did a superb job in driving our agenda, helping...

But with counter-tariffs and counter-counter-tariffs and who knows? Where she stops, nobody knows Michael Fumento image By Michael Fumento —— Bio and Archives--March 6, 2018 0 Comments | Print Friendly | Subscribe | Email Us President Donald Trump has announced plans to impose a stiff 25 percent duty on imports of steel and 10 percent on aluminum. This shortly after slapping heavy tariffs on washing machines and solar panels. Even those with protectionist inclinations need to know these metals aren’t the industries to protect. Few mining jobs would be saved, while the cost of finished goods will rise and encourage...

A number of senior members of the US Congress, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, had joined what has been described as “tariffs resistance”, and demanded the POTUS to kill his proposed aluminum and steel tariff proposal. Here’s a statement from Paul Ryan from earlier on Monday: "We are extremely worried about the consequences of a trade war and are urging the White House to not advance with this plan. The new tax reform law has boosted the economy and we certainly don’t want to jeopardize those gains" Various other Republican leaders also said on Monday that they’re considering, let me...

From Lincoln to William McKinley to Theodore Roosevelt, and from Warren Harding through Calvin Coolidge, the Republican Party erected the most awesome manufacturing machine the world had ever seen. And, as the party of high tariffs through those seven decades, the GOP was rewarded by becoming America's Party. Thirteen Republican presidents served from 1860 to 1930, and only two Democrats. And Grover Cleveland and Woodrow Wilson were elected only because the Republicans had split. Why, then, this terror of tariffs that grips the GOP? Consider. On hearing that President Trump might impose tariffs on aluminum and steel, Sen. Lindsey...