Trump's terrible tariffs: A double whammy for Americans

President Trump celebrated tax season in grand style last week when he handed Americans a big fat tax hike. Tariffs are taxes on imported products and Trump’s executive order is one of the biggest tax increases in recent American history.  

It’s essentially a national sales tax that consumers will pay on top of their local property, state sales and income and federal taxes. The Tax Foundation estimated that the terrible Trump tariffs will amount to an average tax hike of $1,900 annually for American households.   

Trump’s tariffs are both reckless and reactionary. They are sadly reminiscent of the punishing 1930 Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act and the economic nationalism that exacerbated the suffering after the onslaught of the Great Depression with the collapse of the stock market the previous year.  

Noted economist Robert Shapiro appeared on my podcast, Deadline D.C. with Brad Bannon, and reminded my audience that great economic theorists of all ideological stripes from Karl Marx to Milton Friedman believed really big tariffs are really bad ideas. He went on to say that Trump tariffs constitute a self-inflicted wound to the strength of the American economy. 

Tariffs might be the crack in Trump’s MAGA armor. Four Republican senators — Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky — voted for legislation that would reverse The Donald’s punitive taxes on our great North American ally, Canada.

The president’s trade proposals are a double whammy for people saving for retirement. Trump’s tariff plans led to a sharp decline in the value of stocks on Wall Street which in turn decimated the 401(k)s of millions of Americans. At the same time, the Trump administration is making it harder with Social Security Administration office closings and personnel cutbacks for Americans to get back the money they paid into Social Security.  

The president’s economic guru, Elon Musk made his disdain for the lifesaving Social Security benefits perfectly clear when he called the program a “Ponzi Scheme.” People like Musk will never be satisfied until they completely gut the precious program they are now trying to undermine.  

If all that isn’t bad enough, prices continue to rise under the new president who stated on the campaign trail last year that prices would drop on the first day of his second term. Jerome Powell, the chair of the Federal Reserve Board, warned Americans last Friday that the president’s executive order on tariffs could increase the price of consumer goods and halt national economic growth.  

Attention Walmart shoppers, Trump’s red light special, the tariff hikes will add bigly to the prices you pay there. But don’t worry if you’re a banker or billionaire who bankrolled Trump’s campaign, you’re getting a tax cut while the Trump voters who shop at Walmart will pay higher prices for the many Chinese goods sold there. 

The stock market isn’t the only thing in freefall. A new national survey by Reuters indicates that the president’s approval rating (43 percent) is the lowest it has been in his second term. The same survey shows that most Americans believe his tariffs are detrimental to the health of the economy. It’s a safe bet to assume that these bad numbers will only get worse as the full impact of his harmful policies undo the economic gains achieved under his Democratic predecessor. 

Last Saturday’s “Hands Off” rallies against Trump’s policies clearly demonstrated the extent of progressive energy and enthusiasm. Now it’s time for D.C. Democrats to build on that grassroots excitement. Democrats have regrouped after shaking off the impact of Trump’s shock and awe campaign and they are in a much better position to advance the fight against the president. 

Trump’s broken campaign promise to bring prices down immediately and his proposal for a massive tax increase in the form of big tariff hikes are a golden opportunity for Democrats to pounce on and strike hard against Trump and congressional Republicans. 

Democrats are uniting behind an economic message and that is clearly their best line of attack. The president has failed abjectly to fight inflation. Democratic strategist James Carville is right. “It’s the economy, stupid.”

“Benefits Over Billionaires” is catching on as an anti-Trump slogan. It’s a great way to preview the upcoming brutal congressional battle over Trump’s big tax cuts for bankers and billionaires and big reductions in the social safety net for everybody else to pay for them. 

Brad Bannon is a national Democratic strategist and CEO of Bannon Communications Research which polls for Democrats, labor unions and progressive issue groups. He hosts the popular progressive podcast on power, politics and policy, Deadline D.C. with Brad Bannon.