Today Is A Do Day, Mad Donald's Tariffs Are Wrecking The US Economy And His Standing With Voters

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Morning all. Today is a do day. Some things you can do today:

• Phone bank for Susan Crawford with the Wisconsin Democratic Party. They have shifts all day and into the evening. Julia Louise-Dreyfus joins at 1pm ET for those who want a little sizzle in their day. This election is tomorrow, Elon and Trump are all in, and we need to keep working it everyone.

• Give to one of our 5 Hopium backed campaigns/parties before the March 31st filing deadline and the election tomorrow - Susan Crawford and WisDems; our Hopium House 7; Abigail Spanberger for VA Governor; the NC Dem Party to help defend our Supreme Court win there; and Ken Martin’s new DNC.

• Become a paid subscriber to Hopium on the last day of our March 10% off Anniversary sale!

We can do this people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Trump’s Tariff Madness - Here is how Politico is playing it this morning in their new article, World braces for Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’

THE GUNS OF NAVARRO: All eyes are on the U.S. stock market this morning as the world economy braces for the next phase of Trump’s trade war. The president is still finalizing the massive package of tariffs coming on Wednesday, but markets will be increasingly nervous after a weekend of fevered speculation fueled, in part, by the president and his top team. Trump — who told reporters last night that “all countries” will be hit — is in the White House today and signing executive orders at 1 p.m. and 5:30 p.m., with journos invited in for the latter session. Ahead of that, the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq both open at 9:30 a.m.

Where we’re at: Trump had initially promised reciprocal tariffs on every nation that charges import tariffs on American goods — “What they charge us, we charge them,” he told Fox News last month — but later appeared to dial that down, suggesting the new tariffs would, in many cases, be “very lenient.” That shift led to speculation that only America’s largest trading partners would be hit. But Trump said last night — just as he did in the White House last Thursday — that “all countries” are in the firing line. Watch the clip from on board Air Force One.

Essential reading: As my POLITICO colleagues Rachael Bade, Daniel Desrochers and Victoria Guida reported so colorfully on Saturday, the truth is no one is quite sure what’s coming on April 2. But the WSJ published a great primer last night setting out the latest White House thinking, with Trump pushing aides to be “more aggressive” on tariffs over recent days. The WSJ reports the reciprocal tariffs plan could yet be eclipsed by the president’s original 2024 campaign pledge of across-the-board import tariffs of 20 percent — an idea he’d previously appeared to abandon.

The six trillion dollar man: A revival of universal tariffs might be what Trump’s trade guru Peter Navarro was getting at on Fox News on Sunday when he claimed tariffs will bring in $6 trillion over the next decade. Navarro again described Trump’s tariffs as “tax cuts,” even as most mainstream economists say the opposite. WaPo’s Jeff Stein writes: “A tariff regime that generated $600 billion per year would amount to the biggest increase in federal tax revenue since World War II, according to budget expert Jessica Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a center-right think tank. ‘We’ve never seen a president propose such a drastic tax increase at a time where there is no national emergency requiring it,’” she says.

And there’s (plenty) more: The automotive tariffs Trump announced last Wednesday are also due to kick in this week, and the partial carveouts for various Canadian and Mexican imports are also due to end. But given the lack of detail — and Trump’s propensity to last-minute changes of heart — everything remains in flux. And everyone from congressional Republicans (per POLITICO’s Meredith Lee Hill) to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (who called personally Trump last night) are still lobbying the president hard for exemptions.

All of which means: 48 hours out from what Trump has called “Liberation Day” — a moment of protectionism so significant Steve Bannon wants it to be made a federal holiday — there’s still no real clarity about what’s coming. Every business leader and K Street lobbyist will tell you that the thing they hate most is uncertainty. And once again, they have it in spades.

And this really matters: Of all Trump’s activities as president, it’s his high-risk moves on the economy which will cost him most dearly with U.S. voters if things go wrong. His comments to NBC News on Saturday that he “couldn’t care less” if tariffs send the price of cars rocketing are the sort of thing that will come back to haunt him if his big bet on a tariff-based economy backfires.

On that note: The Dow Jones suffered its worst day in weeks on Friday. … Goldman Sachs yesterday upgraded their U.S. recession risk to 35 percent … and Japan’s Nikkei index fell 4 percent during early trading this morning. The direction of travel, for the moment, seems clear.

Real world impacts: AP reports (gulp) that craft beer sellers may be forced to hike prices by up to 50 percent … CNN reports customers are rushing to buy new cars now before the tariffs kick in …while Reuters reckons it’s the cheapest cars (and so less well-off Americans) which will be hardest hit by price hikes.

Here is the Washington Post’s Heather Long this morning, Something worse for the economy could be coming than recession (gift link):

President Donald Trump is pushing the economy to a breaking point with sweeping tariffs and rapid cuts to immigration and the federal workforce. There is growing fear of not just a recession but stagflation, a frightful situation — not seen in the United States since the 1970s — in which the economy contracts and people lose jobs but prices remain high.

This is a self-inflicted wound from Trump. Many of his economic advisers, including Larry Kudlow and Stephen Moore, are urging him to show restraint on tariffs. But Trump is set to unleash the biggest increase in tariffs since the Depression era on Wednesday. He’s calling it “Liberation Day.” It may turn out to b

Consumer sentiment has plunged more than 30 percent since November, when Trump won the election. What’s particularly striking in the latest University of Michigan Survey of Consumers is how many people are suddenly worried about rising unemployment and rising prices — a stagflation environment. Two-thirds of consumers expect unemployment to rise in the year ahead, the highest that reading has been since 2009 when the devastating Great Recession sent the jobless rate to 10 percent.

Normally, prices fall during recessions as demand dries up and retailers cut prices to try to lure people back. But Trump’s intention to put tariffs of almost all imports is spooking consumers and businesses. Americans now predict inflation will jump to 5 percent in a year, according to the survey.

While Americans have been dissatisfied with the economy for years, there is something deeper and more worrisome going on now. The latest data shows an economy of gloom and fear.

Look at this data from a poll CBS released yesterday:

Here is how the CBS writeup of the poll begins:

After a week that brought tough economic news and polling showing Americans' views of the economy are still sour, most say President Trump has focused too much on tariffs — which they believe will end up raising prices — and not enough on lowering prices.

This has Americans collectively skeptical right now about the ability of Mr. Trump's policies to make them financially better off, a sentiment that was key to the success of his 2024 campaign.

It’s clear now that Trump’s madness is not allowing him to understand what is happening around him any longer. Regardless of what he says, and perhaps believes, his tariffs can only do one thing - make us and the world much poorer and far less safe. There is no scenario where they work as he believes, and he is “proven right.” Just as there is no place where Putin is our “friend,” or operating in good faith in these absurd “peace” talks in Saudi Arabia.

From political perspective, Trump is in serious danger of drifting into a place where he becomes in essence an irredeemable and ridiculous fuck up and lame duck - the crazy old man behind the curtain not Oz, an orange Emperor who truly has no clothes. Rs had a big defeat in that PA state Senate race last week, and in a panic withdrew the Stefanik nomination too. As I wrote to you last Thursday the core attributes of what made Trump attractive to non-MAGA voters are eroding:

Two key takeaways from my talk this morning. First, this new scandal is a very serious one, and it is going to further degrade Trump’s increasing degraded brand. I think two of the key pillars of Trump’s appeal to his non-MAGA voters (20-25% of those who voted for him) - that he would bring prosperity, greater opportunity and a better life; and that he would effectively run the government, make it more efficient, save money, be a “reformer” - are starting to come undone. We’ve discussed here that he has already lost that “better life” pillar, as voters have come to believe that Trump means tariffs, higher prices, more struggle for families. Now I think the combination of Musk’s reckless rampage on the US government and the historic buffoonery of Signalgate is undermining the “run Washington like a business/reform” pillar. Without these two pillars what is left for voters to see is the Trump we’ve known all along - sadistic madman, extremist, betrayer of the country and the the worst and most dangerous man America has ever produced. What is left is historic and profound ugliness.

Let’s return to this image from the Economist earlier this month and it’s companion article, Donald Trump’s economic delusions are already hurting America. In this image Trump is not only lighting dollars and our prosperity on fire, he is lighting himself on fire too.

All of this why we need to be on offense now, be loud and keep working hard. While we are doing more outside, in public, we cannot stop contacting our Senators and House Members. We can and must do both as Congressional offices will note the fall off in contacts and read it as our movement is easing up, slowing down. And we just cannot have that, can we??????

Loud and proud people, loud and proud!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Recommended Hopium Actions and Campaigns - While we have made many recommendations to Democrats in recent months for how to raise our game and fight harder and smarter, let’s focus on our current three recommended sets of actions for how we can best channel our love of country and our frustrations into concrete action today in addition to what we discuss above:

1 - Fight The Trump-Musk Attack On Our Government, Our Privacy And Our Constitutional Order - Encourage your Senators and Representatives to let Facts be be submitted to a candid world in a joint Senate-House Letter to America; to hold their own hearings; to file criminal referrals for Musk and his malicious posse to DOJ/FBI and amicus briefs in the court cases regarding the usurpation of their Constitutional authorities or file suits of their own (House Dems began doing this several weeks ago). Encourage them to hold a daily morning press conference to more aggressively challenge Musk’s ransacking of the USG that is making America less prosperous, less healthy, less safe and far less respected in the world.

2 - Loudly Protest Trump’s Embrace of Russia and Abandonment of NATO and Europe - Let your electeds know you are outraged by traitorous Trump’s selling out of Zelenskyy, abandonment of Europe and embrace of Putin; and that we cannot accept this level of appeasement of someone who is a clear enemy of America and the West, and certainly not an ally. Demand that Trump not let his Saudi meeting w/Putin become our Munich; demand that he not become our Neville Chamberlain; demand that we rejoin our European and NATO allies in support of Zelenskyy and democracy here and everywhere. The country is not with Trump’s embrace of Putin and we must be very loud, very, very loud now. See my new essay on the need to support our allies and not surrender to Putin, and my new interview with Rep. Adam Smith, the Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Committee, one of the most important foreign policy voices in our party.

Part II - do all this and demand that Hegseth and Gabbard resign. Hegseth is obvious. He sent war plans on an insecure chat and simply can no longer be trusted. Gabbard for she is in charge of intelligence for the US, and must take responsibility for participating in and not stopping one of the most significant security breaches in US history.

3 - Our Work In The States, The Spring Offensive - I am going to rework this section in the next few days as so much has happened since we called on our community members to organize in the 17 most vulnerable Republican House seats. Rallies and protests have exploded across the country. The DNC/House Dems/State Parties have kicked off People’s Town Halls in all 50 states. I have come to believe that we should be leaning on our state and local electeds to pursue these organized “condemnations” of the Trump regime and their betrayal of America. Let’s start talking now about what we are going to do on July 4th, a day with all of a sudden much more importance.

Paid subscribers should self-report their actions today in our daily chat. So inspired by how hard so many of you are working. I want to make a special plea to all Hopium readers in states with Republican Senators - please make your calls, every day. Even 50 to 100 people calling every day in every red state can make a difference. We have hundreds of Hopium subscribers in every state in the country and it’s critical that we all do our part now.

Keep working hard all, and let’s make this a big day for our freedoms, our families and our future! - Simon