The Daily Populous Sunday March 30th, 2025 night edition
Authored by newrepublic.com and submitted by Murky-Site7468

The Wall Street Journal reports that in a private call with CEOs of the nation’s leading auto companies this month, the president warned them against hiking prices after his tariffs hit. The White House will look unfavorably on them if they do, he darkly intimated, leaving them worried about retribution.

This is getting attention as another abuse of power, akin to his extortion of law firms. But it’s notable for a different reason: It wrecks the spin Trump has offered on his tariffs on many different levels, and it highlights a glaring absurdity about his economic agenda that continues to be overlooked. While Trump’s stated goal of tariffs is to rebuild the nation’s industrial base, he’s gunning to reverse policies by his predecessor in a way that would kill large numbers of manufacturing jobs, including in the auto industry, simply because they would facilitate the transition to a green future.

This week, Trump announced that he’s imposing a 25 percent tariff on all imported vehicles and parts. Experts say this will raise auto prices by many thousands of dollars: tariffs on imported vehicles are a tax on their consumption, and tariffs on parts will make it more expensive to manufacture vehicles here.

LordHarkonen on March 29th, 2025 at 12:02 UTC »

I love how Trump the businessman is telling corporations to sell at a loss.

dan7315 on March 29th, 2025 at 11:04 UTC »

I am not even remotely surprised that Crazy Donald thinks he can stop the negative effects of tariffs by just asking nicely.

"Hey guys, I know I raised taxes on all the parts you build your cars out of, but you better not raise your prices!" He is genuinely stupid if he thinks this won't bankrupt the car companies.

lundah on March 29th, 2025 at 10:51 UTC »

He’s spent 78 years avoiding consequences for the things he’s said and done, why would that change now?