The U.S. Supreme Court decision to overrule President Trump’s broad-scale use of tariffs to punish other countries caught him by surprise. In his unparalleled hubris, he must have figured that the high court was going to roll over for him again, like it did when they gave him complete immunity for actions in office.
His rant in the aftermath of its decision was more histrionic than his usual rants.
Even though the landmark decision by the high court on tariffs goes a long way to redress the Trump-warped imbalance of the powers of Congress vs. the powers of the president, it is leaving in its wake a swamp of uncertainty.
As is his M.O., Trump doubled down on the level of uncertainty by declaring war on the high court. He pulled out his blunderbuss to blast that he was going to go around the court (including two justices he appointed) and impose a 10% across-the-board tariffs on all imports.
That would include higher tariffs on these countries with whom we enjoy a trade surplus (We export/sell them more than we import/buy.):
- Netherlands
- Poland
- Brazil
- Singapore
- Australia
- United Kingdom
Trump’s erratic policy making showed again in spades within hours after his 10% lurch. On his second thought, he raised that to 15% across the board. These seat-of-the pants threats raise economic uncertainty to a new level of chaos.
Is that dumber than dumb or what? The point is that tariffs should only be used as a tool to counter unfair trade practices in countries where we have a large trade deficit. That includes China, our biggest business competitor.
He plays with tariff levels like his own toy yo-yo. Businesses need a predictable future to invest in new machinery, plant expansions, new products and development of talent. Because of Trump, purchase orders have been cut back. Businesses have been hedging on those kinds of decisions. The result is nothing less than a manufacturing recession.
The stock market has done well because of a lure of the unproven potential of massive AI investments, but that doesn’t lift up huge segments of the economy.
There is irony here. Trump believes that his tariffs will bring manufacturing jobs back home. Maybe in the long run that’s possible, but manufacturing took a hit of 108,000 jobs lost in 2025, per the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
That hurt, especially in Wisconsin, the second most manufacturing intensive state.
Further, Trump’s use of tariffs as a blunt instrument is doing farmers no good. They are losing foreign markets in products, such as soybean and cranberries. His one-time make-good checks for farmers don’t cover the losses in the markets. The market losses may never come back.
He’s good at con games, but seldom gets business or economics right. He’s had multiple bankruptcies, and he refuses to understand that tariffs are a tax on U.S. businesses and on American consumers. Higher consumer prices from tariffs are just starting to kick in.
Do you know a few people in your life who get most everything wrong? You learn when they say north, you go south. When they say turn left, you turn right. He is that kind of negative barometer.
He will never grasp the reality that tariffs have never worked as broad policy. That’s partly because his dementia is getting worse as he pushes 80. There is wide variation in mental capacity on how older people keep or lose their marbles. Trump is one of the losers.
We take care of our people with mental losses, but we don’t let them run the country.
Long and short, Trump’s grand experiment with tariffs as a cure-all is proving to be a bust.
It’s also un-American in that one man, an unserious policy man, has solely been making big economic decisions, instead of being made in deliberate, give-and-take debate in Congress.
Here’s hoping our Wisconsin congressional delegation steps up to support the Supreme Court on tariffs and chins up to the serious business of over-seeing U.S. tax and economic policy.
His loser tariff wars must end. They are wounding us.
