Bradley Fitzgerald

Staff Writer

As he strolled into the White House Rose Garden, Trump seemed to have more stride in his step.

Surrounded by auto workers and other working-class personnel, Trump wasted no time. He dove into his speech, outlining why the 10% baseline on all imported goods and further taxes were necessary for the success of the United States.

“Nearly a century later, in the face of unrelenting economic warfare, the United States can no longer continue with a policy of unilateral economic surrender,” said Trump last Wednesday. “We have to take care of our people, and we’re gonna take care of our people first.”

Trump then proceeded to unveil a large poster board outlining all the “tariff rates” from numerous countries on products from the United States, and in turn what the U.S. would charge them. He proceeded to list off each nation, and explained various reasons as to why they had received a tariff.

Pushing aside the comedy of placing a tariff on an island filled with penguins, I find these tariffs reveal one major theme about this new Trump administration: Trump isn’t afraid to risk a current economic downturn if it means the U.S will do better in the long run, as he sees it.

Tariffs have always historically been used to stop consumers from purchasing outsourced products in favor of supporting local ones instead. It is true that once booming towns have floundered due to outsourcing jobs to other countries.

Towns like Bethlehem, Johnstown and Flint lost jobs that had made them booming towns in the Rust Belt. It is not a mystery that the United States post-WWII is a nation of consumers. It is clear we may not be interested in making things, but we certainly are interested in buying them. We have traded in the luster of American steel for the chips and software of Silicon Valley.

What Trump has done is tap into the sentiment of American people who feel America has slipped on the global scale. That the American powerhouses of industry have gone, and that the American way of life has suffered because of it.

Trump has said he wants to bring jobs, products, and industry’s back to the United States. He ran on these issues while he was on the campaign trail and visited places that had suffered from globalization across the country.

With these tariffs, and his plans to implement tax cuts and other deregulations, Trump will fulfill the promises he made to the American people.

I believe the basis that the United States has stopped industrializing, or that manufacturing is ‘dying’ is simply false. U.S. Real Manufacturing Value Added has increased from $1.4 Trillion in 1994 to $2.37 Trillion in 2024, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The answer to why jobs have not increased the same, I concur, is due to robotic engineering advances.

I reckon the reason there has been public repulse, besides the obvious increase in prices, is that nobody has any idea how long these tariffs are to be implemented. Evidence for this was shown in the markets, when they plunged significantly.

Investors have no clue how long these tariffs will be in place, driving them to sell. If Trump had made clear these tariffs would be used strategically and only to bring more favor towards the U.S., I don’t believe the stock market would have descended as much as it did.

The idea that I get from these tariffs is that by denying other nations access to American consumers, competing nations will over time have no choice but to get rid of their tariffs on American goods. It is obvious that the American consumer is an important one in trade, so I assume Trump believes it will not take long for countries like China and Mexico to void their tariffs on the U.S.

The only thing is, what if they don’t? Then what ensues is a long and enduring trade war that may plague Americans for some time.

If these tariffs are meant to be used strategically and are meant to be rolled back once the United States has garnered better footing in global trade, then I believe this will not hurt the American people that much.

However, if Trump plans on keeping these tariffs for the long haul, I fear we may all feel economic discomfort for the foreseeable future.