The other day, Donald Trump unveiled a new “plan” to curb beef prices by suspending tariffs on huge amounts of beef imports, while claiming the beef will be sold to the U.S. at a big discount. But he wouldn’t say which countries will be importing the beef or how he secured that commitment. In this, Trump accidentally revealed that his tariffs actually do raise consumer prices, debunking his own claim that other countries pay the tariffs. This, even as he just escalated his tariffs on another front by expanding his trade war with Canada, which will hit Trump country hard. We think all this shows new levels of contempt for his own voters. So we talked to Paul Krugman, whose Substack is excellent at demystifying such matters. He explains why Trump’s beef plan is a scam, what it reveals about Trump’s disdain for MAGA, and why this trade war with Canada is such a terrible idea. Krugman also discusses how it all discredits MAGA economics and whether liberals can use Trump’s world-historical failures to shift the economic argument more fundamentally. Listen to this episode here.
PODCAST
Krugman: Trump Just Revealed Extraordinary Contempt for MAGA Voters
As Trump’s tariff scams get worse, economist Paul Krugman explains how he just exposed new levels of disdain for his own voters—and why MAGA economics is failing so spectacularly.
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences winner Dr. Paul Krugman in Lisbon, Portugal on April 21, 2025.
Horacio Villalobos/Corbis via Getty Images
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences winner Dr. Paul Krugman in Lisbon, Portugal on April 21, 2025.
