Trump’s Advisers Are Freaking Out Over His Reckless Tariffs

Donald Trump’s wild tariff moves are freaking out his own advisers, who are getting panicked messages from business leaders.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump administration officials, including his chief of staff, Susie Wiles, are getting worried phone calls from CEOs and lobbyists hoping to get the president to lay out a specific economic agenda regarding tariffs. Several have stopped trying to get Trump to back away from his approach on tariffs, appealing to the White House for a clearer message instead.

On Monday, Trump met with CEOs from IBM, Qualcomm, HP, and other tech companies, who warned the president that tariffs could hurt their industry, the Journal reported, citing an unnamed source. Trump told reporters that the topic of the meeting was investing in the United States.

The various messages coming from the White House have also spooked Republicans who think Trump doesn’t have a coherent plan on the economy. Trump has refused to rule out a recession and indicated that tariffs could hurt the average American, and as a result stocks have plummeted. All of the market’s gains since his election have been wiped out, and Trump has flip-flopped and carved out exceptions for his tariffs at the same time.

Trump economic staffers have gotten nervous, including people on the National Economic Council, who are worried that the president’s tariffs and lack of a clear economic plan are not only hurting the stock market but leading to price hikes across the country. Trump has not listened to their warnings.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick appears to be out of the loop on some decisions, at one point saying on Fox News that Canada and Mexico could be close to a deal with the U.S. to avoid some tariffs. This caused chaos within the administration, and some officials managed to persuade Trump to pause tariffs on items that comply with the USMCA trade agreement for one month.

Nobody seems to know what Trump’s plan or his endgame for the economy appear to be. For now, the stock market continues to slide, prices are in flux, and everyone watching the news is on edge for whatever crazy idea Trump decides to go with in the short term. People are spending less, and businesses have no idea what to plan for.

The European Union has struck back with its own retaliatory tariffs—and they’re aimed directly at red states.

The EU on Wednesday announced tariffs on $28 billion worth of U.S. imports, including but not limited to steel and aluminum, textiles, home goods, agricultural products, motorcycles, alcohol, and even jeans—with a special focus on Republican states. Tariffs will also be hitting soybeans in Louisiana (Mike Johnson’s home state); beef and poultry in Kansas and Nebraska; and produce in Alabama, Georgia, and Virginia.

“As the U.S. are applying tariffs worth $28 billion, we are responding with countermeasures worth 26 billion euros,” said EU Commission President Ursula von der Lyen, who manages trade conflicts on behalf of the 27 EU countries. “We firmly believe that in a world fraught with geopolitical and economic uncertainties, it is not in our common interest to burden our economies with tariffs.

“Jobs are at stake. Prices will go up. In Europe and in the United States,” she continued. “We deeply regret this measure. Tariffs are taxes. They are bad for business, and even worse for consumers. These tariffs are disrupting supply chains. They bring uncertainty for the economy.”

This language is in stark contrast with how Trump has discussed tariffs, dismissing any fallout as short transitory periods while refusing to acknowledge the massively destabilizing actions that will have a negative long-term impact on Americans everywhere, including those who voted for him in November.

Pro-Palestine activist and legal U.S. resident Mahmoud Khalil wasn’t arrested by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for committing an actual crime, but because Secretary of State Marco Rubio had personally determined that he had to go.

Khalil, who is a green card holder, was arrested by ICE last week under the authority of the Immigration and Nationality Act, or INA, two officials at the Department of State and Department of Homeland Security told Zeteo News Tuesday.

Section 237(a)(4)(C)(i) of INA says that any “alien” is “deportable” if the secretary of state “has a reasonable ground” to believe their presence could result in “potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences” for the United States.

Separately, a White House official told conservative rag The Free Press Monday that the government did not believe Khalil had committed an actual crime. “The allegation here is not that he was breaking the law,” the official said.

The White House official alleged that Khalil was “mobilizing support for Hamas and spreading antisemitism in a way that is contrary to the foreign policy of the US,” a claim that Khalil has denied and that the government has released no evidence to support.

The INA was originally used to oust those suspected of being Soviet spies. But it has never been used to punish speech, and it’s unclear what evidence Rubio would need to provide to justify superseding Khalil’s First Amendment rights.

Despite the shaky constitutional grounds, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced Tuesday that the Trump administration fully intended to move forward with more arrests like Khalil’s, meaning that its crackdown on the free speech of Palestinians and their advocates will likely continue.

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Council for Immigration, posted on X that the application of the INA presented “very significant” problems with free speech and that “the law may well be unconstitutional.”

Reichlin-Melnick explained that under the law, Khalil would still be entitled to an immigration hearing where he could challenge the basis of his deportation. His status as a lawful, permanent resident would not be immediately stripped.

Khalil, whose wife is eight months pregnant, was reportedly moved from New York to the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center, much to the surprise of his legal representation. U.S. District Court Judge Jesse Furman ordered a hold on Khalil’s deportation Monday, “unless and until the Court orders otherwise,” according to Reuters.

The lack of an actual criminal offense might explain why, at a press conference Tuesday morning, House Speaker Mike Johnson gave a confusing explanation for the arrest of the protest organizer.

In a post on Truth Social Monday, President Donald Trump cheered the arrest of the green card–holding graduate student, writing that the presence of “terrorist sympathizers” was “contrary to our national and foreign policy interests.”

Against federal regulation, Donald Trump is using the influence of the White House to boost Tesla sales.

Several Tesla vehicles were parked in the White House driveway Tuesday while the president practically hosted a commercial for Elon Musk’s car company. Trump was joined by Musk and his son as the president answered reporters’ questions about his sudden affinity for the electric vehicle.

“I’m going to buy because number one, it’s a great product,” Trump told reporters. “It’s as good as it gets. And number two, because this man has devoted his energy and his life to doing this. I think he’s been treated very unfairly by a very small group of people.”

“You can’t be penalized for being a patriot,” Trump said. “People should be going wild.”

But despite his adoration for the vehicle and the man who owns its factories, Trump won’t be driving it.

“I’m not allowed to drive because I haven’t driven a car in a long time,” Trump said. “I love to drive cars. But I’m going to have it at the White House, and I’m going to let my staff use it, I’m going to let people at the place use it.”

“I’m not allowed to use it,” the president repeated.

Trump proceeded to ooh and ahh over his new car, including getting inside and announcing, “Everything’s computer!”

But the strange showcase is evidence that the global Tesla boycott is making an impact. Tesla stock is down by 45 percent so far this year, and analysts have faulted Musk’s reputational shift for the automaker’s financial woes.

Tesla historically attracted a more liberal consumer base with its electric vehicles, but since Musk went “dark MAGA,” that same base has soured on the tech billionaire and his products. That’s proven especially true in some of Europe’s stronger economies, such as Germany, which has seen sales in the country fall by more than 70 percent over the last two months, reported Bloomberg. Sales in China—where Tesla has two major factories—have similarly plummeted, falling by 49 percent in February.

On Monday, the automaker’s stock had its worst day since 2020, as its Musk-induced problems coincided with historic market volatility under Trump’s new tariff plans and further instability caused by the Musk-induced mass layoffs across government.

In a Truth Social post Monday, Trump claimed that the boycott was unlawful, writing that “radical left lunatics” were “illegally and collusively” attacking the company.

Fact check: Boycotts are not illegal and are protected by the First Amendment in the Constitution. The Supreme Court affirmed Americans’ rights to protest private businesses in a landmark 1982 case, NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co.

But U.S. regulations do prohibit federal employees from using their public office to benefit themselves, their friends, families, or affiliates “for the endorsement of any product, service or enterprise.”

Still, it’s not the first time that Trump has used the prestige of the Oval Office to push product. In the midst of the pandemic, the president and his daughter Ivanka used their federal platform to shill beans for Goya, amid nationwide calls to boycott the company after its CEO said the country was “blessed” to have Trump as its leader. The stunt came during a push by the Trumps to increase the president’s appeal with Latino voters ahead of the 2020 election.

Staff at the Department of Education have been told to leave the agency’s headquarters by 6 p.m. Tuesday and that all department offices across the country will be closed Wednesday, with no reason or justification except “security reasons.”

CBS News reports that an email was sent to department staff Tuesday from James Hairfield of the Office of Security, Facilities, and Logistics telling them to bring their laptops home, with staff approved for telework told to work remotely on Wednesday.

“Employees will not be permitted in any ED facility on Wednesday, March 12th, for any reason,” the email stated, stating that offices would reopen on Thursday, “at which time in-person presence will resume.”

The move raises questions, considering both the vague reasoning and ongoing events at the U.S. Agency for International Development, which, like the Education Department, has been targeted by the Trump administration to be shut down permanently. USAID employees were ordered Tuesday to destroy classified and personnel documents, in a likely violation of federal law.

Could similar steps be taken at the Education Department? “Security reasons” is vague enough to mean anything. Under the Trump administration, Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency has conducted all kinds of legally questionable moves in government offices, from setting up commercial servers to even setting up living spaces with expensive sleeping pods. This time, however, they’re targeting a full-fledged department—and closing it will be a tall order for Musk and Trump.

The Trump administration is still trying to convince Americans that tariffs will save the economy, even as the stock market hemorrhages cash.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt got into a heated back-and-forth with an Associated Press reporter on Tuesday, in which she revealed that she really doesn’t understand how tariffs affect consumers—or at least is totally willing to lie about it.

“When President Trump last addressed the VR team when he was on the campaign trail, his big push was on tax cuts. He’s going there today as he’s proposing tax hikes in the form of tariffs—” the AP’s Josh Boak began, before Leavitt interjected to say that Trump is “not doing that.”

“I’m curious why he’s prioritizing that over the tax cuts,” Boak continued.

“He’s actually not implementing tax hikes. Tariffs are a tax hike on foreign countries that have been ripping us off. Tariffs are a tax cut for the American people,” Leavitt said. “And the president is a staunch advocate for tax cuts. As you know, he campaigned on ‘No taxes on tips, no taxes on overtime, no taxes on Social Security benefits.’ He is committed to all three of those things, and he expects Congress to pass them later this year.”

Except, even Donald Trump has admitted that his tariffs will destabilize the economy. ​​During an interview with Fox Business’s Maria Bartiromo that aired Sunday, Trump dodged a question on whether the country would dive headlong into a recession, and suggested that Americans should model their economic projections on a 100-year model—like China—rather than assess his performance on a quarterly basis.

“I’m sorry, have you ever paid a tariff? Because I have,” retorted Boak. “They don’t get charged on foreign companies. They get charged on the importers.”

“And ultimately, when we have fair and balanced trade, which the American people have not seen in decades, as I said at the beginning, revenues will stay here, wages will go up, and our country will be made wealthy again,” Leavitt said.

But the exchange then took a particularly hostile turn, with the 27-year-old claiming that the criticism had made her “regret” giving a question to the AP.

“And I think it’s insulting you’re trying to test my knowledge of economics and the decisions this president has made,” Leavitt added.

Trump has taken aggressive action to express his malcontent with the AP. In February, he rescinded the newswire’s access to the Oval Office and Air Force One, after the AP said it would not refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America,” citing its global audience. Also last month, Leavitt announced that the administration would take control of the White House press pool, hand-selecting which outlets are allowed access to the president and possibly replacing reporters from legacy publications with right-wing podcasters.

America’s deadly measles outbreak spread to a new state Tuesday, as the anti-vaccine Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy has continued to push unproven medicines on the masses.

Oklahoma reported two “probable” cases of measles, indicating a spread beyond the worsening outbreaks in Texas and New Mexico. As of Tuesday, the number of cases in the United States rose to 223, with 175 confirmed infections among those ages 19 and under, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It’s likely that this number is an undercount, due to delays in reporting.

Meanwhile, Kennedy appeared in a wide-ranging interview on Fox Nation with Dr. Marc Siegel, during which he continued to push misinformation about treating measles and downplayed the importance of the MMR vaccine as a method of prevention, according to The New York Times.

Kennedy issued a dampened call for measles vaccinations, noting that the choice of whether or not to get vaccinated was a personal one. The health secretary also claimed that there was a benefit to gaining a natural immunity to measles through infection, as it could help protect against cancer and heart disease, even though there is no evidence to support that claim, according to the Times.

Kennedy also continued to push alternative treatments, claiming that doctors had seen “almost miraculous and instantaneous” recoveries with the use of the inhaled steroid budesonide and the antibiotic clarithromycin. He said that the Department of Health and Human Services would begin clinical tests to prove the benefits of these alternative medicines he had rushed to promote, as well as cod liver oil, which contains vitamin A.

Kennedy has already started promoting vitamin A, going so far as to add a section on its use as a measles treatment to the CDC’s website—conveniently omitting the possible health risks associated with inappropriate dosing, such as liver failure and death.

He has also been consulting with an alternative wellness clinic near the outbreak in West Texas, which has been working to distribute alternative medicines such as vitamin C, cod liver oil, and budesonide amid the growing outbreak.

Kennedy was torched over remarks claiming that a child in West Texas who had contracted measles had probably died because of poor nutrition and exercise—belying the fact that the most vulnerable population to die from measles is those who are unvaccinated.

The plummeting stock market has even Peter Doocy starting to question the Trump administration’s economic decisions.

Ahead of White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s briefing on Tuesday afternoon, the Fox News correspondent called out some of Trump’s recent moves.

“We also expect the White House to try to reassure folks who are sittin’ there looking at their 401ks going down, and down, and down. This is a White House that came in trying to get federal workers to retire by the hundreds of thousands, but it’s tough to make the argument that you should retire if your retirement accounts are getting throttled, which is what is happening right now,” Doocy said on Fox News. “So we expect—we hope—for answers to all of these curiosities any minute.”

Trump’s massive 50 percent tariffs on Canada, announced Tuesday, his 10 percent tariffs on China, and his continuous flirtation with more tariffs on Canada and Mexico, have the stock market in shambles. Monday was the worst day for the Nasdaq in over two years, and on Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell by nearly 1 percent.

Trump is telling Americans that it’s just a transition period. But even his own cable news mouthpiece is having second thoughts.

Staff at the U.S. Agency for International Development, which the Trump administration has targeted to be shut down, were given an order Tuesday that seems to violate federal law.

The few USAID employees remaining after Trump’s mass firings were directed on Tuesday to shred and burn classified and personnel documents remaining at the office’s Washington, D.C., headquarters, Devex reports.

“Shred as many documents first, and reserve the burn bags for when the shredder becomes unavailable or needs a break,” read an email from Erica Y. Carr, the acting executive secretary of USAID, noting that this would be an “all day” event beginning Tuesday morning. USAID employees were ordered to label the burn bags with the word “SECRET” and “USAID/B/IO” with permanent markers.

The shredding reportedly began at 9:30 a.m. at USAID headquarters, and was a shock to the union representing foreign service employees at USAID, the American Foreign Service Association. A spokesperson for AFSA told Devex that the union was “alarmed by reports that USAID has directed the destruction of classified and sensitive documents that may be relevant to ongoing litigation regarding the termination of USAID employees and the cessation of USAID grants.”

The spokesperson added that there are “strict requirements for the retention of official records, particularly those that may be relevant to legal proceedings” under the Federal Records Act of 1950 and its resulting regulations.

“Furthermore, the unlawful destruction of federal records could carry serious legal consequences for anyone directed to act in violation of the law,” the spokesperson added.

Kel McClanahan, a national security attorney, told ProPublica that the shreddings were illegal under the Federal Records Act. McClanahan filed an “unauthorized disposition complaint” with the National Archives and asked them to “take immediate measures to stop this destruction of vast quantities of federal records.”

The Trump administration has thoroughly gutted USAID in its near-complete effort to destroy the agency, having canceled 83 percent of its programs as of Monday. These ideologically motivated cuts will have devastating, deadly impacts throughout the world, including a rise in multiple diseases and other health disasters. And now, in their misguided goal, they are breaking more laws.

JD Vance is desperate to shore up support among House Republicans for a spending bill that will keep the government open for the next seven months—and to do so, he revealed that Donald Trump doesn’t actually intend to allow them to spend all of the money Congress allocates.

During a meeting with House Republicans Tuesday, just hours ahead of the vote on the bill, Vance warned that Republicans would take the blame if the government had to shut down, according to three people in the room who spoke to Politico.

Vance tried to make a desperate plea for unity. “We already lost one vote, we can’t lose another,” he said.

The holdout Vance is referring to is Republican Representative Thomas Massie from Kentucky.

Massie pledged Sunday that he wouldn’t support the continuing resolution. “Why would I vote to continue the waste fraud and abuse DOGE has found?” he wrote on X.

“We were told the CR in December would get us to March when we would fight. Here we are in March, punting again!” Massie added.

To be clear, the Department of Government Efficiency has yet to publish any actual evidence of fraud or abuse. Instead the group has claimed that they’ve canceled droves of government contracts—while a closer look reveals that many were already canceled or are worth a lot less than DOGE claims. But Massie’s conviction, even if mistaken, seems unshakeable. He was the only Republican who didn’t support a GOP budget resolution in February, which would necessitate massive cuts to social services, including the very popular Medicaid.

That bill had passed by a very slim margin of 217–215. Clearly, Vance is concerned about a repeat performance, this time with new defections. So, the vice president tried to meet concerns such as Massie’s by downplaying the actual utility of the government spending bill he hoped to rally Republicans behind.

Vance promised that Trump would “ensure allocations from Congress are not spent on things that harm the taxpayer,” according to Notus’s Reese Gorman.

Vance said Trump would do this under “Section II,” but it’s likely that he meant Article 2 of the Constitution, which the Trump administration has claimed gives the executive the power of impoundment, or a line-item veto of congressionally-appropriated spending.

But Vance’s promise is really a pipe dream: Congress legally retains power of the purse, granted by the Constitution, and the president’s purported powers are severely limited by the Impoundment Control Act of 1974.

If it seems a little outrageous that even with control of the House, Senate, and White House, the Republicans must openly admit that they are working to pass laws they have no intention of actually enforcing, that’s because it is. Rather than forge actual party unity behind his agenda, Trump wants the power to act unilaterally—leaving Vance to bully party members into saying “yes” to Trump doing whatever he wants when it comes to federal funding.