Trump Commerce Secretary Makes Stunning Tariffs Confession

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had a mask-off moment while bending over backward to defend President Trump’s destructive tariffs.

“Will these policies be worth it if they lead to a recession? Even a short-term recession?” Nancy Cordes asked Lutnick on CBS Evening News on Tuesday.

“These policies are the most important thing America has ever had,” Lutnick responded dramatically.

“So it is worth it?”

“It is worth it.… The only reason there could possibly be a recession is because of the Biden nonsense that we had to live with. These policies produce revenues.”

“So you’re saying when it looks chaotic and unpredictable from the outside, that there actually is a master plan when it comes to these tariffs?” Cordes asked.

“It is not chaotic. And the only one who thinks it’s chaotic is someone who’s being silly. He said reciprocal tariffs.”

“Nobody expected him to announce 50 percent tariffs this morning!” Cordes pushed back, referencing Trump’s short-lived announcement of tariffs on Canada.

“He needed to break some guy in Ontario who said he was gonna tax American energy 25 percent,” Lutnick declared, referring to Ontario Premier Doug Ford. “The president of the United States and the White House says, ‘Oh no you won’t’ and breaks him. Breaks him. In what? By a tweet and a Truth. And you think that’s chaotic?”

The Trump administration seems determined to throw the country into a recession after its spiteful tariffs on Canada, Mexico, China, and the European Union have caused the stock market to plummet, badly damaging investor confidence.

One Republican lawmaker isn’t backing down to Donald Trump, and it’s sending the president for a spiral.

Representative Thomas Massie was the only House Republican to vote against passing a stopgap measure Tuesday to keep the Trump administration funded through September. The budget bill narrowly passed 217–213, with one Democrat—Representative Jared Golden—voting for the measure.

“So Massie can vote for Debt Ceiling AND Budget to be put into the Trump Administration, making them both the Republicans problem and responsibility, but can’t give us a simple Continuing Resolution vote allowing us the time necessary to come up with a ‘GREAT, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL???’” Trump posted on Truth Social early Wednesday morning. “Republicans only ‘NO’ Vote. GRANDSTANDER!”

The Senate now has until Friday to pass the legislation and avert a government shutdown.

Massie has been Trump’s go-to target this week after the Kentucky Republican made it clear Monday he would vote against the bill. The president took to his usual tactic: threatening party members on social media until they cave.

“Congressman Thomas Massie, of beautiful Kentucky, is an automatic ‘NO’ vote on just about everything, despite the fact that he has always voted for Continuing Resolutions in the past. HE SHOULD BE PRIMARIED, and I will lead the charge against him,” Trump posted on Truth Social Monday night.

But this time, it didn’t work. Instead of cowering to the GOP’s autocrat like many of his colleagues have done before him, Massie responded to the president’s threat with humor and a smile.

“He’s going after Canada and me today. The difference is Canada will eventually cave,” Massie told reporters Tuesday, Politico reported.

In his 15 years in the House, Massie has had no problem breaking from his colleagues. In fact he’s voted against so many bills that it earned him the nickname “Mr. No.”

The 54-year-old is well-versed in responding to Trump’s empty threats too. In 2020, after Massie forced the House to vote in person on a Covid-19 response bill, the president called him a “third-rate-grandstander” and threatened to boot him from the GOP.

But Massie’s still here, and he will no doubt continue to vote according to his own hawkish budgetary principles.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. equated the health risks of getting the measles vaccine to contracting measles itself, in a dangerous escalation of his misinformation campaign amidst massive outbreaks.

Kennedy continued to emphasize that getting vaccinated should be a personal choice during an interview with Fox News’s Sean Hannity that aired Tuesday night.

“The government shouldn’t force them to do it, there are adverse events from the vaccine, it does cause deaths every year,” Kennedy warned.

“It causes all the illnesses that measles itself causes, encephalitis, and blindness, et cetera,” he continued. “And so people ought to be able to make that choice for themselves. And what we need to do is give them the best information, and encourage them to vaccinate. The vaccine does stop the spread of the disease.”

But Kennedy doesn’t actually think that the vaccine and the illness are the same—he thinks one is better. During the interview, the health secretary claimed that contracting measles was somehow a better method at prevention than getting the vaccine, because it gave people natural immunity.

“It used to be, when I was a kid, that everybody got measles. And the measles gave you lifetime protection against measles infection,” he said. “The vaccine doesn’t do that. The vaccine is effective for some people for life, but for many people it wanes.”

To put it simply, within one interview, Kennedy suggested people might be better off just letting themselves get sick—promoting the spread of the deadly illness that has already infected more than 220 people across several states, resulting in the death of at least one child. Then, the health secretary said that people could get the vaccine, but suggested that it was just as dangerous as contracting a viral illness.

The Centers for Disease Control states that the MMR vaccine is the safest way to protect against measles, and is “much safer than getting measles, mumps, or rubella.” The side effects of the measles vaccine are “usually mild and go away on their own,” according to the CDC.

Encephalitis International, a health non-profit, found that only one to two children in one million who received a measles vaccination developed encephalitis from the vaccination, “which is less than the incidence of all types of encephalitis.”

While measles can cause childhood blindness, the CDC does not consider blindness as a possible side effect of MMR.

Throughout the current outbreak, Kennedy has continually downplayed the importance of getting vaccinated while promoting unproven medicines, such as cod liver oil, which contains vitamin A. He has also claimed that the inhaled steroid budesonide and the antibiotic clarithromycin resulted in “almost miraculous and instantaneous.” While these may help to treat some of the symptoms associated with measles, they will not prevent infections.

Dr. Angela Rasmussen, a virologist, tore into Kennedy’s remarks in a post on X Tuesday calling his claims “two truths & a lie.”

“Truth: There are adverse events from MMR and all vaccines. Truth: People die, albeit very, very, VERY rarely,” she wrote. “BIG FUCKING LIE: the MMR does NOT cause measles or any sequelae. It prevents measles. It’s safe & effective. Measles disables & kills children.”

In a separate post, she noted that the vaccine’s mortality rate was often “grossly exaggerated” by the anti-vaccine movement, of which Kennedy has long been a fixture.

Not only are Kennedy’s claims false and misleading, and not the position of the government he purports to represent, but they are a dangerous message for Americans in the midst of ongoing measles outbreaks.

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.