The Morning: Trump’s tariffs

Plus, Matt Gaetz, the Middle East and banana art.

View in browser|nytimes.com November 21, 2024 Good morning. Today, we're covering Trump's tariff plan — as well as Matt Gaetz, the Middle East and banana art. In San Pedro, Calif. Adam Amengual for The New York Times TRUMP'S AGENDA On tariffs By Ana Swanson I cover trade. President-elect Donald Trump calls tariffs "the most beautiful word in the dictionary." He has talked about them again and again as a fix for America's economic relationship with the rest of the world. Tariffs are a charge on foreign products when they are brought across the border. By making foreign goods more expensive, tariffs encourage Americans to buy products from U.S. factories instead. For Trump, this is a way to spur American manufacturing, create new jobs and lower U.S. trade deficits. He used them liberally in his first term, taxing hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of metals, solar panels and Chinese goods. While running for president this year, he proposed even larger tariffs — of 60 percent or more on China, and up to 20 percent on most goods from other countries. Some doubt whether Trump will follow through with these plans. But I think it's safe to assume he's serious about moving forward with some of them. The Morning is running a series on the policies Trump and his congressional allies may implement next year. In today's installment, I'll talk about his promise to impose tariffs. Note: Figures for 2024 are through September. Source: U.S. Census Bureau | By The New York Times Do they work? Trump advisers describe tariffs as a "core belief" for the president-elect. He has sung their praises for decades. Today he says they can also raise money to fund tax cuts and force other governments to make concessions on trade and immigration. Can tariffs accomplish these goals? Perhaps in part. They can certainly encourage more factory production, at least in the specific industries they shield: When the United States put tariffs on steel, clothing and kitchen cabinets in Trump's first term, companies here generally made more of those things. The incoming president is right on a couple of points: First, tariffs do raise money for the government. The amount they generate has more than doubled since Trump first took office (though it is a tiny percentage of government revenue). Second, the United States has much lower tariffs than most other countries do. Both parties agree that some tariffs help protect industries against unfair competition from China. But tariffs also have downsides, and those can outweigh the economic benefits. Companies charge Americans more to pay for them. And they are regressive, meaning they place a higher burden on poor families than on rich ones. Tariffs can also backfire by hurting U.S. manufacturers. American factories use a lot of foreign parts and materials, and tariffs make it more expensive to get these. Trump's steel and aluminum tariffs, for instance, got U.S. firms to make more metals — but because the price rose, other companies that use metals to make things, like industrial machinery and auto parts, ended up manufacturing less. Imposing tariffs on foreign countries also encourages them to do the same thing to the United States. Suddenly, American exporters lose markets abroad. That costs jobs. A powerful tool Trump has several ways to impose new levies right away. He could use an existing trade investigation from his first term to slap more tariffs on China, as President Biden did earlier this year. His advisers also argue he could quickly impose tariffs on other countries by declaring an economic emergency. This action might be vulnerable in court, but challenges often take years to unfold, and tariffs would probably continue in the meantime. There are a few reasons Trump might hold back. One is that he might try to include tariffs in a big tax bill next year. Then they'd be clearly legal — and impossible to change without another act of Congress. Another factor could be opposition from pro-business advisers or a plunge in the stock and bond markets. Would tariffs help or hurt the economy? It really depends on their size, and other countries' reactions. Dani Rodrik, a Harvard University economist who has written about the harms of globalization, said that if tariffs were low, maybe 10 percent, Americans might just pay a bit more for their imports — not a huge deal. But if tariffs increase significantly beyond that, he said, it could lead to a 1930s-style trade war, in which countries keep retaliating against one another with higher and higher levies. The price of goods could rise quickly. In that scenario, Trump's tariffs would likely hurt rather than help American workers. Trump's Agenda A Morning newsletter series on the policies Donald Trump may pursue next year. Taxes Republican Priorities THE LATEST NEWS Matt Gaetz Matt Gaetz Kenny Holston/The New York Times Federal investigators found a trail of payments from Matt Gaetz, Trump's choice for attorney general, to women who testified that he had hired them for sex. See a map of the payments. House Republicans blocked the release of a report about allegations against Gaetz. Senators weighing whether to confirm him could subpoena it. Pete Hegseth A police report released yesterday detailed a 2017 encounter in which a woman said she had been sexually assaulted by Pete Hegseth, the Fox News host Trump picked for defense secretary. Hegseth said the encounter was consensual. He was never charged with a crime. JD Vance accompanied Gaetz and Hegseth to Capitol Hill to try to persuade senators to confirm them. More on Trump's Appointments Trump selected Matthew Whitaker, an acting attorney general in his first term who lacks foreign policy experience, to be the U.S. ambassador to NATO. Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who will lead Trump's "Department of Government Efficiency," proposed requiring federal employees to work in person full-time. Doing so, they said, could prompt a "wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome." Linda McMahon, Trump's pick for education secretary, supports giving parents money to send their kids to private schools. Dr. Mehmet Oz, the TV personality Trump wants to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, has promoted sham diet pills and ineffective Covid treatments. Pot smoking and mean tweets: Missteps that sank past presidential nominees look quaint next to the allegations against some of Trump's nominees. Congress In some of the final House races to be called, Nick Begich, an Alaska Republican, unseated Mary Peltola, a moderate Democrat. Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, a Democrat who broke with Biden on immigration and China, narrowly won re-election. House Speaker Mike Johnson backed barring Sarah McBride, a Democrat who is the first openly transgender member of Congress, from women's bathrooms on Capitol Hill. The House unanimously passed legislation that would make it easier for reporters to protect their sources. Trump wants Republicans to kill it. More on Politics North Carolina's Republican-controlled legislature passed a bill to strip powers from the incoming Democratic governor and give Republicans more control over elections. A jury convicted a Tennessee man who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 of plotting to murder the F.B.I. agents who investigated him. Biden turned 82 yesterday. Middle East The U.S. cast the sole vote against a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas because the resolution did not make the truce contingent on the release of hostages. Bernie Sanders, a critic of U.S. support for Israel, proposed measures to block weapons transfers to the country. All Republicans and most Democrats in the Senate rejected it. Israel's military offers to freeze the sperm of soldiers killed in war. Some grieving widows and parents struggle with the ethics of the decision. Business The Justice Department asked a federal court to force Google to sell Chrome, its web browser. A judge ruled in August that the company had an illegal monopoly in search. Nvidia, which makes chips that power artificial intelligence, said that its profits had doubled compared with last year. Comcast will spin off its cable channels, including MSNBC and CNBC, into a new public company. Target's stock price fell 21 percent, its biggest drop in more than two years, after weak sales. Other Big Stories In British Columbia.  Chad Hipolito/The Canadian Press, via Associated Press A powerful storm killed at least two people, downed trees and knocked out power to tens of thousands of homes in Northern California and the Pacific Northwest. A 26-year-old immigrant from Venezuela was convicted of killing Laken Riley, a Georgia nursing student, and sentenced to life in prison. Trump has highlighted Riley's murder as a failure of the immigration system. Opinions Public health officials hurt their cause when they describe everything from gun violence to loneliness as a "crisis" — if everything is a crisis, then nothing is, Jeneen Interlandi argues. Logistics, not the law, will be the main check on Trump's mass deportation plans, Dara Lind argues. Here's a column by Tressie McMillan Cottom on Trump's cultural power. The Thanksgiving Sale is on. Time to subscribe to Cooking. Cooking answers "What's for dinner?" deliciously, every day. Explore thousands of easy five-star recipes. Save on your first year of Cooking. MORNING READS In Georgia. Emile Ducke for The New York Times Looking westward: Some winemakers in Georgia, a former Soviet republic, want to end their dependence on Russia. Health: Has menopause made you ache? There's a name for that. Social Q's: "A friend lied about her dying brother to cancel plans with me. Help!" Bag charms: Dangly accessories hung from handbags are all the rage. Some cost more than the handbags themselves. Lives Lived: A modern-day Icarus who popularized hang gliding, Bill Moyes set a world record for the longest unassisted flight, was arrested after soaring into the Grand Canyon and nearly killed himself several times. He died at 92. SPORTS Women's college basketball: The Connecticut coach Geno Auriemma became the coach with the most wins in college basketball history. M.L.B.: The league announced that the Detroit Tigers ace Tarik Skubal had won the A.L. Cy Young Award, while the Atlanta Braves left-hander Chris Sale won the N.L. honor. ARTS AND IDEAS Johnny Carson on his final show in 1992. Alice S. Hall/NBCU, via Getty Images In a fractured media landscape, it can be hard to grasp just how big Johnny Carson was, Jason Zinoman writes. What was the source of his appeal? "There's always been more of a subtext and strategy to his performance," Jason writes, "a crowd-pleasing fantasy beneath the facade that speaks to deeper and darker strains in the American psyche." Read his piece. More on culture Timothy A. Clary/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Maurizio Cattelan's "Comedian" — a banana duct-taped to a wall — sold at auction for $6.2 million. The buyer is a crypto entrepreneur. Percival Everett won the National Book Award for fiction for his novel "James," a retelling of Mark Twain's "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" from the perspective of an enslaved man. Late-night hosts joked about Biden's birthday. "We got you a cake, but Nancy Pelosi insisted you sacrifice it for the good of democracy," Stephen Colbert said. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Craig Lee for The New York Times Serve this light, snappy, lemon-garlic kale salad as the perfect holiday side. Make your sofa look more inviting. Tie the room together with an area rug. GAMES Here is today's Spelling Bee. Yesterday's pangram was microcrack. And here are today's Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Need help? 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