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      Want to see where Trump’s tariffs are leading US business? Look at Georgia

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      If you want a bellwether to measure the broad impact of Donald Trump’s tariffs on the economy, look south, to Georgia. The political swing state has a $900bn economy – somewhere between the GDPs of Taiwan and Switzerland.The hospitality industry is facing an existential crisis. Wine merchants wonder aloud if they will survive the year. But others, like those in industrial manufacturing, will carefully argue that well-positioned businesses will profit. Some say they’re insulated from international competition by the nature of their industry. Others, like the movie industry, are simply confused by the proposals that have been raised, and are looking for entirely different answers. So far, it’s a mixed bag.In a state Trump won by two points and with yet another pivotal US Senate race in a year, Republican margins are thinner than those of the retailers with their business on the line here.Carson Demmond, a wine distributor in Georgia, finds herself looking at seaborne cargo notices for her wine shipments from France with the nervousness of a sports gambler watching football games. She’s betting on her orders of French champagne and bordeaux getting to a port in Savannah before tariffs restart.It’s a risk. Demmond put a hold on orders after Trump enacted sky-high tariffs on European goods last month. When he paused the tariffs days later, Demmond began to assess what she might chance on restarting some purchases.But her wine isn’t showing up on a ship in France yet, she said.“I don’t see them booked on ships yet, and normally they would already be booked, and I would already have sail dates,” she said. “I see a lot of my orders now collecting in consolidation warehouses in Europe, which says to me that there’s something wrong.”Demmond suspects that shipping is suffering from a bullwhip-like effect from uncertainty around tariffs and the economy: so many buyers are trying to get ahead of tariffs that there aren’t enough shipping containers to go around to meet the short-term demand.“It means that as strategic as I’m trying to be with regards to timing my orders so I don’t get hit with lots of tariff bills at the same time, I feel like now all of that is out of my control,” Demmond said. “I never want to face a situation where I have too many orders that all sail and land at the same time, and then getting hit with really large tariff bills in one fell swoop.”US courts, meanwhile, are vacillating on the legality of Trump’s tariffs. The stock market rallied this week after the US court of international trade (CIT) ruled that Trump’s use of extraordinary powers under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) exceeded his authority. Less than a day later, an appellate court lifted the lower court’s block on the tariffs while the case plays out.Unpredictability is driving volatility, and volatility is poisonous to businesses built for stable markets and stable prices.Georgia’s ports have not yet witnessed the massive slowdown occurring on the west coast. Shipping at the port of Los Angeles is down by a third as buyers cancel orders from China. But Savannah – the third-busiest port in the United States behind the Los Angeles area and New York/New Jersey ports – just came off its busiest month.“We’re still watching how this goes,” said Tom Boyd, the chief communications officer for Georgia’s ports authority. “We still are having 30 to 32 vessels a week. Most everybody has been front loading to avoid any supply chain disruptions. Volumes are strong, but we expect volumes to decrease.”Savannah’s port sees more ships from the Indian subcontinent, Vietnam and Europe than from China, because it’s a few days shorter from India through the Suez Canal than across the Pacific, he said.Demmond, who runs the wine distributor Rive Gauche, watches the reports up and down the eastern seaboard carefully because many of the ships from Europe dock in New Jersey before coming south, she said. About 60% of her business is in French wine. Shipping volumes are making logistical planning difficult, she said. Amazon has hired away warehouse workers, which slows down unloading and can leave her wine on a ship for longer periods.She likened the logistical disruption today to the effects of Covid-19 shutdowns.“There’s going to be a crazy ripple effect through multiple industries,” Demmond said. “In normal times, I could count on approximately eight weeks from the time I send my purchase order to the winery for them to prepare it, to the time that it arrives at port. Now, you know, I have no idea, because everything is different and unpredictable. I have a hard time quoting arrival times to people.”Demmond is a wine merchant, not a political economist. Predicting the course of trade negotiations has become a business hazard. She and other Georgia wine distributors met with the representative Hank Johnson last month to describe the effect of a 200% tariff on European wine imports on their business.Many restaurants derive half of their revenue or more from alcohol sales. If the cost of spirits triples, many people will change their dining habits. Domestic supply can’t make up the difference, she said. A decision to expand a domestic winery made today wouldn’t produce a bottle of wine for three to five years. By then, Congress or a new president may have rescinded the tariffs, blowing up the investment.If it were just European liquor, a conservative might dismiss the disruption as something affecting well-heeled wine snobs. But the problem has wide applicability, Demmond said.“There are no American coffee growers. There are no coffee farms here,” she said. “That’s an impossibility. All you’re doing is increasing prices. You’re not helping create jobs by taxing that stuff. Some of it is impossible to re-shore.”Georgia calls itself the Peach state, but California has long eclipsed Georgia’s peach production. Instead, the most widely exported Georgia peach has been the one moviegoers see at the end of the credits: Georgia had $2.6bn in film and television production in 2023.Georgia’s tax incentive program is among the most aggressive in the US and the reason Georgia has become a rival to Hollywood. It’s an economic development strategy that has unusually bipartisan support in a state famously split down the middle politically. Studios have invested billions in Georgia over the last 10 years.Between Disney’s Marvel movies such as The Avengers, Tyler Perry’s studios in Atlanta and Netflix productions including Stranger Things, Georgia has overtaken Hollywood as a center for cinematic production. In any given year, studios spend $2-$4bn making movies in Georgia, according to figures from the Georgia Film Office.But the tax-incentive-chasing film industry is fickle. Acres of shiny new studio space springing up across the state have not prevented the movie business from slowing down a bit over the last couple of years. With the release of Thunderbolts*, for the first time in more than a decade no Marvel movies are slated for production in Georgia. Disney has shifted to studios in England and Australia.So when Trump said he wanted a 100% tariff on foreign-produced films, Georgia Entertainment CEO Randy Davidson did a double take.“It kind of took people by surprise,” Davidson said. “You know, on the one hand, you have people that have been struggling with their jobs here already, thinking initially that was going to be like a quick-fix answer to get production back here. … And then there was the other side: how is politicizing movies into the tariff discussion beneficial? Because it doesn’t make sense.”Trump’s tariff talk emerged after a meeting at the White House with actor Jon Voight and independent film producer Steven Paul. Voight proposed to support the domestic film industry with federal tax credits and international cooperative production agreements, not with a tariff, said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, Sag-Aftra’s chief negotiator and national executive director.“You know, we haven’t had a federal tax incentive in the United States,” Crabtree-Ireland said. “It’s quite common in a lot of major production centers around the world now, and I think it’s definitely time for us to have that conversation.”Films are largely a digital service today. Setting aside the logistical difficulty of assessing a tariff on intellectual property, doing so would violate American law.Crabtree-Ireland suggested that Trump’s rhetoric might be an aggressive negotiating ploy, starting out with an extreme stand that moves a compromise point to a more favorable position. But a workable plan would have more nuance, Crabtree-Ireland said: “Which is what I think ultimately would be under consideration.”Crabtree-Ireland said he wouldn’t expect a federal tax incentive to supplant state tax credits. But any international agreement to level the incentive playing field would have to address it.“What Georgia can hope for is that this topic does not get entangled in a charged-up political atmosphere where it will have a shot to be an actual bipartisan effort and initiative that would actually be good for the country,” Davidson said.As Georgia companies try to manage inventory before a tariff deadline, warehouse space is only one issue. Capital is another.“Most companies can’t afford to get two years’ worth of inventory to manage their business while we figure out what’s going to happen, right? So, they’re going to buy a little time, but not a lot,” said Carl Campbell, an executive director for business recruitment at the Dalton chamber of commerce.Not that there’s a warehouse to be rented in Dalton right now. The north Georgia mill town of about 34,000 in far-right representative Marjorie Taylor Greene’s district is a longstanding center of the carpet-and-flooring industry in the US. But it has had competition for warehouse and industrial space in recent years from solar panel manufacturers, spurred by state tax incentives, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and federal incentives for the semiconductor industry.“Everything’s full, you know.” Campbell said. “We’ve got companies that are going to grow manufacturing capacity. They’re currently deciding where to do it, and so the tariffs may swing it to the US. Sometimes that’s swinging that our way. Sometimes it’s making that decision happen sooner rather than later, and sometimes it makes it not happen at all.”Campbell notes that both Democrats and Republicans can lay claim to Dalton’s industrial successes. Qcells, a solar panel manufacturer owned by the Korean conglomerate Hanwha, is an example, he said.“When Trump was in office the first time, he implemented tariffs on goods from China,” Campbell said. “They suddenly got very, very serious about doing panel production and assembly in the US. And they had to do that quickly and as fast as possible.” The same tariff regime began imposing costs on imported flooring from Asia, which boosted Dalton’s flooring manufacturers.Three years later, the Inflation Reduction Act – enacted under Joe Biden – added incentives for clean energy manufacturing, and Georgia’s two Democratic senators, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, worked to make sure some of the benefit landed in Georgia. About $23bn has been invested in clean energy production in the state since the act passed. Qcells used those incentives to expand in 2023, and employs more than 2,000 people today.“Tariffs are sometimes a tale of winners and losers. And so, yeah, we won a little bit on that,” Campbell said. “And of course, some of our companies got hurt, and they lost a little bit on that.”The problem, again, is uncertainty, he said.“It can create an opportunity for folks like me and companies like ours, yeah, but it can also crush business plans – if you’re reliant on foreign goods and suddenly you just took a 25% hit on your cost. It’s made some people sit on their hands and not move forward on some efforts that we were thinking would happen soon. It’s made some other folks, you know, escalate plans and have to do them faster.” More

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      Trump announces 50% steel tariffs and hails ‘blockbuster’ deal with Japan

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      Donald Trump announced on Friday he was doubling foreign tariffs on steel imports to 50%, as the president celebrated a “blockbuster” agreement for Japan-based Nippon Steel to invest in US Steel during a rally in Pennsylvania.Surrounded by men in orange hardhats at a US Steel plant in West Mifflin, Trump unveiled the new levies, declaring that the dramatic rate increase would “even further secure the steel industry in the United States”.“Nobody is going to get around that,” Trump said, of the tariff rate hike from what was 25%.In a social media post after the conclusion of his remarks, Trump announced that the 50% tariffs on steel would also apply to imported aluminum and would take effect on 4 June.“This will be yet another BIG jolt of great news for our wonderful steel and aluminum workers,” he declared in the post.It was not immediately clear how the announcement would affect the trade deal negotiated earlier this month that saw tariffs on UK steel and aluminum reduced to zero.Trump’s Friday tariffs announcement came a day after a federal appeals court temporarily allowed his tariffs to remain in effect staying a decision by a US trade court that blocked the president from imposing the duties.The trade court ruling, however, does not impede the president’s ability to unilaterally raise tariffs on steel imports, an authority granted under a national security provision called section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act.The precise relationship between Nippon Steel and US Steel raised questions on Friday, even for some of Trump’s allies. The president has thrown his full support behind the deal, months after insisting he was “totally against” a $14.9bn bid by Nippon Steel for its US rival.The United Steelworkers union had previously urged Trump to reject Nippon’s bid, dismissing the Japanese firm’s commitments to invest in the US as “flashy promises” and claiming it was “simply seeking to undercut our domestic industry from the inside”.Speaking to steelworkers, Trump insisted that US Steel would “stay an American company” after what he is now calling “a partnership” with Nippon.But US Steel’s website links to a standalone site with the combined branding of the two companies that features a statement describing the transaction as “US Steel’s agreement to be acquired by NSC”.On the website touting the deal, there were also multiple references to “Nippon Steel’s acquisition of US Steel” and the “potential sale of US Steel to Nippon Steel”.Even pro-Trump commentators on Fox expressed bafflement over the exact nature of the deal.“This is being described as ‘a partnership’, this deal between Nippon and US Steel – but then it’s described as an acquisition on the US Steel website,” Fox host Laura Ingraham pointed out on her Friday night show.She asked a guest from another pro-Trump outlet, Breitbart: “Who owns the majority stake in this company?”When the guest said he did not know, Ingraham suggested Trump might not be aware of the details. “I don’t know if he was fully informed about the terms of the deal. We just don’t know.”Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, had blocked Nippon’s acquisition, citing national security concerns, during his final weeks in office.During his remarks at the rally, Trump gloated that the Nippon investment would once again make the American steelmaker “synonymous with greatness”. He said protections were included to “ensure that all steel workers will keep their jobs and all facilities in the United States will remain open and thriving” and said Nippon had committed to maintaining all of US Steel’s currently operating blast furnaces for the next decade.The president also promised that every US steel worker would soon receive a $5,000 bonus – prompting the crowd to start a round of “U-S-A!” chants.Trump told the steelworkers in attendance that there was “a lot of money coming your way”.“We won’t be able to call this section a rust belt any more,” Trump said. “It’ll be a golden belt.”During the event, Trump invited local members of United Steelworkers on to the stage to promote the Nippon deal, which saw its leader break with the union to support it. Praising the president, Jason Zugai, vice-president of Irvin local 2227, said he believed the investments would be “life-changing”.But the powerful United Steelworkers union remained wary.“Our primary concern remains with the impact that this merger of US Steel into a foreign competitor will have on national security, our members and the communities where we live and work,” United Steelworkers president David McCall said in a statement.“Issuing press releases and making political speeches is easy. Binding commitments are hard.”Trump framed the administration’s drive to boost domestic steel production as “not just a matter of dignity or prosperity or pride” but as “above all, a matter of national security”.He blamed “decades of Washington betrayals and incompetence and stupidity and corruption” for hollowing out the once-dominant American steel industry, as the jobs “melted away, just like butter”.“We don’t want America’s future to be built with shoddy steel from Shanghai. We want it built with the strength and the pride of Pittsburgh,” he said.In his remarks at a US steel plant, Trump also repeated many of the false claims that have become a feature of his rallies including the lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him. He gloated over his 2024 victory and, gesturing toward his ear that was grazed by a would-be assassin’s bullet last year at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, said it was proof that a higher power was watching over him.He also called on congressional Republicans to align behind his “one big, beautiful bill,” urging attendees to lobby their representatives and senators to support the measure.Lois Beckett and Callum Jones contributed reporting More

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      Google and Home Depot drop Pride Toronto sponsorship amid Trump’s DEI war

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      In another blow to one of the largest celebrations of LGTBQ+ people in North America, Pride Toronto has unexpectedly lost two more major corporate sponsors, just weeks before the festival in a setback the festival’s organizer says is direct result of Donald Trump’s campaign to eradicate diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in the US.Google and Home Depot both announced their plans to abandon the festival in the form of one-line emails, said Kojo Modeste, the executive director of the Canadian event.Organizers have warned that the loss of sponsors will pose operational challenges for Pride Toronto that attracts 3 million attendees annually. Other organisations, including local trade unions, have stepped in to help make up the shortfall, but Modeste told the Guardian he was deeply worried about the celebration’s future.“Am I going to have to drastically cut what the festival looks like for 2026? This is not the place that I want to be in,” he said.Home Depot told the Guardian it continually reviews its non-profit giving and decided not to contribute this year. Google told the newspaper it would be supporting “Toronto Googlers” marching in the parade and “community moments” from Pride.The sudden exit of Google and Home Depot follows the departure in February of three other prominent sponsors. At the time, Modeste did not name them, but on Friday he revealed that they were Nissan, Adidas and Clorox.Nissan Canada said it was unable to sponsor Pride in Toronto due to a “local decision” that it says was based on a reevaluation of marketing and media activities. Adidas and Clorox have been approached for comment.“These are American companies and they are showing their true colours,” said Modeste. “We thought they were with the community, but clearly, they’re not.”Corporate sponsorship not only goes towards paying staff, but hundreds of local artists and to keep Pride as a free event.Modeste said he grew up in a period before widespread Pride celebrations – and did not want that to be the experience of current younger generations. “I don’t want to be the one to have to make that decision, to take Pride away from the community,” he said.The White House’s condemnation of diversity and inclusion efforts has resulted in corporations shirking away from festivals that they once loudly supported, said Sui Sui, a professor at Toronto Metropolitan University whose research focuses on DEI initiatives.Sui said that the move also signals that commitments large sponsors made in the past were tenuous and motivated not because of genuine support, but because of the perceived profitability of aligning with such causes.The months-long purge of US federal government workers by the Trump administration has resulted in the firings of tens of thousands of people, including those who worked in forwarding diversity and equity initiatives.Sui said that the chill around sponsors for pride events has also affected New York City and Philadelphia. Mastercard, Nissan, Pepsi, Garnier and more major backers have abandoned the New York celebration, while Target and Philadelphia Union exited Philly Pride 365.“Canada is following suit,” she said.For the future, Pride Toronto and other pride events may need to rely more significantly on grassroots efforts to keep events going, she said.“It’s for them to see who truly believes the importance of Pride.” More

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      Trump news at a glance: tariffs reinstated, for now, after rollercoaster of court decisions

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      President Trump’s tariffs remain in place, at least for now, after an appeals court ruled that his administration can continue to collect import fees.The latest ruling came just a day after a separate court ruled that Trump had overstepped his power, a judgment that his administration has pushed back against.White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said on Thursday that America cannot function when diplomatic or trade negotiations are “railroaded by activist judges”.Here are the key stories at a glance:Trump wins breathing space after major blow to tariff policyThe Trump administration is racing to halt a major blow to the president’s sweeping tariffs after a US court ruled they “exceed any authority granted to the president.”A US trade court ruled the US president’s tariffs regime was illegal on Wednesday in a dramatic twist that could block Trump’s controversial global trade policy.On Thursday, an appeals court agreed to a temporary pause in the decision pending an appeal hearing. The Trump administration is expected to take the case to the supreme court if it loses.Read the full storyTrump allies rail against court’s tariff rulingRepublicans and close allies of Donald Trump are railing against a federal judicial panel that blocked a wide swath of the US president’s tariffs Wednesday night, including those against China.Some attempted to frame the decision as part of a broader fight between the Trump administration and US justice system. Trump has frequently complained about legal decisions that don’t go his way, attacking judges on social media in ways that have alarmed civic society experts.Read the full storyTariffs derailed by law firm that received money from Trump backersDonald Trump’s tariff policy was derailed by a libertarian public interest law firm that has received money from some of his richest backers.The Liberty Justice Center filed a lawsuit against the US president’s “reciprocal” tariffs on behalf of five small businesses, which it said were harmed by the policy.Previous backers of the firm include billionaires Robert Mercer and Richard Uihlein, who were also financial backers of Trump’s presidential campaigns.Read the full storyChina condemns US decision to revoke student visasChina has lodged a formal protest over the US declaration that it will “aggressively” revoke the visas of Chinese students, with the foreign ministry saying it had objected to the announcement made a day earlier by Marco Rubio.Read the full storyFed asserts independence from Trump over interest ratesThe Federal Reserve issued a rare, strongly worded statement on Thursday after chair Jerome Powell spoke with Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday morning, holding firm on the central bank’s independence amid pressure from Trump to lower interest rates.The three-paragraph statement emphasized the Fed’s independent, non-partisan role in setting monetary policy based on economic data.“Chair Powell did not discuss his expectations for monetary policy, except to stress that the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming economic information and what that means for the outlook,” the statement read.Read the full storyTrump violating right to life with anti-environment orders, youth lawsuit saysTwenty two young Americans have filed a new lawsuit against the Trump administration over its anti-environment executive orders. By intentionally boosting oil and gas production and stymying carbon-free energy, federal officials are violating their constitutional rights to life and liberty, alleges the lawsuit, filed on Thursday.Read the full storyImmigration agents get quota to arrest 3,000 people a dayThe Trump administration has set aggressive new goals in its anti-immigration agenda, demanding that federal agents arrest 3,000 people a day – or more than a million in a year.The new target, tripling arrest figures from earlier this year, was delivered to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) leaders by Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, and Kristi Noem, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) secretary, in a strained meeting last week.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      Robert F Kennedy Jr’s flagship health commission report contains citations to studies that do not exist, according to an investigation by the US publication Notus.

      Top House Democrat Jamie Raskin has demanded Donald Trump reveal a list of who attended his private dinner last week for major investors in his meme coin, as questions swirl about the deep and secretive connections between the Trump administration and the cryptocurrency industry.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 28 May 2025. More

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      Federal Reserve issues rare statement asserting independence amid Trump pressure

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      The Federal Reserve issued a rare, strongly worded statement on Thursday after chair Jerome Powell spoke with Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday morning, holding firm on the central bank’s independence amid pressure from Trump to lower interest rates.The three-paragraph statement emphasized the Fed’s independent, non-partisan role in setting monetary policy based on economic data.“Chair Powell did not discuss his expectations for monetary policy, except to stress that the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming economic information and what that means for the outlook,” the statement read.Powell told Trump that he and other Fed officials “will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based solely on careful, objective, and non-political analysis”, according to the statement.That the Fed, which tends to be extremely reserved with public statements, issued the brief memo shows that officials are aware of Trump’s pressure campaign and are standing firm on the Fed’s independence.At Thursday’s White House press briefing, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the Fed’s statement is “correct” but that Trump “did say that the Fed chair is making a mistake by not lowering rates”.Historically, presidents show deference to the Fed, respecting the central bank’s independence. But over the last few months, Trump has tried to publicly pressure Powell to lower interest rates, as the Fed did last year, though officials say that the economy – thrown into a tailspin from Trump’s trade war – has become too unstable to continue lowering rates.After Trump’s “liberation day” in early April, when he announced a slate of tariffs that ended up crashing US stock markets, Trump wrote on social media: “This would be a PERFECT time for Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to cut Interest Rates. He is always ‘late,’ but he could now change his image, and quickly.”Powell, who was appointed during Trump’s first term in 2018, has resisted the pressure from Trump and has warned that high tariffs could lead to inflation and, earlier in May, said that officials are “in no hurry” to cut interest rates – all statements that seem to have put Trump on edge.“‘Too Late’ Jerome Powell is a FOOL, who doesn’t have a clue,” Trump wrote after the Fed’s meeting.Trump had previously threatened to fire Powell, though it’s unclear whether the president has the power to do so. Last week, the supreme court allowed Trump to follow through on his dismissal of officials on the National Labor Relations Board, the panel that oversees labor disputes, but judges noted that the Federal Reserve is a “uniquely structured, quasi-private entity” – implying that it likely won’t be so easy for Trump to get rid of Powell. More

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      Trump tariffs derailed by law firm that received money from his richest backers

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      Donald Trump’s tariff policy was derailed by a libertarian public interest law firm that has received money from some of his richest backers.The Liberty Justice Center filed a lawsuit against the US president’s “reciprocal” tariffs on behalf of five small businesses, which it said were harmed by the policy.The center, based in Austin, Texas, describes itself as a libertarian non-profit litigation firm “that seeks to protect economic liberty, private property rights, free speech, and other fundamental rights”.Previous backers of the firm include billionaires Robert Mercer and Richard Uihlein, who were also financial backers of Trump’s presidential campaigns.Mercer, a hedge fund manager, was a key backer of Breitbart News and Cambridge Analytica, pouring millions into both companies. He personally directed Cambridge Analytica to focus on the Leave campaign during the UK’s Brexit referendum in 2016 that led to the UK leaving the European Union.For its lawsuit against Trump’s tariffs, the Liberty Justice Center gathered five small businesses, including a wine company and a fish gear and apparel retailer, and argued that Trump overreached his executive authority and needed Congress’s approval to pass such broad tariffs.The other group who sued the Trump administration over its tariffs was a coalition of 12 Democratic state attorney generals who argued that Trump improperly used a trade law, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), when enacting his tariffs.In such a polarized time in US history, it may feel odd to see a decision celebrated by liberal and conservatives. But Trump’s tariffs have proven controversial to members of both parties, particularly after Wall Street seemed to be put on edge by the president’s trade war.The US stock market dipped down at least 5% after Trump announced the harshest of his tariff policies. Recovery was quick after Trump paused many of his harshest tariffs until the end of the summer.Stocks started to rally on Thursday morning after the panel’s ruling. The judges said that the law Trump cited when enacting his tariffs, the IEEPA does not “delegate an unbounded tariff authority onto the president”. The decision is on a temporary hold after the Trump administration appealed.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionWhile the ruling does not impact specific tariffs on industries such as aluminum and steel, it prevents the White House from carrying out broad retaliatory tariffs and its 10% baseline “reciprocal” tariff. The White House is appealing the ruling, which means the case could go up to the US supreme court, should the high court decide to take on the case.Members of both groups who sued the Trump administration celebrated the ruling. Jeffrey Schwab, senior counsel for the Liberty Justice Center, said in a statement that it “affirms that the president must act within the bounds of the law, and it protects American businesses and consumers from the destabilizing effects of volatile, unilaterally imposed tariffs”. Oregon’s Democratic attorney general, Dan Rayfield, who helped the states’ lawsuit, said that it “reaffirms that our laws matter”.In a statement, Victor Schwartz, the founder of VOS Selections, a wine company that was represented by the Liberty Justice Center in the suit, said that the ruling is a “win” for his business.“This is a win for my small business along with small businesses across America – and the world for that matter,” he said. “We are aware of the appeal already filed and we firmly believe in our lawsuit and will see it all the way through the United States Supreme Court.” More

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      ‘Trump always chickens out’: Taco jibe ruffles president’s feathers

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      Trump Always Chickens Out – or Taco for short. Investors like narratives to explain the financial world, and they appear to have seized on this one: whenever Donald Trump faces a market backlash, he will back down.It would be fair to say the US president did not take kindly to the suggestion that he was being a “chicken” when asked by a reporter at the White House about the term that is gaining traction on Wall Street.“Oh isn’t that nice – ‘I chicken out.’ I’ve never heard that,” Trump mused on Wednesday in response to the reporter’s question on the so-called Taco trade. He then launched into extended comments on how high the tariffs he imposed on China were, and how he had “helped” China by cutting them.“But don’t ever say what you said,” he added to the reporter. “That’s a nasty question.” Apparently riled, he later returned to the theme, insisting that he was no chicken, and that often people accused him of being too tough.But recurrent retreats by Trump have become the basis for stock markets rebounding after falls, even as the US president has raised tariffs to their highest level in more than a century.The S&P 500, the US stock market benchmark, has gained about 1% during 2025, despite a deep slump in April as Trump announced “liberation day” tariffs on trade with most countries in the world.The stock market rise appears to have been aided by the Taco trade narrative: that market turmoil will correct the president’s course and allow companies to keep on making strong profits. That belief will strengthen if courts uphold Wednesday night’s ruling by New York’s court of international trade that Trump’s tariffs have been imposed illegally.When the Financial Times columnist Robert Armstrong coined the Taco acronym on 2 May, it was a pithy observation of market reaction to Trump’s chaotic policymaking. However, less than a month on, one question is whether being accused of being “chicken” will needle the president to take a harder line with trading partners.On some fronts – notably on transporting people to El Salvador without due process – the Trump administration has indeed defied barrages of criticism and several court orders. Yet on financial markets, the pattern is clear of a harsh initial position followed by a sizeable retreat. The partial climbdowns have often followed close behind slumping bond prices – increasing US government borrowing costs – a dynamic that could expose the world’s largest economy if left unchecked.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe liberation day tariff announcement was followed by a 90-day pause. Trump said he would raise EU tariffs to 50%, before delaying that until 9 July. He ratcheted up levies to a punitive 145% on China, before dropping them to 30% during a 90-day pause. And he toyed with forcing out the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, only to backtrack quickly once investor displeasure became clear.However, the market optimism has not matched economic forecasts, which suggest that the White House’s actions are still historically significant. More

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      Musk is pivoting from DC and Doge’s failures – and wants investors to know

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      Elon Musk really wants the public – and investors – to know that he’s leaving Washington DC behind.In a series of interviews and social media posts this week, Musk has criticized Donald Trump’s marquee tax bill and emphasized his recommitment to leading SpaceX, Tesla and the artificial intelligence company xAI. The world’s richest person claimed that he was back to working around the clock at his companies – to the point of sleeping in conference rooms and factory offices once again.Musk has been telegraphing a pivot back to his businesses for months, but in recent appearances, he has repeatedly distanced himself from his unpopular stint in Washington while proclaiming that his new sole focus is his tech empire. It is a drastic turnaround for Musk, who spent most of the last year constantly at Trump’s side promoting far-right ideology online, appearing on stage at political rallies and pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the Republican party.The shift, which comes amid public and investor backlash against Musk’s political ambitions, was apparent this week as SpaceX launched and lost control of its Starship prototype rocket. Musk gave a round of media appearances to the Washington Post, Ars Technica, CBS News Sunday Morning and a YouTube aerospace influencer, all of which featured him emphasizing his dedication to his companies or attempting to explain away the shortcomings of his heavily criticized “department of government efficiency”.“The federal bureaucracy situation is much worse than I realized,” Musk told the Washington Post on Tuesday. “I thought there were problems, but it sure is an uphill battle trying to improve things in DC, to say the least.”Musk additionally told the Post that Doge had been turned into a “whipping boy” that was criticized for anything that went wrong under the Trump administration. In Ars Technica, Musk admitted: “I think I probably did spend a bit too much time on politics.”Bashing Trump’s tax billThe turn from Trump’s self-appointed “first buddy” back to the familiar territory of space travel and tech has taken place as Doge faces numerous legal challenges and remains widely unpopular.Although Musk successfully seeded the government with his allies and helped gut regulators that would oversee his companies, Doge’s central promise to slash $2tn worth of fraud and waste has been an obvious failure. Doge’s cuts, while devastating to government services, humanitarian aid and the federal workforce, have amounted to little in terms of actual budget savings. Much of the savings it has claimed on its “wall of receipts” have also turned out to be false, including the cancellation of an $8bn contract that in reality was an $8m contract.Musk’s answer for Doge’s shortcomings appears to be casting the blame on some of his familiar foes: politicians and bureaucrats. In doing so, however, he has increasingly split with the Republican party – though notably stopped short of any criticism of Trump himself.Musk’s split with Congressional Republicans has been starkest on X, the social media platform that he owns. Musk’s posts have fully leaned into the narrative that Doge’s actions were successfully reducing waste, but that Congress hamstrung its operations through actions like approving Trump’s tax bill, which is expected to add $2.3tn to the deficit.Musk told CBS that he was “disappointed to see the massive spending bill, which increases the budget deficit …  and undermines the work that the Doge team is doing”.Now, Musk claims, he will focus on saving humanity through technologies like self-driving cars, interplanetary rockets and humanoid robots – exactly the products his companies need investors to believe in.“I have come to the perhaps obvious conclusion that accelerating GDP growth is essential,” Musk posted on Friday in response to a thread calling the GOP bill “disastrous” and demanding term limits on Congress. “Doge has and will do great work to postpone the day of bankruptcy of America, but the profligacy of government means that only radical improvements in productivity can save our country.”In a separate exchange, he replied to a conversation between two users with large followings who routinely praise his leadership and business acumen.“I think Elon is realizing that, despite the promises made by the new administration and a Republican-controlled Congress – and all the campaign platforms they ran on – the current incentive structures and entrenched special interests in government make it nearly impossible to enact any meaningful, long-term changes to address the many big issues we face,” one pro-Musk account posted.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“DOGE has done incredible work, but the GOP has failed to actually implement any of the cuts,” another prominent Musk-booster replied.“Yeah (Sigh),” Musk responded to the thread.Musk goes back to selling the futureWhat became clear throughout Musk’s time in Washington was that the public did not enjoy seeing him and many in the Trump administration did not like working with him. Numerous polls showed his overall popularity declining even as people supported the premise of reducing government inefficiencies. Musk’s prominent involvement in a Wisconsin supreme court election intensified opposition to his influence, while international demonstrations made him the face of the administration. Musk also found few friends within the Trump administration, with report after report of heated clashes with senior officials and some Republican political operatives warning his brand had become too toxic for the party.The pushback against Musk affected his businesses, causing Tesla sales to plummet to the point that the company’s board reportedly began considering replacing him as CEO. While Musk denied those claims, in recent weeks he has very loudly reaffirmed his dedication to leading his businesses.“Back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms,” he posted on Saturday. “I must be super focused on 𝕏/xAI and Tesla (plus Starship launch next week), as we have critical technologies rolling out.”While only a few weeks ago Musk’s posts on X were a nonstop stream of invectives against Democrats, fringe theories about immigration and demands to gut the judicial system, his online output has also changed. His posts this week have been heavily focused on SpaceX’s ambitions to go to Mars and Tesla’s self-driving car program, stopping only occasionally to promote attacks against “the woke mind virus” or feud with the government of his native South Africa.As Musk moves away from full-time politics and tries to win back investor confidence, he has also doubled down on his habit of making grandiose predictions of how his technologies will transform the world. Echoing a long list of previous claims that have missed deadlines and so far failed to come to fruition, he has promoted new endeavors like Tesla’s humanoid robots as crucial to the future of civilization.“Once you have humanoid robots, the actual economic output potential is tremendous. It’s really unlimited,” Musk said on stage at the Saudi-US Investment Forum on 13 May. “Potentially, we could have an economy 10 times the size of the global economy, where no one wants for anything.”Rather than dwell on a year of missed targets and intense backlash, Musk is back to selling a future where anything is possible. More