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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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      Trump news at a glance: Surprise doubling of steel tariffs risks global market turmoil – again

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      Donald Trump said he was doubling tariffs on imported steel to 50% at a rally celebrating a “partnership” deal between US Steel and Japan-based Nippon Steel on Friday.Speaking in front of an audience of steelworkers, the US president said: “We are going to be imposing a 25% increase. We’re going to bring it from 25% to 50%, the tariffs on steel into the United States of America, which will even further secure the steel industry in the United States.”The surprise announcement, which contained no further detail, was cheered by the crowd at a US Steel plant in West Mifflin, Pennsylvania. Trump added: “Nobody is going to get around that.”He spoke after US markets closed for the weekend. But the increase, set to take effect next week, is likely to create fresh economic turmoil.Here are the key stories of the day:Trump announces 50% steel tariffsThe US president announced he was doubling foreign tariffs on steel imports to 50%, as he celebrated a “blockbuster” agreement for Japan-based Nippon Steel’s to invest in US Steel during a rally in Pennsylvania.Surrounded by men in orange hardhats, Donald Trump unveiled the tariff rate increase as he spoke at a US Steel plant in West Mifflin, declaring that the dramatic hike would “even further secure” the US steel industry.It was not immediately clear how the announcement would affect the trade deal with the UK, negotiated earlier this month, that saw tariffs on steel and aluminium from the UK reduced to zero.Read the full storyTrump bids farewell to Musk – though not reallyThe president saw Elon Musk off from the White House on Friday, as the Tesla chief concluded his more than four months leading the so-called department of government efficiency’s disruptive foray into federal departments that achieved far fewer cost savings than expected.Standing alongside Trump in the Oval Office, Musk – who faced a 130-day limit in his tenure as a special government employee that had ended two days prior – vowed that his departure “is not the end” of Doge.Read the full storyMusk allegedly took lots of drugs while advising TrumpElon Musk engaged in extensive drug consumption while serving as one of Trump’s closest advisers, taking ketamine so frequently it caused bladder problems and travelling with a daily supply of about 20 pills, according to claims made to the New York Times.Read the full storyGolden Dome won’t be done by end of Trump’s termThe president’s so-called Golden Dome missile defence program – which will feature space-based weapons to intercept strikes against the US – is not expected to be ready before the end of his term, despite his prediction that it would be completed within the next three years.Read the full storyTrump fires National Portrait Gallery chiefDonald Trump says he is firing the first female director of the National Portrait Gallery, which contained a caption that referenced the attack on the US Capitol that his supporters carried out in early 2021.Read the full storyHarvard visitors to face social media screeningThe Trump administration has ordered US consulates worldwide to conduct mandatory social media screening of every visa applicant seeking to travel to Harvard University, with officials instructed to view private accounts as potential signs of “evasiveness”.Read the full storySupreme court allows White House to revoke migrants’ protected statusThe US supreme court on Friday announced it would allow the Trump administration to revoke the temporary legal status of hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan, Cuban, Haitian and Nicaraguan migrants living in the US, bolstering the Republican president’s drive to step up deportations.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      The state department is seeking to create an “Office of Remigration” as
      part of a restructuring of the US diplomatic service to facilitate Trump’s rightwing anti-immigration policies.

      The FBI is investigating an apparent impersonator who pretended to be the White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles, in texts and calls to her contacts, including prominent Republicans.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 29 May 2025. More

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      Why Trump does not suffer Congress when it comes to his prized tariffs

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      When it comes to cutting taxes or paying for mass deportations, Donald Trump is happy to work with Congress. But if the issue is his prized and disruptive tariff policy, the president has made clear that he has no time for their legislative wrangling.Trump underscored his sentiment towards Congress after a US trade court this week briefly put a stop to his controversial policy of placing levies on a wide range of countries, before a different court reversed that decision while legal proceedings continue.“The horrific decision stated that I would have to get the approval of Congress for these tariffs. In other words, hundreds of politicians would sit around DC for weeks, and even months, trying to come to a conclusion as to what to charge other Countries that are treating us unfairly. If allowed to stand, this would completely destroy Presidential Power – the Presidency would never be the same!” the president wrote on Truth Social.The statement served to put Congress in its place, even though its Republican leaders have shown Trump great deference since taking office. The Senate has approved just about every official he has nominated, no matter how controversial, while the House of Representatives last week overcame substantial differences among the GOP conference to pass the One Big Beautiful bill containing Trump’s tax and spending priorities.If there’s one place where there is daylight to be found between Trump and his Republican allies, it’s his tariff polices. Even avowed supporters of the president have raised their eyebrows at his on-again, off-again imposition of levies on the countries from which US consumers buy their goods and factories source their inputs, and Republican leaders have gone to great lengths to thwart their attempts to do something about them.Which might be why Trump struck out on his own, and hoped the courts would back him up. So far they have not. The US court of international trade, which ruled to block Trump’s tariffs on Wednesday, was very clear it believed his policies “exceed any authority granted to the president”.The matter may ultimately come down to the views of the supreme court, where Trump appointed half of the six-justice conservative supermajority during his first term. Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard Law School professor, said the case is likely to present a test of how the supreme court views the “major questions doctrine” (MQD), which argues clear congressional authority is needed for agencies to carry out any regulations of national importance, in light of Trump’s tariffs moves.The doctrine was used to defang regulators last year when the court overturned the Chevron decision, limiting regulators’ powers and arguing they had overstepped their authority.The supreme court may not be minded to accept the major questions doctrine when it comes to the commander in chief, wrote Goldsmith in his newsletter, Executive Function. “It is an open question whether the MQD applies to congressional authorizations to the president. Every Supreme Court decision involving the MQD has involved agency action, and lower courts are split on whether the MQD applies to presidential authorizations,” he said.For Congress’s beleaguered Democrats, this week’s court intervention, however fleeting, provided grist for the case they’ve been trying to make to voters ever since Trump took office, which is that he is trying to act like the sort of monarch America was founded on rejecting.“This is why the Framers gave Congress constitutional power over trade and tariffs,” said Suzan DelBene, a Washington state House Democrat who has proposed one of many bills to block Trump’s tariffs. “The court spoke decisively in defense of our democracy and against a president attempting to be king.” 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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      The Guardian view on Trump’s tariffs: the courts have drawn a line. So must Congress | Editorial

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      If one thing is more challenging to the rule of law than a genuine emergency, it is the invention of a phoney one. Since returning to the White House in January, President Donald Trump has upended global trade and international relations, wiping billions off the stock market in the process, by imposing tariffs that he claims are a necessary response to an emergency. Yet that emergency does not really exist, except in the manner that Mr Trump himself has created it.The president claimed, on 2 April, that a lack of reciprocity in US overseas trade arrangements was “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and economy of the United States”. He claimed that this justified him in declaring an emergency and governing by executive decree under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). Congress, which normally has the responsibility to decide US trade policy, was thus wholly ignored. Statutory consultative arrangements, traditionally an essential preliminary, went out of the window too. Mr Trump was effectively exercising an executive power grab.Now, after this week’s ruling by a US federal trade court, most of Mr Trump’s tariffs have been blocked. In a case brought by a coalition of businesses and US states, the court of international trade found that most of the tariffs “exceed any authority granted” to the president under the 1977 law. The White House will appeal. Meanwhile, trade talks aimed at creating so-called deals between the US and nation-state victims of the Trump policies are likely to be paused, while existing deals, including that with the UK, may be affected too.There will be a worldwide sense of relief for as long as it lasts. But the higher courts now face an important political responsibility as well as a judicial one. The ruling has left nations and businesses hanging. Some tariffs will remain, such as those on steel, aluminium and cars. Many others are suspended. Markets hate uncertainty.The issues at stake are very large. They are immediate, because the ruling suspends many but not all tariffs, and also strategic, because it challenges Mr Trump’s wide-ranging attempts to rule by executive order. Both are extremely important. Global trade and economic recovery, in Britain among many other countries, rest on the outcome. But so does Mr Trump’s strategy, which dates back to his first term, of using IEEPA powers to rule by decree, not merely on trade issues but, for example, in sanctioning officials from the international criminal court.The good news is that the president’s plans to impose tariffs on almost every country on the planet will now be subjected to something approaching the legal and constitutional scrutiny that they should have had in the first place. The rule of law, thankfully, has struck back, at least for now.The bad news is that Congress still shows no sign of reining Mr Trump in, as it should. Ironically, the IEEPA was originally a Jimmy Carter-era legislative attempt to boost congressional oversight of presidential emergency powers. Under Mr Trump, that role has been trashed. The worst of all outcomes would be for Congress to now give Mr Trump the powers to which he has laid claim. That is a real danger. The best outcome would be for Congress to give the IEEPA a fresh set of teeth. These would ensure that emergency powers are properly defined and applied, and never again abused by this or any other overmighty president.

      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. 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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      Top Russian security official dismisses Trump’s ‘playing with fire’ warning to Putin – US politics live

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      Top Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev, responding to Donald Trump’s warning that Vladimir Putin is “playing with fire”, said on Tuesday the only truly bad thing to worry about was World War Three.“Regarding Trump’s words about Putin “playing with fire” and “really bad things” happening to Russia. I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!” Medvedev wrote on X.Margo Martin, special assistant to President Donald Trump, posted a video on X, of the president calling Savannah Chrisley to announce his pardon of her parents, Todd and Julie Chrisley.Martin posted, “President Trump calls @_ItsSavannah_to inform her that he will be granting full pardons to her parents, Todd and Julie Chrisley!”The stars of the reality TV series Chrisley Knows Best rose to fame for showcasing their lavish lifestyle and tight-knit family.In 2019, the Chrisleys were indicted by a federal grand jury on 12 counts of bank and wire fraud, tax evasion and conspiracy, all of which they have denied.The reality stars began their prison sentences in January 2023. Their original sentences, which were 12 years and seven years, respectively, were reduced in September 2023.The possibility of halting abortions in Missouri has resurfaced after the state’s supreme court sent a case back to the lower court for reconsideration.The court ruled today that a district judge had used the wrong legal standard in decisions made in December and February. Those rulings had temporarily allowed abortions to continue in Missouri for the first time since the state’s near-total ban took effect following the US supreme court’s overturning of Roe v Wade in 2022.The high court ordered Judge Jerri Zhang to vacate her previous rulings and reassess the case using the proper legal framework it outlined.The state argued in its March petition that Planned Parenthood failed to prove women were harmed in the absence of the temporary blocks. Instead, officials said Zhang’s rulings left abortion clinics “functionally unregulated” and women with “no guarantee of health and safety.”A judge in Washington struck down an executive order targeting law firm WilmerHale, marking the third ruling to overwhelmingly reject President Donald Trump‘s efforts to punish firms he perceives as enemies of his administration.US District Judge Richard Leon, an appointee of Republican President George W Bush, said Trump’s order retaliated against the firm in violation of US constitutional protections for free speech and due process, Reuters reports.WilmerHale is the former home of Robert Mueller, the Republican-appointed special counsel who led a probe into Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election and Trump campaign ties to Moscow. Trump has derided the investigation as a political “witch hunt.”Leon barred federal agencies from enforcing the 27 March executive order against WilmerHale, a 1,100-lawyer firm with offices in Washington, DC and across the country.The Associated Press is reporting that the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to halt an order allowing migrants to challenge their deportations to South Sudan, an appeal that came hours after the judge suggested the Trump administration was “manufacturing” chaos and said he hoped that “reason can get the better of rhetoric.”Judge Brian Murphy in Boston found the White House violated a court order with a deportation flight to the chaotic African nation carrying people from other countries who had been convicted of crimes in the U.S. He said those migrants must get a real chance to be heard if they fear being sent there could put them in danger, he said.In an emergency appeal, the federal government argued that Murphy has stalled its efforts to carry out deportations of migrants who can’t be returned to their home countries. Finding countries willing to take them is a “a delicate diplomatic endeavor” harmed by the court requirements, Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote.Murphy, for his part, said he had given the Trump administration “remarkable flexibility with minimal oversight” in the case and emphasized the numerous times he attempted to work with the government, according to an order published Monday night.“From the course of conduct, it is hard to come to any conclusion other than that Defendants invite a lack of clarity as a means of evasion,” the Boston-based Murphy wrote in the 17-page order.Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville announced he is running for Alabama governor in 2026.The Alabama lawmaker launched his campaign website today, and he’s set to officially announce his campaign this afternoon on Fox News.In 2016, he was still working as the University of Cincinnati’s head football coach, and he previously coached at Auburn University in Alabama. In 2020, he won a seat representing Alabama in the United States Senate, his first stint into elected office.Tuberville is looking to succeed term-limited Republican Governor Kay Ivey. He is immediately the frontrunner to win the seat in the deeply-Republican state. The move also sets up an open Senate race in Alabama in the midterms.The senator has been flirting with the idea of going for the governor’s seat for some time now, and was already backed by several groups before announcing his candidacy. GOP groups like the Club for Growth preemptively backed him, and other would-be Republicans candidates like lieutenant governor Will Ainsworth opted out of the race.Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened to “maybe permanently” strip federal funding to California if the state continued to allow transgender athletes to compete in girls’ and women’s sports.In an early post on social media, Trump assailed California Governor Gavin Newsom, accusing him of defying an executive order the president signed earlier this year by continuing to “ILLEGALLY allow MEN TO PLAY IN WOMEN’S SPORTS”.“I will speak to him today to find out which way he wants to go???” Trump said of Newsom. “In the meantime I am ordering local authorities, if necessary, to not allow the transitioned person to compete in the State Finals. This is a totally ridiculous situation!!!”As of midday on the west coast, it remained unclear if the president and the governor had spoken. Nor was it clear what federal funds Trump was threatening to withhold from the state.The White House did not immediately respond to a request for clarity.The president’s post appeared to reference a transgender high school student who recently won the regional girls’ long jump and triple jump competition.Also on Tuesday, the California Interscholastic Federation, the state’s governing body for high school sports, announced that it would pilot an entry process for this weekend’s track and field championship. It said it was extendinga spot to “any biological female student-athlete” who would have qualified in a competition where a transgender athlete secured qualifying marks.In the inaugural episode of his podcast, Newsom said it was“deeply unfair” for transgender athletes to compete in women’s sports. On Tuesday, a spokesperson for his office said the federation’s new policy was “a reasonable, respectful way to navigate a complex issue without compromising competitive fairness” and that Newsom was “encouraged by this thoughtful approach”.Newsom has not responded publicly to the president’s taunt. Until now, Trump has largely avoided the public clashes with Newsom that were commonplace during his first term. Newsom in return has done little to antagonize the president, seeking federal aid to help Los Angeles recover from the devastating fires earlier this year.California law allows transgender students to compete in sports consistent with their gender identity. According to the governor’s office, the number of transgender high school student athletes in California’s 5.8 million student public school system is fewer than 10.The Trump administration has asked the supreme court to intervene in its attempt to rapidly deport migrants to countries other than their own, Reuters is reporting.We’ll bring you more on this as we get it.

      Top Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev, responding to Donald Trump’s warning that Vladimir Putin is “playing with fire”, said that the only truly bad thing to worry about was World War Three. “Regarding Trump’s words about Putin “playing with fire” and “really bad things” happening to Russia. I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!” Medvedev wrote on X.

      Israeli troops opened fire near thousands of hungry Palestinian people as a logistics group chosen by Israel and backed by the US to ship food into Gaza lost control of its distribution centre on its second day of operations.

      The Trump administration has ordered US embassies worldwide to immediately stop scheduling visa interviews for foreign students as it prepares to implement comprehensive social media screening for all international applicants. A Tuesday state department cable instructs consular sections to pause adding “any additional student or exchange visitor (F, M, and J) visa appointment capacity until further guidance is issued” within days.

      The Trump administration is set to order federal agencies to cancel all government contracts with Harvard University worth an estimated $100m, dramatically escalating the president’s assault against America’s most prestigious university.

      King Charles III delivered the “speech from the throne” to open Canada’s parliament, in which he made no direct reference to Donald Trump but was closely watched for implicit criticisms of the US president and his dramatic recasting of the US relationship with Canada. In the speech, which emphasized Canadian values, sovereignty and strength, Charles hailed Canada as “strong and free” and said Canadians can “give themselves far more than any foreign power on any continent can ever take away”.

      The White House has lost confidence in a Pentagon leak investigation that Pete Hegseth used to justify firing three top aides last month, after advisers were told that the aides had supposedly been outed by an illegal warrantless National Security Agency wiretap. The extraordinary explanation alarmed the advisers, who also raised it with people close to vice-president JD Vance, because such a wiretap would almost certainly be unconstitutional and an even bigger scandal than a number of leaks. But the advisers found the claim to be untrue and complained that they were being fed dubious information by Hegseth’s personal lawyer, Tim Parlatore, who had been tasked with overseeing the investigation.

      NPR, the US public broadcaster that provides news and cultural programming to more than 1,000 local stations, has filed a federal lawsuit against Trump’s administration, challenging an executive order that cuts federal funding to the public broadcaster as an unconstitutional attack on press freedom.

      Robert F Kennedy Jr unilaterally announced that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would remove Covid-19 booster shots from its recommended immunization schedule for healthy children and pregnant women, in an unprecedented move from a US health secretary.

      Donald Trump’s media company said that institutional investors will buy $2.5bn worth of its stock, with the proceeds going to build up a bitcoin reserve. About 50 institutional investors will put up $1.5bn in the private placement for common shares in Trump Media and Technology Group, the operator of Truth Social and other companies, and another $1bn for convertible senior notes, according to an announcement from the company.

      Trump threatened to withhold federal funding if California did not stop a transgender girl in high school from competing in state track and field finals, and said he would discuss it with governor Gavin Newsom.

      The United States warned Americans against traveling to Venezuela, emphasizing a growing risk of wrongful detention in the country where there is no US embassy or consulate.

      A federal judge has issued an order temporarily barring the US transportation department from withholding federal funding from New York as the Trump administration seeks to kill Manhattan’s congestion pricing program.
      Top Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev, responding to Donald Trump’s warning that Vladimir Putin is “playing with fire”, said on Tuesday the only truly bad thing to worry about was World War Three.“Regarding Trump’s words about Putin “playing with fire” and “really bad things” happening to Russia. I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!” Medvedev wrote on X.Israeli troops have opened fire near thousands of hungry Palestinians as a logistics group chosen by Israel and backed by the US to ship food into Gaza lost control of its distribution centre on its second day of operations, my colleague Emma Graham-Harrison reports from Jerusalem.An 11-week total siege and an ongoing tight Israel blockade means most people in Gaza are desperately hungry. Hundreds of thousands walked through Israeli military lines to reach the new distribution centre in Rafah on Tuesday.But the newly established Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which uses armed American security contractors, was not prepared for them and staff at one point were forced to abandon their posts.“At one moment in the late afternoon, the volume of people at the SDS [secure distribution centre] was such that the GHF team fell back to allow a small number of Palestinians in Gaza to take aid safely and dissipate,” the foundation said in a statement.The Israeli military said it fired “warning shots” near the compound to restore control. It was not immediately clear if there had been any injuries among people trying to get food.On Sunday, Jake Wood, the founding director of the GHF, resigned, my colleague Lorenzo Tondo reported, saying that it would not be possible for the group to deliver aid “while also strictly adhering to the humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and independence”.The UN and major humanitarian organisations had already refused to work with the GHF on the grounds that doing so would compromise values that are key to reaching civilians in all conflict zones, and put both their teams and recipients of aid in Gaza at risk.They also warned that a newly formed group with no experience would not be able to handle the logistics of feeding over 2 million people in a devastated combat zone.The dangerous chaos on Tuesday appeared to confirm many of those fears. The GHF said its decision to abandon the distribution centre “was done in accordance with GHF protocol to avoid casualties”.And here’s Joseph Gedeon’s story on National Public Radio, the US public broadcaster that provides news and cultural programming to more than 1,000 local stations, filing a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration, challenging an executive order that cuts federal funding to the public broadcaster as an unconstitutional attack on press freedom.Here’s my colleague Leyland Cecco’s story on King Charles III’s speech to Canada’s parliament, in which he made no direct reference to Donald Trump but was closely watched for implicit criticisms of the US president and his dramatic recasting of the US relationship with Canada.Health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr has announced that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would remove Covid-19 booster shots from its recommended immunization schedule for healthy children and pregnant women.Legal experts said the Trump administration appointee’s decision, which Kennedy announced on social media, circumvented the CDC’s authority to recommend such changes – and that it is unprecedented for a health secretary to unilaterally make such a decision.“I couldn’t be more pleased to announce that as of today, the Covid vaccine shot for healthy children and healthy pregnant women has been removed from the CDC’s recommended immunization schedule,” Kennedy said in the announcement.Kennedy claimed the Biden administration last year “urged healthy children to get yet another Covid shot despite the lack of any clinical data to support the repeat booster strategy in children”.The secretary was flanked by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner – Dr Marty Makary – and the head of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Dr Jay Bhattacharya. Neither the head of the FDA nor of the NIH would typically be involved in making vaccine administration recommendations.Bhattacharya claimed the announcement was “common sense and good science”.Removing the booster shot from the recommended immunization schedule could make it more difficult to access – and it could affect private insurers’ willingness to cover the vaccine. About half of Americans receive healthcare through a private insurance company.Such a unilateral change is highly unusual if not unprecedented for a typical US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary. And it could leave the HHS department open to litigation.Donald Trump’s media company has said that institutional investors will buy $2.5bn worth of its stock, with the proceeds going to build up a bitcoin reserve.About 50 institutional investors will put up $1.5bn in the private placement for common shares in Trump Media and Technology Group, the operator of Truth Social and other companies, and another $1bn for convertible senior notes, according to an announcement from the company.Trump Media said it intended to use the proceeds for the creation of a “bitcoin treasury”. The effort mirrors the president’s moves to create a “strategic bitcoin reserve” for the US government.Trump, who referred to cryptocurrencies in his first term as “not money”, citing volatility and a value “based on thin air”, has shifted his views on the technology. During his campaign, he became the first major candidate to accept donations in the form of cryptocurrency. Since assuming office, he has launched his own cryptocurrency.Last week, Trump rewarded 220 of the top investors in one of his other cryptocurrency projects – the $Trump memecoin – with a swanky dinner luxury golf club in northern Virginia, spurring accusations that the president was mixing his duties in the White House with personal profit.During an event at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida during his presidential campaign in May 2024, Trump received assurances that crypto industry backers would spend lavishly to get him re-elected. He spoke at the major bitcoin event during his campaign, and JD Vance, the vice-president, is slated to speak at the conference this week.Earlier we reported that Donald Trump has threatened to withhold federal funding if California did not stop a transgender girl in high school from competing in state track and field finals, and said he would discuss it with governor Gavin Newsom.Reuters reports that in his social media post, Trump appeared to be referring to AB Hernandez, 16, who has qualified to compete in the long jump, high jump and triple jump championship run by the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) at a high school in Clovis this weekend.The CIF is the governing body for California high school sports, and its bylaws state that all students “should have the opportunity to participate in CIF activities in a manner that is consistent with their gender identity”. California law prohibits discrimination, including at schools, based on gender identity.Trump referred in his social media post earlier today to California’s governor as a “Radical Left Democrat” and said: “THIS IS NOT FAIR, AND TOTALLY DEMEANING TO WOMEN AND GIRLS.” He said he was ordering local authorities not to allow the trans athlete to compete in the finals.Under the US and California constitutions, state and local officials and individuals are not subject to orders of the president, who can generally only issue orders to agencies and members of the federal government’s executive branch.Trump threatened that “large scale Federal Funding will be held back, maybe permanently,” if his demands are not met. Such a move would almost certainly lead to a legal challenge by California, which has already sued over multiple Trump administration actions it says are illegal or unconstitutional.Trump also referred to comments Newsom made on his podcast in March when the governor also said he believed competition involving transgender girls was “deeply unfair”.A spokesperson for Newsom declined to comment on Trump’s remarks, but referred to comments Newsom made in April when he said overturning California’s 12-year-old law allowing trans athletes to participate in sports was not a priority.“You’re talking about a very small number of people,” Newsom told reporters. Out of the 5.8 million students in California’s public school system, there are estimated to be fewer than 10 active trans student athletes, according to the governor’s office.A CIF spokesperson did not respond to Reuters’ questions, and Hernandez could not be immediately reached for comment.The United States has warned Americans against traveling to Venezuela, emphasizing a growing risk of wrongful detention in the country where there is no US embassy or consulate.“US citizens in Venezuela face a significant and growing risk of wrongful detention,” the State Department said in a statement. It has assigned Venezuela its highest travel alert – Level 4: Do Not Travel.It cites risks including torture in detention, terrorism, kidnapping, unfair law enforcement practices, violent crime, civil unrest and inadequate healthcare.Venezuela’s authoritarian president Nicolás Maduro tightened his grip on power yesterday as his ruling party yesterday celebrated its “overwhelming victory” in regional and parliamentary elections, which were boycotted by the majority of opposition parties – who called the elections a “farce”. Turnout was below 15%.Meanwhile last Monday, the US supreme court allowed the Trump administration to end Biden-era protections that had allowed some 350,000 Venezuelan immigrants to remain in the United States. The decision lifted a federal judge’s ruling that had paused the administration’s plans, meaning temporary protected status holders are now at risk of losing their protections and could face deportation. Joe Biden, had granted the status to Venezuelans due to political and economic strife in their home country.A federal judge has issued an order temporarily barring the US transportation department from withholding federal funding from New York as the Trump administration seeks to kill Manhattan’s congestion pricing program, according to NBC New York.US district judge Lewis Liman held the hearing one day before transportation secretary Sean Duffy has warned the government could begin withholding federal government approvals for New York projects.New York launched its first-in-the-nation program in January, charging most passenger vehicles a toll of $9 during peak periods to enter Manhattan south of 60th Street, in a bid to cut congestion and raise funds to improve mass transit.King Charles and Queen Camilla have now departed the National War Memorial in Ottawa, Canada and are on their way back to the airport.After Charles’s speech in the Senate, the pair attended a wreath laying ceremony at the National War Memorial.Donald Trump has “never evolved” and “isn’t close with anybody”, according to Mary Trump, the US president’s niece and a vocal critic of his business and political career.The daughter of Donald’s older brother, Fred Trump Jr (nicknamed Freddie), Mary Trump told the Hay festival in Wales – where she was discussing her latest book about the Trump family, Who Could Ever Love You – that she no longer has relationships with anyone in her family apart from her daughter.She described herself as “the black sheep of the family”, calling her grandfather, Fred Trump, Donald’s father, “literally a sociopath”, and adding: “Cruelty is a theme in my family.”She explained that much of her understanding of her uncle comes from when she was in her 20s and Donald hired her to ghostwrite his second book. She said:
      He is the only person I’ve ever met who’s never evolved, which is dangerous by the way … Never choose as your leader somebody who’s incapable of evolving – that should be one of the lessons we’ve learned, for sure. More