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      in US Politics

      As Trump’s tariff regime becomes clear, Americans may start to foot the bill

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      Burying the hatchet with Brussels, Donald Trump – flanked by the leader of the European Commission – hailed a bold new era of transatlantic relations, an ambitious economic pact, and declared: “This was a very big day for free and fair trade.”That was seven years ago. And then on Sunday, the US president – flanked by a different leader of the European Commission – hailed another new era of transatlantic relations, another economic pact and declared: “I think it’s the biggest deal ever made.”Trumpian hyperbole can typically be relied upon as long as he’s in the room, at the lectern or typing into Truth Social. What matters after that is the underlying detail – and we have very little, beyond a handful of big numbers designed to grab headlines.What we do know, as a result of this deal, is that European exports to the US will face a blanket 15% tariff: a tax expected, at least in part, to be passed along to US consumers. The price of key products shipped from the EU, from cars to medicine and wine, is about to come into sharp focus.This pact is not unique. Trump’s agreement with Japan also hits Japanese exports to the US with a 15% tariff. Most British exports to the US face a 10% tariff under his deal with the UK.A string of countries without such accords, including Brazil, Canada and South Korea, are set to face even higher US tariffs from Friday. The Trump administration currently has a blanket 10% levy in place for US imports, although the president threatened to raise this to “somewhere in the 15 to 20% range” earlier this week.Ignore, for a moment, the chaos and the noise. Put to one side the unpredictable stewardship of the world’s largest economy, and its ties with the world. And forget the many U-turns, pauses and reprieves which have followed bold pronouncements, again and again and again.If you, like many businesses in the US and across the world, are struggling to keep up, take a step back and look at a single number. Since Trump took office, the average effective US tariff rate on all goods from overseas has soared to its highest level in almost a century: 18.2%, according to the Budget Lab at Yale.Trump argues this extraordinary jump in tariffs will bring in trillions of dollars to the US federal government. On his watch, tariffs have so far brought in tens of billions of dollars more in revenue this year than at the same point in 2024.But who picks up the bill? The president and his allies have position this fundamental shift in economic policy as a historic move away from taxing Americans toward taxing the world. But in reality, everyone pays.Tariffs are typically paid at the border, by the importer of the product affected. If the tariff on that product suddenly goes from 0% to 15%, the importer – as you’d expected – will try to pass it on. Every company at every stage of the supply chain will quite literally try to pass the buck, as much as possible.And the very end of the chain, economists expect prices will ultimately rise for consumers. The Budget Lab at Yale estimates the short-term impact of Trump’s tariffs so far is a 1.8% rise in US prices: equivalent to an average income loss of $2,400 per US household.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBig firms that have so far done their best to hold prices steady amid the blizzard of tariff uncertainty are now starting to warn of increases. Inflation, which Trump claims is very low in the US, picked up in June.The president appeared to reluctantly reckon with the reality that Americans may start to foot the bill for his tariffs before setting off for Scotland late last week.Asked about the prospect of using revenue from tariffs to distribute “rebate” checks to US consumers, Trump said: “We’re thinking about that, actually … We’re thinking about a rebate, because we have so much money coming in, from tariffs, that a little rebate for people of a certain income level might be very nice.”Given what inflation did to Joe Biden’s electoral fortunes, and Trump’s keen eye for populist policies, it’s hardly a stretch to imagine those cheques – signed by Donald J Trump – landing in bank accounts in time for the midterm elections next November.And such a move would, indeed, be very nice. Especially as it appears increasingly likely that, after this week, Americans will probably be paying more for almost everything. More

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      in US Politics

      The key to understanding Trump? It’s not what you think

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      View image in fullscreenDonald Trump embodies dealmaking as the essence of a particular form of entrepreneurship. Every deal begins with his needs and every deal feeds his wants. He thus appears to be like other super-rich people: seemingly bottomlessly greedy, chasing the next buck as if it is the last buck, even when they have met every criterion of satiation.But Trump is different, because his brand of greed harks back to an idea of leadership that is primarily about adversarial dealmaking, rather than about innovation or improved managerial techniques. Trump’s entire career is built on deals, and his own narcissism is tied up with dealmaking. This is because of his early socialization into his father’s real-estate dealings in and around New York. Real estate in the United States, unlike the money-making modes of super-rich individuals in other countries, relies on deals based on personal reputation, speculation on future asset values, and the ability to launder spotty career records. Profits and losses over time can be hard to identify and quantify precisely, as Trump’s auditors and opponents have often confirmed, since profits, which depend on speculation and unknown future value, are by definition uncertain.Trump’s incessant boasts about being an apex dealmaker cast light on almost every aspect of his approach to his presidential decision-making. Numerous observers have long cast doubt on Trump’s image as a consummate dealmaker, pointing to his many failures in his long real-estate career, his abortive political and diplomatic deals, his backsliding and reversals, and his overblown claims about deals in progress. But these criticisms miss the point.Deals, whether in finance, real estate, or in any other part of the economy, are just one step in the process of reaching full-fledged, binding agreements subject to the force of law. They are a stage in the negotiation process that has no force until it is finalized as a contract. It is, at best, an agreement to agree, which can turn out to be premature, poorly conceived or unacceptable to one or other party. Put another way, it is an engagement, not a wedding. A deal allows a negotiator like Trump to claim victory and blame the other party or some other contextual variable if things do not work out.In fact, in the hands of someone like Trump, deals are ways to evade, postpone or subvert the efficient work of markets. Trump does not like markets, precisely because they are impersonal and invisible. Their results – for corporations, entrepreneurs, investors and shareholders – are subject to clear measures of success and failure.Because deals are personal, adversarial and incomplete, they are perfect grist for Trump’s relentless publicity machine, and allow him to polish his brand, massage his ego and signal his prowess to opponents – without the regulations and measurable consequences of regular market risks. The downside risk for an aborted or interrupted deal is negligible, and the upside is guaranteed by the legal power of fully completed contracts.Trump has figured out to an exceptional degree that dealmaking does not need to be successful in order to massively increase his wealth. Whether or not true, his claims to successful deals are the key to his brand and profitmaking worldwide, either directly or through the business endeavors of his sons. These range from his latest Trump perfume and Trump mobile telephone services, his Maga accessories, Trump golf courses around the world, his real estate and resorts, and of course his highly profitable cryptocurrency holdings. In every case, his deals either lead to further deals, which service his branding machine, or they lead to direct increases in his personal and corporate wealth. Deals, successful or not, are Trump’s magic means to amass money and feed his avarice.Avarice is a vice with a long history in Christian theology. It is widely defined as an excess of greed, an inordinate level of greed, an insatiable greed. It has been viewed by economic historians as a passion that must be curbed and replaced by calculated, moderated self-interest in order for the rationality of the modern market to function as a dominant economic principle. From this perspective, greed can have numerous objects – such as food, sex and power – whereas avarice is single-minded in its focus on money.Trump exemplifies this focus. Though he has to function in a world where avarice is meant to be regulated by the market mechanisms of price and competition, he has managed to successfully pursue his avarice with little obstacle.This driving desire defines Trump’s “egonomics” – the intimate connection between his narcissistic urges and his wish for increasing his stock of money. The governing principles of his economic policy have nothing to do with America getting its due, as his messaging about tariffs argues, or about restoring dignity to the working class, as he signals to his Maga base. Nor are they about power or prestige. The object of everything he does is money, and in the service of the boundlessness of money, which Trump has made the defining object of his desire. Other commodities are of interest to him only insofar as they serve his desire to acquire, hoard and increase his stock – of money.View image in fullscreenMoney for what?The first – and most soothing – theory is that Trump wants money to buy power – more of it, perhaps all of it. More power than China, than his generals, than Harvard. We all know power – via our parents, our teachers, our bosses, our police. It is a force we understand, a pull we recognize. If Trump only wants more of something that many people have, and even more want, he is legible, he is like us.But power for what? To do what? To get what?Perhaps he is chasing an unassailable place in history, both human and eternal. So then it is not just power he endlessly chases, but glory. For this we have some evidence in the clownish thesaurus of words that he uses to describe his achievements, his looks, his wit, his wisdom, his all-round superhumanity: best, most, only, incredible, ever, more. In this orgy of superlatives, he is always curled high up in the clouds, like a Maurice Sendak toddler. But since Trump, from his perspective, brooks no real competition in life, in politics, in real estate, or even in history, there can be no glory for him which is not tainted by the mediocrity of his competitors. And true glory usually requires some form of self-sacrifice, some sense of compassion, some ability to transcend oneself. Given his woeful deficits in these areas, the glory game cannot be the key to understanding Trump.And so we go to a more familiar space: the realm of prestige, status and stardom. This realm is wired into competitions, tournaments and casinos of every sort, where winning is well-defined, losing is for losers and there is usually only one survivor and one winner who takes all. The competition for status is as old as recorded human history and accompanies every human society that has had leaders and followers, more and less skilled competitors for food, shelter and sexual partners. It begins with simple rules for coming out on top and evolves over time into the most elaborate forms of status competition, often driven by males – including wartime exploits, trophy wives, palatial homes and bottomless conspicuous consumption.These tournaments of value can be observed in settings as disparate as auctions, horse races, philanthropic gifts and corporate mergers and acquisitions. There is widespread consensus among thinkers from many eras and regions that status is a limited good, which has its own economics of supply and demand, distinct from those of pecuniary gain. This insight looks, at first, like the key to Trump.But attractive as this argument may seem, it too is a red herring.View image in fullscreenTrump’s signature riffAmong Trump’s own tactics, the one he loves to use most is tariffs. Trump’s obstinate insistence on tariffs as the key to restoring American manufacturing, swelling the US treasury and reducing American consumer prices has flummoxed most mainstream economists. Tariffs are for Trump the ideal way to combine dealmaking, status-grabbing and his penchant for money as its own bottomless value.It is evident that Trump’s understanding of the trade-offs of globalization is rudimentary and often internally contradictory. Indeed, he shows signs of believing that making deals of any sort requires only outsize confidence, charismatic force and bottomless access to financial backing. In fact, Trump’s view of himself as an incomparable dealmaker (a claim at odds with his many entrepreneurial disasters) conceals his deep distaste of real markets – in which a large apparatus of binding promises, the tendency to stable price equilibria, and the connection of supply and demand through pricing – can frustrate his brand of deal-making, which is always oriented to maximizing his personal prestige.Trump’s deep-seated desire to be the winner who takes all in the global prestige economy sheds some light on his weaponization of tariffs. We can catch a glimpse of this logic in a most unlikely context. It was captured in detail by one of the fathers of British social anthropology, Bronisław Malinowski, in his 1922 book on a unique trading system that he found in the Trobriand Islands of Oceania, on several trips there in the years between 1915 and 1917. This anthropological classic, Argonauts of the Western Pacific, casts new light on Trump’s tariff mania.What Malinowski described is a system of trading across about 18 coral islands within a 175 sq mile (453 sq km) area, between “big men”, leaders of lineages who exchanged highly specific valuables (such as decorated shell necklaces and bracelets) and their counterparts in this network of islands. Called the kula system, it had a highly codified set of rules to hedge voyagers against oceanic weather dangers and hostile groups in other islands, some of whom were cannibals. The goods appropriate to kula exchange could never be hoarded, marketed or bartered like normal utilitarian goods. This was a strictly ceremonial system geared to enhancing the prestige of male elites, of moving these well-known objects in a circuit which could last for years.The diplomatic rituals of these exchanges were ensconced in an atmosphere of pretend hostility between the parties, often because other groups in these islands were real enemies, always poised for real warfare. Hanging on the knife-edge between trade and war, these exchange circuits were strictly distinguished from barter or money transactions (what we would today call market transactions). The kula system was a way of organizing exchange, averting war, signaling prestige and making allies through a tightly regulated flow of valuables outside market exchange circuits.Trump does not care about Malinowski, the Trobriand Islands, non-capitalist exchange systems or “big man” politics in kinship-based polities. But his operating system belongs in this type of diplomatic world, one that requires nothing except a non-negotiable interest in winning deals. Trump’s onslaught of tariffs, falling on everyone like nuclear ash, is meant to make him the king of the global prestige market, no matter the cost to diplomatic traditions, financial markets, customer capacities or fair balances of trade. Trump appears to be undistracted by any other economic priority outside the aim to be the apex dealmaker.The kula system is grounded in a non-monetary system of honor, prestige and reciprocity, which helps us understand Trump’s tariff strategy but does not fit his narcissist drive to crush all his fellow players. Even the kula system is about relationships. Trump is strictly about winning deals.So we must beware of seeing the urge to dominate all prestige markets as Trump’s bottom line. Trump’s bottom line is money. Being an avaricious man, Trump worships money – both its power and its pomp – and he seeks it through his extensive networks of children, clients, tax lawyers and cronies, all devoted to the increase of his wealth. This pecuniary drive has a transcendent, epic and unquenchable force which cannot be explained by reference to the other things that money can buy. Even his quest for prestige through arm-twisting tariff deals is primarily about positioning himself to secure future deals in his individual capacity. His is a special brand of avarice.View image in fullscreenThe new cryptocracyThere is no better way to explore the ways in which Trump’s various egonomic strategies come together than in the recent invention and propagation of cryptocurrency, which has spawned a shadow world of speculators, fraudsters, legal hucksters, elected and unelected lobbyists. Their usual victims are vulnerable citizens, low-level grifters, pensioners, badly informed investors and other natural prey. The entire industry lives in a gray economy, attached to mainstream markets, assets and regulators like the tiny remora fish that feast off sharks. It survives in a legal twilight zone, where its currency is accepted only by some businesses as legal tender, and where smart players use pump-and-dump tactics to make fast profits with short-lived “coins” of various kinds. Whatever the utility of cryptocurrency in the real world of goods and services, it is mainly a tool for amassing wealth by gambling on its future convertibility to real money in specialized currency exchanges.Cryptocurrency puts Trump in the position of being a player and the owner of a casino-like system at the same time, so that he always wins, if not in one role, then in the other. The outrageous self-enrichment schemes of Trump and his family in the crypto industry, which have been carefully exposed in several media outlets recently, establish new frontiers for Trump’s shameless violation of even the simplest norms about conflict of interest. The best example of these ventures is his memecoin, $Trump, which has made him and his close associates a fortune by selling access to Trump through a barely regulated crypto mechanism. By some estimates, Trump has gained several billions of dollars in his net worth through his crypto ventures, which combine nepotism, influence-peddling and dealmaking in a unique package.Through cryptocurrency, Trump has found the ultimate way to attach his core impulse – avarice – to the larger machinery of the markets. There is some truth to the argument that Trump wants more of everything he can get, including power, glory and prestige. But what he wants more than anything else is money, which is just a temporary token of more money, and more money for ever more.The unique instinct behind Trump’s avarice, which sets him apart from other billionaires who continue to chase wealth, is that he has found a way to build his fortune through deals – whether deals that make him money by inflating the value of his brand, which can then make him more money through more deals, or through the enforceability of completed contracts.Through his dealmaking, Trump has managed to triumph over the market, making it work for him to amass greater and greater sums of money, whether his deals are seen through to fruition or not. We can summarize Trump’s approach to markets by adapting a famous sentence, spoken by him, about how he grabs women: Trump grabs markets by the deal. Illustrations by Joao Fazenda

      Arjun Appadurai, professor emeritus at New York University, is the former provost of the New School. More

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      Rubio moves to strip US visas from eight Brazilian judges in Bolsonaro battle

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      The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has reportedly stripped eight of Brazil’s 11 supreme court judges of their US visas as the White House escalates its campaign to help the country’s former president Jair Bolsonaro avoid justice over his alleged attempt to seize power with a military coup.Bolsonaro, a far-right populist with ties to Donald Trump’s Maga movement, is on trial for allegedly masterminding a murderous plot to cling to power after losing the 2022 election to his leftwing rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Bolsonaro is expected to be convicted by the supreme court in the coming weeks and faces a jail sentence of up to 43 years.As the day of judgment nears, Trump has been increasing pressure on the court and President Lula’s administration. On 9 July, the US president announced he would impose 50% tariffs on all Brazilian imports as of 1 August, partly as a result of the supposed persecution of his ally. The move triggered an outpouring of nationalist anger in the South American country, with Lula describing it as “unacceptable blackmail”.On Friday, after federal police raided Bolsonaro’s house and fitted him with an electronic tag to stop him absconding, Rubio announced further moves in support of the defendant, who he claimed was the victim of a “political witch hunt”.Writing on X, Rubio said he had ordered visa revocations for the judge leading the investigation into Bolsonaro, Alexandre de Moraes, as well as “his allies on the court” and their family members. Rubio did not name his other targets but the Brazilian newspaper O Globo identified them as Luís Roberto Barroso, José Antonio Dias Toffoli, Cristiano Zanin, Flávio Dino, Cármen Lúcia Antunes Rocha, Luiz Edson Fachin and Gilmar Ferreira Mendes.Two other judges who were nominated to the court during Bolsonaro’s 2019-23 presidency, André Mendonça and Kassio Nunes Marques, reportedly avoided the sanction, as did a third judge, Luiz Fux.Lula denounced what he called “another arbitrary and completely groundless measure from the US government”.“Interference in another country’s justice system is unacceptable and offends the basic principles of national sovereignty and respect between nations,” the president said on Saturday, adding: “I’m certain that no kind of intimidation or threat – from whoever it may be – will compromise the most important mission of our nation’s powers and institutions, which is to act permanently to defend and safeguard the democratic rule of law.”The Trump strategist Alex Bruesewitz welcomed Rubio’s announcement, calling Bolsonaro’s treatment “sick and wrong”.Bolsonaro’s congressman son, Eduardo, thanked Rubio for his decision. “Thank you very much for this fight in favor of free speech, we do believe in the same values,” tweeted Eduardo, who has been living in the US since February and has reportedly been lobbying officials there over his father’s plight.Trump’s interventions have appalled millions of Brazilians who hope to see their former leader held responsible for the alleged coup attempt, which culminated in the 8 January riots in Brasília.Lula’s institutional relations minister, Gleisi Hoffmann, called the visa cancellations “an aggressive and petty retaliation” and “an affront to the Brazilian judiciary and national sovereignty”.Even influential rightwing voices have criticised the US’s attempt to meddle in one of the world’s most populous democracies by imposing 50% tariffs.On Saturday, the conservative Estado de São Paulo newspaper described Trump’s behaviour as “unacceptable external interference in Brazil’s domestic matters”. “Trump has not only attacked our national sovereignty … [but also] stained the history of diplomatic relations between the two largest democracies in the Americas,” the newspaper’s editorial board wrote.While the Bolsonaros have hailed Trump’s actions, they also appear to have grasped how the announcement of tariffs has backfired, allowing Lula to pose as a nationalist defender of Brazilian interests and paint the Bolsonaro clan as self-serving “traitors”.Lula, who had been facing growing public disillusionment and an uphill battle to win re-election next year, has enjoyed a bounce in the polls since Trump launched his trade war, the brunt of which will be borne by coffee producers and cattle ranchers in Bolsonaro-voting regions, such as São Paulo.Celso Rocha de Barros, a political columnist, said he suspected the Bolsonaros had been blindsided by the scale of Trump’s attack.“I think [Bolsonaro] wanted some kind of penalty – something he could use to say: ‘Look, Brazil’s being punished because of Bolsonaro’s persecution. But [the tariffs] went far too far … [they] screwed Bolsonaro’s base,” said Rocha de Barros, pointing to their potential impact on agribusiness.On Friday night, Bolsonaro’s senator son, Flávio, post on X, calling on Trump to suspend the tariffs and replace them with individual sanctions. Soon after, however, he deleted the post. More

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      How can Democrats win back working-class voters? Change their tune | Joan C Williams

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      Doing the same thing and expecting a different result – that’s the definition of insanity. So I fall into despair when I hear yet another news story, and yet another politician, talking incessantly about assaults on democracy. It’s as if folks have read no post-2024 election polling. Defense of democracy was a top issue for Democrats but way, way down for those who voted for Donald Trump: their top concerns were inflation and the economy. Democrats lost the popular vote. They need to attract voters they lost in the last election. What’s complicated about this?Assaults on democracy are driven by narcissistic authoritarianism, for sure – but they’re also a strategy to control the narrative in ways that aid and abet the far right. Democrats need to stop walking into the same old trap, and supplement defense of democracy with a viable strategy to lure back enough non-college-educated voters to win elections.The first step is to understand why defense of democracy doesn’t work with non-college voters. Both white voters and voters of color without degrees typically care more about the economy than democratic norms. Inequality predicts low trust in political institutions, and the US has a serious inequality problem. Many feel democratic institutions have failed them: while over 90% of Americans did better than their parents in the decades after the second world war, only about half of those born in the 1980s will, with particularly sharp declines in “blue wall” states Democrats need to win.Democrats’ failure to connect with non-college voters has been analyzed as an institutional problem of “the groups” inside the beltway – the web of non-profits that reflect the values of the 8% of Americans who are progressive activists. But Democrats’ problem is less an institutional than a cultural problem.Many Democratic candidates feel compelled to keep talking about the issues their core college-educated constituencies care most about – defense of democracy, the climate crisis, abortion rights – in language that appeals to college graduates.What a gift for Maga: in 2024, 84% of voters cared more about the cost of living than the climate crisis and 79% cared more about the cost of living than abortion rights. Only 18% of voters said “preserving American’s institutions” was more important than “delivering change that improves Americans’ lives” (chosen by 78%).Remember the famous ad: “Kamala Harris cares about they/them. Trump cares about you.” That definitely attracted the transphobic – but it also attracted working-class people angry that Democrats weren’t campaigning on the kitchen table issues that mattered most to them. The path forward for Democrats is to learn how to connect with non-college voters, using three arguments.First, Trump is not focused on the kitchen table issues he ran on. Second, he has cut government programs that provide security for ordinary Americans in order to finance huge tax cuts for big business. Third, he’s playing checkers in a world where the big boys play chess, making American weak again in the process.For college grads, the key point about Trump’s tariffs is that they’re chaotic and “dumb”. But the key point for voters without degrees is that Trump isn’t delivering on his core election promise to make middle-class life work for hardworking Americans. The most effective ads of 2024 focused on economics: one called out the cost of rent, groceries and utilities; another decried Trump for fighting “for himself and his billionaire friends” to finance a national sales tax that would raise prices on middle-class families (which is precisely what tariffs do). Democrats should provide a clear contrast, insisting on a society “where hard work is repaid with a stable life” (to quote Zohran Mamdani’s acceptance speech).Tariffs take us in the opposite direction. Not only do they raise prices for American consumers but they also hurt two constituencies non-college voters care about: farmers and small business. America’s most farming-dependent counties went for Trump by 77%; tariffs cut American farmers off from key markets abroad for soybeans, almonds and other agricultural products. Trump’s tariffs also threatened to destroy small business supply chains – the small flower shop that imports flowers from Mexico and the small manufacturer whose supply chains includes Canada – which is why more than half of 600 small business owners surveyed expressed concern about tariffs. That’s important because they represent twice the proportion of voters as compared to Europe. Non-college grads hold small business in high esteem; it’s the most trusted institution in the US. Many non-college Americans’ fondest hope is to own a small business so they can stop being order-takers and become order-givers instead.College grads are upset that the “department of government efficiency” (Doge) has terminated National Science Foundation grants (including mine), and fired climate scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency. But for non-college voters the key message is that Doge is robbing the settled middle class of the security they yearn for and deserve. Ethnographies show again and again that stability and order are highly valued by the blue-, pink- and routine white-collar voters who are flocking to the far right.Trump’s budget cuts include blue-collar jobs, such as federal firefighters. Also targeted is the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema
      ), which helps ensure that ordinary Americans don’t fall out of the middle class when their house floods or burns down in a wildfire. Doge also has fired so many Social Security employees that people now face long waits at Social Security and Medicare – benefits Trump promised to protect. Doge also eliminated USAID programs that bought grain from hard-pressed Kansas farmers.Why are all these assaults on the middle class necessary? To enable huge tax cuts for big business and Trump’s billionaire friends. Three-fourths of Americans are dissatisfied with the size and influence of major corporations, and 58% believe upper-income Americans’ taxes are too low.As a central theme, Democrats should insist that government defend small business and stop catering to big business. Anti-elitist rhetoric is important, as evidenced by both research and the big crowds at the Bernie Sanders and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez Fighting Oligarchy rallies.The third crucial theme is that Trump’s foreign policy is not Maga but “Mawa” (Make America Weak Again). His Taco (Trump Always Chickens Out) tariffs are making the US look foolish and ineffectual. He plays into our enemies’ hand by insulting allies while sucking up to dictators who stroke his ego: Russia and North Korea were among the only countries not included in his initial tariff plan.His administration is trying to fire nearly 1,000 FBI agents whose only fault is that they followed orders, threatening our chief anti-terrorism agency’s ability to do its job in a dangerous world. Fired, too, is the head of cybersecurity, a four-star general summarily dismissed on the advice of a known dingbat after a distinguished 33-year military career.The “Mawa” theme taps into working-class patriotism, security-mindedness, and masculinities. As compared to elites, non-elites are more patriotic, because everyone stresses the highest-status categories they belong to and being American is one of the few high-status categories non-elites can claim. For similar reasons, non-elites endorse traditional masculinities at higher rates: unlike class ideals, gender ideals are social ideals they can fulfill. Blue-collar families are more security-minded for a different reason: they often feel the world is a scary and uncertain place – which, for them, it often is.The left needs to get as conversant in working-class values as the far right is. Masculinity is a good example. We need a lot more jibes like Taco tariffs and political cartoons (Instagram, TikTok, anyone?) that contest Trump’s macho self-image. He’s not a Real Man; he’s a little rich boy so vain and frantic for attention he’s readily manipulable. His fragility is his Achilles’ heel, which is fast becoming America’s Achilles heel.None of these themes resonate as much with college grads as does defense of democracy. But if you care about democracy or immigrants or LGBTQ+ issues or the climate – and I care about them all – we need to build a coalition with working-class people whose values center kitchen table economics, security and patriotism. We haven’t done so yet, and who’s paying the price? The climate and marginalized groups. Not to mention our democracy.

      Joan C Williams is distinguished professor of law and Hastings Foundation chair (emerita) at University of California College of the Law San Francisco. She is also the author of Outclassed: How the Left Lost the Working Class and How to Win Them Back More

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      Trump’s latest tariffs ‘are real’ unless deals improve, economic adviser says

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      Donald Trump has seen some trade deal offers and thinks they need to be better, Kevin Hassett, the White House economic adviser, said on Sunday, adding that the president will proceed with threatened tariffs on Mexico, the European Union and other countries if they don’t improve.“Well, these tariffs are real if the president doesn’t get a deal that he thinks is good enough,” Hassett told ABC’s This Week program. “But you know, conversations are ongoing, and we’ll see where the dust settles.“Hassett told ABC’s This Week program that Trump’s threatened 50% tariff on goods from Brazil reflect Trump’s frustration with the South American country’s actions as well as its trade negotiations with the US.On Thursday, Brazil threatened to retaliate against Trump’s plan with its own 50% tariff on US goods. “If he charges us 50%, we’ll charge him 50%,” Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the Brazilian president, told local news outlet Record, a day after Trump threatened to impose steep duties on Brazilian goods.Hassett’s comments come one day after Trump announced on his Truth Social social media platform that goods imported from both the European Union and Mexico will face a 30% tariff rate starting on 1 August, angering European capitals who had thought they had previously reached a deal with Trump. The prior deal would have involved a 10% tariff, five times the pre-Trump tariff, which the bloc already described as “pain”.The German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, on Sunday said he will work intensively with French president Emmanuel Macron and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen to resolve the escalating trade war with the United States.“I discussed this intensively over the weekend with both Macron and Ursula von der Leyen,” Merz told German broadcaster ARD, adding he had also spoken with Trump about the matter.“We want to use this time now, the two and half weeks until August 1 to find a solution. I am really committed to this,” Merz said.Merz said the German economy would be hit hard by the tariffs, and he was doing his best to make sure US tariffs of 30% were not imposed.Unity in Europe and a sensible dialogue with the US president were now needed, Merz said, although countermeasures should not be ruled out. “But not before August 1,” he said.EU trade ministers are scheduled to meet on Monday for a pre-arranged summit and will be under pressure from some countries to implement €21bn ($24.6bn) in retaliatory measures, which are now paused until 1 August, the same day as Trump’s new deadline.Macron has called on the EU to “defend European interests resolutely” in response to Trump’s threats.French cheese and wine producers have warned of the damaging impact that Trump’s threatened 30% tariffs on imports from the EU would have on the country’s agriculture industry.A 30% duty would be “disastrous” for France’s food industry, said Jean-François Loiseau, the president of food lobby group ANIA, while Francois Xavier Huard, the CEO of dairy association FNIL, said: “It’s a real shock for milk and cheese producers – this is an important market for us.”In the interview with ABC News on Sunday, Hassett also said that Trump has the authority to fire the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, for cause if evidence supports that, adding that the Fed “has a lot to answer for” on renovation cost overruns at its Washington headquarters.Any decision by Trump to try to fire Powell over what the Trump administration calls a $700bn cost overrun “is going to depend a lot on the answers that we get to the questions that Russ Vought sent to the Fed”, Hassett said.Vought, the White House budget director, last week slammed Powell over an “ostentatious overhaul” of the Fed’s buildings and answers to a series of questions. Trump has repeatedly said that Powell should resign because he has not lowered interest rates, and the Wall Street Journal reported this week, citing anonymous sources, that Hassett is vying to succeed him as the Fed chair. More

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      Donald Trump announces 30% tariffs on goods from the EU and Mexico

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      Donald Trump announced on Saturday that goods imported from both the European Union and Mexico will face a 30% US tariff rate starting 1 August, in letters posted on his social media platform, Truth Social.The tariff assault on the EU came as a shock to European capitals as the European Commission and the US trade representative Jamieson Greer had spent months hammering out a deal they believed was acceptable to both sides.The agreement in principle put on Trump’s table last Wednesday involved a 10% tariff, five times the pre-Trump tariff, which the bloc already described as “pain”.EU trade ministers will meet on Monday for a pre-arranged summit and will be under pressure from some countries to show a tough reaction by implementing €21bn ($24.6bn) in retaliatory measures, which they had paused until midnight the same day.In his letter to Mexico’s leader, Trump acknowledged that the country had been helpful in stemming the flow of undocumented immigrants and fentanyl into the United States.But, he said, the country had not done enough to stop North America from turning into a “Narco-Trafficking Playground”.“We have had years to discuss our Trading Relationship with The European Union, and we have concluded we must move away from these long-term, large, and persistent, Trade Deficits, engendered by your Tariff, and Non-Tariff, Policies, and Trade Barriers,” Trump wrote in the letter to the EU. “Our relationship has been, unfortunately, far from Reciprocal.”Claudia Sheinbaum said on Saturday she is sure an agreement can be reached before Trump’s threatened tariffs take effect on 1 August.Speaking during an event in the Mexican state of Sonora, the Mexican president added that Mexico’s sovereignty is never negotiable.The higher-than-expected rate has dealt a blow to the EU’s hopes of de-escalation and a trade deal and could risk a trade war with goods of low margins including Belgian chocolate, Irish butter and Italian olive oil.The EU was informed of the tariff hike before Trump’s declaration on social media.In a letter to the EU, Trump warned that the EU would pay a price if they retaliated: “If for any reason you decide to raise your Tariffs and retaliate, then, whatever the number you choose to raise them by, will be added onto the 30% that we charge.”The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, said the 30% rate would “disrupt transatlantic supply chains, to the detriment of businesses, consumers and patients on both sides of the Atlantic”.She said the bloc was one of the more open trading places in the world, and still hoped to persuade Trump to climb down.“We remain ready to continue working towards an agreement by August 1. At the same time, we will take all necessary steps to safeguard EU interests, including the adoption of proportionate countermeasures if required,” she said.Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, called for “goodwill  … to reach a fair agreement that can strengthen the west as a whole. It would make no sense to trigger a trade war between the two sides of the Atlantic.” She added that both sides should avoid “polarisation”.The decision to hike the tariffs will also be another test of Trump’s ability to act in good faith in negotiations.Brussels will view the latest threat as a maneuver by Trump to extract more concessions from the EU, which he once described as “nastier” than China when it came to trade.Bernd Lange, head of the European Parliament’s trade committee, said on Saturday that Brussels should react immediately with countermeasures against Trump’s “outrageous” threat to hike tariffs on imports from the European Union.The EU had been negotiating intensively with Washington for more than three weeks and had made concessions, said Lange.“It is brazen and disrespectful to increase the tariffs on European goods announced on April 2 from 20% to 30%,” Lange told Reuters.“This is a slap in the face for the negotiations. This is no way to deal with a key trading partner.”While Trump indicated earlier this week that his new rates, also levelled against big economies including Japan, South Korea and Brazil, will not apply until 1 August, his latest tactic will create much distrust.Europe should make it clear that these “unfair trade practices” were unacceptable, Lange said.“We have postponed the first stage of our countermeasures for the time being, but I am firmly convinced that they must now be implemented immediately,” he said.“The first list of countermeasures must be activated on Monday as planned, and the second list should also follow quickly.”Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, downplayed the impact of the threatened 50% tariff. Trump and Lula have indicated a willingness to negotiate, though Lula also said: “Trump could’ve called, but instead posted the tariff news on his website – a complete lack of respect which is typical of his behavior towards everyone.”Even if Trump had agreed to the proposal put on his table on Wednesday, further negotiations would have been needed in any case to create a legal text that can be formally registered by the US government, a process that is itself laden with risk.The UK took seven weeks to get its agreement registered with a promise included to reduce tariffs on car exports from 27.5% to 10%, but the agreed zero tariff for the British steel industry was omitted.Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former congressional budget office director and president of the center-right American Action Forum, said the letters were evidence that serious trade talks had not been taking place over the past three months. He stressed that nations were instead talking among themselves about how to minimize their own exposure to the US economy and Trump.“They’re spending time talking to each other about what the future is going to look like, and we’re left out,” Holtz-Eakin said.He added that Trump was using the letters to demand attention, but, “in the end, these are letters to other countries about taxes he’s going to levy on his citizens”.The new tariff ends a turbulent week for the EU with Trump announcing an extension for talks until 1 August on Monday, then on Tuesday announcing the EU would “probably” receive a letter setting its new US tariff rate within 48 hours, claiming the bloc had shifted from being “very tough” to “very nice”.But diplomats viewed it as a mixed message as Trump stressed that he was still talking to negotiators from the bloc, but that he was displeased with European policies toward US tech firms. More

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      Threats, delays and confusion: 10 key points to understand another week of Trump tariff turmoil

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      Donald Trump ramped up his trade rhetoric this week, firing off more than 20 letters to governments outlining new tariff rates if agreements aren’t reached by 1 August.In April, Trump announced a 10% base tariff rate and additional duties ranging up to 50% for many other countries, although he later delayed the effective date for all but 10% duties until 9 July after market panic.Trump officials initially suggested they would strike dozens of deals with key economies by the 9 July deadline, but as the 90-day pause ended this week, the president announced a range of new rates for various countries, but delayed their implementation until next month.Here’s what’s happened:

      Trump informed powerhouse suppliers Japan, South Korea and a number of other nations at the start of this week that they will face tariffs of at least 25% starting from August unless they can quickly negotiate deals.

      On Wednesday he announced more tariffs on countries like the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Algeria, as well as a 50% tariff on products from Brazil, tying the move to what he called the “witch-hunt” trial against its former president, Jair Bolsonaro. Trump criticised the trial Bolsonaro is facing over trying to overturn his 2022 election loss. Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, threatened to hit back with reciprocal 50% tariff on US goods.

      On Thursday, Trump announced the US would impose a 35% tariff on imports from Canada, despite ongoing negotiations and prime minister Mark Carney’s decision last month to rescind a digital services tax that faced criticism from the US president. Carney said his government would continue to defend Canadian workers and businesses in their negotiations and work towards the 1 August deadline.

      Trump also said on Thursday that a letter would be sent to the European Union, the US’s biggest trading partner, “today or tomorrow”. Last week the EU and US were closing in on a high-level “framework” trade deal that would avert 50% tariffs on all exports from the bloc.

      The steep tariff rates announced throughout the week range from 25-50%, with some of the harshest levies imposed on developing nations in south-east Asia, including 32% for Indonesia, 36% for Cambodia and Thailand and 40% on Laos and Myanmar, a country riven by years of civil war.

      On his first official visit to Asia, US secretary of state Marco Rubio sought to reassure regional powers of Washington’s commitment to them, saying countries there may get “better” trade deals than the rest of the world. Prior to Rubio’s arrival in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian prime minister Anwar Ibrahim condemned the tariffs at the opening of an Asean foreign ministers’ meeting.

      Trump has also vowed to implement tariffs of up to 200% on foreign drugs and 50% on copper. Copper prices hit a record high in the US after the announcement.

      US treasury secretary Scott Bessent said he expected several trade announcements this week, but to date the US has secured just two deals with trading partners. The first with the UK, signed on 8 May, includes a 10% tariff on most UK goods, including cars, and zero tariffs for steel and aluminium. A second deal was reached with Vietnam last week that sets a 20% tariff for much of its exports, although the full details are unclear, with no text released.

      On Thursday, Trump said the tariffs had been “very well-received”, adding that the stock market “hit a new high today”.

      Global stock markets have largely shrugged off the latest threats. Analysts say traders now expect a deal or another delay, while investors appear to be waiting until a deal is done or the tariffs kick in. More

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      Trump announces 50% tariff on Brazil, citing what he claims is a ‘witch-hunt’ against Bolsonaro – live updates

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      Donald Trump announced a 50% tariff on imports from Brazil in a letter posted on social media in which he began by complaining about the the prosecution of his ally, the former president Jair Bolsonaro.Until now, Trump’s tariff letters have been nearly identical, changing little more than the names of countries and leaders and the tariff rates, but the intemperate letter addressed to Brazil’s current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was markedly different, beginning with a diatribe about the supposed “international disgrace” of the “Witch Hunt” against Bolsonaro, who is now standing trial before the country’s supreme court for his role in an alleged coup attempt on 8 January 2023, following his election defeat.The pro-Bolsonaro riots at the seat of Brazil’s federal government in Brasília that day closely echoed the pro-Trump riot at the US capitol on January 6 2021.“The way that Brazil has treated former President Bolsonaro, a Highly Respected Leader during his Term , including by the United States, is an international disgrace. This Trial should not be taking place. It is a Witch Hunt THAT should end IMMEDIATELY!”, Trump wrote, employing the idiosyncratic writing style of his social media posts in a formal letter.“Due in part to Brazil’s insidious attacks on Free Elections, and the fundamental Free Speech Rights of Americans (as lately illustrated by the Brazilian Supreme Court, which has issued hundreds of SECRET and UNLAWFUL Censorship Orders to U.S. Social Media platforms, threatening them with Millions of Dollars in Fines and Eviction from Brazilian Social Media market),” Trump added, “starting on August 1, 2025, we will charge Brazil a Tariff of 50% on any and all Brazilian products sent into the United States, separate from all Sectoral Tariffs.”In addition to his outrage over the prosecution of Bolsonaro, over the failed coup attempt, Trump’s letter referred to the country’s decision to ban the former president from running in the next election, and to a dispute over a Brazilian supreme court judge ordering Truth Social, Trump’s social media platform, and Rumble, a video-sharing platform JD Vance invested in, to remove the US-based accounts of a leading supporter of Bolsonaro.As the Guardian reported in February, Trump’s company and Rumble, which is backed by the far-right tech billionaire Peter Thiel, sued the Brazilian supreme court justice Alexandre de Moraes over the orders in federal court in Florida.Donald Trump’s enraged letter to his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, announcing that the US would impose a 50% tariff on imports from Brazil, said that the move was motivated in part by the treatment of former president Jair Bolsonaro, who was barred from running for office until 2030 and is on trial for allegedly plotting to remain in office after losing his bid for re-election in 2022.The culmination of Bolsonaro’s efforts to hold on to power was a riot by his supporters in the nation’s capital who tried to prevent the transfer of power to the election’s winner, Lula, on 8 January 2023.Given that Trump still maintains that he was within his rights to plot to remain in office himself, after losing his bid for re-election in 2020, and the efforts culminated in a riot by his supporters on January 6 2021, it is not hard to see why Trump seems to be so dedicated to the idea that Bolsonaro did nothing wrong.As our colleague Tiago Rogero reported last month, Bolsonaro denied masterminding a far-right coup plot during testimony in his trial before Brazil’s supreme court, but did admit to taking part in meetings to discuss “alternative ways” of staying in power after his defeat in the 2022 election.In just over two hours of questioning, the 70-year-old said that after the electoral court confirmed Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s election victory, “we studied other alternatives within the constitution.”Those options included the deployment of military forces and suspension of some civil liberties, Bolsonaro said, but he argued that such discussions could not be considered an attempted coup.During his first term in office, it was obvious that Trump saw then president Bolsonaro – a far-right, climate-change denier – as a kindred spirit, and Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo, cultivated close ties to Trump’s inner circle, and family, during visits to the US.Eduardo Bolsonaro took leave from his post as a congressman in Brazil and has been living in the US since March, lobbying Trump and Republican politicians to impose sanctions on Brazil.Brazil’s currency, the real, fell over 2% against the dollar late on Wednesday after Trump posted a letter online imposing a 50% tariff on imports and scolding the nation for its supposed mistreatment of its former leader, Jair Bolsonaro, who stands accused of trying to overturn his 2022 election loss through a coup.Trump’s letter said his administration will start collecting the 50% tariff on products imported to the US from Brazil, “separate from all sectoral tariffs”, starting on 1 August.Donald Trump announced a 50% tariff on imports from Brazil in a letter posted on social media in which he began by complaining about the the prosecution of his ally, the former president Jair Bolsonaro.Until now, Trump’s tariff letters have been nearly identical, changing little more than the names of countries and leaders and the tariff rates, but the intemperate letter addressed to Brazil’s current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was markedly different, beginning with a diatribe about the supposed “international disgrace” of the “Witch Hunt” against Bolsonaro, who is now standing trial before the country’s supreme court for his role in an alleged coup attempt on 8 January 2023, following his election defeat.The pro-Bolsonaro riots at the seat of Brazil’s federal government in Brasília that day closely echoed the pro-Trump riot at the US capitol on January 6 2021.“The way that Brazil has treated former President Bolsonaro, a Highly Respected Leader during his Term , including by the United States, is an international disgrace. This Trial should not be taking place. It is a Witch Hunt THAT should end IMMEDIATELY!”, Trump wrote, employing the idiosyncratic writing style of his social media posts in a formal letter.“Due in part to Brazil’s insidious attacks on Free Elections, and the fundamental Free Speech Rights of Americans (as lately illustrated by the Brazilian Supreme Court, which has issued hundreds of SECRET and UNLAWFUL Censorship Orders to U.S. Social Media platforms, threatening them with Millions of Dollars in Fines and Eviction from Brazilian Social Media market),” Trump added, “starting on August 1, 2025, we will charge Brazil a Tariff of 50% on any and all Brazilian products sent into the United States, separate from all Sectoral Tariffs.”In addition to his outrage over the prosecution of Bolsonaro, over the failed coup attempt, Trump’s letter referred to the country’s decision to ban the former president from running in the next election, and to a dispute over a Brazilian supreme court judge ordering Truth Social, Trump’s social media platform, and Rumble, a video-sharing platform JD Vance invested in, to remove the US-based accounts of a leading supporter of Bolsonaro.As the Guardian reported in February, Trump’s company and Rumble, which is backed by the far-right tech billionaire Peter Thiel, sued the Brazilian supreme court justice Alexandre de Moraes over the orders in federal court in Florida.In brief remarks to the press earlier, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that following his second meeting with Donald Trump in two days: “President Trump and I have a common goal: we want to achieve the release of our hostages, we want to end Hamas rule in Gaza, and we want to make sure that Gaza does not pose a threat to Israel any more.”On the ceasefire negotiations, the Israeli leader, who was at the US Capitol for meetings with lawmakers, went on:
      President Trump wants a deal, but not at any price. I want a deal, but not at any price.
      Israel has security requirements and other requirements, and we’re working together to try to achieve them.
      Donald Trump earlier told reporters there is a “very good chance” of a ceasefire in Gaza this week or next. He said
      There’s a very good chance of a settlement this week on Gaza. We have a chance this week or next week.
      Trump made it clear several times that his priority was achieving “peace” and getting the hostages back, but – like Netanyahu – he made no mention of other urgent matters like the desperate need to safely get aid to starving Palestinians in the strip.Asked by a reporter whether pushing out Palestinians to third countries they have no connection to will make Israel safer in the long run, Netanyahu said:
      We’re not pushing out anyone, and I don’t think that’s President Trump’s suggestion. His suggestion was giving them a choice.
      He claimed Palestinians should have “freedom of choice” to leave Gaza, “no coercion, no forcible dislocation. If people want to leave Gaza they should be able to do so,” he said of the besieged territory, much of which his military has flattened to rubble.Israel stands accused of committing genocide and ethnic cleansing in Gaza, and has made clear its intention to seize parts of the territory and remain there indefinitely.The US supreme court has maintained a judicial block on a Republican-crafted Florida law that makes it a crime for immigrants in the US illegally to enter the state.The justices denied a request by state officials to lift an order by Florida-based US district judge Kathleen Williams that barred them from carrying out arrests and prosecutions under the law while a legal challenge plays out in lower courts. Williams ruled that Florida’s law conflicted with the federal government’s authority over immigration policy.Florida’s attorney general James Uthmeier and other state officials filed the emergency request on 17 June asking the supreme court to halt the judge’s order. Williams found that the Florida law was likely unconstitutional for encroaching on the federal government’s exclusive authority over US immigration policy.The state’s request to the justices was backed by America First Legal, a conservative group co-founded by Stephen Miller, a senior aide to Donald Trump and a key architect of the administration’s hardline immigration policies.Florida’s immigration measure was passed by the state’s Republican-controlled legislature and signed into law in February by governor Ron DeSantis. It made Florida one of at least seven states to pass such laws in recent years, according to court filings.The American Civil Liberties Union in April sued in federal court to challenge the law. Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida, in a statement issued after the challenge was filed said that Florida’s law “is not just unconstitutional – it’s cruel and dangerous”.Williams issued a preliminary injunction in April that barred Florida officials from enforcing the measure.The Atlanta-based 11th US circuit court of appeals in June upheld the judge’s ruling, prompting the Florida officials to make an emergency request to the supreme court.On the same day that Florida’s attorney general filed the state’s supreme court request, Williams found him in civil contempt of court for failing to follow her order to direct all state law enforcement officers not to enforce the immigration measure while it remained blocked by the judge.Williams ordered Uthmeier to provide an update to the court every two weeks on any enforcement of the law.The Senate has voted 53 to 43 approve Republic Airways CEO Bryan Bedford to head the Federal Aviation Administration.Bedford, the head of the regional air carrier nominated by Donald Trump and approved for a five-year-term, will oversee $12.5bn in funding over five years to remake the aging US air traffic control system passed by Congress last week.Bedford has also pledged to maintain tough oversight of Boeing, which came under harsh criticism from the National Transportation Safety Board last month for a mid-air emergency involving a new Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9 missing four key bolts.The Federal Emergency Management Agency should be eliminated in its current form and reformed so it responds more effectively to disasters, homeland security secretary Kristi Noem said at a meeting on reforming Fema on Wednesday.Speaking at a review council discussing reforms of Fema, Noem said the “entire agency needs to be eliminated as it exists today, and remade into a responsive agency”.Noem’s comments were a restatement of her thinking on Fema’s future but notable given that Fema personnel have been deployed to Texas to help in search and rescue efforts following flash floods on 4 July that have killed at least 119 people, with scores more still unaccounted for.Noem, who chairs the Fema Review Council, noted that the agency had provided resources and supported the search and recovery efforts in Texas, but criticized the agency for what she called past failures to respond to disasters effectively.“It has been slow to respond at the federal level,” Noem said. “That is why this entire agency needs to be eliminated as it exists today, and remade into a responsive agency.”Defenders of the agency have said the Trump administration is seeking to politicize a vital agency that helps states both prepare for natural disasters like hurricanes and floods and clean up in the aftermath.Further to my earlier post on this, Donald Trump said that five west African nations are going to lower their tariffs and that the United States treats the continent better than China does.At a meeting with the leaders of Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mauritania and Senegal at the White House, Trump added that he did not think those countries at the gathering were likely to see any US tariffs.Donald Trump also said that his administration will reach a deal with Harvard University.“Harvard’s been very bad – totally antisemitic. And, yeah, they’ll absolutely reach a deal,” he told reporters at the White House.Earlier we reported that his administration had escalated its feud with Harvard, declaring the Ivy League school may no longer meet the standards for accreditation and that it would subpoena it for records about its international students.Donald Trump said there is a “very good chance” of a ceasefire in Gaza this week or next, after meeting Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday for the second time in two days to discuss the situation.“There’s a very good chance of a settlement this week on Gaza,” Trump told reporters. “We have a chance this week or next week.”He made it clear several times that his priority was achieving “peace” and getting the hostages back, but made no mention of other matters like the desperate need to safely get aid to starving Palestinian people in the strip.Donald Trump said he would release more letters to countries notifying them of higher US tariff rates today and tomorrow, including Brazil.“Brazil, as an example, has not been good to us, not good at all,” Trump told reporters at the event with west African leaders at the White House. “We’re going to be releasing a Brazil number, I think, later on this afternoon or tomorrow morning.”Trump said the tariff rates announced this week were based on “very, very substantial facts” and past history.Donald Trump earlier told a table of west African leaders that he would like to travel to Africa “at some point”.Trump has never visited the continent in an official capacity, and his signaling that he’s open to doing so is no doubt tied to his view of the many commercial opportunities for the US in African countries.Trump’s guests today include the leaders of Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mauritania and Senegal, and has so far concentrated on his “trade, not aid” policy.With all of these countries facing 10% tariffs on goods exported to the US, they seem keen to try to negotiate this rate down. Indeed several leaders have sought to flatter Trump as a “peace-maker” and said they want him to get a Nobel Peace Prize, while also touting their countries’ wealth in assets such as critical minerals and rare earths and their strategic importance in terms of migration and maritime security.War-torn South Sudan has said it is holding a group of eight men controversially deported from the United States.Only one of them is from South Sudan. The rest comprise two people from Myanmar, two from Cuba, and one each from Vietnam, Laos and Mexico.The Trump administration is trying to move unwanted migrants to third countries as some nations refuse to accept returnees. Administration officials said the men had been convicted of violent crimes in the US. The decision has been fought in US courts.“They are currently in Juba under the care of the relevant authorities, who are screening them and ensuring their safety and wellbeing,” the South Sudanese foreign ministry said in a statement late on Tuesday.It did not give details, but said the “careful and well-studied decision” was part of “ongoing bilateral engagement”.“South Sudan responded positively to a request from the US authorities as a gesture of goodwill, humanitarian cooperation and commitment to mutual interests,” it added.The deportations have raised safety and other concerns among some in South Sudan.“South Sudan is not a dumping ground for criminals,” said Edmund Yakani, a prominent civic leader.United Nations experts, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council but who do not speak on behalf of the UN, have criticised the move.“International law is clear that no one shall be sent anywhere where there are substantial grounds for believing that the person would be in danger of being subjected to … torture, enforced disappearance or arbitrary deprivation of life,” 11 independent UN rights experts said in a statement.As Donald Trump approaches six months in office as president, his administration’s agenda has shaken every corner of US life.According to research from Harris Poll, Americans are reconsidering major life events including marriage, having children and buying a home amid economic anxiety under the Trump administration.Six in 10 Americans said the economy had affected at least one of their major life goals, citing either lack of affordability or anxiety around the current economy.We want to hear from you. Have you been delaying major life decisions amid economic and political anxieties? When did things begin to feel destabilized? What effect in particular has delaying life decisions had on your household?Find the link to take part here:EU trade commissioner Maroš Šefčovič has not had his scheduled call with US trade representative Jamieson Greer yet, so those on standby for a possible announcement by Donald Trump today on a deal with the bloc may have some time to wait. More