Today in Politics, Bulletin 105. 4/4/25 Ron Filipkowski Apr 4 ∙ … It was a bloodbath on Wall Street today, as Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs are liberating people from their retirement savings and investments. The Dow was down 2,231 (5.50%), NASDAQ was down 962 (5.82%), and Tesla was down a whopping 27.85 (10.42%). … China announced it will impose retaliatory tariffs of 34% on US imports. They also announced they will restrict exports of 7 types of rare earths, start an anti-dumping probe into medical CT X-ray tubes from US, halt imports of poultry products from the US, and add 11 US defense companies to their “unreliable entity” list. … The rare earth export ban is the one that is really going to hurt, because some of these are mined almost exclusively in China and are used in many high-tech products including EVs. … Trump then responded with this post from the golf course: “CHINA PLAYED IT WRONG, THEY PANICKED - THE ONE THING THEY CANNOT AFFORD TO DO!” … Yes, the Chinese who pass 5-year budgets are panicking. It’s what they’re known for. But not our boy Trump. He’s a steady hand on the economy. … USA Today: “Most of the 200 million iPhones Apple produces each year are made in China. Of the consumer goods affected by the 54% tariff, iPhones could take the biggest hit from the sharp hike. Consumers could see prices jump as much as 43%. In that scenario, Wedbush Securities analyst Daniel Ives said an iPhone could cost as much as $3,200.” … Financial Times: “If it endures, Trump’s decision to enact sweeping tariffs on US trade partners will go down as one of the greatest acts of self-harm in American economic history. They will wreak untold damage on households, businesses and financial markets across the world, upending a global economic order that America benefited from and helped to create.” … CNBC reported that JP Morgan raised their estimate on the likelihood of a recession up from 40% last month to 60% now. Bruce Kasman, head of global economic research: “These policies, if sustained, would likely push the US and possibly global economy into recession this year.” … Wharton’s Jeremy Siegel to CNBC: “I think this is the biggest policy mistake in 95 years.” … MN Gov Tim Walz: “I haven’t seen an economic crash this bad since the last time Trump was in office.” … Before Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s remarks today, Trump begged him to bail him out of this mess: “This would be a PERFECT time for Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to cut Interest Rates. He is always late, but he could now change his image, and quickly. Energy prices are down, Interest Rates are down, Inflation is down, even Eggs are down 69%, and Jobs are UP, all within two months - A BIG WIN for America. CUT INTEREST RATES, JEROME, AND STOP PLAYING POLITICS!” … Powell then announced he has no intention of doing anything for at least a month since US policy is so volatile and unstable that it makes it impossible to predict where the economy is going. … Meanwhile Trump skipped the dignified transfer ceremony at Dover AFB of 4 US service members who died in a training accident in Lithuania so he could fly to Miami to attend a LIV golf dinner at his golf resort. Fox Nat Security correspondent Jennifer Griffin: “Trump will remain in FL and will not travel to Dover AFB for the dignified transfer of 4 American soldiers who died during a training exercise in Lithuania. The LIV Golf tournament begins today. Trump just arrived at his golf club.” … Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN): The stock market’s crashing, retirement savings are disappearing, and he’s out golfing.” … Here he is today. Emperor Caligula Nero Trump. Golfing away while the economy burns to the ground. … CBS reported that Trump will also be speaking at a $1 million dollar-a-person candlelight dinner tonight at Mar-a-Lago. All the funds raised will go to Trump’s super PAC. … With anger boiling over and nationwide protests planned for Saturday, Melania Trump is getting out of dodge, announcing that White House spring garden tours will be canceled: "This decision has been made out of an abundance of caution and to ensure the safety of all within proximity to public demonstrations planned near the White House on Saturday." … 1,100 ‘HandsOff!’ protests are scheduled in all 50 states. … Fencing was also put up around the White House today. … Fox host Maria Bartiromo last night posted: “Big overreaction in the stock market today.” Turns out she was wrong. Thursday was an underreaction. I think many investors were in a state of shock on day one. Today, reality hit hard and the markets reflected that. Credit to my friend Hoodlum on X for creating this: … Fox host Jeanine Pirro: “I don't really care about my 401(k) today. You know why? I believe in this man.” … Trump supporter and Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy: “I’m down $7 Million today. Trump has put his tariffs all over the place. I’ve been trying to understand them - I don’t. And everything is in the shitter because of it.” … MAGA podcaster and Russia-paid propagandist Benny Johnson: “Losing money means nothing. Digital ones and zeroes. In the end, you won't miss any of it. Losing your country costs you everything. You will never get that back. Your kids will be slaves to foreign powers who hate us. Without America First policies, we become slaves. Fight.” … Republicans suddenly don’t care about money. Imagine that. … Trump seemed to indicate he isn’t going to back off tariffs anytime soon with this all-caps post: “MY POLICIES WILL NEVER CHANGE. THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO GET RICH, RICHER THAN EVER BEFORE!!!” … Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, the architect of the tariff policy, assured the Fox audience that everything is going to be fine: “The operation has happened, the patient is in bed and starting to recover. We just had to wait for the AI technology boom to be here now to let us compete with all the cheap labor all around the world.” … The oligarchs dream of the day AI and robots can do all the work so they don’t have to hire and pay people. … Trump was asked about the markets tanking: “I think it's going very well. It was an operation like when a patient gets operated on.” … A new Ipsos poll has Trump’s approval rating dropping 10 points from last week: Approve: 42%, Disapprove: 52%. I’m off to a culinary festival tomorrow and will be back Sunday night with the weekend recap. Each week seems like a month right now, but I will continue to chronicle everything that is happening every day in this epic struggle to defeat this toxic MAGA movement and preserve our Republic. Thanks for caring enough to read this and for taking action in whatever way you are able to help the cause - I know many of you will be out at the protests this Saturday and that is awesome! If you missed yesterday’s Bulletin, you can read it here. … Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) on Fox: "I'm certainly concerned about what's happening right now in the markets, and I hope the administration is looking at it as well. What's also indisputable is the markets are down about 8% in just two days, and I'm getting all kids of reactions from businesses, farmers in WI that are highly concerned about what's happening. Those are the facts. It's a bold, risky move." … Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ) was asked on Fox about the stock market crashing: "You gotta give the administration a little bit of room here. A few months at least - it's just the beginning." … Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) points out that Congress can vote to repeal the tariffs anytime, but they are too afraid of Trump: “Congressional Republicans don’t think of themselves as members of a separate and co-equal branch of govt, devised by the Constitution to be a check on the power of the presidency. Instead, they see themselves more like a board of advisors to a CEO competing for access as courtiers.” … Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) to MeidasTouch: “This is also a political tool for Trump. You can see what he’s doing with these universities and law firms—penalizing them and making them come to him to pledge loyalty. I think it’s likely the same thing could happen with the tariffs: each big company or industry will have to come to Trump to get tariff relief in exchange for political loyalty, in exchange for a commitment to buy Trump cryptocoin, or to make sure their workers don’t speak out against him. … “He’s trying to destroy democracy. And the reason these tariffs may not make any sense when you look at the design is because maybe they’re not really economic or trade policy. Maybe they’re actually political policy. So once again, it’s an absolute disaster for regular working people—and maybe a big threat to our democracy.” … Politico reported from the courthouse that the judge ordered the Trump admin to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia from an El Salvador prison by Monday. ICE deported Garcia, who had legally protected status, by falsely claiming that he was a gang member. … Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt: “We suggest the Judge contact President Bukele because we are unaware of the judge having jurisdiction or authority over the country of El Salvador.” … Despite being humiliated and rejected by Denmark, JD Vance wants to bribe the people of Denmark to join the US: “They get about $60,000 a year from the government of Denmark. That's $60,000 per year per person in Greenland. What the president has said is we could give the people of Greenland way more money than that.” … Doesn’t sound like ‘America First’ to me. … Sec of State Marco Rubio met with Danish Foreign Minister Lars Rasmussen, and each made a social media post after the meeting. But they seemed to have two very different takes on what went down: Rubio: “Met with Danish Foreign Minister Rasmussen in Brussels today to talk about the defense priorities shared by our two nations. We discussed the importance of increasing burden sharing within NATO and addressing threats to the Alliance.” Rasmussen: “Honest and direct meeting with Secretary Rubio yesterday. I made it crystal clear that claims and statements about annexing Greenland are not only unacceptable and disrespectful. They amount to a violation of international law.” … NYT reported that despite Trump’s hype about what a huge success his missile attacks against the Houthis were, DOC officials admit they have only had limited success. Estimated costs of the strikes are $200 million so far, they have been continuing, and could exceed $1 billion by next week. … NPR reported that 19 states are suing Trump over his blatantly unconstitutional executive order seeking to implement a series of new voting laws. The lawsuit was filed in federal district court in Massachusetts, and alleges that the order "usurps the States' constitutional power and seeks to amend election law by fiat." The lawsuit argues that only the states and Congress has the power to decide how elections should be run. … The NYT reported that DOJ has restored the guy rights to actor Mel Gibson despite his 2011 domestic violence conviction. DOJ’s pardon attorney Elizabeth Oyer was fired last month after she refused to agree to restore Gibson’s gun rights. Oyer said that she was ordered to grant the request because of Gibson’s relationship with Trump, but she refused. … Trump fan, MAGA darling, and born-again christian Russell Brand was charged today with rape and sexual assault in UK. This was Brand 6 weeks ago with HHS Secretary RFK Jr. and Medicare/Medicaid Administrator Dr. Oz. … RFK Jr. now says he made a mistake in his recent firings of another 10,000 people from HHS, and wants many of them to come back: "We're streamlining the agencies. We're going to make it work for public health, make it work for the American people. In the course of that, there were a number of instances where studies that should have not have been cut were cut, and we've reinstated them. Personnel that should not have been cut were cut -we're reinstating them, and that was always the plan." … It was always the plan. Which is different than the plan yesterday. … Poltico reported that a poll conducted by Data for Progress of Democratic primary voters in NY showed that they would favor AOC over Chuck Schumer in a Senate primary 55%-36%. 9% were undecided. … Journalist Alex Raufoglu asked Rubio why Russia bombing energy infrastructure in Ukraine: “I guess then that means they're violating the ceasefire. That's not a good sign, but I think that would tell you this, that ultimately, this is a war right now, things are going to be blowing up in Ukraine and inside of Russia, because there's still a war going on. That's what we're trying to end okay, if we have a true ceasefire, which is what we wanted, a complete ceasefire, nothing should be blowing up. But the Russians didn't agree to that. They wanted a partial. And then, obviously, when you get into these partials, it's one of the reasons why we didn't push for a partial. We'll take it because it's better than nothing. But one of the reasons why didn't we push, why we didn't push for a partial because there's always disputes about what are you hitting and what you're not hitting. But in the end, this is still a war, and we want it to stop the fact that religious sites are being hit, or energy sites are being hit, or civilian sites are being hit. That's why war is a bad thing, and that's why the President wants to end it as far as conducting another campaign, well, then that'll be a very clear sign, right? If all of a sudden, we wake up tomorrow and the Russians are launching a massive offensive, then I think that's a pretty clear sign they're not interested in peace. That hasn't happened yet. Let's hope it doesn't happen. We want to know whether they want to do peace or not, and if they do, then there's a way there, and we're willing to help. If they're not, then it's good to know earlier so we can adjust our policies accordingly.” … Thanks for clearing that up.