The Trump political competition for the Brazilian political tariff – and American consumers strikes
President Trump once claimed that the tariff was about reciprocity. Now they use them like balloons in the post -truth population queen, as a 50 percent tax was slapped on Brazil not due to commercial imbalances, but because of the problems of former Brazilian President Gere Bolsonaro.
The last Trump tariff gesture is the diplomacy of political grievance, not economic policy.
If Trump believes that Brazil’s prosecution for Polsonaro because of its alleged involvement in a failed illegal coup, he must defend or impose penalties. Instead, it imposes a tariff that hurts US consumers and exporters, although the United States was running a $ 7.4 billion commercial surplus with Brazil in 2024.
In his public message, Trump criticized the Brazilian government to prosecute Bolsonaro, describing these charges as an “international disgrace”. He announced that his introduction to a protest against the “alleged Brazil attacks on free elections”-which meant the organization of American technology platforms that hosted extreme right-wing content during the election crisis in Brazil.
It is an increasing challenge to the “economic” application to the “mutual” definitions after this truth. But it has become wrong to get to know Trump’s need for an emotional scene, a calibration of a base that responds to punitive gestures, not the results of politics.
This is a complete departure from how America is traditionally used. The 1930 SMOOT-HWLY Law was at least coherent in its occurrence. It aims to protect the American industry. It has failed amazingly, as the economic crisis depths and provoke global revenge, but it was still an economic policy.
The Brazilian Trump tariff does not serve any economic purpose at all. The United States exported nearly $ 50 billion of goods to Brazil last year – much more than Brazil. However, the price of this theatrical tariff will be paid by American consumers and exporters, not by Bolsonaro or Brazilian President Luise Lula Da Silva.
Brazil is 16 commercial partners in America. Disorders will fade through agriculture, space, energy and manufacturing. America is the largest consumer of Brazilian goods. But in the Maga carnival, the audience chants loudly when the strong man throws a punch – even when he lands on his wallet.
Polsonaro, who was now banned from running for positions until 2030, told the Wall Street Journal he was relying on Trump to use the American economic lever to punish Brazil and help in his return. This imagination is now partially achieved. Trump has eaten the cause of Bolsonaro by exposing the US trade surplus.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration is an investigation in Section 301 to justify an additional tariff for Brazil, noting “unfair” practices in a country where American exporters flourish. The result is pre -defined: more chaos, more costs, and more applause from those conditional to see just an aggressive power.
Trump reshapes the personal grievance as a national reformer, then he weapons political tools for symbolic revenge. The fact that the tariff of 50 percent is likely to raise prices, provoke revenge, destabilize a useful commercial relationship that does not record as a problem. It instead records as evidence of will, the heart of populism.
There was a time when he served the American commercial policy for actual economic purposes. Even President Richard Nixon waged the misleading wage and price controls in 1971 were at least attempts to address real economic problems. What we have now is a tariff that imposed a defense of a sympathetic to the alleged coup, which is imposed against a country that has a healthy surplus, paid by Americans who may not realize the costs until they appear in the groceries.
When the post -fact is a policy queen contest, everyone pays the price, whether they are interested in watching the scene and enjoying it or not.
Stephen Schneider studied philosophy and got a MD before switching to financing and investment. It is especially interested in how to form the political culture of the American financial system.
