Trump has effectively imposed a trade embargo on China, which means that after the inventory runs out, American retail will soon dry up. And since Europeans are already bypassing U.S. military contractors to beef up their defense spending —El Salvador is our only ally now— Trump is likely to do something desperate, like firing the Fed chair or seizing Greenland. American presidents decades from now will still be cleaning up what Trump did to this country in 2025. David Frum breaks down the insanity and stupidity of the vision behind the tariffs regime as well as the deep feelings of betrayal in Canada. If globalism means peace, prosperity, and commerce, then let's be globalists. David Frum joins guest host Jonathan V. Last for the weekend pod. show notes David's new Atlantic podcast David on screw manufacturing and the absurdity of Trump's tariffs David on how the tariffs will make smuggling great again Tim's playlist
Chapter 1: What are the implications of Trump's trade embargo on China?
We're going to talk about a bunch of different things because you're the best guest on this podcast all the time. Tim is the regular host, has to pretend that he doesn't have favorite guests, but I don't have to make any such things. You are the best guest.
Last night, we got a Supreme Court ruling unanimously on Kilmar Abrego-Garcia, the Maryland father of a special needs child who was wrongly deported down to the mega prison in El Salvador. The court ruled that the administration must facilitate his return, but it did not order it.
Chapter 2: How does the Supreme Court ruling affect deportation cases?
And it also indicated that courts may not have the power to do so because of, quote, deference owed to the executive branch in the conduct of foreign affairs. David, this reads to me like a less good decision than some people seem to hope because it presumes a world of regular order. Tell me, what are your thoughts on this?
Well, I think oftentimes in these decisions, you have a choice of the full espresso, 5-4, the espresso macchiato, 6-3, or the cafe americano at 9-0. And so pretty obviously, Roberts thought it was more important to have a 9-0 outcome than to have a really robust decision. I think I'm not going to gainsay John Roberts on those kinds of Supreme Court tactics. It's pretty obvious.
It got the headline, bring this guy home. He's not... in Siberia. He's not in China. Your claim that you have no ability to return somebody from America's only ally in the world right now, El Salvador, which is being paid. We hear $6 million a year, but we don't really know. And we don't know if there's a fee for the president on top of the stated $6 million.
But you can't get them out of the El Salvadorian prison you helped to create. We don't believe you. So that's all worth doing. They've also given the Trump administration a pathway to return somebody because they The Trump administration is so obsessed with not losing face. They can never admit they made a mistake, but now there's a nine to zero court order. They're going to have to comply.
And that opens the way to returning other people who are wrongly held and who never got a hearing.
Do you think that Trump wants to comply with this? Because it seems to me that it's pretty easy for him to not comply if he doesn't want to. He can do one of two things. He could say no, because this is actually foreign affairs and has to do with the national security of the United States with the purview of the chief executive.
Or he could say, I tried, I spoke to them, and I can't tell you about those discussions because of executive privilege. but it is simply not possible.
Look, we can power a small city with the energy generated by JVL worry. Yes. But I think in this case, the worry is right, but I think it's pointed in the wrong direction. My concern, and I'm not saying I'm right, but I think they will return the first. A nine to zero Supreme Court decision, you start defying those, and now we're on the path to out... lawlessness.
And I think Trump is saving that for the 2026 elections. I don't think he wants to go early. I don't think he wants to have the people in the streets now, especially with the economy in such a shambles. I think the plan is if he's thinking about defying the rules, he's going to do that in the 2026 election season. What I worry about in this case,
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Chapter 3: Why might Trump want to fire the Federal Reserve Chair?
And the Supreme Court may think, well, we gave one to the never Trumpers on not sending people to foreign prisons without a hearing. We're going to have to give one to Trump on his power to fire the head of the Federal Reserve Board, which is the next critical crisis that is on our way.
And we had a ruling on that on Wednesday, which is helpful to Trump on that, right? Can you talk a little bit about this? Why would Trump feel the need to fire Powell now instead of just waiting out the end of his term? I mean, I have so many questions for you, but let's start with that one. So Trump has crashed the car.
He has an economic strategy that was unbelievably stupid, and it's visibly failing. And the little amphetamine injection that the economy got from the pause of some of the tariffs, the market has quickly figured out that doesn't mean anything, that the United States is launched in simultaneous trade war with its three most important trading partners, not just China, but Canada and Mexico.
The Canada and Mexico tariffs are all still there. Interest rates were going to have an 8% mortgage rate in the blink of an eye. American retail is going to stop, not immediately because retailers have built up a lot of inventory of things from China, but there's a trade embargo with China.
That means for everything from T-shirts to electronic components, sooner or later that embargo is going to mean those items fail and there's a retail and manufacturing crisis in the United States. So Trump needs an excuse. He needs someone to blame. And this is where we get to the sub-rational parts of the Trump brain. There has to be someone else whose fault it is.
And I noticed that the Trump suck-ups in Silicon Valley have begun to say, we need a rate cut. We need a rate cut right now. The Federal Reserve is saying, are you joking? We've got this inflationary crisis headed our way. You can't have a rate cut now. And this is a supply crisis of your own making. We can't give you a monetary exit from a genuine supply crisis you made. No, the answer is no.
Trump needs now a huge hullabaloo to give MAGA people something to shout about and to blame and to point fingers. Jerome Powell is going to be the designated target. While he could wait him out, of course, Trump's psychology means he has to do something. He has to be seen in command. Like Truman firing MacArthur, he will need to fire Powell. He also needs—and this is a little more rational—
Trump in his first term twice tried to get unacceptable people onto the Federal Reserve. And one was actually literally voted down and the other was denied without a vote. The Republicans in the Senate in first term protected the Federal Reserve. The new, more defeated Republicans of the second term are right now unlikely to do that.
But if you wait to the end of Powell's term, things may be so bad for Trump that at that point, Republicans begin to show a little bit more spine and say, you know, you can't put you know, your stooge on the Federal Reserve. So this is a better moment. He needs to act. It's a better moment to act.
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Chapter 4: What is the significance of tariffs on the global supply chain?
The nickel comes from Canada or maybe from Indonesia. And the people who are making the nickel have no idea what use does this nickel go to. And the idea that it's the cell phone in their pocket may contain some of the nickel they mined or refined. And they never knew it. That's a kind of beautiful idea.
And then the entrepreneur who is coming up with some new concept using the phone and texting a business partner across the other side of the world or talking on FaceTime in real time, or WhatsApp, I hope not Signal, in real time on the other side of the world. These are people who are linked in this harmonious, peaceful commerce.
I mean, I've been very caught up in the story of free trade all my intellectual life. It's one of my foundational causes. And it's not a grim, efficient process. accountant idea. It's a beautiful idea. It's an inspiring idea. And you only are reminded how beautiful and inspiring it is when someone threatens it because he believes in aggression and force and domination and exploitation.
I can't see the beauty of global cooperation.
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Chapter 5: How has protectionism affected US politics historically?
But Trump wants to run an authoritarian state, but mostly it has been very easy and successful for him and worryingly so to defy laws. But enforcing laws is a more challenging project. And it's enforcing laws that will be broadly violated and where there's no moral consensus in favor of the laws and where the local police don't want to be your partners. Okay, in Alabama, they'll do it.
Will the California state police cooperate with the crackdown on tube socks smuggling? I don't know. Doubt it.
Yeah. And once it's in, right, once the merchandise gets into the States, then stopping distribution is impossible.
I don't think this happens right away because I think retailers have built massive inventories already. Warehouses are full of normal goods at normal prices. And there probably are a couple of quarters where things can be sold at normal prices. And I imagine the tariff scheme collapses before we run out of inventories of tube socks, but maybe not.
So you launched your new show, The David Frum Show, over at The Atlantic this week. You have Rahm Emanuel on as your first guest. It's a very interesting conversation. You talked a lot about Canada, too. Can you just talk to me a little bit about what it has been like personally for you to see America, your adopted country, basically take sides against Canada? You know, your home country?
I mean, it must be horrifying. How does that work? What does that do?
Let me be personal about this, because it's not just a matter of mom and dad quarreling. So I was born in 1960. I came of age during the heyday of Canadian anti-Americanism. So Canada has two kinds of anti-Americanism. It has a right-wing variety, which is loyalty to the British Empire, anger at America as basically the daughter who betrayed mom,
And my home province of Ontario, the motto at the bottom of the provincial code of arms is, faithful she began, faithful she remains, in Latin. Faithful to what? To the British crown. Because Ontario was originally settled by, and my part of Ontario where I live in the summer is settled by refugees from the American Revolution, New Yorkers.
who said, you broke, you know, my neighbor broke his oath of allegiance to our king, but I'm not doing that. I'm moving to Ontario and getting a land grant and raising my family in faith and loyalty to the true king. So that was, there's a conservative faith.
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