Trump’s response to causing a recession: He updates “Let them eat Cake” to “Let them Drive Teslas”
Trump is our Marie Antoinette
On Tuesday, an even more animated than usual Jim Cramer on CNBC said the quiet part out loud on air: Trump is trying to “manufacture” a recession. Cramer cited as support that Trump is following the 1930 playbook of GOP President Herbert Hoover who when faced with a slowing economy, imposed massive tariffs on our allies known as Smoot-Hawley. As the CNBC host rightly noted, economists/historians have all pointed to those tariffs as key “reason why we had the Great Depression.”
Washington Post writer Catherine Rampell--who focuses on economics--was on MSNBC a short time later sharing a similar sentiment. She explained that Trump had inherited an “excellent economy” but he appears “hell bent on sabotaging the it.” She, too, cited Trump’s tariffs and the uncertainty he has caused which appears intentional.
They are correct. Our growing economic woes are 100% because of Trump. For starters, before Trump was sworn in, forecasts for the 2025 economy were “universally solid.” The Federal Reserve, commercial firms, university economists and more predicted the economy in 2025 would grow by 2.3% to 2.7% this year.
Then came Trump. There is no disputing the chaos he has sewed has created grave economic uncertainty. The most obvious place being with his tariff wars against our allies that are on again and off again depending on the day. Businesses cannot plan for the future when they don’t know if cost of goods will be higher or lower by 25% depending on Trump’s whims.
Trump is knowingly following Herbert Hoover’s policies that led to a depression. In 1930—a short term after Oct. 1929 stock market crash—GOP President Hoover proposed massive tariffs by way of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. Economists urged Hoover and the GOP not to do this, warning with the slowing economy it would exacerbate the economic decline.
But Hoover—like Trump—ignored the advice of experts. And on June 17, 1930, Hoover signed the law. In response—as we are seeing now—our trading partners imposed retaliatory tariffs. Next Wall Street lost confidence—exactly as we are seeing now. Banks failed and the US descended into one of the worst economic calamities known.
When Hoover came into office in the 1929, unemployment was at 4.4%--almost identical to what it was when Trump took office in January. By the time Hoover left office four years later, unemployment had risen to 23.6%.
But with Trump we are face even more potential economic pain because Trump is combining tariffs-which are a tax on consumers—with massive cuts to federal spending and layoffs in the area of 20% of the federal workforce.
You don’t need a PhD in Economics to understand that when an economy is slowing, cutting federal spending, causing massive layoffs and increasing taxes by way of tariffs are a recipe for financial disaster. Recent reports tell us that job growth is already slowing, unemployment is climbing, consumer confidence saw the largest decline since 2021, the stock market has dropped by more than 10% since December and consumers are pulling back on spending.
All of this is why predictions for US economy have turned sour. Last week JPMorgan announced that economic growth expectations may ‘crater’ and increased their prediction the U.S. would hit a recession this year. Same goes for economists at Moody's Analytics. Worse, an economic model utilized by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta recently predicted that economy in the first quarter of this year for our country would contract by 2.4%.
This is 100% because of Trump. As Rampell explained on MSNBC on Tuesday, the best thing Trump could’ve done in his first two months as President with regard to the economy was “play golf” and “let the trends continue.” But instead, his tariffs, spending cuts and layoffs have brought us to where we are.
What has Trump’s response been? Well on Tuesday he took time out to do an informercial for his top campaign donor Elon Musk because Tesla’s sales have been sliding badly. Trump first called the consumer boycott of Tesla “illegal” and then said anyone protesting at Tesla dealerships who engages in vandalism “should be labeled domestic terrorists.” (Of course, Trump defends his supporters who actually committed an act of domestic terrorism with their Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol as “patriots” and pardoned them.)
Trump—who turned “the White House lawn into a Tesla showroom”--then bragged that he was buying an $80,000 Tesla from the world’s richest person because the car is “as good as it gets.” It was there when a Fox News reporter-of all people--asked Trump: “What is your message of buying a new car while there are some folks who will see this clip at home and they are struggling…have uncertainty about work?” Trump responded nonchalantly, “Well, I think they’re gonna do great.”
Trump just updated Marie Antoinette’s infamous line “Let them eat Cake” when told that her subjects could not afford bread to, “Let them drive Teslas.”
And on Wednesday, we learned that Trump’s pimping of Musk’s cars delivered the return he was seeking. As the NY Times reported, Musk is planning to donate $100 million “into groups controlled by the Trump political operation.”
Back in the real world, our economy is much more fragile than many grasp. And just like in 1930 America, income inequality has made our economy a house of cards where the foundation is weak but the small group of oligarchs who control the nation are living an obscene lifestyle. By 1929, the top one percent of families received 23.9% of all pretax income. Currently, the top 1% own 30% of the nation’s wealth.
Alarmingly, a recent study found that nearly 60% of Americans can’t afford an unexpected expense of $1,000. Even more concerning, 37% of Americans indicated they can’t even afford a surprise $400 expense. As one financial expert recently told CBS news, “We are essentially a paycheck-to-paycheck nation."
All of this explains why a new CNN poll released Wednesday finds that 56% of Americans disapprove of his handling of the economy--worse than at any point during his first term in office. Only 39% approve of Trump’s tariffs. Overall, Trump’s approval rating has fallen to 45%, with 54% disapproving.
But there is Trump telling working class Americans that they should be ready to sacrifice economically during what he calls a "period of transition." Trump doesn’t care about us—he cares about Musk and his fellow oligarchs. While a recession will causes us real pain, he knows that it actually makes the rich even richer.
This is what an oligarchy looks like. And it’s up to us to put an end to it.
Trump is doing exactly what he was told to do by his master- Putin: he’s destroying the U.S. from within and making democracy look like a joke.
So, Emperor Dipshit and King Ketamine think that that spectacle was going to save Tesla? How ignorant are they. It will drive away the well off liberal tree huggers who have been Tesla's primary customers. At the same time it will cause MAGA heads to explode. They have been trained to hate electric cars (because of the liberal tree huggers) and are now being told they have to buy one? Going to be tough to pay for a Tesla while still making payments on that F-250...