Although President Donald Trump didn’t actually confess that his global trade war is driving up the cost of groceries for Americans, he did finally drop his dubiously named “reciprocal” tariffs on key imports on Friday. According to a White House fact sheet, Trump’s new executive order ends his tariffs on beef; cocoa and spices; coffee and tea; bananas, oranges, and tomatoes; other tropical fruits and fruit juices; and fertilizers. The New York Times had reported Thursday that “the Trump administration is preparing broad exemptions to certain tariffs in an effort to ease elevated food prices that have provoked anxiety for American consumers.”The reporting drew critiques of the administration’s economic policies, including from members of Congress such as Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who said that “Trump just admitted it: Americans are footing the bill for his disastrous tariffs.”Also responding to the Times reporting, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) wrote on social media Friday: “After months of increasing grocery prices, Donald Trump is finally admitting he was wrong. Americans are literally paying the price for Trump’s mistakes.”More lawmakers and other critics piled on after Trump issued the order. CNN‘s Jim Sciutto said: “Trump administration now acknowledging what economists and business leaders have told us from the beginning: that tariffs are driving up prices.”MeidasTouch and its editor in chief, Ron Filipkowski, also called out the president on social media, with the outlet sarcastically noting, “But Trump said his tariffs don’t raise prices.”Congressman Don Beyer (D-Va), who serves on the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Trade, said in a Friday statement that “President Trump is finally admitting what we always knew: His tariffs are raising prices for the American people.”“After getting drubbed in recent elections because of voters’ fury that Trump has broken his promises to fix inflation, the White House is trying to cast this tariff retreat as a ‘pivot to affordability,’” Beyer said, referencing Democrats who won key races last week, from more moderate Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger, the incoming governors of New Jersey and Virginia, to democratic socialist Mayors-elect Zohran Mamdani of New York City and Katie Wilson of Seattle. In addition to those electoral victories for Democrats, last week featured a debate over Trump’s trade war at the US Supreme Court. According to Beyer: “The simple truth is that Republicans want credit for something they think the Supreme Court will force them to do anyway, after oral arguments before the court on Trump’s illegal abuses of trade authorities went badly for the administration. Trump is still keeping the vast majority of his tariffs in place, and his administration is also planning new tariffs in anticipation of a Supreme Court loss.”“The same logic-that Trump’s tariffs are driving up prices on coffee, fruit, and other comestibles-is equally true for the thousands of other goods on which his tariffs remain,” he continued.”“Only Congress can do that, by reclaiming its legal responsibility under the Constitution to regulate trade, and permanently ending Trump’s trade war chaos,” he stressed. “All but a handful of Republicans in Congress are still refusing to stand up to Trump, stop his tariffs, and lower costs for the American people, and unless they find a backbone, our economy will continue to suffer.”As the Associated Press noted Friday, “The president signed the executive order after announcing that the U. S. had reached framework agreements with Ecuador, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Argentina designed to ease import levies on agricultural products produced in those countries.”Trump’s order also came just a day after Democrats on the congressional Joint Economic Committee released a report showing that US families are paying roughly $700 more each month for basic items since Trump returned to office in January-with households in some states, such as Alaska and California, facing an average of over $1,000 monthly. The president has floated sending Americans a $2,000 check, purportedly funded by revenue collected from his tariffs, but as Common Dreams reported Wednesday, economist Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research crunched the numbers and found that the proposed “dividend” doesn’t add up.
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DOJ devises ‘wackadoodle’ plan to save Alina Habba’s legal cases from collapse: expert
The Department of Justice has concocted an “unprecedented” scheme to preserve dozens of criminal cases filed by interim U. S. Attorney Alina Habba after a Manhattan defense attorney challenged her appointment. Defense attorney Thomas Mirigliano, whose client was indicted by Habba on drug and weapons charges, was the first to challenge the validity of Habba’s work, citing a controversial decision by U. S. District Judge Aileen Cannon to argue that Habba lacked the authority to bring charges in the case, reported NOTUS.“I thought, ‘Wow, that’s a great idea,” Mirigliano said after getting the idea after listening to an interview with former DOK prosecutor Andrew Weissman’s. “I’m not a cocktail party guy. I have a lot of business in New Jersey, however . I just have no allegiance to anyone except my clients, and I think I have gained respect for that. I have no problem saying what needs to be said. I don’t pull punches.”Many more lawyers have followed Mirigliano’s lead. U. S. District Judge Matthew Brann ruled Aug. 21 that Habba “is not currently qualified to exercise the functions and duties of the office in an acting capacity” and “must be disqualified from participating in any ongoing cases” because her interim appointment by President Donald Trump ended without her Senate confirmation. That move put hundreds of cases at risk in New Jersey.“There’s a risk, but that office apparently thinks it’s worth the risk,” said one source. The cases ranging from firearms and drug trafficking to securities fraud and tax dodging have been plunged into legal limbo since defense lawyers in New Jersey successfully challenged her appointment.”NOTUS reviewed more than 140 criminal cases filed in recent months which show how Habba has largely brushed aside explicit court warnings about her dubious authority,” the publication reported. “An analysis of those cases show that more than 39 indictments could be contested, because she signed them after July 1 the point at which a judge deemed she acted ‘without lawful authority.’ Twenty-eight of those came after the judge’s ruling in August.”However, the Department of Justice has stepped in by involving its second-ranking official, who, like Habba, has previously served as Trump’s personal defense attorney.”On the same day the order was issued, Habba signed off on four different indictments three for felony gun possession and another for cocaine dealing except this time, right above her name in the signature block appeared that of a high-ranking official: Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche,” NOTUS reported. Top DOJ officials typically are no involved in run-of-the-mill criminal matters, according to a legal expert who was stunned to see Blanche’s signature on the indictments.“They’re trying to make it seem like he’s ultimately responsible for the filing and to make any defects in her appointment immaterial by putting a higher up on the paperwork,” said Rutgers University law professor David Noll. “This is all such wackadoodle, unprecedented territory. I’d be surprised if there’s an answer in case law as to whether the courts would accept it.”Appellate judges seemed doubtful that Habba could remain in her position during Oct. 20 arguments, and DOJ lawyers were unable to provide a clear date for when her time would run out, although DOJ counsel Henry Whitaker suggested that she could serve “successive 120-day appointments” to meet statutory requirements.“Can you come up with an example of any time that such a concatenation of events has occurred with respect to the appointment of a United States attorney?” said Appellate Judge D. Brooks Smith.“I guess I cannot,” Whitaker admitted, as Habba sat in the courtroom.