'Heed the warnings': Scathing WSJ editorial warns Trump 'could sink his presidency' after first 100 days

29 April

Donald Trump

On Monday, April 28, Canada's federal election became largely a referendum on U.S. President Donald Trump's steep new tariffs and his call for Canada to become part of the United States.

Prime Minister Mark Carney, a member of the Liberal Party, ran on an aggressively anti-Trump platform and won — defeating Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre. Although Poilievre tried to distance himself from Trumpism, Carney was perceived as the more anti-Trump of the two.

Carney, during his victory speech, declared, "President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us. That will never ever happen.”

Trump's economic policies are not only unpopular in Canada — they are also unpopular in the U.S., where economists are warning of the possibilities of inflation, a recession, shortages on shelves and a weakening of the U.S. dollar.

In an editorial published on April 28, the Wall Street Journal's conservative editorial board argues that tariffs will doom Trump's second presidency if he doesn't change course.

"The White House motto seems to be that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing too much," the WSJ board writes. "That's especially true on tariffs, which could sink his presidency. Mr. Trump was elected to control inflation and raise real incomes, but tariffs do the opposite. They guarantee at least a one-time increase in prices on imported goods that will flow through the economy. They portend shortages for consumers, and for businesses that source goods and components from abroad."

The board continues, "The tariffs are the largest economic policy shock since Richard Nixon blew up Bretton Woods in 1971, which unleashed inflation that Nixon tried to stop with wage and price controls and a tariff. The economic consequences arguably doomed Nixon's second term, perhaps as much as Watergate."

Trump's "willy-nilly assault on friends and foes," according to the WSJ editorial board, "has shaken global confidence in U.S. reliability."

"Voters reelected Mr. Trump in part because they remembered fondly his first-term economy," the conservative board writes. "But that success owed mainly to his pursuit of conventional GOP priorities like tax reform and deregulation. This term he is indulging his trade and foreign-policy obsessions, and the early results are negative. He'll fail unless he heeds the warnings."

Read the Wall Street Journal's full editorial at this link (subscription required).

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