Democrats’ real complaint with President Trump’s trade strategy isn’t over imposed tariffs but stolen turf. None of Democrats’ tariff complaints ring true. However, all their turf worries are more than real… they are existential.
President Trump has a long history of applying tariffs across a broad range of imports and U.S. trading partners. His first came on solar panels and washing machines back in 2018 during his first administration. His administration then rolled them out in a regular cadence during the remainder of his first term.
Trump’s latest tariff actions have gone from his earlier rifle shot approach to a barrage. It began on February 1 with tariffs on China, Canada, and Mexico. On April 2, Trump announced a 10 percent tariff on all U.S. imports to begin on April 5, with higher specific reciprocal tariffs to be applied to some nations on April 9 (now paused for 90 days). As of April 16, Chinese imports face a 145 percent tariff, while the rest of the world’s have a 10 percent levy.
Throughout this tariff turmoil, Democrats have lined up in opposition. Not surprisingly, seeing a political opening they have attacked the tariffs. They have called them inflationary. They have cited the steep stock market drops. They have questioned the trade fight with China.
Yet as they have sounded tocsins on all of these, their notes have rung hollow.
On tariffs themselves, Democrats are on shaky ground. The Biden administration largely kept the tariffs from Trump’s first term in place for four years—then increased them late in his presidency. In fact, the Biden administration’s trade policy was largely nonexistent. They neither had nor wanted trade negotiating authority from Congress.
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When it comes to inflation, the Democrats’ ground is shakier still. Inflation was one of the Biden administration’s defining failures. In 2020, despite COVID, the highest inflation rate was 2.5 percent in January. In 2021, it was 1.4 percent in January and 1.7 in February. Then Biden-flation kicked in. Inflation hit 2.6 percent in March 2021, a level it did not reach again until August 2024; between those dates, it peaked at 9.1 percent in June 2022 (a 40-year high). And for the last five months of Biden’s presidency, inflation was rising again, hitting 3 percent when he left office in January.
That Democrats' concern about stock market drops begs believability. This after all, is the party that embraced the Occupy Wall Street Movement just a few short years ago. Twice its self-proclaimed Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has seriously challenged to be its presidential nominee, while its current darling is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), who famously preened in a “Tax The Rich” dress.
Nor is being tough on China alien to Democrats. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has long been one of the get-tough-on-China leaders—particularly calling it out for its currency manipulation. The Biden administration also accused China of genocide against its Uyghur people.
No, Democrats’ real complaint against Trump is not what he has done with his current tariffs, but what he has done to their former turf: Trump has stolen populism from them.
Populism is one of Democrats’ most cherished legacies. Before wokeness overcame them, Democrats’ hallowed heroes of the people stretched back from Jefferson to Jackson to William Jennings Bryan to FDR to LBJ.
However, on issue after issue—pro-Americanism, law and order, enforcing border security, pro-U.S. energy, ending divisive DEI, stopping transgender unfairness—Trump has outflanked Democrats with average Americans.
Now, with his tariff push aimed at reshoring American manufacturing, Trump threatens to do so again. For decades, Democrats have proclaimed that America’s trade policies have hurt American workers. For years, Democrats have bemoaned the decline of American manufacturing. In both cases conveniently forgetting that NAFTA was President Clinton’s creation.
For generations, Democrats have proclaimed themselves the party of the working man and of minorities. Yet, here is President Trump pursuing a policy—a policy Democrats now attack—that actually puts teeth to what had only been Democrats’ talk.
In 2022, the liberal Economic Policy Institute issued a paper detailing America’s loss of manufacturing jobs that concluded “the loss of manufacturing jobs has been particularly devastating for Black and Hispanic workers and other workers of color.” Want to know why Trump did so much better with Black and Hispanic voters in 2024?
Democrats’ tariff complaints can be summarized as disingenuous. At best. Democrats’ turf problems can be summarized as losing the populist approach. President Trump is stealing populism from the Democrat Party on issue after issue.
While Democrats’ elitism has cost them their populist legacy, Trump has seized it for Republicans. And Democrats have no idea how to get it back.
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