WE all have heard or experienced the high cost of food these days……well finally the problem has got some small amount of attention from Donny and the Thugs….
President Trump announced Friday that he was scrapping US tariffs on beef, coffee, tropical fruits, and a broad swath of other commodities—a dramatic move that comes amid mounting pressure on his administration to better combat high consumer prices. “We just did a little bit of a rollback on some foods like coffee,” Trump said aboard Air Force One as he flew to Florida hours after the tariff announcement was made. Pressed on his tariffs helping to increase consumer prices, Trump acknowledged, “I say they may, in some cases” have that effect. “But to a large extent they’ve been borne by other countries,” the president added.
- Trump has built his second term around imposing steep levies on goods imported into the US in hopes of encouraging domestic production and lifting the US economy. His abrupt retreat from his signature tariff policy on so many staples key to the American diet is significant, and it comes after voters in off-year elections this month cited economic concerns as their top issue, resulting in big wins for Democrats in Virginia, New Jersey, and other key races around the country, the AP reports.
- Inflation—despite Trump’s pronouncements that it has vanished since he took office in January—remains elevated, further increasing pressure on US consumers.
- The Trump administration has insisted that its tariffs had helped fill government coffers and weren’t a major factor in higher prices at grocery stores around the country. But Democrats were quick to paint Friday’s move as an acknowledgement that Trump’s policies were hurting American pocketbooks.
- “President Trump is finally admitting what we always knew: his tariffs are raising prices for the American people,” Virginia Democratic Rep. Don Beyer said in a statement. “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.'”
- Trump signed an executive order that also removes tariffs on tea, fruit juice, cocoa, spices, bananas, oranges, tomatoes, and certain fertilizers. Some of the products covered aren’t produced in the United States, meaning that tariffs meant to spur domestic production had little effect. But reducing the tariffs will still likely mean lower prices for US consumers.
- Trade groups praised the move and urged Trump to roll back more of his tariffs, the Wall Street Journal reports. “It’s certainly a step in the right direction, but it’s important to recognize that the pain that American working families and businesses feel from tariffs goes way beyond coffee and bananas,” said Jake Colvin, president of the National Foreign Trade Council.
He said the ‘tariffs, in some cases, contributed to the high cost’ (paraphrase)….this from a stable genius that is a whiz kid in economics and he did not think it would effect the prices?
Now how many of you think this will bring food prices more in line?
If the distributors do not lower prices what will be Donny’s retribution?
To say I am not impressed is an understatement.
How About you?
But wait! Remember that Uncle Don cut a deal with Argentina for beef and that should start bringing prices down…..right?
Beef prices have been giving Americans sticker shock at grocery stores lately, and they are poised to reach even more stomach-churning levels next year, according to Omaha Steaks CEO Nate Rempe.
“So we are headed for what I’m calling the $10-a-pound reality by third quarter of ’26,” he predicted. “Families are going to see $10-a-pound ground beef in the grocery store.”
According to the latest consumer price index data, the average price of ground beef was $6.323 a pound in September. That’s up 14% since January and 26% from January 2024.
If ground beef hits $10 a pound, the price would represent a 58% surge from September’s level.
So that much hyped deal will do little to lower beef prices if the article is correct.
Once again Donny proves a stable genius he is not.
And finally the excuse for higher beef prices….hint it is Biden’s fault…..
Scott Bessent was ridiculed for suggesting skyrocketing beef prices have nothing to do with MAGA’s economic policies and everything to do with a supposed invasion of cows across the southern border.
The Treasury Secretary expounded his wild theory during a Sunday sit-down with Maria Bartiromo over on Fox News. The host described the crisis to Bessent, asking for his take on “ten dollar… meat, a pound!”
Arguing the beef industry is in “a perfect storm” that the White House “inherited” from the Joe Biden administration, the secretary shot back that rising costs are a direct result of migrants entering the U.S. from Latin America.
WE knew someone would use that dodge eventually, right?
I Read, I Write, You Know
“lego ergo scribo”
Prices go up up and up, and we get a small acknowledgment of it with some help for coffee and bananas…
This should be a bigger story than it is……chuq
It’s as if he has woken up from one of his Oval Office naps and realised that he knew nothing about tariffs in the first place. Not much point in ‘rolling back’ now, the damage has already been done to American farmers and small businesses that have gone under during 2015. I’m surprised that crowds are not attacking the White House to protest, I really am.
Best wishes, Pete.
I too have a hard time understanding the people just accepting this without a challenge. chuq
2015 was a typo. Should have been 2025 of course.
No worries I kinda figured it out……chuq
Considering the hold that Trump has over the media, any challenges are most likely under-reported. Plus … even after the King Marches, how much has changed?
IT has changed….it is going from bad to worse. chuq
Meat and Potatoes … another day in a much greater America, right?
If much ‘greater America’ is in parenthesis….chuq