Politics
Amid Trump tariffs, the world responds with a free export: Humor
An evening show last week at the Hollywood Improv comedy club included poop jokes, a song about young people being too woke and a raunchy impression of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
There were no quips about President Trump’s international tariffs, even from a comedian who had just posted a lengthy podcast episode about the on-again-off-again executive orders that have led to a global trade war and, many fear, could trigger a recession.
To get your fill of trade-related chuckles these days, there’s a much more reliable, if unexpected, source: the official Facebook page of the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C.
The site has been rapidly manufacturing memes and sarcastic captions to capitalize — unrestrained by any tariffs — on a hot international export, namely jokes at the expense of the United States and its tariff-loving president.
One meme shows a red MAGA hat on a store shelf bearing a “Made in China” tag. The $50 price is crossed out, replaced by a tariff-inflated cost of $77.
Another cartoon — labeled “The Art of the Deal,” after Trump’s 1987 book — shows a pair of gambler’s hands. One with the word “tariffs” on its suit sleeve draws from a deck of cards bearing percentages. The Embassy’s caption: “But… the cards are made in #China. #Tariffwar.”
In Canada, the premier of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, signed a decree in an oversized folder and held it up with his signature, à la Trump. “This order,” he said, “it’s a wonderful order. It’s a beautiful order. This order is pulling American booze off the liquor mart shelves.”
Premier of Manitoba Wab Kinew at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington on Feb. 12, 2025. In March, he signed a decree to remove American alcohol from liquor store shelves in response to tariffs imposed by President Trump.
(Ben Curtis / Associated Press)
And on Norfolk Island — a remote rock in the Pacific Ocean with about 2,000 residents and essentially no exports to the U.S. — a children’s book author memed a baffled-looking tropical wrasse fish. The caption: “When you find out Norfolk Island exports are getting hit with a 29% tariff … guess that’s one way to leave a fish floundering.”
There are many ways world leaders, businesses and consumers are grappling with the growing threat of a global trade war, but perhaps the easiest — and, for some, the most therapeutic — is to rely on dark humor.
Joking about Trump’s frenetic rollout of tariffs has become a common response to the altogether serious issue of an economic fight started by the president that has upended markets, led to boycotts of American-made goods and travel to the U.S., and sparked fears of a recession.
Some of the humor has a barbed, geopolitical aim in a war for the world’s hearts and minds — see the Chinese government’s fusillade of memes — but political scientists say that, for many people, humor is a natural response to stressful times.
Patrick Giamario, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and author of the book “Laughter as Politics: Critical Theory in an Age of Hilarity,” said humor is an important part of the modern political process — and, for many, an attempt to make sense of events that feel overwhelming.
“The fact that we’re laughing so much now is a sort of sign of how broken things are,” Giamario said. “We laugh when things stop making sense.”
In addition to global angst, the levies have spawned: References to Trump as a “domestic tariffist.” Videos generated by artificial intelligence that show obese Americans toiling in garment factories. And lots of memes about over-taxed penguins angry about Trump’s tariffs, which targeted a few barren, uninhabited subantarctic islands.
“Poor old penguins, I don’t know what they did to Trump,” Australian trade minister Don Farrell quipped to the Australian Broadcasting Corp. “But, look, I think it’s an indication … that this was a rushed process.”
Australian Trade and Tourism Minister Don Farrell, left, arrives for a meeting with Chinese Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao, right, in Beijing, May 12, 2023.
(Michael Godfrey / Associated Press)
Trump’s tariffs have kept much of the world’s collective heads on a swivel. When he announced them, he said they would bring “jobs and factories … roaring back into our country” — despite skepticism from economists across the political spectrum.
On April 2 — which Trump dubbed “Liberation Day” — he announced a baseline tariff of 10% on imported goods from all foreign countries. He also announced higher rates, which he called “reciprocal tariffs,” for countries he said were unfairly taxing American goods. Financial markets plunged.
A week later, Trump changed course, saying he would pause the so-called reciprocal tariffs for 90 days while leaving the universal 10% tariff in place. He wrote on his Truth Social account: “BE COOL! Everything is going to work out well.” Markets surged.
Meanwhile, Trump escalated his standoff with China, hiking levies on Chinese imports — except, he later said, on electronics such as smartphones and laptops — to 145%.
Beijing retaliated by raising its levies on U.S. goods to 125%. The trade war was joined by a meme war.
Many of the Chinese memes portray American workers as unprepared for the kinds of jobs that bring products to their homes at cheaper prices.
During a press briefing last week, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about Chinese officials sharing AI-generated videos depicting Trump, Vice President JD Vance and billionaire Elon Musk working in factories.
“I have seen the videos,” Leavitt said. “I’m not sure who made the videos or if we can verify the authenticity. But whoever made it clearly does not see the potential of the American worker, the American workforce.”
Screenshots of Leavitt herself being trolled by a Chinese diplomat who accused her of wearing a Chinese-made dress in the White House briefing room also have gone viral.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks with reporters in the James Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House, April 15, 2025, in Washington.
(Alex Brandon / Associated Press)
“Accusing China is business. Buying China is life,” Zhang Zhisheng, China’s consul general in Denpasar, Indonesia, posted on X. “The beautiful lace on the dress was recognized by an employee of a Chinese company as its product.”
Ramesh Srinivasan, founder of the University of California Digital Cultures Lab, said it is clearly strategic for the typically staid Chinese government to turn to memes and internet jokes to communicate its stance on the trade war, which is that it “is ridiculous and unnecessary.”
“They’re presenting it in a much more innocuous and funny way, and that’s very, very intelligent,” Srinivasan said. “It’s a sign of the times.”
Donald Trump Jr. takes photos with supporters after a town hall meeting Monday, March 17, 2025, in Oconomowoc, Wis.
(Jeffrey Phelps / Associated Press)
Trump and his acolytes, of course, are veterans of the meme wars (his son and advisor, Donald Trump Jr., lists “Meme Wars General” in his Instagram bio). The president’s meme-filled X, née Twitter, account helped launch his political career, as did his crude-but-catchy nicknames for his opponents: Crooked Hillary Clinton, Sleepy Joe Biden and Little Marco [now Secretary of State] Rubio, among others.
Srinivasan said Trump, the former reality television star, has long been skilled at using dark humor to his advantage, especially online, where he is “this kind of hybrid troll-meme person.”
Traditional Russian wooden dolls called Matryoshka depicting China’s President Xi Jinping, President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are displayed for sale at a souvenir shop in St. Petersburg, Russia.
(Dmitri Lovetsky / Associated Press)
On the internet, the tariff jokes keep coming.
One widely-shared POV — internet lingo for “point of view” — video on TikTok shows a grumpy toddler striding officiously through an empty office. The caption: “POV: Me on my way to HR yet again for nicknaming my co-worker ‘Tariff’ for costing the company more than they’re worth.”
On YouTube, Penguins International, an apolitical conservation nonprofit dedicated to studying and protecting penguins, couldn’t resist getting in on the fun.
After Heard Island and the McDonald Islands — Australian territories where lots of penguins and no humans live — were listed on Trump’s tariffs list, Penguins International announced an online Protest March of the Penguins.
“Waddle we want? No tariffs!” read one digital protest sign.
“Beaks up!” read another.
On Wednesday, the Colorado-based organization posted a YouTube video of the birds’ annual migratory trek across the ice to their breeding grounds. As they squawked and brayed, a narrator said: “This year, they march in protest. They are peaceful. They are flightless. But they are certainly not voiceless.”
“We wanted to take an unusual current event and make light of it and stir up some support for some penguins that are endangered and threatened to go extinct,” David Schutt, executive director of Penguins International, said in an interview. Before the tariff announcement, he added, “most people didn’t know about the islands that these penguins are on.”
James Austin Johnson as President Trump, left, and Andrew Dismukes as Howard Lutnick during the “Saturday Night Live” skit “Trump Tariff Cold Open” on April 5, 2025.
(Will Heath / Getty Images)
During an Easter-themed “Saturday Night Live” skit this month, Trump, played by James Austin Johnson, said: “Many people are even calling me the Messiah, because of the mess I, uh, made out of the economy — all because of my beautiful tariffs. So beautiful. They were working so well that I had to stop them.”
On her “Good for You” podcast on April 13, comedian Whitney Cummings joked about Trump’s stated motive of using tariffs to bring manufacturing jobs back to the U.S., where workers — especially young ones who prefer remote work — don’t want them.
“I have nieces who are Gen Z,” Cummings said. “They’re not going to work in a factory. They won’t even work at the Cheesecake Factory because that would mean they would have a boss.”
Whitney Cummings at Hollywood Improv.
(Troy Conrad)
American manufacturing largely moved overseas, she continued, because “no one in America believes they should be working for some corporation who treats workers badly. They want to be the head of the corporation who treats workers badly.”
Two nights later, Cummings did a stand-up set at the Hollywood Improv, performing on a stage that has hosted comedy legends such as Robin Williams, Chris Rock and Eddie Murphy.
Cummings made some mildly political jokes — including one about growing more conservative after having a child and trading in her electric car for a gas model because gas stations are the only places where it’s socially acceptable to leave a small child alone in a vehicle.
But during her short set, she stayed away from tariffs — which are, perhaps, funnier on the internet.
Politics
Nearly 20 states sue HHS over declaration to restrict gender transition treatment for minors
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A group of 19 Democrat-led states and Washington, D.C., filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over a declaration that aims to restrict gender transition treatment for minors.
The lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; its secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.; and its inspector general comes after the declaration issued last week described treatments such as puberty blockers, hormone therapy and gender surgeries as unsafe and ineffective for children experiencing gender dysphoria.
The declaration also warned doctors they could be excluded from federal health programs, including Medicare and Medicaid, if they provide these treatments to minors.
The move seeks to build on President Donald Trump’s executive order in January calling on HHS to protect children from “chemical and surgical mutilation.”
HHS UNLEASHES SWEEPING CRACKDOWN ON CHILD ‘SEX-REJECTING PROCEDURES,’ THREATENS HOSPITAL, MEDICAID FUNDING
The lawsuit was filed against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; its secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.; and its inspector general. (Elizabeth Frantz/Reuters)
“We are taking six decisive actions guided by gold standard science and the week one executive order from President Trump to protect children from chemical and surgical mutilation,” Kennedy said during a press conference last week.
HHS has also proposed new rules designed to further block gender transition treatment for minors, although the lawsuit does not address the rules, which have yet to be finalized.
The states’ lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Eugene, Oregon, argues that the declaration is inaccurate and unlawful and urges the court to prevent it from being enforced.
“Secretary Kennedy cannot unilaterally change medical standards by posting a document online, and no one should lose access to medically necessary health care because their federal government tried to interfere in decisions that belong in doctors’ offices,” New York Attorney General Letitia James, who led the lawsuit, said in a statement.
The lawsuit claims the declaration attempts to pressure providers into ending gender transition treatment for young people and circumvent legal requirements for policy changes. The complaint said federal law requires the public be given notice and an opportunity to comment before substantively amending health policy and that neither of these were done before the declaration was released.
HHS’ move seeks to build on President Donald Trump’s executive order in January calling on HHS to protect children from “chemical and surgical mutilation.” (Tom Brenner for The Washington Post via Getty Images)
The declaration based its conclusions on a peer-reviewed report that the department conducted earlier this year that called for more reliance on behavioral therapy rather than broad gender transition treatment for minors with gender dysphoria.
The report raised questions about standards for the treatment of transgender children issued by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and brought concerns that youths may be too young to give consent to life-changing treatments that could result in future infertility.
Major medical groups and physicians who treat transgender children have criticized the report as inaccurate.
HHS also announced last week two proposed federal rules — one to cut off federal Medicaid and Medicare funding from hospitals that offer gender transition treatment to children and another to block federal Medicaid money from being used for these procedures.
HOUSE APPROVES MTG-SPONSORED BILL TO CRIMINALIZE GENDER TRANSITION TREATMENT FOR MINORS
New York Attorney General Letitia James led the lawsuit against the Trump administration. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
The proposals have not yet been made final and are not legally binding because they must go through a lengthy rulemaking process and public comment before they can be enforced.
Several major medical providers have already pulled back on gender transition treatment for youths since Trump returned to office, even those in Democrat-led states where the procedures are legal under state law.
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Medicaid programs in just under half of states currently cover gender transition treatment. At least 27 states have adopted laws restricting or banning the treatment, and the Supreme Court’s decision this year upholding Tennessee’s ban likely means other state laws will remain in place.
Democrat attorneys general from California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Wisconsin, Washington state and Washington, D.C., as well as Pennsylvania’s Democrat governor, joined James in the lawsuit.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON — Tips provided to federal investigators about Donald Trump’s alleged involvement in Jeffrey Epstein’s schemes with young women and girls are “sensationalist” and “untrue,” the Justice Department said on Tuesday, after a new tranche of files released from the probe featured multiple references to the president.
The documents include a limousine driver reportedly overhearing Trump discussing a man named Jeffrey “abusing” a girl, and an alleged victim accusing Trump and Epstein of rape. It is unclear whether the FBI followed up on the tips. The alleged rape victim died from a gunshot wound to the head after reporting the incident.
Nowhere in the newly released files do federal law enforcement agents or prosecutors indicate that Trump was suspected of wrongdoing, or that Trump — whose friendship with Epstein lasted through the mid-2000s — was investigated himself.
But one unidentified federal prosecutor noted in a 2020 email that Trump had flown on Epstein’s private jet “many more times than previously has been reported,” including over a time period when Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s top confidante who would ultimately be convicted on five federal counts of sex trafficking and abuse, was being investigated for criminal activity.
The Justice Department released an unusual statement unequivocally defending the president.
“Some of these documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election,” the Justice Department statement read. “To be clear: the claims are unfounded and false, and if they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already.”
“Nevertheless, out of our commitment to the law and transparency, the DOJ is releasing these documents with the legally required protections for Epstein’s victims,” the department added.
The Justice Department files were released with heavy redactions after bipartisan lawmakers in Congress passed a new law compelling it to do so, despite Trump lobbying Republicans aggressively over the summer and fall to oppose the bill. The president ultimately signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act into law after the legislation passed with veto-proof majorities in both chambers.
One newly released file containing a letter purportedly from Epstein — a notorious child sex offender who died in jail while awaiting federal trial on sex-trafficking charges — drew widespread attention online, but was held up by the Justice Department as an example of faulty or misleading information contained in the files.
The letter appeared to be sent by Epstein to Larry Nassar, another convicted sex offender, shortly before Epstein’s death. The letter’s author suggested that Nassar would learn after receiving the note that Epstein had “taken the ‘short route’ home,” possibly referring to his suicide. It was postmarked from Virginia on Aug. 13, 2019, despite Epstein’s death in a Manhattan jail three days prior.
“Our president shares our love of young, nubile girls,” the letter reads. “When a young beauty walked by he loved to ‘grab snatch,’ whereas we ended up snatching grub in the mess halls of the system. Life is unfair.”
The Justice Department said that the FBI had confirmed that the letter is “FAKE” after it made the rounds on Tuesday.
“This fake letter serves as a reminder that just because a document is released by the Department of Justice does not make the allegations or claims within the document factual,” the department posted on social media. “Nevertheless, the DOJ will continue to release all material required by law.”
The department has faced bipartisan scrutiny since failing to release all of the Epstein files in its possession by Dec. 19, the legal deadline for it to do so, and for redacting material on the vast majority of the documents.
Justice Department officials said they were following the law by protecting victims with the redactions. The Epstein Files Transparency Act also directs the department not to redact images or references to prominent or political figures, and to provide an explanation for each and every redaction in writing.
The latest release, just days before the Christmas holiday, includes roughly 30,000 documents, the department said. Hundreds of thousands more are expected to be released in the coming weeks.
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a statement in response to the Tuesday release accusing the Justice Department of a “cover-up,” writing on social media, “the new DOJ documents raise serious questions about the relationship between Epstein and Donald Trump.”
Documents from Epstein’s private estate released by the oversight committee earlier this fall had already cast a spotlight on that relationship, revealing Epstein had written in emails to associates that Trump “knew about the girls.”
The latest documents release also includes an email from an individual identified as “A,” claiming to stay at Balmoral Castle, a royal residence in Scotland, asking Maxwell if she had found him “some new inappropriate friends.” Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Prince Andrew, has come under intense scrutiny over his ties to Epstein in recent years.
Speaking at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Monday, Trump said the continuing Epstein scandal amounts to a “distraction” from Republican successes, and expressed disapproval over the release of images in the files that reveal associates of Epstein.
“I believe they gave over 100,000 pages of documents, and there’s tremendous backlash,” Trump told reporters. “It’s an interesting question, because a lot of people are very angry that pictures are being released of other people that really had nothing to do with Epstein. But they’re in a picture with him because he was at a party, and you ruin a reputation of somebody. So a lot of people are very angry that this continues.”
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White nationalist Nick Fuentes vowed to campaign against Vivek Ramaswamy in a slur-laced rant denouncing the Republican’s Ohio governor bid.
The declaration came just days after Ramaswamy called out Fuentes during a speech at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest conference in which he criticized Fuentes over some of his inflammatory remarks.
“I think I’m going to go to Ohio and the word that we are looking for is denial. We have to deny Vivek Ramaswamy the governorship. This is the only race I care about in ‘26. It’s the only one I care about,” Fuentes said during a Tuesday livestream. He also used a slur to describe Ramaswamy and said he does not care if a Democrat defeats him in the governor’s race.
When asked by Fox News Digital for a response, a spokesperson for Ramaswamy’s campaign said on Wednesday, “We’re focused on the issues that matter most to Ohioans, not fringe voices that prefer a far-left Democrat to the Trump-endorsed conservative.”
VIVEK RAMASWAMY TURNS TO CONSERVATIVE YOUTH TO SHAPE THE MOVEMENT’S NEXT PHASE, ANALYZES 2026 RACES
Vivek Ramaswamy speaks during Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest conference on Friday, Dec. 19, 2025. At right is White nationalist Nick Fuentes outside a Turning Point event on June 15, 2024, in Detroit. (Cheney Orr/Reuters; Dominic Gwinn/Getty Images)
Ramaswamy laid out his vision for what it means to be an American during remarks Friday at AmericaFest.
“What does it mean to be an American in the year 2026? It means we believe in those ideals of 1776,” he said at the Turning Point USA event. “It means we believe in merit, that the best person gets the job regardless of their skin color.”
“It means we believe in free speech and open debate,” he added. “Even for those who disagree with us, from Nick Fuentes to Jimmy Kimmel, you get to speak your mind in the open without the government censoring you.”
RAMASWAMY REVEALS MAIN LESSON LEARNED BY REPUBLICANS AFTER DEMOCRATS’ BIG WINS ON ELECTION DAY
Vivek Ramaswamy speaks during Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest 2025, on Friday, Dec. 19, 2025, in Phoenix. (Jon Cherry/AP)
Ramaswamy then said, “If you believe in normalizing hatred toward any ethnic group, toward Whites, toward Blacks, toward Hispanics, toward Jews, toward Indians, you have no place in the future of the conservative movement, period.”
“And I will not apologize for that. I will not hedge when I say it,” Ramaswamy continued. “If you believe, and you will forgive me for giving you an exact quote from our online commentator, Nick Fuentes. If you believe that Hitler was pretty f—— cool, you have no place in the future of the conservative movement. You can debate foreign aid, Israel all you want. That’s fine. That’s fair. But you have no place with that level of hatred.”
Ramaswamy declared his candidacy for the Ohio governorship in late February.
Ramaswamy is running to replace Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, shown here in the Old Senate Chamber in the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 21, 2025. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
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Current Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, who is also a Republican, is term-limited and will be departing office in January 2027.
Fox News Digital’s David Rutz contributed to this report.
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