Politics

California businesses are reeling from Trump's on-again, off-again tariffs

Published

9 months ago

March 16, 2025

California businesses are reeling from Trump's on-again, off-again tariffs

Tariffs haven’t yet hit the supply chain at Anawalt in Malibu, but the hardware store and lumber seller is bracing for steep price hikes in the coming weeks.

The majority of the lumber that the store sells comes from Canada and nearly all of its steel products are made in China, general manager Rieff Anawalt said. Those countries, along with Mexico, have been targeted in sweeping tariffs imposed by President Trump during his second term, sparking a global trade war that intensified this week.

“These tariffs are 100% going to impact us,” Anawalt said. Wholesale reps for the family-run hardware company, which has five locations around Los Angeles County, have warned him to expect prices to go up by April 1 — costs that he said he’ll have to pass on to customers.

“We’re going to see major increases: 15% to 25% across the board in this industry,” he said. “It’ll make COVID prices seem cheap.”

Across California, businesses of all kinds — farmers, automakers, home builders, tech companies and apparel retailers — are reeling from weeks of on-again, off-again tariff chaos as Trump has announced a slew of levies against the country’s top three trading partners, implementing some while modifying, delaying or reversing others.

“It’s a day-by-day soap opera, and just like a soap opera, you get relief, then it heats up again,” said Jonathan D. Aronson, a professor of international communication and international relations at USC.

As a result, business owners “don’t know what’s going to happen,” he said. “They can’t plan. They don’t know how much to produce. They don’t know who their business partners are going to be.”

This month has been particularly tumultuous. On March 4, Trump’s 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico kicked in, with a limit of 10% on Canadian energy; he also doubled the tariff on all Chinese imports to 20%. All three countries vowed to strike back with their own measures.

A lumber yard in British Columbia, Canada, last month. Canada is the largest foreign supplier of lumber to the U.S.

(Bloomberg via Getty Images)

The next day, Trump granted a one-month exemption for U.S. automakers on his new tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico. The day after that, he said he was postponing many of the tariffs on Canadian and Mexican imports for a month.

On Monday, in a blow to farmers in California and across the U.S., China imposed retaliatory duties of up to 15% on American agricultural products including chicken, corn, beef, pork, wheat and soybeans. Then on Wednesday, Trump’s 25% tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports went into effect.

To counterbalance the effects of the tariffs on their bottom lines, businesses may have to overhaul their operations, said Jerry Nickelsburg, faculty director of the UCLA Anderson Forecast.

“The way in which firms react to that uncertainty is to not put all their eggs in one basket,” he said. “So they cut back on how much they would order, which means they’re going to produce less and they need fewer people — or if not fewer people, fewer hours for the people they have.”

The latest volley came Thursday morning, when Trump threatened to place a 200% tariff on wine and liquor from the European Union in response to the EU proposing a 50% tariff on American whiskey. About an hour later, he wrote in a follow-up post on Truth Social that the U.S. “doesn’t have Free Trade. We have ‘Stupid Trade.’”

“The Entire World is RIPPING US OFF!!!” he said.

Bolstering the economy was one of Trump’s core promises during the election, and tariffs are key to his strategy. He threatened to slap tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China on his first day back in office, explaining the decision as a way to crack down on illegal immigration and drugs.

But the escalating trade tensions have pummeled Wall Street for three weeks. On Thursday, the S&P 500 closed in correction territory, ending the day down 1.39%; the index is now 10.1% below its record close Feb. 19. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 537.36 points, or 1.3%, closing at 40,813.57.

The fallout for farmers

The prolonged back-and-forth has also unsettled companies, both those that import goods from abroad and those that sell their products to foreign clients. California’s economy could be especially hard hit because of its heavy reliance on trade with China and Mexico, and because of its position as a global agricultural powerhouse.

Farmer Joe Del Bosque holds a raw almond.

California farmers grow the largest share of the nation’s food — more than a third of the country’s vegetables and more than three-quarters of its fruits and nuts are grown here — and the state’s fertile ground is a major supplier of produce to countries around the world. Farmers also rely heavily on fertilizer from Canada, which could cost more as the tariffs take hold.

“Farmers in California are going to be hurt particularly badly because almonds, soybeans and things like that are huge exports of the United States,” Aronson said.

The state also accounts for about 85% of wines produced in the United States and is home to thousands of grape growers and wineries, many of them small and generations-old. The Wine Institute says the industry supports employment for more than 420,000 Californians and generates $73 billion in economic activity in the state. Canada is the largest market for California wine.

A flurry of activity at the ports

Some L.A.-area companies have been stockpiling inventory to get ahead of expected price hikes tied to the tariffs, said Stephen Cheung, chief executive of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp.

“A lot of them were hit pretty hard during the last trade war with China,” he said, “so they knew better than to wait and hope for the best.”

That has been reflected in shipping data from the ports in Long Beach and Los Angeles, which continue to record huge numbers thanks to several months of front-loading cargo ahead of Trump’s inauguration.

The Port of Long Beach moved 765,385 twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEUs, in February, a 13.4% increase from the previous year. January’s year-over-year growth was even larger: 952,733 TEUs — a unit of measurement based on the volume of a standard shipping container — were moved, representing a 41.4% increase.

An aerial view of the Port of Long Beach.

After Trump launched a trade war with China during his first term, the Port of Long Beach lost about 20% of expected Chinese cargo in 2019, Chief Executive Mario Cordero said. That was supplemented by a 10% increase in imports from countries in Southeast Asia including Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand. He expects the same thing to happen this time around.

In the coming months, Cordero said, the local economy could see supply chain disruptions, similar to what occurred during the pandemic, “if we continue on the path of aggressive and high” tariffs.

The Port of Los Angeles expects a 10% reduction in volume from last year amid Trump’s tariffs against China, Executive Director Gene Seroka said.

It’s a day-by-day soap opera, and just like a soap opera, you get relief, then it heats up again.

— Jonathan D. Aronson, a professor of international communication and international relations at USC

One of the largest seaports in the country, the L.A. port has seen sharp increases in cargo since last summer as businesses stocked up in anticipation of potential Trump tariffs. Just under 10.3 million TEUs, a near record, passed through the port last year.

Those numbers are likely to trend downward as tariffs take hold and the economy adjusts, Seroka said. “Fewer containers mean fewer jobs.”

L.A. businesses try to adjust

Economists say it’s difficult for companies to quickly change suppliers, and some may be loath to upend their supply chains given the ever-changing nature of Trump’s trade policies.

Some are trying anyway.

Francesca Grace, an interior designer and home stager in Los Angeles, said tariffs have already affected the availability and price of items including fabrics, wood and other building materials, and smaller decor pieces.

Supply chain delays have extended her project timelines in some cases to three to six weeks from immediate availability, and she’s contending with “at least a 25% rise” in costs for materials from China. As a result, she’s now trying to source all of her products locally, up from 75%.

“While this shift aligns with our values, it will also cause our pricing to increase,” Grace said. “We are doing everything we can to avoid increasing our pricing too much. The last thing we want is for these changes to negatively impact our business or make our designs inaccessible.”

Other businesses say they have little choice when it comes to where they get their merchandise.

“Lumber prices are what they are. There’s no sourcing it somewhere else, so we’re going to have to deal with it as it comes,” said Anawalt, the general manager at the Malibu hardware store. “It’s so beyond my control, there’s nothing I can do. I was panicked at first, but now I’m just going to wait.”

Politics

Sen Murphy warns ‘people are going to die’ as Congress punts on expiring Obamacare subsidies

Published

10 hours ago

December 20, 2025

Press Room

Sen Murphy warns ‘people are going to die’ as Congress punts on expiring Obamacare subsidies

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A bipartisan Obamacare fix remains out of reach in the Senate, for now, and lawmakers can’t agree on who is at fault.

While many agree that the forthcoming healthcare cliff will cause financial pain, the partisan divide quickly devolved into pointing the finger across the aisle at who owns the looming healthcare premium spikes that Americans who use the healthcare exchange will face.

Part of the finger-pointing has yielded another surprising agreement: Lawmakers don’t see the fast-approaching expiration of the Biden-era enhanced Obamacare subsidies as Congress failing to act in time.

“Obviously, it’s not a failure of Congress to act,” Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., told Fox News Digital. “It’s a failure of Republicans to act. Democrats are united and wanting to expand subsidies. Republicans want premium increases to go up.”

Partisan rancor over Obamacare has seeped into how lawmakers view the effect that expiring subsidies will have on their constituents. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., argued that it was a “life or death” situation, while Republicans contended that Democrats set up the very cliff they maligned. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

DEMOCRATS’ LAST-MINUTE MOVE TO BLOCK GOP FUNDING PLAN SENDS LAWMAKERS HOME EARLY

Senate Republicans and Democrats both tried, and failed, to advance their own partisan plans to replace or extend the subsidies earlier this month. And since then, no action has been taken to deal with the fast-approaching issue, guaranteeing that the subsidies will lapse at the end of the year.

A report published last month by Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit healthcare think tank, found that Americans who use the credits will see an average increase of 114% in their premium costs.

The increase can vary depending on how high above the poverty level a person is. The original premium subsidies set a cap at 400% above the poverty level, while the enhanced subsidies, which were passed during the COVID-19 pandemic, torched the cap.

For example, a person 60 years or older making 401% of the poverty level, or about $62,000 per year, would on average see their premium prices double. That number can skyrocket depending on the state. Wyoming clocks in at the highest spike at 421%.

SENATE MULLS NEXT STEPS AFTER DUELING OBAMACARE FIXES GO UP IN FLAMES

Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., doesn’t want to blow up Obamacare or get rid of Obamacare subsidies, but he does want to provide Americans with more options for healthcare. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

In Murphy’s home state of Connecticut, premiums under the same parameters would hike in price by 316%.

“When these do lapse, people are going to die,” Murphy said. “I mean, I was talking to a couple a few months ago who have two parents, both with chronic, potentially life-threatening illnesses, and they will only be able to afford insurance for one of them. So they’re talking about which parent is going to survive to raise their three kids. The stakes are life and death.”

Both sides hold opposing views on the solution. Senate Republicans argue that the credits effectively subsidize insurance companies, not patients, by funneling money directly to them, and that the program is rife with fraud.

Senate Democrats want to extend the subsidies as they are, and are willing to negotiate fixes down the line. But for the GOP, they want to see some immediate reforms, like income caps, anti-fraud measures and more stringent anti-abortion language tied to the subsidies.

Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., who produced his own healthcare plan that would convert subsidies into health savings accounts (HSAs), argued that congressional Democrats “set this up to expire.”

SENATE REPUBLICANS LAND ON OBAMACARE FIX, TEE UP DUELING VOTE WITH DEMS

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., panned Senate Democrats’ Obamacare subsidy proposal as “obviously designed to fail.” (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

But he doesn’t share the view that the subsidies’ expected expiration is a life-or-death situation.

“I’m not taxing somebody who makes 20 bucks an hour to pay for healthcare for somebody who makes half a million dollars a year, that’s what they did,” he told Fox News Digital. “All they did was mask the increase in healthcare costs. That’s all they did with it.”

Sen. Jim Banks, R-Ind., similarly scoffed at the notion, and told Fox News Digital, “The Democrat plan to extend COVID-era Obamacare subsidies might help less than half a percent of the American population.”

“The Republican plan brings down healthcare costs for 100% of Americans,” he said. “More competition, expands health savings accounts. That needs to be the focus.”

Democrats are also not hiding their disdain for the partisan divide between their approaches to healthcare.

Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, told Fox News Digital that the idea that this “is a congressional failure and not a Republican policy is preposterous.”

“They’ve hated the Affordable Care Act since its inception and tried to repeal it at every possible opportunity,” he said, referring to Obamacare. “The president hates ACA, speaker hates ACA, majority leader hates ACA, rank-and-file hate ACA. And so this is not some failure of bipartisanship.”

While the partisan rancor runs deep on the matter of Obamacare, there are Republicans and Democrats working together to build a new plan. Still, it wouldn’t deal with the rapidly approaching Dec. 31 deadline to extend the subsidies.

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., predicted that the Senate would have a long road to travel before a bipartisan plan came together in the new year, but he didn’t rule it out.

“It’s the Christmas season. It would take a Christmas miracle to execute on actually getting something done there,” he said. “But, you know, I think there’s a potential path, but it’ll be heavy lift.”

Alex Miller is a writer for Fox News Digital covering the U.S. Senate.

Politics

Column: What Epstein ‘hoax’? The facts are bad enough

Published

11 hours ago

December 20, 2025

Press Room

Column: What Epstein ‘hoax’? The facts are bad enough

Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, Noam Chomsky and Woody Allen were among the familiar faces in the latest batch of photographs released by Democrats on the House Oversight Committee in connection to the late Jeffrey Epstein. With the Justice Department preparing to make additional files public, the images underscore an uncomfortable truth for us all: The convicted sex offender moved comfortably among some of the most intelligent men in the world. Rhodes scholars, technology leaders and artists.

Also in the release was a photograph of a woman’s lower leg and foot on what appears to be a bed, with a paperback copy of Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita” visible in the background. The 1955 novel centers on a middle-aged man’s sexual obsession with a 12-year-old girl. Epstein, a serial sexual abuser, famously nicknamed one of his private planes “The Lolita Express.” And we are to believe that some of the globe’s brightest minds could not put the dots together?

Donald Trump, who once described himself as “a very stable genius,” included.

“I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy,” Trump told New York magazine in 2002. “He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”

Later, the two had a public falling out, and Trump has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. Great. But denial after the fact is only one side of this story. The other is harder to digest: Either the self-proclaimed “very stable genius” spent nearly two decades around Epstein without recognizing what was happening in plain sight — or he recognized it and chose silence. Neither explanation reflects on intelligence as much as it does on character. No wonder Trump’s defenders keep raising the most overused word in American politics today: hoax.

“Once again, House Democrats are selectively releasing cherry-picked photos with random redactions to try and create a false narrative,” said White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson. “Here’s the reality: Democrats like Stacey Plaskett and Hakeem Jeffries were soliciting money and meetings from Epstein after he was a convicted sex offender. The Democrat hoax against President Trump has been repeatedly debunked, and the Trump administration has done more for Epstein’s victims than Democrats ever have by repeatedly calling for transparency, releasing thousands of pages of documents and calling for further investigations into Epstein’s Democrat friends.”

Jackson has a point.

Democrats were cherry-picking which photos to release, even if many of the men pictured were aligned with progressives. That includes the president, who was a Democrat when he and Epstein were running together in New York in the 2000s. Trump didn’t register as a Republican until 2009. Now whether the choice of photos and timing was designed to shield political friends or weaponize against perceived enemies isn’t clear. What is clear is that it doesn’t take a genius to see that none of this is a hoax.

The victims are real. The flight logs are real. The millions that flowed into Epstein’s bank account have wire transfer confirmation numbers that can be traced. What Democrats are doing with the information is politics as usual. And you don’t want politics to dictate who gets justice and who gets vilified.

Whatever the politicians’ intentions, Americans can decide how to react to the disclosures. And what the men around Epstein did with the information they gathered on his jet or his island fits squarely at the heart of the national conversation about masculinity. What kind of men could allow such abuse to continue?

I’m not saying the intelligent men in Epstein’s ecosystem did something criminal, but the lack of whistleblowing before his arrest raises questions about their fortitude for right and wrong. And the Trump White House trying to characterize this conversation as a partisan witch hunt — a hoax — is an ineffective strategy because the pattern with their use of that word is so clear.

We saw what happened on Jan. 6, and Trump tells us the investigation is a hoax. We hear the recording of him pressuring Georgia officials to find votes, and he tells us the investigation is a hoax. Trump campaigned on affordability issues — the cost of bacon, no taxes on tips — but now that he’s in office such talk is a hoax by Democrats. As if we don’t know the price of groceries in real time. Ten years ago, Trump told us he had proof that President Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. We’re still waiting.

In his book, “Art of the Deal,” Trump framed his lies as “truthful hyperbole” but by now we should understand for him hyperbole matters more than truth — and his felony convictions confirm that some of his claims were indeed simply false.

So if there is a hoax, it is the notion that none of the brilliant men whom Epstein kept in his orbit had any idea what was going on.

YouTube: @LZGrandersonShow

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Ideas expressed in the piece

The release of photographs and documents from the House Oversight Committee demonstrates that Epstein moved freely among some of the world’s most accomplished and intelligent individuals, including Rhodes scholars, technology leaders and artists.
Either these prominent men failed to recognize warning signs despite obvious indicators like Epstein’s “Lolita Express” nickname referencing a novel about child sexual abuse, or they recognized the reality and chose silence—neither explanation reflects well on their character.
Claims that this is a hoax lack credibility because the evidence is concrete: the victims are real^[1], the flight logs are documented^[1]^[3], and the millions flowing through Epstein’s bank accounts have verifiable wire transfer confirmation numbers.
The apparent lack of whistleblowing from the men in Epstein’s ecosystem before his 2019 arrest raises serious questions about their moral fortitude and willingness to stand against wrongdoing.
The Trump administration’s strategy of characterizing these disclosures as a partisan witch hunt is ineffective, given the pattern of applying the term “hoax” to numerous matters that subsequently proved to be substantiated, from investigations into January 6 to documented pressuring of Georgia officials.
Regardless of whether Democrats’ selection of which photographs to release was politically motivated, legitimate questions about masculinity and moral responsibility remain central to the national conversation.

Different views on the topic

Democrats selectively released cherry-picked photographs with random redactions designed to create a false narrative while attempting to shield their own political allies, including figures like Stacey Plaskett and Hakeem Jeffries who solicited money and meetings from Epstein after his conviction.
The timing and selection of photographs released by House Democrats appear strategically designed to weaponize the Epstein matter against political opponents while deflecting scrutiny from Democratic figures who also maintained connections to the convicted sex offender^[2].
The Trump administration has demonstrated greater commitment to transparency on the Epstein matter through the release of thousands of pages of documents and calls for further investigations into Epstein’s connections to Democratic associates.
Characterizing this as purely a partisan response overlooks the fact that prominent figures across the political spectrum, including those who were Democrats when they associated with Epstein in the 2000s, had connections requiring examination^[2].

Politics

Trump administration touts ‘most secure border in history’ as 2.5 million migrants exit US

Published

22 hours ago

December 19, 2025

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Trump administration touts ‘most secure border in history’ as 2.5 million migrants exit US

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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Friday that more than 2.5 million illegal immigrants have left the United States since President Donald Trump returned to office this year, citing a sweeping immigration crackdown that it says led to the “most secure border in American history.”

In a year-end report highlighting the agency’s accomplishments, DHS claimed that illegal border crossings plunged 93% year-over-year, fentanyl trafficking was cut in half, and hundreds of thousands of criminal illegal immigrants were either arrested or deported, amounting to a dramatic shift from the Biden administration.

“In less than a year, President Trump has delivered some of the most historic and consequential achievements in presidential history—and this Administration is just getting started,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a statement. “Under President Trump’s leadership, we are making America safe again and putting the American people first. In record-time we have secured the border, taken the fight to cartels, and arrested thousands upon thousands of criminal illegal aliens.”

EXCLUSIVE: MILLIONS OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS LEAVE US IN RECORD-BREAKING YEAR UNDER TRUMP POLICIES, DHS SAYS

U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said Friday that President Donald Trump “has delivered some of the most historic and consequential achievements in presidential history” since he took office on Jan. 20. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

While Trump’s first year back in office was “historic,” the administration “won’t rest until the job is done,” Noem added.

Of the 2.5 million illegal immigrants that left the country since Trump took office on Jan. 20, an estimated 1.9 million self-deported and more than 622,000 were deported, according to DHS.

The Trump administration has encouraged anyone living in the United States illegally to return to their native countries using the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Home Mobile App, which allows users to claim a complimentary plane ticket home and a $1,000 exit bonus upon their return.

BIDEN ADMIN MARKED ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT, ALLEGED MURDERER AS ‘NON-ENFORCEMENT PRIORITY,’ DHS REVEALS

United States Customs and Border Protection sent boats to the Chicago River amid “Operation Midway Blitz” on Thursday, Sept. 25, 2025. (Chicago Tribune/Getty Images)

CBP seized nearly 540,000 pounds of drugs this year, almost a 10% increase compared to the same time frame in 2024, DHS said, adding that the U.S. Coast Guard has retrieved roughly 470,000 pounds of cocaine, or enough to kill 177 million people.

Taxpayers have been saved more than $13 billion at DHS, the agency said, noting that several agencies, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Cyber and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the Secret Service have returned “to their core missions.”

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Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem touted the progress made during President Trump’s first year back in office. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Secretary Noem awarded $10,000 bonuses earlier this year to TSA officers and personnel who displayed exemplary service, overcame hardships, and displayed the utmost patriotism during the 43-day government shutdown.

DHS touted the administration’s achievements, asserting that “countless lives have been saved” this year and “the American people have been put first again.”