Timeline for Trump pain

We're about to feel the pain of the president's recklessness.

Listening to podcasts of focus groups of voters switched from Biden in 2020 to Trump in 2024 is pretty depressing. They’re largely sticking with Trump, even if they are wary of what he’s doing. They clearly get most of their information filtered through pro-Trump networks. They can cite his arguments for tariffs without even realizing that some of the arguments are contradictory. They also don’t seem to understand the damage that Trump has done to our international relationships.

I suspect their attitudes will change in the coming weeks when they start to feel the pain of Trump’s chaotic economic policies. A recent thread by a guy named Molson Hart believes we are still a few weeks away from the impact of Trump’s tariffs. Hart, who describes himself as founder and CEO of a “consumer products company,” says trade with China essentially came to a halt on April 10 when Trump announced his 145% tariff on the country. The last container ship from China will arrive on the West Coast around May 10. After that, trucking will slow to a crawl because there are no goods to deliver. Warehouses will stand empty, prompting layoffs of warehouse and dock workers.

The same process will follow in the Midwest about two weeks later when the last container ships arrive in Houston and last trucks arrive in Chicago. In early June, the last containers will arrive on the East Coast. By summer, we’ll see scarcity which will cause prices to increase and shelves to sit empty. Manufacturers will struggle to get parts, causing layoffs in the sector Trump claims to be building.

Hart says that even if Trump reverses course almost immediately, it will take months to repair and rebuild the supply chains that have been broken. He compares the situation to the COVID lockdowns. “Once you shut down, it takes a long time to get economic activity back to where it was, if you ever can,” he writes.

He finishes his thread by saying, “It’s almost like we’re speeding towards a brick wall but the driver of the car doesn’t see it yet. By the time he does, it’ll be too late to hit the brakes.”

I think that sounds about right. We’re about to get hit with a lot of economic pain and most of the country doesn’t even understand what’s happening. When people start to feel the hurt, they will turn on Trump, but probably not until then, even though his favorability ratings are already dropping.

That said, it’s not just the economy that he’s broken. He’s also destroyed trust and relationships that have been the foundation of the post-World War II world. In an interview, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney says his country’s relationship with the United States will never be the same. He didn’t talk so much about the tariffs as he did the threats. He says the Canadian people feel betrayed by the United States and are willing to endure economic hardships to become less reliant on their neighbor.

European countries, for their part, are talking to China about easing restrictions. They are moving away from buying US military equipment and beginning to retool to build their own, though that will take years. In the short term, they may look to countries like South Korea to provide them with the military hardware to keep Ukraine from falling. They no longer see the United States as a reliable ally because of Trump’s bullying, threats, and moves toward Russia. The defense industry is about to take a hit and the communities that rely on that revenue will, too.

It’s easy to blame Trump for the slide into economic chaos and becoming an international pariah, but Republicans in Congress share the blame. They’ve abdicated their powers of restraint. They’ve enabled Trump by approving his embarrassingly inept Cabinet and refusing to reel in his ability to impose tariffs, a power granted by Congress. They are acting more like a subservient arm of government than an equal power. They are enabling authoritarianism.

If Republicans wanted isolationism, they’re about to get it. The goods will stop coming. The tourists will stay away. The leading minds will look for other countries to unleash their ideas and creativity. We will be a country scorned, not admired.

Republicans are hoping that all of this chaos has happened early enough that the economy and new order will sort itself out by the midterms. That’s a pipe dream. Trump has made us economically weaker and less respected in the world. Republicans in Congress have gone right along with it.

I hope those swing voters understand who caused the pain.