President Trump unveiled sweeping tariffs this week on dozens of countries, with some of the steepest tariffs levied on some of America’s biggest trading partners. The move, arguably the most far-reaching of his second term so far, sent stocks into a nosedive and substantially raised the prospect of a recession.
Voters were bracing for the effects in their own lives, but some said they were, for now, waiting and watching to see how all of this plays out.
— Campbell Robertson
‘As a business owner, you don’t make money right away, right?’
Hamid Chaudhry, 53, from Reading, Pa.
“I live in Trump country,” Hamid Chaudhry said. “Nobody is panicking.”
The owner of a farmer’s market, he said he has taken a 25 percent cut in profits over the past year because of the rising costs of goods and services. He said he believed that in the next few months, the pain could run even deeper, so he was building up a rainy-day fund. But he was hopeful that the tariffs would eventually pay off, most likely by the next presidential election.
“As a business owner, you don’t make money right away, right?” said Mr. Chaudhry, who voted for Mr. Trump. “When I listen to Trump, what he’s saying is, ‘It’s a short-term pain, but there’s the light at the end of the tunnel.’”
But while his confidence in Mr. Trump’s economic management remained unshaken, Mr. Chaudhry said he was still worried about the administration’s approach to immigration. He was distressed about a 29-year-old migrant father sent to a Salvadoran prison by mistake.
Not only do such arrests and swift expulsions run counter to due process, Mr. Chaudhry said, but they were potentially dangerous, in that they could create untold numbers of angry young people who felt let down by the United States.
“You cannot separate families like that,” he said. “You have created all those orphans, and regardless of whatever happened, they’re all going to remember this.”
— Campbell Robertson
‘It’s just not going to turn out good for anybody.’
Veronica McCloud, 63, from Charleston, S.C.
For years, Veronica McCloud has driven hundreds of miles every month — and sometimes weekly — to visit her mother in a small South Carolina town. Each round trip — almost 260 miles — has taken a toll on her Toyota Camry, now 10 years old.
Now she was worried that Mr. Trump’s tariffs would result in higher vehicle prices. As a retiree on a fixed income, she carefully considered both everyday and big-ticket purchases. She has been weighing whether to replace her car, she said, wondering how long she has before prices go up.
“I pray that my car lasts — I don’t even know if me and my husband can even afford it,” Ms. McCloud said, referring to the possibility of purchasing a new car.
She learned of Mr. Trump’s tariff plan when he was campaigning, but she had hoped he would reconsider such a risky bet, or at least show more favor toward allies.
A longtime Democrat who voted for Kamala Harris, Ms. McCloud hadn’t agreed with most of Mr. Trump’s policies. But she might have been more supportive if he had provided better, fuller explanations of his plans. The flurry of tariffs, she said, were just the latest example of a rollout that felt rushed, confusing and without regard for working and retired Americans.
“It’s just not going to turn out good for anybody,” she said.
Ms. McCloud said if the economic squeeze was a long-term one, she might have to leave retired life behind and get a part-time job. The question she kept asking was, if the president knew the risks, “why are you plowing ahead?” she said.
— Audra D. S. Burch
‘The risk-taking, the bold moves, the scary stuff that he does, to me, is no surprise.’
Dave Abdallah, 59, from Dearborn Heights, Mich.
“It’s a good idea to try,” Dave Abdallah said, referring to the new tariffs against other nations. They were bold, he felt, and he was a fan of daring action.
“Why can’t we charge them with the same thing to get them to either lower theirs, or stop a lot of products from being imported into the United States?” Mr. Abdallah said.
Was he nervous about potential downsides — rising prices, an economic downturn? Not really, he said, but given how many people in his area worked in the car industry or knew someone who did, he had concerns.
Hopefully, any damage to that industry and the larger economy wouldn’t last too long, said Mr. Abdallah, a real estate agent who voted for the Green Party candidate Jill Stein. Hopefully, he said, the tariffs would help by dampening foreign competition and creating boom times for auto factories.
“That’s the long-term goal,” he said. “Is it foolproof? I don’t know.”
But Mr. Abdallah wasn’t startled by Mr. Trump’s moves — he had been reading his books since the 1980s, when he first became intrigued by Mr. Trump’s go-for-it attitude.
“The risk-taking, the bold moves, the scary stuff that he does, to me, is no surprise,” he said.
— Kurt Streeter
‘These are tough decisions that have to be made or we are going to be staring at some major economic issues.’
Perry Hunter, 55, from Sellersburg, Ind.
For Perry Hunter, a high school teacher who voted for Mr. Trump, the tariffs made sense: He felt they were an effective way to raise revenue for a nation in debt.
“We could have universal health care, we could have free, universal education after high school, we could feed the poor, but we just don’t have the money right now,” he said.
He added, “These are tough decisions that have to be made or we are going to be staring at some major economic issues in the future.”
The drop in the stock market didn’t concern Mr. Hunter as much as it might others — he said he had no money invested in it. Still, he said he thought short-term pain would be tolerable if the United States was headed for a boom.
Mr. Hunter said he was watching gas prices closely — he said they had gone up recently in his area — and noted that high, local grocery prices were nothing new. Always careful about his spending, he said he didn’t plan to change his habits. For now, he was willing to wait many months to assess things.
But Mr. Hunter was troubled by the mistaken deportation of the migrant father to the Salvadoran prison. It could be “the line in the sand” for him to possibly drop his support for the president, he said, “if we make these mistakes and don’t correct them quickly.”
— Juliet Macur
‘Give us a little more information, so we can wrap our head around what it is you’re doing.’
Darlene Alfieri, 55, from Erie, Pa.
Darlene Alfieri just wanted some answers. She was thinking of lowering prices at her flower shop, and about whether to put fewer roses in arrangements. Because flowers are optional purchases, she said she felt her business could be vulnerable.
She was even more worried about how her children, who didn’t have the savings she did, would fare should there be a serious downturn.
Ms. Alfieri, a Democrat, voted for Mr. Trump because she wanted big changes, and she knew it could be messy. But she had been through rough patches before, she said. In the 2008-9 recession, her stock holdings cratered, but they recovered enough within a few years for her to pay for her daughter’s college tuition.
She was willing to endure some disruption in pursuit of longer-term goals, but right now no one was explaining what these goals might be, in detail.
“Give us a little more information, so we can wrap our head around what it is you’re doing,” she said. Without that, she said, it looked like Mr. Trump was throwing darts.
She believed that the administration did have a plan, she said, “but I want to know when the hell they’re going to clue the rest of us in.”
While Ms. Alfieri has been unimpressed by the Democrats’ responses, she also insisted that time was running out for the president to explain to voters what he was doing.
“If he hasn’t shown the American people that this really is putting us in a better position, I think that’s his expiration date,” she said, referring to whenever campaigning for the next presidential election ramps up. “At that point, if people can’t see it, can’t understand it, can’t make sense of it, can’t survive it, they’re going to move on.”
— Campbell Robertson
‘The world doesn’t know how to interpret what’s going on.’
Jaime Escobar Jr., 46, from Roma, Texas
The mayor of a small border town, Jaime Escobar Jr., was relieved when he learned Mexican goods would be spared by Mr. Trump’s newest tariff plan.
Mr. Escobar, who voted for Mr. Trump after years as a Democrat, said many of his constituents rely on tomatoes, avocados and vegetables from Mexico.
“We won’t hurt too much on that end,” he said. But he also said he would continue to monitor how recent, previously announced tariffs on Mexico would affect his town.
He believes that in the long run, Mr. Trump’s economic plan could bring more manufacturing jobs to the U.S. side of the border. Many neighboring cities in Mexico are known for plants that manufacture items like car parts, TV sets and electronic widgets. He said he would like to see similar jobs in his area.
“I’m not an expert in economics, but I do see how he’s trying to bring manufacturing back,” he said, adding, “It’s not going to happen from one day to the next.”
Mr. Escobar said he was willing to give Mr. Trump time to make it pay off.
“Some people say it’s a force for good or for bad, but he is a force,” he said, adding that Mr. Trump “is throwing a wrench in the system, and people don’t know what to think.”
Still, the rocky stock market worries Mr. Escobar. “The world doesn’t know how to interpret what’s going on,” he added. “So it does concern me. I would be lying if I said that it didn’t.”
— Edgar Sandoval
‘I still want to keep my vibes up, and hope and trust.’
Tali Jackont, 57, from Los Angeles
Tali Jackont was holding out hope that this week’s tariffs would end up helping the United States, but she was worried.
“It is too risky,” said Ms. Jackont, a longtime Democrat who voted for Mr. Trump, in part because she thought he could help the economy.
But she quickly offered a caveat: “I still want to keep my vibes up, and hope and trust.”
Ms. Jackont, an educator born in Israel, compared Mr. Trump’s tariff policy to someone tossing ingredients together haphazardly, hoping for the best. Sometimes, she said, “by coincidence,” something good comes from this kind of risk.
She was dismayed, she said, that the tariff tactics could strengthen President Vladimir Putin of Russia because no taxes were placed on his nation this week, while the policies could weaken longtime alliances with Europe, Canada and Mexico.
And prices for virtually all of her groceries and many regular purchases like health insurance, car insurance and gas were already climbing, she said.
After the tariff announcement, how long would Ms. Jackont wait for Mr. Trump to bring about a price drop?
Not longer than six months, she said.
“When someone tells you that he’s an expert in some area, your expectations are high,” she said. “That’s why I give him a certain time. Maybe it’s a short time. He said he’s an expert in the economy, and he knows everything, so my expectations are high.”
— Kurt Streeter
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