America's Talking - ‘Main Street, Not Wall Street’: Trump Defends Tariffs, Touts Immigration Success

Episode Date: May 2, 2025

(The Center Square) – President Donald Trump delivered remarks at a rally in Michigan Tuesday evening, his 100th day in office of his second term. Trump touted his progress cutting federal waste, ��protecting workers, restoring the rule of law” and ending illegal immigration as part of “the most successful 100 days in the history of any administration.” “Instead of putting China first, I'm putting Michigan first and I'm putting America first,” Trump said at the Macomb County Rally.Support this podcast: https://secure.anedot.com/franklin-news-foundation/ce052532-b1e4-41c4-945c-d7ce2f52c38a?source_code=xxxxxxFull story: https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/article_6a808be8-45e3-4fa5-97e0-554851cb0d33.html Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Greetings, everyone, and welcome to America in Focus, powered by the Center Square. I'm Dan McAulb, Chief Content Officer at Franklin News Foundation, publisher of the Center Square Newswire Service. President Trump and his administration have been touting their accomplishments all week after hitting and surpassing the 100-day mark of his second term. They touted plumbing illegal border crossings, mass deportations of violent criminals, non-citizens making the country safer, fair trade deals being negotiated with dozens of other countries,

slashing of what he says is wasteful spending of federal tax dollars and more. Joining me to discuss this is Casey Harper, Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief for the Center Square. Casey, you covered Trump's speech in Michigan on his 100th day, where he also appointed to companies deciding to invest tens of billions of dollars in manufacturing jobs and infrastructure in the U.S. Tell us more, Casey. Yeah, actually, interestingly, this week, Trump said that that dollar figure is up in the trillions now. I don't think we verified that. But that's what he's saying. He's saying that we have trillions of dollars of investment from

businesses because of his tariffs. And coming into the speech, Trump had a lot of things he needed to accomplish. He was at his best in true rally style. Much of the speech was off the cuff. It was a very long speech or something like 90 minutes. And a lot of interaction with the crowd. He just at times would call someone up to the microphone impromptu and have them speak for a moment and it felt like a good old fashioned Donald Trump rally. And it was entertaining. He spent probably the most time touting his success on immigration, which is by far his biggest win, our polling, which we've talked about on the show at the Center Square voters' voice poll has shown that the one issue that voters are happiest with Trump's work on so far is immigration.

He's done a lot of things. He's shut down the southern border. He's tried to end birthright citizenship for the children of illegal aliens. He has declared the cartels, you know, terrorist organizations. He's ended welfare payments to illegal aliens. He's done a lot of things like that. And basically, the immigration crisis has largely ended. And interestingly, because of that, our poll found now it's not a top issue for voters anymore. And so he went out there, he really explained and touted what he's on the border, which was smart politically, I think. The second thing he did is he went out there and he defended his tariffs, which are his, you know, very highly controversial. He's a little bit on an island on some of these tariff policies. And we've seen even the president has backed off of him.

He put a 90-day pause. He's working on these trade deals. It's been very tumultuous. Some of the Trump apologists are saying this is just the art of the deal. The markets have really taken a dive because of all this. We know, we just had GDP numbers come out and show the GDP, the GDP decreased slightly in the last quarter. So there's some troubling economic indicators, though inflation has gone down recently. So, you know, Trump is in this kind of interesting economic moment, and he was trying to make the case for his tariffs. And, you know, he's doing it in Michigan. He says, we need to make cars in Michigan, not China. And he's really trying to defend this policy where even, you know, Republicans are beginning to turn against them. Yeah, even though

as you are aware, because you cover the Trump administration, as is our team at the Center Square, it's been a hot, hectic, 100 days. It seems like every day Trump is either signing a new executive order, he's changing his tariff policy reacting to some news. So there's no doubt the second Trump administration during those first hundred days. He's accomplished a lot. However, you know, obviously Democrats are pushing back hard on the immigration policy, on the tariffs, on his energy policies. So not everybody is on board in calling what he and his administration touts his accomplishments as if they are accomplishments. Well, that's definitely true. And I mean, you know, it's a matter of perspective, whether you think that shutting the southern border or deporting, you know, he's initiated a massive

deportation campaign. A lot of Americans are really happy about that, believe it's long overdue. Of course, many Democrats are very frustrated with it. He used some of the, in his speech, Trump echoed some of the rhetoric of past speeches. He talked about the golden age of America, which was a phrase that really grabbed headlines earlier this year when Trump was sworn in and he gave his speech. He talked talking about how this is the golden age of America. I thought it was a good line when he said, we need to make cars in Michigan, not China. He said, in 100 days, we have delivered the most profound change in Washington in 100 years. He really has emphasized how this term, this first 100 days has been so monumental. And I mean, there's so many things he's done

in this 100 days that we don't even really have time to go through all of them. But there's things you could easily forget. Like, he signed the Lake and Riley Act, which is a big part of the campaign. And he finally got it signed. And it's barely even seemingly worth the media coverage or didn't get the media coverage, partially because of bias and partially because of how fast everything is moving. He also echoed a line that was a big line in a previous speech where he talked about how when he came in office, everyone said it was impossible to shut down the border, that even Biden said it was impossible. He said, but it turned out all we needed was a new president.

And so he, it was typical Trump style in this speech. He touted he's done so many different things, so many different orders. He's ended transgender participation in the military. He's ended DEI in the federal government. He talked about his cutting of waste through Doge and Elon Musk, which of course has been very controversial. But he basically shut down USAID and has cut thousands of employees and different kinds of spending from the federal government. So whether you agree with what he's done or not, I think it's hard to, you have to admit that this first 100 days have been chock full of action. an action-packed, maybe more action-packed than we've ever seen first 100 days.

In the brief time we have left, Casey, what can we expect in the next 100 days? Of course, Congress is working on passing a budget that would extend his signature, perhaps his Trump's signature achievement in his first term, the 2017 tax cuts and job jobs act. That is set to expire at the end of the year. He wants Congress to pass that. So that's something we'll be looking at any other items we should be paying attention to. Yeah, you're right. That's a major issue. It's going to add to the deficit, but it's going to extend those popular Trump tax cuts, things like the doubling of the child tax credit. For instance, there's a lot of things in there. I think we want to watch his negotiation in Ukraine and Israel, the wars there. He's starting to turn against Putin, apparently, in his public remarks and maybe favor Ukraine a little bit more. So it'll be interesting to watch that journey over the next 100 days if there's any big developments or resolutions. to those two conflicts overseas. A big thing to watch is, you know, we have, in the next 100 days, we have the deadlines for these tariffs to go back in place or for trade deals. So I think in the next

hundred days, we're going to see a lot of trade deals come out, or he's going to have to pause everything again. But I think the market is really wanting certainty. They're wanting clarity on what he's going to do in that regard. And then lastly, I'd say we'll have to keep an eye on the courts because so many of his policies have been challenged. in the courts and over the next 100 days you might start to get some progress, some rulings, some dismissals because right now so many of the things he's trying to do are caught up in the legal system and so you might see over the next 100 days rulings for or against them that give some clarity on whether these policies are going to become reality.

Thank you for joining us today, Casey. Listeners can keep up with this story and more at thecentersquare.com.