Bulwark Takes - Trump Can Be Stopped — Here’s How | Bulwark on Sunday with Bill Kristol & Sarah Longwell

Episode Date: April 15, 2025

This week on Bulwark on Sunday, Sarah Longwell joins Bill Kristol to tell you exactly what to do to stop Trump’s corruption and chaos.

Bettering your business takes working with the best. With the James Hardy Alliance, you gain access to leads, training, networking, and support from the number one brand of siding in North America. Achieve new levels of success by joining the James Hardy Alliance today. I think we're live. We are live. Thank you, Sarah. Welcome to Bill Work Live on Sunday. I'm Bill Kristol, joined by Sarah Longwell. I think we were on together, what, just two weeks ago? Is that right? It's three weeks ago. Yeah, two weeks ago. But I thought it was really worth continuing that conversation and updating it because something I think big has happened in the last two weeks, but you'll tell me is it or isn't big. And so how's Trump doing? And particularly,

what do you think the effect of the terrorist announcement, which has happened, what, 10, 11 days ago now? What do you think the effect of that has been, is, will be on his presidency and his approval? Yeah. Oh, well, look, we've got brand new CBS polling today that shows Trump down to 47% in his approval, but he's got even worse numbers on the economy. And this is now getting very consistent across polling, which is that Trump's normally, even when people don't like him, and this is such a reversal. I cannot tell you how different this is from the first term, where Trump would have high approval ratings on the economy, but kind of lower overall approval ratings because people found him chaotic

and, you know, didn't like his personality or thought he was embarrassing us on the world stage. This time it's almost, it's not quite reversed, but he's getting, his overall approval while going down is higher than how people view him on inflation and on handling of the economy. And the reason that this is, I think, the worst case scenario for Trump is that his mythology, right, central to it is the idea that he's a businessman, that he's going to do things that help the United States economically. And so the tariffs and the market freak out that followed tariffs and the myriad headlines that accompanied it, not just about the markets, but I mean, look, I don't know that people quite understand the nuances of bond yields and whatnot, but they do understand the idea that things are volatile

in the economy. The other thing that I think is a lot of small business owners who I think expected Trump, I hear there's people in the focus groups, a lot of them who are either small business owners or they work for a small business. And those people, they understand supply chains. They really understand tariffs. And for those voters, a lot of them are not necessarily Trump fans so much as they thought he would be better for their small business in the economy. And those are the people right now who are like, well, this kind of uncertainty makes it impossible for me to run my business. And I think this is the key. Trump is injecting an enormous amount of uncertainty, not just into the market, but into sort of our entire economy.

And when you have uncertainty, right, for any business owner, uncertainty is the worst condition for a small business because, you know, you got to order things in advance. You got to be forward looking. Everything is about planning and costs. And oftentimes your margins are narrow. And so I the the pain points that I'm hearing in the focus groups right now, we did one with the Biden to Trump voters last week. And, you know, you get your your people who are really into Trump's idea that he is going to turn around the American economy and bring back manufacturing. And they believe that. And they're like, I'm staying the course. Like we're going to do this and we have to stiffen our spines and I'm pro. I think long-term it's going to be good. That's about a third of the group. The rest of the group is always in like a,

I don't know how to think about this. I'm nervous. I'm worried. And then there's a third that is like, this is bad. I do not like this. And I think that that reflects the numbers that you're seeing on both inflation and on tariffs specifically where what people say is the vast majority do not, there's, you get some Republicans who will say in the long term, it's beneficial, but literally every other number. So the vast majority of people do not think it will be beneficial in the long term. So that includes a lot of Democrats and independents. And then on top of that, people think that the vast majority of people, overwhelming numbers, think we're in for

short-term volatility and pain. And so it's a lot to ask of people. And I think that of all the things, and this is a sad commentary. I'm not, I don't like that this is true, but I do think it is true that for all the January 6th and the Trump cozying up to Putin and everything else, like we're just, we're a people now that the only way they're going to move off Trump is if there are negative personal consequences for them. And the economy is the number one way in which Donald Trump can inflict negative personal consequences on people. And so I think if it keeps up and we continue to see this kind of volatility follow Trump, eventually this guy's the art of the deal, the smart businessman will start to slip away. I do think someone pointed this out to me, it was 20 years ago when Bush's numbers started to collapse in 2005 and they started to go down,

obviously because of the Iraq war, as well as Katrina and Harriet Meyers and other things. But when his numbers started to collapse on how's he doing in fighting the war on terror, that's when one of the smart Republican types said to me, this is not fixable. I mean, you can't have your strongest issue become a weak issue. You can survive other issues. People say, I don't really like Trump's case. The personal life, he's too harsh, maybe even on, you know, all the bigotry, all the million, foreign policy, nervous about that but no

but the economy the economy the economy so i do think it is interesting as you say that he's at 44 approval on the economy and 47 overall it makes one think that 47 can come back is the 44 might be a more of a leading indicator than the 47. the 44 you and i were talking about this before but i'd like you to share your thoughts on this so the 44 he, he was at 51 approved on March 2nd, 48, March 30th, 44 now. So that's about a point at almost exactly- That's on his economy. Yes, that's the economy. That's the 44% specifically on the economy. Right. Got to 47 approval. But on both cases on the general approval, which was 53, 47, 50, 50, 47, 53 over these six, seven weeks, he's gone

down basically a point a week. And I guess part of me thinks, I don't know, point a week, shouldn't he be, this is a disastrous policy he's embraced and it's been disastrously executed, shouldn't it be worse? But maybe a point a week is, if a point a week kept going a point a week, that would be a lot. So which, are you, is the point of week good or is it, or is it annoyingly slow? Uh, I think it's good. And, uh, this is just me exercising a theory here, but my theory would be that if his numbers sort of collapsed fast and like, it was just this market signal that we don't like this one thing, Trump reverses it. It probably comes back up. I think a sustained drop that is slow, likely I think it's harder to win those numbers back. I think that reflects probably the slow changing of minds on Trump overall. And I'm

talking about his overall approval rating because like his number on inflation, he's at 40% on his handling of inflation and so i think what happens is your point about the leading indicator and so he's at 44 in the economy overall is that over time trump will go down to meet those numbers on the economy if it sustains uh and once you're down in 42 percent last time was on, I was talking about like you got to get Trump. I think I said 32 percent, 35 percent. And that, you know, that number is really just a reflection of what I think Trump's durable basis and where I think you have people who voted for him on the businessman mythology and the economy are. And so if you sort of separate those two, you can assume that people with their red hats on, like they stick with Trump when they're sort of naked on the side of the road,

their house is gone, but like as long as they've got that hat, they're still pro Trump. It's somebody else's fault. That'll be the immigrants fault. That'll be the left's fault, whatever. But the people who voted for Trump out of purely self-serving reasons, just I want my groceries to be cheaper, I want stuff to be cheaper, I want housing to be more abundant, all of those things. When that doesn't happen, I think those people as they peel away,

then Trump goes from, boy, I've got an iron grip on so many voters, including independent voters, including these Hispanic and Black voters who've been moving our way to the only people Trump has a super grip on is the MAGA base. it means, as it has now for some time, that Trump can sort of still own a majority of a Democratic, or sorry, of a Republican primary, and Republican primary voters. And so you continue to get really, really Trumpy people. But if Trump is wrecking the economy, the coalition that is sort of lined up against those types of people, and no longer thinks they're good for the economy, that becomes the vast majority of people. You know, it's striking just along the same lines too that CBS asked, I think intelligently actually,

well, who do you think is most responsible for the economy right now and for the state of the economy? Trump, 54%, Biden, 21%, both of them 20%, I think. So, I mean, that's pretty striking that he's only been president. It's hard to believe, but I guess the downside of all that activity of his is people think he's really in charge and he's really changed everything. And it's his. I mean, I think Reagan, I'm old enough to remember this.

You're not. Reagan benefited a lot because even a year and a half in, in 82, in the bad recession that we had, where Volcker was squeezing inflation uh squeezing interest rates down and they still thought well it's kind of carter's fault you know he gave him reagan inherited a bad company he has to give a little more time for the stuff to work now ultimately the stuff worked i mean ultimately reality matters a lot right so reagan wouldn't have been successful if he hadn't had a big comeback in 83 and 84 and we should and that's true obviously about trump ultimately too i think um if the economy's booming a year from now, he can weather this rocky initial patch of tariffs. I don't think that's likely,

but I am struck by how much voters, it's all Trump's now. And in a way more of the economy, I suspect that other issues, don't you think foreign policy, they'll say, well, the world was messy, Biden was weak. That's hard for Trump to figure out,

could give him a little time. The fact that they've given him such, the voters have given him such ownership of the economy is pretty striking, I think. Yeah, he asked for it. I mean, and look, voters remember, I hear this in the focus groups a lot, like, well, he said he was going to lower prices right away. That's not happening. But they're like, but I understand like Rome wasn't built in a day. Things don't happen in a day, but the longer inflation is persistent. but this thing about Trump's ownership of the economy, that is really true. I mean, he just like they hired him for the economy. And this is where Trump, I think, is misreading his mandate.

Like you could say, yes, there were sort of two issues. The voters really hired him to take care of. One was the economy, and that includes inflation. The other one was immigration, I think. And you could maybe throw crime in there a little bit. But I think that voters, those are always the top issues. And when you I think one of the persistent problems for Democrats is that if you ask the majority of voters their top issues and then you ask them which issues they think which party is better on. It is the

Republicans, the issues that they focus on tend to align more with where the vast majority of Americans are in terms of what they care about. And so voters were really clear what they were hiring Donald Trump to do, which is why he's leaning so hard. Like when the market was crashing, you suddenly saw a whole bunch more tweets about like trans sports like suddenly like trans a trans person doing disc golf i don't know i don't really understand that as a sport but uh like those went up because people that you could see the sort of maggot influencers being like quick throw something else into the water to distract them uh from the fact that the economy is tanking. And you can do that with some portion of Trump's base. You really can.

Like they're there for the grievance culture war issues and owning the libs all day long. And as long as they're still deporting people without due process, they're gonna be fans of that. The economy though, it just is, it's just for a lot more of the American voters, that's going to be a matter, that's the personal consequences, and it's Trump's. It's Trump's. And that's good. I mean, it's good in the sense that, you remember when the signal

chain came out, when they put Jeffrey Goldberg on there? There was an actual, in the back and forth, I can't remember which official did it, but they were like, our position is one blame Biden. Biden was weak. You know, like they laid out the fact that trying to blame Biden is part of it. And they are doing that right. They're trying to say to people right now, well, we've got so we've got to, you know, fix this economy that Biden left us that was so wrecked. But actually, if you look at any economic data, you will see that the manufacturing was going up under Biden and it started to crater during Trump. And I think Democrats, I wish you would tell that story

a little bit more, go out there and tell that story. But in any event, I don't think blaming the economy on Biden's going to work for them with outside of that, like 32 percent. My sense also will get on to the Democrats as I can. You did such interesting focus groups this week with progressive Democrats and moderate Democrats. But it seems to me they're not just one last thing on the economy. Again, thinking back to Reagan in 81, 82, I think he benefited a lot from the sense that he was it was stay the course. That's literally what he said. And they didn't waver much. Now, if you know a lot, you know that he did give in, he accepted some tax increases in mid 82, which took back a little bit of the cuts

at 81 and so forth. But basically he seemed to be, and he really was to be fair, sticking with his basic agenda, cutting individual tax rates and supply side tax cuts, letting Volcker squeeze inflation, interest rates down and get inflation out of the economy um I don't you have a sense or maybe I'm wrong I mean do you think the little the back and forth stuff that Trump is doing again leaving aside whether it's actually he's probably helping tariffs are less high because he's now paused the first round and then paused the second round of tariffs on China for you know uh iPhones and so forth um so that's probably helps a little bit on the real economy for now, maybe, but on the other hand, it introduces uncertainty.

But my sense is politically, I don't know, I feel like maybe he's getting the worst of both worlds. He's pursuing a policy agenda that people are pretty doubtful about, and he's doing it in a way that looks kind of chaotic and zigzaggy. I mean, I don't know, I guess the zigzag stuff might help him if he looks like he's reacting to reality. I just think he did. Look, if I was, I don't like his agenda, but were I trying to implement it, I would have done it in exactly the opposite way, right? Which is you cut taxes first, you do the things that are popular. I mean, he is putting active pressure on Jerome Powell to lower interest rates, which is garbage that he's doing that, but like he is trying to interfere on interest rates. And I mean, you, once the environment was, you were like, people were seeing you as having done good things for the economy. People were

feeling positive impacts. Like then you can do, you could probably, you were in a better position to sell your, now we're going to remake the American economy agenda. And instead, I think what he's done now is they're like trying to panic past tax cuts. He's putting all kinds of pressure on the Fed that's very like, and probably pushing, my guess is the Fed to reassert its independence or assert its independence. I don't know what you think about that, but I think they're not going to do anything that the market doesn't dictate that they should do. And so, yeah, I just don't think, and look, prices are going to go up anyway. Prices are going to go up for a few different reasons. One, people, maybe businesses start to plan for the tariffs by building in price increases anyway there are still the 10% tariffs and you know I think one

of the things actually with the iPhone and the computers and the chips that's interesting David from made this point I think it's a good one is that they're basically pulling off the tariffs for the stuff rich people can buy right your nice smartphone your nice laptop um but cheap clothes cheap shoes uh those types of things that poorer people buy those will still get tariffed in this in this trade war with China um and so you know I just don't think we know how this is going to start really rippling through um and I the one my guess is, is people though that are trying to curb his instincts by getting him to do it slow are hoping that the negative impacts will be medium and not catastrophic and that that will dissuade him from doing the bigger push.

Right. I mean, another question is if you really do get a rough economy, which I think is quite likely at this point, it may be a recession, but also inflation. And then the Fed is in a terrible position where it can't cut rates for the recession, but it can't hike rates to deal with inflation. Then Trump turns on the Fed as an obvious victim to go after. And he could try to fire Powell, especially if they win one of these court cases that increases his authority over independent agencies. The court could distinguish the Fed from some of these other agencies, but it might not. Or he might, anyway, Trump might claim it might not. So I think the degree of, yeah, I think the economy, which was kind of his calling, people who rewrote the history of 2017

to 2020 and decided to be for Trump this time after being a little bit put off by January 6th and worried about Trump, maybe preferring DeSantis or Haley in the primaries. Those people did think the economy was the safe part of the Trump agenda. And again, I come back to your original point that when the safe part of your agenda becomes the unsafe part of your agenda, that's not a good, that can't be good politically. Now, if it all works out and the economy's booming 18 months from now, we're obviously in a different world. But- Yeah. And look, you never want the economy to crash. This is where everybody's life is. And so, on the other hand though, and Tim and I talked about this on The Secret Pod, like there is a benefit long term to people touching the stove and seeing that Donald Trump literally has no idea what he's doing. And that in large part, this is just Donald Trump kind of having a good time with the whole American economy.

And the long term damage it does to people's trust in us around the world, people pulling back their investments in the United States, the decline of the dollar, like he is diminishing America's greatness right in front of our eyes. And I think that the only way we sort of move past so many of these bad ideas or even the idea of putting forward somebody who has no idea what they're doing just because people think like, oh, they're a celebrity or they're not a regular politician, that that comes with bad outcomes. I do think that's an important, like, that's just like maybe a hard lesson America's going to need to learn. Oh, that's a good, that's a good point. Talk about the Democrats. You did these focus groups and discussed them on the focus group pod. I think it was, they were divided into sort of self-described moderates and self-described progressives. It's actually, so what we did was I was interested in just hearing from Democrats about how they wanted the party to be, to go, like what direction they wanted. And there's this, obviously there's

always this debate going on, especially sort of on Twitter between progressives and moderates on the Democrat side about like, which is, as they seek to, you know, rise from the ashes, which is the better direction for them. And so we convened a group of Democrats who wanted the party to be more moderate, and a group of Democrats who wanted the party to be more progressive. And as I was listening to them, I kept being like, which group is this? Because you couldn't tell the difference, because it didn't matter moderate or progressive. What they all wanted was the Democrats to be more aggressive. And like what was funny to me is how when they were talking about the politicians that they like with the with the progressives,

like this was sort of the main deviation is you would hear people say, you rashida talib and um uh you know jasmine crockett and the moderates were more sort of corey booker uh whatever but like actually there's there's a little bit of that but more than anything there was uniform agreement that people democrats are not meeting the moment that they were like i mean they were out on schumer but they were kind of out on jeffries too like which i was a little surprised by i thought he would at least get points for kind of being like young new gen but they are i want new blood i want people who are going to stand up to this guy they were very pro bookers um doing his you-hour speech, even they understood that it didn't matter in the grand scheme of things, or like it wasn't going to win them elections, but they felt like

people standing up and telling the truth about what's happening is really important right now. Because when you get a Gretchen Whitmer who goes to Donald Trump, into Donald Trump's office, in the Oval Office, while he's saying he's going to have the DOJ investigate Chris Krebs and Miles Taylor, people who were, from his last administration, ultimately critical of him. And she's standing there hiding her face behind her binder. That was an enormous missed opportunity. And I just got to say, if Gretchen Whitmer had had in that moment, instead of covering her face with a binder, had said, this is autocratic behavior and I am leaving and I will not be a prop to this. And she'd walked out. Gretchen Whitmer would be the front runner for 2028 right now. Because that's what people want to see from their elected leaders. Hiding your

face with a binder to act like you weren't there and then putting out a statement that said, like, it wasn't in my me being there wasn't an endorsement of what he was doing. I'm sorry, man. Your voters, Democratic voters, that is they will not stand for it. They want somebody who is putting forward just a clear oppositional framing to Donald Trump. And so, yeah, my advice to Democrats is your voters are begging you, like your numbers are so low because they're mad you're not doing enough. And you're not, you're not, this is a moment, I mean, even just the way Democrats, some of them were flubbing the tariffs. Like, I mean, I said this, this is not my normal. I try to be, you know, the boys can sometimes be crass.

I try not to be. But I will say, like, it is fairly obvious to me that when Donald Trump is just like punching himself in the nuts and like losing voters and everyone's mad at him. Your job is not to then go turn around and punch yourself in the nuts. Go hit him. Go on offense. What is wrong? I just, these are the parts where, you know, sometimes people complain, oh, you guys, you know, who are Republicans, you just get mad at Democrats. And I'm always like, listen, what I need as an American, forget right or left, just as an American, right? We do not want this autocratic experiment to be, like, to win. We don't want it to be denormalized. And so what I want is slightly agnostic of policy. I'm with these voters. I want to see Democrats saying every day relentlessly, I don't know where this line of thinking really comes from of like, we need to stand back and do nothing. the bill uh on the funding bill because they're like well this would have distracted from trump

you know decimating the economy and i'm like this is that is like you what is i don't know whatever reverse four-dimensional chess is like no you need to highlight what is happening every second of every day that your job is to and and to push back put bills don't You don't have to go be a TikTok influencer. Be a legislator. Go make them take bad votes. I mean, you can't make them take bad votes because you are not in charge right now, but you can do things to highlight. And Cory Booker was a good example of that. And you can sort of make them take bad votes. You can make them take votes that will prevent the bills from coming to the floor, which you can then say, I mean, truthfully, this is in effect a vote for the terrorists. And you can say over and over

that four Republican senators and four Republican House members could stop these terrorists. Now, it's not quite correct. I mean, there'd be a veto maybe of a resolution to overturn them or to suspend the emergency powers. Though there's actual legislation that Grassley's introduced that would go further and actually would stop them if the past that if if you could then maybe overturn the veto with a senior republican like grassland but anyway you don't have to get into all that i think this is the key point i i was struck i was with a bunch of democrats earlier this week very nice meeting very a lot some of them very impressive but they couldn't they talked about the town halls they've been doing and say i always have to begin by

explaining that we don't have power here in washington so they have to kick they can't i don't want them to hold us responsible for not doing things they can do. Just to strike me as absolutely backwards. You have to say it is an outrage. I've introduced or co-signed or, you know, whatever, co-sponsored 18 pieces of legislation to stop this, to stop this, to stop that. And I've spoken up every day against it. Now, then you give that for three or four minutes. Now you can then say you have to understand the Republicans who are in the majority are doing

their best to prevent all these bills from coming to a vote. But you need to lead with what you're doing, right? You're an elected official, not lead with a kind of pundit explanation of how, you know, in the American system, when you have a very united majority party against you, you don't have much power. The House rules really aren't friendly to minorities. I mean, they're like, they're like, acting like political scientists, not like elected officials to some degree. But do you think they're kind of coming around? I feel like they're kind of gradually getting there, maybe. I think they're seeing things. So part of, and this is where, you know, I think you can look at Cory Booker from a like sheer vote perspective and be like,

well, it didn't move the needle anywhere. Well, except that a lot of people wanted to talk to Cory Booker about him taking a stand and a bunch of the voters brought it up as like, yes, please, anything. Reflect my level of concern about the moment. And I think that that can give, like we always talk about permission structures, I think that can build some permission structures for other Democrats to say, I see what's happening. I just need to start saying something. And also, and I know this is disappointing because I think we're pretty desperate for some leadership in this moment as we watch everyone in the elite class. I mean, this week we saw a bunch more law firms capitulate to Trump, almost pre-surrender to Trump. He wasn't even going after them yet. They're just like throwing money at him so that he doesn't come after them. But like the protests, those are good. I mean, you have got,

we have got to show that the energy is in opposition to what is happening. And so it's going to take people peacefully in the streets, not just once. It's going to have to build, I think, over time. And also, I'll just say one last thing. And this goes to some things that I'm going to work on in some of my other capacities. But I think it's very important, Again, going back to the idea that people are going to lead elites on this. That's a bad sign, but still, this is what's going to happen. Go make a video. I don't care if you're on TikTok or Instagram or Twitter or YouTube or whatever. Pick your platform, when you like, and make a video about how trump's policies are negatively impacting your life

or negatively impacting the lives of people you know put them online like let's flood the zone with the stories of what is happening because that i think people are always like well what can i do what can i do i'm like you got to say tell your story you got to let somebody can hear it this is what uh this is what Republicans did. Even when they were mad about inflation and everybody, it became this thing where they would take pictures of their the checks at dinner. That's how we learned that, you know, some people were complaining about it after ordering a steak and a bourbon and a couple of bourbons. That is people saying, look at this negative consequence on me personally, and I'm sharing it. The left is going to have to do that right now, too, including independents, Republicans who regret their vote for Trump, like getting those stories out there, people could be somewhat they should people sometimes that's very good advice i think incidentally and i do get asked this as you do all the time you know what can we do and and i say well some version of what you

said they're not that was very well said and i think the focus on the videos is very important because it's such a doable thing if you can't do it you can get some younger neighbor or nephew to help you do it and then it's up and, you know, maybe a hundred people watch it and not do them already agree. So it doesn't have much effect. And maybe it goes a little viral and 5,000 people watch it. Maybe 50,000 people watch it.

You just don't know. And maybe it triggers other people to do it. And I think the same as, and then they say, well, what issues? I need to look at, someone needs to tell me what I should talk about. I mean, obviously, you know, there should be a focus

on some of the big main issues. You don't want some crackpot thing though. It's a free country. You can't stop it. But they should pick whatever issues most offend them, honestly don't want, there should be a focus on some of the big main issues. You don't want some crackpot thing, though. It's a free country. You can't stop it. But they should pick whatever issues most offend them, honestly, I think, and most move them. And that they have some personal connection to, you know, my cousin's married to someone from Venezuela who just lost temporary protected status, is going to be deported. And he or she, he's been working steadily for the three years he's been here and paying

taxes. And what is going on? This is totally, you know, it doesn't have to all a kind of uh tariff related though that's the biggest issue right now so yeah that's really deep i mean do you find people react i mean i guess we've seen some of these videos begin to pop up right not not even through the sort of the organizations that you've been so involved in but but just spontaneously online. Yeah. And I think, I do think this is what shifts vibes, right? When you hear people talk about vibes. And I think that when people get fired from jobs as a result of the economy, when they see as a retiree on fixed incomes, you know, losing money at a time when, you know,

they're not very far from retirement, like all the scary things. I think people need to tell those stories because when people just hold them inside, you know, then I think, and this is where the right wing ecosystem, the right wing media ecosystem is so efficient. Like even looking at the numbers of people who say, you know, in the long term, we're going to benefit. And most of those are Republicans. They're living in a media ecosystem that is telling them that news. They're like, if you just hang on, this is going to be better for you long term. And I think the left gets in this mindset of like, well, we need our own media ecosystem. To some degree. I mean, it's not a bad thing that we're all moving in the direction of independent media and trusted voices and trusted messengers over the media brands of our childhood.

But the number one thing that people trust still is people like me. And I don't mean me, Sarah Longwell. I mean me like everyday person. And when people see other people sharing their stories, they will share them too. Like that permission structure has always been really, that, it was a thing that happened on the right where regular Republican voters started to talk about how expensive their groceries were or how expensive meals were. And it bubbled up to like the elite levels of the right where they started doing it more to some mocking, but for real people posting their grocery bills,

like people should still do that poster grocery bills, show them that that tariffs or or that inflation is continuing to harm you like that is how you do it. Now, that's so good. That's such great advice. It's a good thing to, and you don't have to have a, honestly, do you have a really long explanation? You don't have to buy it to some economic theory or say, well, Trump's introduced these tariffs

and the effect of tariffs is a kind of a tax. Just say, Trump said he was going to get our prices down. Here's my bill. You know, if you have it from three weeks ago, here's my bill from today or whatever. I mean, I think, yeah, I think simplicity is fine and you don't have to explain everything and you don't have to cover everything, right? These things could be cumulative and add up in a pretty powerful way, actually. Yeah, that's great that you suggest that. Okay. Any final words? That's a really wonderful

last word, but. We can leave it there. I just, I want people to, you know, don't get beaten down. I think it can be to, you know, don't get beaten down. I think I think it can be hard psychologically, actually. One of the tough things about the tariffs when Trump pulls them back is that he claims victory and lots of people let him write. His whole administration comes out and says art of the deal. And it's very frustrating because for a hot second, right, people could see that the emperor had no clothes and you can see them, you know, coming, clawing it back into their own reality where they're lying to people and people are buying it. And that's frustrating. But I think that that is, you can only do that for so long when the consequences are actually negative. Like people will feel them yeah a

colleague of ours texted he's going to get away with this isn't he what he pulled back i think on the terrace and i i think not actually but anyway yeah that's a good note to add on sarah thank you for joining me on this taking half an hour out of your weekend and um thank you all for joining us on the bulwark on sunday bye guys