Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Trump Looks Like a Fool as GOP Backs Away from Tariffs

Episode Date: April 5, 2025

Welcome to the Bear market that Trump created in 24 hours, with China grounding the world economies to a halt with a new 34% tariff, the world recognizing that Trump doesn’t know what the word “reciprocal” means and used a 3rd-grade formula to calculate his tariffs, and JP Morgan doubled its prediction of a recession to 60%. Michael Popok reports that even leading Senate Republicans think that the Trump Administration is selling “deep stupid” to the American people and that we are “all going to die” from the policies. Get 20% off when you go to https://Liquid-IV.com and use code LEGALAF at checkout! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Visit your Toronto area Ford store or Ford.ca today. Well, welcome to the bear market caused by a crash of Donald Trump's own making as the worldwide markets in China wake up and start retaliating against the US economy and against Donald Trump and by extension the American consumer and the middle class. I'm Michael Popak. I'm putting on my Wall Street hat for today. Let's look what's happened just 24 hours after Liberation Day. A name I'm sure will go down in the annals of history of one of the worst euphemisms ever used by a president.

Here's what's happened. China woke up and said, oh, we'll see your 54% phony reciprocal tariff based on a formula that a third grader could have come up with. And we will match you with a 34 percent tariff across the board across all goods. And while we're at it, we're going to put about 30 different U.S. companies on a no supply list so they can't get any of our materials that they need for their production.

By the way, many U.S. manufacturers use Chinese component parts or products in their own goods. So let's put a couple of dozen US countries on there. Let's slow down the supply of rare earth minerals and things that only come from China. And in the impact on that, the oil market is in the tank. All of the futures markets have slid another 5%.

We're now down 10%. And listen to this one, folks. JP Morgan Chase, that's Jamie Diamond's bank, just a week ago, I did a hot take where I said that their new prediction for recession before Liberation Day, a US recession happening in 2025 was at 40%. It's now up to 60%. That's just off of Liberation Day because most of Wall Street and the big banks who backed Donald Trump all thought he was bluffing. They all thought, no he's the ultimate wheeler, dealer, trader, let's make a deal. Art of the deal. He'll just try to bring all these people back to the table, all these countries back to the table, and he'll cut a deal. Nope, he didn't cut a deal. He just imposed the tariffs. He didn't even threaten to impose the tariffs like he did in Mexico and Canada, giving those

countries time to negotiate. He just imposed them and then wagged a bony finger. Scott Bissett, Howard Lotnick, don't you dare, don't you dare retaliate. They could go higher and now we know that the formula, I did a separate hot take on this recently, the formula underneath it all is, what's the legal term I'm looking for? Fagazi, Fakakta, something a fourth

grader could have come up with. They call it a, these are reciprocal tariffs. Reciprocal tariffs, except they don't seem to know what the word reciprocal means. So instead of making them reciprocate, right, well your tariff is 12% against our imports, so we're gonna hit you with a 12% reciprocal tariff is 12% against our imports, so we're going to hit you with a 12% reciprocal tariff. See how that word is used in a sentence properly, Trump administration? No, that's not what they did. Apparently, and it didn't even take like an AI scientist or a world economist to come

up with this. All they, because I saw some weird numbers, right? I'm looking at why is it like a 70% reciprocal tax with the Ivory Coast? Really, they're hitting us with 70% import taxes and to, no, that's not what it was. They took the country's, let's just do the fraction, right? On the numerator, the top number,

they did the country's trade deficit with the United States. Okay, well, if the country doesn't have a lot of things to sell, it's trade deficit with the United States. Okay, well, the country doesn't have a lot of things to sell, it's going to be in a deficit. But country trade deficit is your numerator, your denominator is total value of exports to the US. So country's trade deficit in dollar divided by exports to the US, get, wait, I'm not done, then take a half of that and it gives you the number. This is like how you predict how tall a baby is going to be. Well, it's the father's height and it's the mother's height and then you add them together, divide by half and that's how big the baby is going to be.

Really? And so China, for instance, let's just play the math out. $300 billion deficit. I mean, it's not nothing. Canada is relatively small at $40 billion, just by comparison. $300 billion deficit for China divided by $440 billion of import value is 67%. There we go, 67%. Cut that in half. That's your reciprocal tariff. You see why the world is

smacking their forehead and going that is the underpinnings intellectual underpinnings of a reciprocal tariff. They're insane. This show is sponsored by Liquid IV. Sometimes when my family is fast asleep and nobody's watching but the family dog, I get my big pile of car magazines and the Sunday paper with a sleeve of chocolate chip cookies and a glass of oat milk. Love looks different for everyone, especially when it comes to all the ways you treat and celebrate yourself. Gift yourself the everyday indulgence of extraordinary hydration from Liquid IV,

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into extraordinary hydration. Treat yourself to extraordinary hydration from Liquid IV. Get 20% off your first order of Liquid IV when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code LegalAF at checkout. That's 20% off your first order with code LegalAF at liquidiv.com. They are totally insane. And now what's happened is $2 trillion worth of corporate value has been shed. And the response to that? Marco Rubio. Again, another in a series of non-economists that work with Donald Trump. Marco Rubio, barely a lawyer. I knew the guy in Florida. Let me just tell you that.

He was in one of my law firms for about 20 minutes. It was a no-show job. The guy never showed up for work, but he got paid because he was at the time the youngest speaker of the Florida House and they wanted to have him around. Okay? This guy, trust me, can barely balance his own family checkbook. He is not an economist. He gets up and says, we're just in a period of recalibration. As soon as the world properly adjusts, we'll all be fine. I actually heard somebody say that yesterday in a store that I was in, like a manager of the store, oh, it'll be fine, you know, a Trumper.

Oh, it'll be fine. The world will just recalibrate. The world will just recalibrate, passing the tariffs as taxes onto the American people. And that's why JP Morgan Chase doesn't think they're going to recalibrate. They think we're heading for a recession. And a bear market. I started off the hot take with bear market. We were in a roaring bull market, meaning rising market.

Yeah, that's what Donald Trump inherited. He decided he doesn't like the bulls, doesn't want to run with the bulls. He wants to have a bear. Yeah, he loves bears, right? Like Putin and Russia. So now we've got a bear market, meaning we are contracting, meaning we are falling off the cliff. That's why $2 trillion worth of value got shed.

And what does Marco Rubio, the non-economist, say about that? He says, don't worry, it's because the stock price for American value was overpriced because it was based on a production schedule and production methods that were not healthy. Thanks, Mr. Little Marco's never ran a business, can't balance a checkbook. Thanks for telling me how the stock market works. I mean, it's, it's so bad that even, even, uh, lead Republicans cheering on

Donald Trump think this is insane. Okay, John Kennedy, a Senator from Louisiana, had two quotes yesterday, two quotes, one on Newsmax and one I'll show you, in which he said, one, we're all going to die. When they asked him about these policies and predictions of success by the Trump administration, his response was, we're all gonna die someday. That is the direct correlation between these policies and reality, death. Let's play the clip.

In the long run, we're all dead. Short run matters too. Nobody knows what the impact of these terrorists is gonna be on the economy. And then he doubled down on it on Newsmax in an interview, which I won't show you, in which he said, if the people in the Trump administration think that these predictions may come true, or they know what's going to happen in the future, then they're selling deep stupid. future, then they're selling deep stupid. I never thought I would say I would agree with Senator John Kennedy from Louisiana, but they are selling deep stupid in the Trump

administration. In fact, that should be their new motto. They should get rid of MAGA and they should just have on their bumper stickers and hats, selling deep stupid. And how dumb do they think the American people are now I'll tell you something else that happened I'll cover here at the end of the hot take all of the industries and segments that supported Donald Trump or are represented represented in his cabinet by Howard Lutnick the Commerce Secretary Linda McMahon Elon Musk all of their companies went down 10%. 9 to 10% in value. Boom. Gone. Yesterday. Every one of them. Howard Lutnick has two companies, BGC and Newmark.

Look them up. Down 9%. Linda McMahon has a company that runs World Wrestling Enterprises called TKO. Down 8-9%. Tesla down another six percent all down all the segments that supported Donald Trump a couple hundred million dollars from the oil industry down eight to ten percent all the tech pros that were up on the podium with them up in the family circle during his inauguration all down 15 12%. Nine, 10% a piece for Apple, for Amazon, for Meta. Down. Anything in tech. Down 10%.

And heading down further at the opening bell today. We could be down 20% in stock value. Donald Trump was given a crown jewel, a gift, a roaring economy by Joe Biden. So roaring that his only thing he had to worry about was how to maintain inflation, working with Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell, which they were working on,

and it was trending downwards at the time of the election. Let me remind you, I'm so nostalgic over Joe Biden at the moment. And what did Donald Trump do with it? We are always, Democratic presidents are always cleaning up behind the elephant, behind the elephant of the Republican party. Every time we get, we either get a crappy economy from them that we have to fix, like Obama and Biden. And then when we turn a good economy over to the next person, they screw it up. Obama turned over a great economy to Trump, screwed it up. It was on life support. Biden comes in, fixes it. Obama took it over from Bush. It was dead. The economy was dead when Obama got in,

resuscitates it. We're always cleaning up behind the elephant. And I'm going to be there for it here on the Midas Touch Network and on Legal AF. So now and free subscribe at LegalAFMTN. That's at LegalAFMTN.