Tag Archives: china

Newsweek: Child Protections for Green Card Applicants Reversed: What To Know

Posted on by
Reply

Anew interpretation of immigration law has upended protections for children of long-waiting green card applicants, putting some 200,000 young people—many of whom have spent their entire lives in the U.S.—at risk of losing their legal status once they turn 21.

The change to the Child Status Protection Act (CSPA) undoes a Biden-era policy that had shielded thousands of children from “aging out” of green card eligibility, and represents a seismic alteration for children on immigrant families holding H-1B visas.

Why It Matters

The rollback isn’t just a technical tweak to visa calculations—it could decide whether thousands of children stay with their families or are forced to leave the only country they’ve ever known.

The impact will fall hardest on families of H-1B visa holders stuck in the green card backlog. About 200,000 children—mostly from India and China—risk “aging out” when they turn 21, losing dependent status and facing a future of student visas, self-deportation, or exile. For families who have already waited decades, the change highlights both the fragility of existing protections and the broader failures of America’s immigration system to keep families together.

What To Know

The new U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) rule officially took effect on August 15. From that date forward, only the Final Action Dates chart from the Visa Bulletin will determine a child’s CSPA age.

Families that submit adjustment of status applications before that date will still be protected under the more flexible February 2023 policy, which allowed children to rely on the earlier “Dates for Filing” chart. Those who wait beyond the deadline risk seeing their children age out much faster under the new calculation system.

In practical terms, families who delay filing until after mid-August may lose the protective cushion that previously gave them more time before their children turned 21.

The New Changes and What They Mean

The 2023 policy let families use the Dates for Filing chart to lock in a child’s CSPA age. This gave families valuable time and allowed more children to remain eligible as dependents, even amid long visa backlogs.

Immigration lawer, Carolyn Lee said: “The 2023 policy was an expansive move by USCIS to allow children to stop aging earlier. That is, to be given a broader avenue to remain under 21. However, this move raised other questions because it did not conform with U.S. State Department’s adoption of the “stop aging” point – or “visa availability.” So, the new policy, while snapping back to the less expansive position, aligns with State’s and eliminates confusion in this regard.”

Lee added: “The real problem is that dependents still can get separated from their parents during the lengthy visa adjudication process. Our immigration laws embrace family unity as a public goal, and so while we’re thankful to have CSPA, when faced with clients who face the very difficult outcome of being separated from their little ones, I do wonder whether we can look at this problem through a different lens and come up with a better solution.”

Advocates praised the 2023 policy as fairer, but critics said it conflicted with the State Department’s rules. With the new policy, USCIS is now reverting to Final Action Dates, aligning policies but narrowing protections. Eligibility will now hinge solely on this, and the change could accelerate the point at which children “age out” by turning 21 before receiving their green card.

The result is less flexibility for families, has higher risks for children, and potentially devastating consequences for those who have spent years—sometimes decades—waiting in line for permanent residency.

What Is the CSPA?

The Child Status Protection Act, passed in 2002, was designed precisely to shield families from bureaucratic delays.

Its goal was to allow children to retain eligibility despite the often yearslong wait between filing and approval.

The law calculates a “CSPA age” that subtracts certain delays from a child’s actual age, sometimes keeping them under the age of 21 even after their actual twenty-first birthday passes.

The law, however, leaves room for interpretation, especially around what counts as a “visa availability date.”

Without congressional reform of green card quotas, experts warn that children will continue facing the risk of aging out.

What People Are Saying

USCIS, in an August 8 alert detailing changes to the CSPA, said: “The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) defines a child as a person who is both unmarried and under 21 years old. If an alien applies for lawful permanent resident (LPR) status as a child but turns 21 before being approved for LPR status (also known as getting a Green Card), that alien can no longer be considered a child for immigration purposes.

It added: “This situation is commonly referred to as aging out, and may mean these aliens must file a new petition or application or wait even longer to get a Green Card, or are no longer eligible for a Green Card.”

Immigration lawer, Carolyn Lee told Newsweek via email on August 26 “The Child Status Protection Act is an important ameliorative law [something that improves a situation or reduces harm] that recognizes that delays in U.S. immigration processing can separate parents from their children and addresses that heartbreaking problem. It does so by providing a mechanism—a formula, really—that in its operation may keep children under 21 and thereby retain their derivative status.

What Happens Next

USCIS will open a formal rulemaking process later in 2025, inviting public comments that advocates and families are expected to use to push back against the policy. Legal challenges are also possible, as courts may be asked to decide whether the stricter interpretation conflicts with the CSPA’s purpose of keeping families together.

In the meantime, lawyers are urging families to act fast and document extraordinary circumstances to protect eligibility.

The Trump regime is making changes that will likely force 200,000 children of H-1B visa holders to leave the only country they’ve ever known.

Child Protections for Green Card Applicants Reversed: What To Know
Stricter green card rules may split families because children of visa holders lose protections once they turn 21.

https://newsweek.com/child-protections-green-card-applicants-reversed-what-know-2119952

CNN: End of an era: Billions of packages of ‘cheap’ goods shipped to the US are now subject to steep tariffs

Posted on by
Reply

A big change to all the “cheap goods” Americans order just went into effect.

For nearly a century, low-value packages of goods from abroad have entered the United States duty free, thanks to what’s known as the “de minimis rule,” which as of 2015 has applied to packages worth less than $800.

The loophole has reshaped the way countless Americans shop, enabling many small businesses globally to sell goods to US consumers with relative ease and allowing, in particular, ultra-low-cost Chinese e-commerce sites like Shein, Temu and AliExpress to sell everything from clothing to furniture to electronics directly to American shoppers, escaping many duties in place for packages exceeding the $800 threshold.

But those days are over. As of one minute past midnight Eastern Time, all imported goods — regardless of their value — are now subject to 10% to 50% tariff rates, depending on their country of origin. (In certain cases, they could face a flat fee of $80 to $200, but only for the next six months.)

A headache for delivery services

Ahead of the expiration of the de minimis rule, a slew of delivery services across Europe, as well as Japan, Australia, Taiwan and Mexico suspended deliveries to the United States, citing logistical compliance challenges.

International shipper UPS, meanwhile, said in a statement to CNN Thursday: “We stand ready for the new changes and do not anticipate any backlogs or delays.”

DHL, which suspended service for standard parcel shipments from Germany but is continuing to ship international packages to the United States from all other countries it serves, told CNN that shipments “may experience delays during the transitional period as all parties adjust to the changes in tariff policy and regulation.”

The United States Postal Service and FedEx declined to comment on whether customers should anticipate delays.

“Our systems are fully programmed and equipped to support the seamless implementation of these changes. CBP has prepared extensively for this transition and stands ready with a comprehensive strategy, having provided clear and timely guidance to supply chain partners, including foreign postal operators, carriers, and qualified third parties to ensure compliance with the new rules.

Susan Thomas, the acting executive assistant commissioner for Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Trade, told CNN in a statement that the agency’s systems “are fully programmed and equipped to support the seamless implementation of these changes.”

“CBP has prepared extensively for this transition and stands ready with a comprehensive strategy, having provided clear and timely guidance to supply chain partners, including foreign postal operators, carriers, and qualified third parties to ensure compliance with the new rules,” she said.

A potential benefit for some American small businesses

While some small businesses, like some individual consumers, have benefited from the de minimis exemption by purchasing goods duty-free, the end of the exemption may benefit some, too.

For Steve Raderstorf, co-owner of Scrub Identity, which sells scrubs and other medical apparel at two stores located in Indianapolis, the tariff change will “level the playing field” for him and, he believes, other small business owners, he said.

A 2023 report by Coalition for a Prosperous America, a group that advocates for US producers and manufacturers, estimates that e-commerce giants like Amazon and Walmart took in hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue in 2022 through their networks of third-party sellers who took advantage of the loophole.

Raderstorf said almost all the goods he sells are imported. But as a small business, he doesn’t have the ability to set up a third-party network to tap into the exemption. Instead, his imported goods are all subject to applicable tariffs.

Additionally, many of the foreign manufacturers from whom he purchases goods in bulk in order to get a better price have benefited from de minimis by setting up sites to sell directly to people who could have otherwise shopped at his stores.

With de minimis gone, he feels small businesses have a better chance to compete more fairly with mega retailers and also support their local communities more.

“When somebody comes to my door and they want me to support the local football team or baseball team, I have money to do that then, and then it gets back into the community,” he told CNN. “When it goes to China, it never, ever stays in the United States — it’s gone for good.”

Since the de minimis exemption was closed for China and Hong Kong, CBP has seen packages that would have otherwise qualified for duty-free status go down from an average of 4 million a day to 1 million, White House officials told reporters Thursday.

Raderstorf is empathetic to Americans who are concerned about the increased cost of goods — but at the same time, he’s hopeful it’s “going to push them back out into their communities to meet their local retailers.”

End of an era: Billions of packages of ‘cheap’ goods shipped to the US are now subject to steep tariffs | CNN Business
A big change to all the “cheap goods” Americans order just went into effect.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/08/29/business/end-of-an-era-billions-of-packages-of-cheap-goods-shipped-to-the-us-are-now-subject-to-steep-tariffs

CNBC: Most Trump tariffs ruled illegal in blow to White House trade policy

Posted on by
Reply
  • A federal appeals court ruled that most of President Donald Trump’s global tariffs are illegal, striking a massive blow to the core of his aggressive trade policy.
  • Trump is all but certain to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court.

A federal appeals court ruled Friday that most of President Donald Trump‘s global tariffs are illegal, striking a massive blow to the core of his aggressive trade policy.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a 7-4 ruling held that the law Trump invoked when he granted his most expansive tariffs does not actually grant him the power to impose those levies.

Trump is all but certain to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court. The appellate court paused its ruling from taking effect until Oct. 14, in order to give the Trump administration time to ask the Supreme Court to take up the case.

The White House did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on Friday’s ruling, which is the second straight loss for Trump in the make-or-break case.

The Trump administration has argued that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, empowers the president to effectively impose country-specific tariffs at any level if he deems them necessary to address a national emergency.

The U.S. Court of International Trade in late May rejected that stance and struck down Trump’s IEEPA-based tariffs, including his worldwide “reciprocal” tariffs unveiled in early April. But the Federal Circuit quickly paused that ruling while Trump’s appeal played out.

Most Trump tariffs ruled illegal in blow to White House trade policy
The appeals court stayed its ruling until Oct. 14, giving the Trump administration time to ask the Supreme Court to hear the case.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/08/29/trump-trade-tariffs-appeals-court-ieepa.html

Market Watch: Trump closes the ‘de minimis’ shipping loophole. Etsy and eBay shares have tumbled.

Posted on by
Reply

‘De minimis’ exemption for shipments worth $800 or less now has ended

Shares of Etsy Inc. and eBay Inc. have been down sharply over the past week, with analysts pinning the moves on the Trump administration’s closure of a trade loophole on Friday.

The “de minimis” exemption has made it possible for shipments worth $800 or less to avoid tariffs and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol scrutiny. It was ended in May for shipments from China, hurting e-commerce companies Shein and PDD Holdings Inc.’s (-1.34%) Temu, and the loophole now has gone away for all other countries, as well.

President Donald Trump rolled out an executive order targeting de minimis treatment on July 30, specifying that the exemption would end at 12:01 a.m. Eastern time Friday.

Trump’s order is “removing a key channel for low-value cross-border shipments,” Cantor analysts said in a report, and Etsy  (-1.43%), eBay (-1.70%) and Shopify (SHOP -0.06%) “likely have notable direct exposure.” They noted that Etsy and eBay have underperformed the Nasdaq Composite Index (-1.15%)  over the past week. As of Thursday’s close, Etsy shares are down 14% over the past five trading sessions, while eBay has dropped 6% and Shopify is down 1%. The Nasdaq is up 1% over the same period.

“Over the medium term, supply diversification from domestic sellers should mitigate the impact on demand,” the Cantor analysts wrote.

Etsy has offered a guide to its sellers as the de minimis exemption comes to an end, promising to “continue to share updates over the next few months that make it easier to facilitate cross-border transactions and incorporate the cost of tariffs into your shop operations.” The chief executive for eBay, Jamie Iannone, said during an earnings call on July 30 that the company is “not immune to the increased costs from tariffs” but believes it is “relatively resilient from that perspective, more so than others.”

The overall impact to the U.S. economy of eliminating the loophole is “likely to be limited,” Evercore ISI analysts said in a note. Shipments claiming the de minimis exemption were valued at $65 billion in the past fiscal year, amounting to around 2% of total U.S. imports.

While postal carriers for a number of countries have announced they’re temporarily suspending shipments to the U.S. due to operational uncertainty around the new policy, the Evercore analysts noted that Customs and Border Patrol data show that more than 90% of de minimis packages are carried by private express carriers and logistics providers, who are “not indicating any disruption when the policy takes effect.”

“The move will have an impact on some consumers who will now bear at least a share of tariffs as well as the higher administrative costs associated with processing smaller packages for tariff collection,” the Evercore analysts said. They noted that a recent study found that both high- and low-income households have taken advantage of the de minimis exemption, but that “low-income households benefit disproportionately as a share of their income.”

In addition, Evercore’s team noted that all existing tariffs now will apply to packages under $800, except during a six-month transition period when there will be an option of paying either a percentage rate equal to the country-specific tariff or a flat fee ranging from $80 to $200 that scales with the country’s tariff rate.

Peter Navarro, Trump’s senior counselor for trade and manufacturing, predicted on Thursday afternoon that ending the de minimis loophole “will save thousands of American lives by restricting the flow of narcotics and other dangerous and prohibited items, add up to $10 billion a year in tariff revenues to our Treasury, create thousands of jobs and defend against billions of dollars more lost in counterfeiting, piracy and intellectual-property theft.”

Navarro also criticized foreign postal carriers that have suspended shipments to the U.S.

“Foreign post offices need to get their act together when it comes to monitoring and policing the use of international mail for smuggling and tariff-evasion purposes,” the Trump adviser told reporters during a briefing. “We are going to help them do that, but at this point, they are vastly underperforming express carriers like FedEx (-0.29%), DHL (-0.36%) and UPS (+0.24%) .”

The Alliance for American Manufacturing is among the organizations praising Trump’s move.

“Closure of the de minimis loophole is an important step forward, but there’s still more work to be done in leveling the playing field for U.S. manufacturers,” AAM President Scott Paul said in a statement. He said the loophole hurt American manufacturers and was “exposing American consumers to illegal, counterfeit and toxic products.”

Trump closes ‘de minimis’ shipping loophole. Etsy and eBay shares have tumbled.
The “de minimis” exemption for shipments worth $800 has ended.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-is-closing-a-shipping-loophole-shares-in-etsy-and-ebay-are-tumbling-baffd57f

Reason: Does It Matter That Donald Trump Is Confused by Magnets?

Posted on by
Reply

Is this another example of Trump’s inability to understand why global trade is good for America, or does it suggest something even more serious?

In just a few months since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has claimed remarkable powers to reshape global trade and has erected some huge barriers to imports into the United States.

Trump has done all of that while repeatedly revealing how little he knows about what he imagines he can design. By now, it is obvious that Trump does not understand what trade deficits are, does not know that Americans bear the cost of his tariffs, and does not comprehend how American manufacturing is dependent on global supply chains.

But what if the problem actually runs deeper than that? What if the man who has been entrusted by the Republican Party to reshape huge swaths of the national economy and the flow of global trade is suffering from the same sort of cognitive decline that marked Joe Biden’s time in office?

It’s an unsettling question, but one that ought to be pondered in the wake of what happened on Monday in the Oval Office. While hosting South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and taking questions from reporters, Trump went off on a long, nonsensical tangent about magnets and what he apparently believes is a two-decade-long conspiracy orchestrated by the Chinese government.

“They have to give us magnets,” Trump began. “If they don’t give us magnets, then we have to charge them 200 percent tariff for something, you know?”

Alas, there’s the old fallacy at the root of so much of Trump’s trade policies. In effect, the president is promising to place higher taxes on Americans if the Chinese government doesn’t do what he wants. How that’s supposed to work remains unclear as ever.

Aside from that nonsense, however, there is a discernible point here: The trade of rare earth metals, including some that are used to make high-end magnets, is a crucial part of the U.S.-China trade war. In April, China added those items to its export restriction list in response to Trump’s threat of higher tariffs on Chinese goods. The inability to import those magnets is a serious problem for American automakers and other industries. It’s almost like trade wars have unintended consequences.

After that, things got truly unhinged.

“You know, China intelligently went and they sort of took a monopoly of the world’s magnets, and nobody needed magnets until they convinced everybody 20 years ago, ‘Let’s all do magnets,'” Trump continued.

To be clear, the concept of magnetism is not something that the Chinese invented in the early 2000s. It’s also not true that “nobody needed magnets” before then, even though global demand for rare earth metals has increased in the digital age, since they are essential for manufacturing the advanced electronics that power everything from televisions to fighter jets

This ought to illustrate to Trump why launching a trade war with China (and much of the rest of the world) is such a terrible idea. From cocoa beans to bananas to rare earth metals like samarium and yttrium, there are tons of commodities that do not exist in sufficient quantity in the United States to meet consumers’ and business’ needs. The free market has found ways to solve that imbalance, but Trump’s trade policies are making those solutions more expensive and difficult.

But not to worry, Trump explained, because America is now “heavy into the world of magnets now—only from a national security standpoint.”

“But we have a much more powerful thing, and that’s tariffs,” he added. “We’re going to have a lot of magnets in a pretty short period of time.”

Well, that’s a relief, I guess? It sounds like he’s got it all under control, though anyone listening to those remarks would understandably wonder what “it” is.

Incredibly, this isn’t even the craziest thing Trump has ever said on the subject of magnets.

At a campaign rally last year, Trump claimed that “all I know about magnets is this: Give me a glass of water, let me drop it on the magnets, that’s the end of the magnets.”

Magnets, to be clear, work just fine when they are wet. They also work underwater. (In fairness, Trump is not the first prominent figure in American culture to wonder about these things.)

Of course, Trump has never been someone who speaks with particular clarity. His unscripted remarks are often meandering, unfocused, and riddled with inaccuracies and strange non sequiturs. He believes himself to be an expert in everything from global macroeconomics to the hydraulic systems on naval ships.

Even by those standards, however, Monday’s business with the magnets stands out.

Indeed, if you walked past someone in the street who was repeating Trump’s words verbatim, you’d likely keep a healthy distance and possibly wonder what substance they’d most recently been using. If an elderly loved one—a parent or a grandparent, maybe—said the same things privately that Trump said in front of television cameras on Monday, you’d probably wonder if something was wrong. Maybe you’d encourage them to see a doctor.

But this isn’t a bum in the park or your grandfather that we’re talking about. This is the person who currently wields more power than any other human being on the planet, and who is using that power in novel and expansive ways to reshape the economy. Whatever the appropriate response might be in those other situations, shouldn’t it be significantly elevated here?

I am not saying that Trump is a moron, or senile, or in a state of mental decline. But we ought to ponder with some seriousness the same question that Reason‘s Jacob Sullum asked a few months ago during a similarly bizarre incident: If Trump were any of those things, how would we know?

Does It Matter That Donald Trump Is Confused by Magnets?
Is this another example of Trump’s inability to understand why global trade is good for America, or does it suggest something more serious?

https://reason.com/2025/08/27/does-it-matter-that-donald-trump-is-confused-by-magnets

Slingshot News: ‘I Thought We’d Have That Settled Easier’: Trump Demonstrates His Incompetence, Defends His Failed Negotiations With Russia During Press Conference

Posted on by
Reply
‘I Thought We’d Have That Settled Easier’: Trump Demonstrates His Incompetence, Defends His Failed Negotiations With Russia During Press Conference
During his remarks at a press conference in June, President Trump defended his failed negotiations with Russia. Trump stated, “I thought we’d have that settled easier.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/i-thought-we-d-have-that-settled-easier-trump-demonstrates-his-incompetence-defends-his-failed-negotiations-with-russia-during-press-conference/vi-AA1LkS4d

CNN: Could tariffs ruin Christmas?

Posted on by
Reply
Could tariffs ruin Christmas?
For years, vendors at the world’s largest wholesale market in Yiwu, China have been exporting Christmas and Halloween decorations to the US. But now, they’re in the middle of the escalating US-China trade war, forced to suspend or cancel orders.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/could-tariffs-ruin-christmas/vi-AA1DdJvl

Daily Beast: Trump Threatens Countries Failing to Show Him ‘Respect’ in Deranged Late-Night Meltdown

Posted on by
Reply

The president makes vague threats while lashing out at overseas digital services taxes.

Tariff-loving Donald Trump has issued an unhinged threat against countries he claims don’t show the U.S. and major tech companies “respect.”

In a typical deranged late-night post on Truth Social, the MAGA president warned he would impose “substantial” new tariffs and block U.S. chip exports to countries that enforce digital taxes.

Trump argued that digital service taxes are designed to “harm, or discriminate” against American technology, and issued a sinister warning for if they are not dropped.

Trump has long railed against digital services taxes, including those imposed in Europe, which primarily hit U.S. tech giants, including Apple, Google, and Meta.

“They also, outrageously, give a complete pass to China’s largest Tech Companies. This must end, and end NOW,” Trump wrote.

“With this TRUTH, I put all Countries with Digital Taxes, Legislation, Rules, or Regulations, on notice that unless these discriminatory actions are removed,” he added. “America, and American Technology Companies, are neither the ‘piggy bank’ nor the ‘doormat’ of the World any longer. Show respect to America and our amazing Tech Companies or, consider the consequences! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

While not mentioning any nation by name, his comments appear to be a swipe at the European Union, whose Digital Markets Act (DMA) designates tech behemoths as “gatekeepers” and seeks to ensure they do not have a monopoly on their respective markets or abuse their powers.

The president’s warning came shortly after the U.S. and EU issued a joint statement pledging to negotiate over “unjustified trade barriers” targeting U.S. tech companies and agreeing not to impose customs duties on electronic transmissions, Bloomberg reported.

In June, Canada also pulled plans to tax American tech companies’ operations in the country to appease Trump amid threats to impose higher tariffs on imports from its northern neighbor.

Trump blasted Canada’s proposed digital tax—which would have slapped a 3 percent levy on Canadian revenue above $20 million—as a “blatant attack.”

At the time, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney “caved” to Trump by dropping the tax, originally announced in 2020.

Trump Threatens Countries Failing to Show Him ‘Respect’ in Deranged Late-Night Meltdown
The president makes vague threats while lashing out at overseas digital services taxes.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trump-threatens-countries-failing-to-show-him-respect-in-deranged-late-night-meltdown

Black Enterprise: Black Beauty Salons Hit Hard By Trump Tariffs: ‘We’re Impacted At Every Level’

Posted on by
Reply

Trump’s tariffs are taking a heavy toll on Black-owned beauty salons that rely on Chinese-made hair products.

Diann Valentine, 55, founder of Slayyy Hair, first felt the impact of tariffs when a 145% levy on Chinese imports hit, resulting in a $300,000 bill to clear 26,000 units of braiding hair at the Los Angeles port in May. Since then, she has raised the prices of her braiding hair and drawstring ponytail extensions by 20%. Valentine was also forced to lay off four employees and now works 16-hour days to keep her two Glow+Flow beauty supply stores in Inglewood and Hawthorne, California, running smoothly.

“To lose that kind of money at this stage has been devastating,” Valentine said.

“We’re being impacted at every level,” said Dajiah Blackshear-Calloway, 34, a salon owner based in Smyrna, Georgia. “I’m either having to eat that cost or pass that expense along to my clients, which affects their budgets and their pockets as well.”

Blackshear-Calloway’s salon, staffed by two stylists, offers a range of services from $50 natural hairstyles to $745 tape-in weave extensions. Her most popular services include $254 sew-in weaves and $125 quick weaves, where extensions are glued onto a stocking cap.

However, tariffs have driven up the cost of a package of hair imported from Vietnam from $190 in May to $290, while a bottle of hair glue from China jumped from $8 to $14.99 at her local supply store. To avoid passing these costs on to clients, Blackshear-Calloway now asks them to bring their own hair, making a quick weave $140 without hair, compared to $400 with hair provided.

Diann Valentine, 55, founder of Slayyy Hair, first felt the impact of tariffs when a 145% levy on Chinese imports hit, resulting in a $300,000 bill to clear 26,000 units of braiding hair at the Los Angeles port in May. Since then, she has raised the prices of her braiding hair and drawstring ponytail extensions by 20%. Valentine was also forced to lay off four employees and now works 16-hour days to keep her two Glow+Flow beauty supply stores in Inglewood and Hawthorne, California, running smoothly.

“To lose that kind of money at this stage has been devastating,” Valentine said.

Tariffs are hitting Black business owners particularly hard, including many salon owners. Andre Perry, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, notes that the wealth gap leaves Black entrepreneurs, especially those in low-margin industries like consumer goods or haircare services, in financially vulnerable positions, with tariffs further eroding their profits.

“Many Black entrepreneurs started off with less wealth,” Perry said.

Black businesses have endured for generations through innovation and resilience, and it will take that same spirit to navigate the challenges Americans now face due to Trump’s tariffs. Industry experts have been offering tips for small business owners affected by the tariffs, including communicating openly with customers, reassessing supply chains, streamlining operations to address inefficiencies, consulting a financial advisor, and exploring business credit lines.

Black Beauty Salons Hit Hard By Trump Tariffs: ‘We’re Impacted At Every Level’
Donald Trump’s tariffs are putting added strain on Black beauty salons hit hard by the rising cost of Chinese-made hair extensions.
Black Beauty Salons Hit Hard By Trump Tariffs: ‘We’re Impacted At Every Level’

Raw Story: Ex-general warns Trump using National Guard as ‘catnip’: ‘He needs to put on a show’

Posted on by
Reply

A retired American general tore into President Donald Trump and said his latest threats to send the National Guard into Democratic-run cities are merely a tactic to distract his base and the media, likening it to “catnip.”

Major General William Enyart joined MSNBC on Monday afternoon to discuss Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s (D) blistering speech, hitting back at Trump’s plans to send troops to Chicago.

“A barnburner of a speech from Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who told the people of Illinois in no uncertain terms that what Donald J. Trump plans to do in his city is, ‘unprecedented, illegal, unconstitutional, and un-American,’ urging him publicly with the city’s business, faith and elected officials, ‘Do not come to Chicago,'” noted host Nicolle Wallace.

She added that Pritzker made a “salient, indisputable fact” that 13 of the top 20 cities when it comes to homicide rates are led by Republicans. Additionally, eight Republican-led states have the top homicide rates.

Enyart said Pritzker made a “spot-on speech.”

“Trump desperately needs to cling on to power. And I think the reason that he is taking these actions is distraction, distraction, distraction,” he said.

Enyart then hit back at Trump’s claims with statistics of his own.

“The price of hamburger a year ago today: $5.35 a pound. Hamburger today: $6.98 a pound. That’s a 33% increase. Coffee $6.32 a year ago. Today, it’s $8.41 a pound, another 30-plus percent. Food prices have gone up every single month, but one, since Trump took office,” he noted.

Enyart called out Trump for vowing to drive food prices down.

“Yet another lie. He can’t afford to face truth. And that’s why he has to have distraction,” he railed.

Enyart called Trump’s use of the National Guard in Washington, D.C., and proposal to do the same in Chicago simply that.

“He is doing it in order to provide a distraction to his base and to, frankly, to most of the news media so they’ll chase that catnip,” he said, calling Trump’s tariffs a “failure,” along with his negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Corn prices have cratered. Corn prices are 40% down from what they were under the Biden administration,” he added.

Soybean prices for farmers, he added, are down more than 50% since Biden’s administration.

” China used to buy 60% of their soybeans from the United States farmers. Today? 20%. Brazil took those. Why? Trump’s tariffs. His policies are incredibly unpopular, and so he needs to put on a show. He is a mastermind at showmanship, and that’s what he is doing.”

See the video below or at the link here.

Ex-general warns Trump using National Guard as ‘catnip’: ‘He needs to put on a show’

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-grocery-prices-2673917522