Pre-Markets Drop Hard on New Trump Tariff Talk
Friday, May 23, 2025Pre-market futures are down precipitously this morning as President Trump amps up the rhetoric on his global trade war. While advocates of his plan applaud the hard-line approach, as it promises to bring a new economic reality to the U.S. and its trading partners, investors are back to frowning at the oceans of uncertainty they are once again directly faced with.The Dow is currently down -560 points, roughly -1.3%, while the S&P 500 is -90, -1.5%. The Nasdaq, which has been reinvigorated by recent AI-related growth items, has fallen -400 points, -1.9%, and the small-cap Russell 2000 is -45, -2.1%. It was only earlier this week we were putting in top trading levels for the past month. It may take some major trade deals to turn this back around. Trump is warning Apple AAPL will be facing additional +25% tariffs on iPhones made overseas — whether in China as they are currently or India, as Apple CEO Tim Cook has proposed — unless they are produced here in the U.S. Employing an American workforce to produce iPhones is, stated mildly, not in the cards for the company. Thus, the -3.5% drop in AAPL stock this morning adds to its -19% loss year to date.Not content with going on the offensive against one of America's most successful companies, the president also turns his attention to the European Union (EU), on which he now proposes a +50% tariff on imports from Europe. The EU is a bigger trading partner with the U.S., with currently a $160 billion trade surplus. This is now being challenged.All of this, of course, comes ahead of a three-day holiday weekend in the U.S.: Memorial Day is this Monday, when markets will be closed. A week from today, we'll see a big Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) report — the Fed's preferred gauge on monthly inflation. Also next week will bring us quarterly earnings from NVIDIA NVDA, the most successful chipmaker on the planet. (You can see the full Zacks Earnings Calendar here.)After today's opening bell, New Home Sales for April are expected to wane back below +700K (+724K in March, to be specific) to +695K. A month ago, new home sales were seeing the most business in the South, while the Northeast fell back by -22%. In April, 30-year fixed mortgage rates averaged +6.88%.We wish you all a happy and safe Memorial Day weekend, where we keep in mind those who sacrificed their lives and livelihoods on behalf of defending our nation. See you next week.Questions or comments about this article and/or author? Click here>>
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With troops in Los Angeles, echoes of the Kent State massacre
Ohio National Guard members with gas masks and rifles advance toward Kent State University students during an anti-war protest on May 4, 1970. More than a dozen students were killed or injured when the guard opened fire. (.) This article was originally published by The Trace. Earlier in June, President Donald Trump deployed thousands of National Guard troops and Marines to quell anti-deportation protests and secure federal buildings in downtown Los Angeles. The move, some historians say, harks back 55 years to May 4, 1970, when Ohio's Republican governor summoned the National Guard to deal with students demonstrating against the Vietnam War at Kent State University. Guard members were ordered to fire over the students' heads to disperse the crowd, but some couldn't hear because they were wearing gas masks. The troops fired at the students instead, killing four and wounding another nine. The shooting served as a cautionary tale about turning the military on civilians. 'Dispatching California National Guard troops against civilian protesters in Los Angeles chillingly echoes decisions and actions that led to the tragic Kent State shooting,' Brian VanDeMark, author of the book 'Kent State: An American Tragedy,' wrote this week for The Conversation. We asked VanDeMark, a history professor at the United States Naval Academy, more about the parallels between 1970 and today. His interview has been edited for length and clarity. After the Kent State shooting, it became taboo for presidents or governors to even consider authorizing military use of force against civilians. Is the shadow of Kent State looming over Los Angeles? VanDeMark: For young people today, 55 years ago seems like a very long time. For the generation that came of age during the '60s and were in college during that period, Kent State is a defining event, shaping their views of politics and the military. There are risks inherent in deploying the military to deal with crowds and protesters. At Kent State, the county prosecutor warned the governor that something terrible could happen if he didn't shut down the campus after the guard's arrival. The university's administration did not want the guard brought to campus because they understood how provocative that would be to student protesters who were very anti-war and anti-military. It's like waving a red flag in front of a bull. The military is not trained or equipped to deal well with crowd control. It is taught to fight and kill, and to win wars. California Governor Gavin Newsom has said that deploying the guard to Los Angeles is inflammatory. What do you fear most about this new era of domestic military deployment? People's sense of history probably goes back five or 10 years rather than 40 or 50. That's regrettable. The people making these decisions — I can't unpack their motivation or perceptions — but I think their sense of history in terms of the dangers inherent in deploying U.S. troops to deal with street protests is itself a problem. There are parallels between Kent State and Los Angeles. There are protesters throwing bottles at police and setting fires. The Ohio governor called the Kent State protesters dissidents and un-American; President Trump has called the Los Angeles demonstrators insurrectionists, although he appears to have walked that back. What do you make of these similarities? The parallels are rather obvious. The general point I wish to make, without directing it at a particular individual, is that the choice of words used to describe a situation has consequences. Leaders have positions of responsibility and authority. They have a responsibility to try to keep the situation under control. Are officers today more apt to use rubber bullets and other so-called less-lethal rounds than in 1970? Even though these rounds do damage, they're less likely to kill. Could that save lives today? Most likely, yes. In 1970, the guard members at Kent State, all they had were tear gas canisters and assault rifles loaded with live ammunition. Lessons have been learned between 1970 and today, and I'm almost certain that the California National Guard is equipped with batons, plastic shields, and other tools that give them a range of options between doing nothing and killing someone. I've touched one of the bullets used at Kent State. It was five and a half inches long. You can imagine the catastrophic damage that can inflict on the human body. Those bullets will kill at 1,000 yards, so the likelihood that the military personnel in Los Angeles have live ammunition is very remote. Trump authorized the deployment of federal troops not only to Los Angeles but also to wherever protests are 'occurring or are likely to occur,' leading to speculation that the presence of troops will become permanent. Was that ever a consideration in the '60s and '70s, or are we in uncharted waters here? In the 1960s and early 1970s, presidents of both parties were very reluctant to deploy military forces against protests. Has that changed? Apparently it has. I personally believe that the military being used domestically against American citizens, or even people living here illegally, is not the answer. Generally speaking, force is not the answer. The application of force is inherently unpredictable. It's inherently uncontrollable. And very often the consequences of using it are terrible human suffering. Before the Kent State shooting, the assumption by most college-aged protesters was that there weren't physical consequences to engaging in protests. Kent State demonstrated otherwise. In Los Angeles, the governor, the mayor, and all responsible public officials have essentially said they will not tolerate violence or the destruction of property. I think that most of the protesters are peaceful. What concerns me is the small minority who are unaware of our history and don't understand the risks of being aggressive toward the authorities. In Los Angeles, we have not just the guard but also the Marines. Marines, as you mentioned, are trained to fight wars. What's the worst that could happen here? People could get killed. I don't know what's being done in terms of defining rules of engagement, but I assume that the Marines have explicitly been told not to load live ammunition in their weapons because that would risk violence and loss of life. I don't think that the guard or the Marines are particularly enthusiastic about having to apply coercive force against protesters. Their training in that regard is very limited, and their understanding of crowd psychology is probably very limited. The crowd psychology is inherently unpredictable and often nonlinear. If you don't have experience with crowds, you may end up making choices based on your lack of experience that are very regrettable. Some people are imploring the Marines and guard members to refuse the orders and stay home. You interviewed guard members who were at Kent State. Do you think the troops deployed to Los Angeles will come to regret it? Very often, and social science research has corroborated this, when authorities respond to protests and interact with protesters in a respectful fashion, that tends to have a calming effect on the protesters' behavior. But that's something learned through hard experience, and these Marines and guard members don't have that experience. The National Guard was deployed in Detroit in 1967; Washington, D.C. in 1968; Los Angeles in 1965 and 1992; and Minneapolis and other cities in 2020 after the murder of George Floyd. Have the Marines ever been deployed? Or any other military branch? Yes. In 1992, in the wake of the Rodney King controversy, the California governor at the time, a Republican named Pete Wilson, asked President George H.W. Bush to deploy not only the guard but also the Marines to deal with street riots in Los Angeles. That's the last time it was done. And how did that go? I'm not an expert on this, but I assure you that the senior officers who commanded those Marines made it very clear that they were not to discharge their weapons without explicit permission from the officers themselves, and they were probably told not to load their weapons with live ammunition. In 1967, during the Detroit riots, the Michigan National Guard was called out to the streets of Detroit. When the ranking senior officer arrived, he ordered the soldiers to remove their bullets from their rifles. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
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The Senate GOP's hard-liners are suddenly sounding softer on the megabill
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