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Why Kamala Harris has the advantage in debating Donald Trump

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“All of the things that we’ve done, nobody’s ever, never seen anything like, even from a medical standpoint. Right to try, where we can try space age materials instead of going to Asia or going to Europe and trying to get when you’re terminally ill. Now, you can go and you can get something. You sign a document.” Thus spake Donald Trump during his debate with President Joe Biden in June. Sift a bit, and maybe consult Google, and you can extract the meaning from the heap of words, shovelled up as part of his closing argument. The debate, a disaster for Mr Biden, may yet also prove one for Mr Trump, who did well that evening only because his opponent did worse.

Economics

Trump is losing the confidence of business leaders, billionaire investor Bill Ackman says

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Bill Ackman, CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, speaks during an interview for an episode of “The David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations,” in New York on Nov. 28, 2023.

Jeenah Moon | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Billionaire investor Bill Ackman said that America was heading toward a self-inflicted “economic nuclear winter” as a result of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariff policy rollout.

“By placing massive and disproportionate tariffs on our friends and our enemies alike and thereby launching a global economic war against the whole world at once, we are in the process of destroying confidence in our country as a trading partner,” Ackman, who had endorsed Trump during the elections, wrote on social media platform X.

Trump’s latest tariffs, signed into effect Wednesday, set a 10% baseline levy on all imports, hitting over 180 countries and hammering global markets.

China faces the highest tariffs, with the Trump administration having imposed 54% in duties since January. Beijing has retaliated with 34% tariffs on all goods imported from the U.S.

U.S. equities capped off a vicious week for investors last Friday, down 9.08%, according to data from FactSet, as Trump’s moves stoke fears of a global economic slowdown. J.P. Morgan lifted the odds for a U.S. and global recession to 60% by the end of the year, up from 40% previously.

“Business is a confidence game. The president is losing the confidence of business leaders around the globe,” Ackman said.

“The consequences for our country and the millions of our citizens who have supported the president — in particular low-income consumers who are already under a huge amount of economic stress — are going to be severely negative. This is not what we voted for,” the hedge fund manager said.

Trump has the opportunity to call for a timeout for any negotiations to resolve any “unfair” tariff deals.

“Alternatively, we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down,” he said.

In a separate tweet, Ackman also took potshots at U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. “He profits when our economy implodes. It’s a bad idea to pick a Secretary of Commerce whose firm is levered long fixed income,” Ackman said, adding that it is an “irreconcilable conflict of interest.”

On Sunday, Lutnick told CBS that the Trump administration will remain steadfast in its reciprocal tariffs against key trading partners even in the face of a global stock rout.

The U.S. Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

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Economics

Texas looks set to pass America’s biggest school-voucher scheme

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GREGG ABBOTT was playing retribution politics before it was cool. Two years ago the governor of Texas named his top policy priority: a sprawling school-voucher bill that would give parents $10,000 each year if they sent their children to private schools, opting out of the public system. He wants choice “not just for millionaires” but for the state’s nearly 6m schoolchildren, one of every nine in America. But after failing to get his bill passed he went on the attack and backed primary challenges to Republicans who had voted against it, knocking most of them out of the legislature. Now Austin’s politicos are betting vouchers will pass. On April 3rd the bill made it out of committee. Mr Abbott is planning a “Texas-sized party” to celebrate its becoming law.

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Economics

How Donald Trump’s tariffs will probably fare in court

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WITH AMERICA still reeling from the tariffs imposed by Donald Trump on around 180 countries, a conservative organisation has filed a lawsuit challenging an initial round of tariffs the president announced in February—and doubled in March—on Chinese imports. The New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), which counts Charles Koch, a right-wing billionaire, among its supporters, argues that Mr Trump lacked the authority to impose these levies. Similar lawsuits against the broader tariff blitz of April 2nd could yet scuttle the boldest—and most destructive—move of Mr Trump’s second term.

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