Latest news with #AmericanCompass
Bloomberg
5 days ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
Trumponomics: Is Trump Right About the Fed Getting It Wrong?
On this episode of Trumponomics, we discuss whether Jerome Powell has overestimated the risk of inflation stemming from the US trade war. Joining us are Oren Cass, founder and chief economist at American Compass and Anna Wong, chief US economist at Bloomberg Economics who served in various roles in Trump's first administration. Along with host Stephanie Flanders, they examine whether the Fed has been getting it wrong on rates, and if so, why.
Wall Street Journal
7 days ago
- Automotive
- Wall Street Journal
Ronald Reagan Was No Protectionist
During a debate that I participated in at the Harvard Club of New York in December, Oren Cass, founder of the think tank American Compass, tried to draft President Ronald Reagan into the ranks of trade protectionists. Mr. Cass quoted a claim that Reagan was 'the greatest protectionist since Herbert Hoover' and said that he 'took repeated aggressive protectionist trade actions against the Japanese in particular.' Mr. Cass's argument, now a standard protectionist claim, was that because Reagan in 1981 agreed to a temporary voluntary restraint deal limiting the number of Japanese automobiles that could be imported into the U.S., he was a protectionist. I pointed out to Mr. Cass that I saw Reagan 'at least once a week' during that period while I was working on the president's budget, which I co-authored in the House, and could attest that the president hated the deal. He agreed to the compromise only to prevent lawmakers from passing more extreme protectionist legislation. Several historical events led up to the Japan agreement. The U.S. emerged from World War II with a monopoly in heavy manufacturing because our industrial base was new and intact while most of the developed world's factories were largely in ruins. That started to change after the first Japanese Toyotas rolled off the ship in Los Angeles. By the 1970s, America's auto monopoly faced growing competition on quality and price. Foreign auto imports surged, putting financial stress on an industry that had become noncompetitive. Congress responded by bailing out Chrysler Corporation, which was on the verge of bankruptcy, in 1979. In March 1981, the presidents of America's Big Three automakers—General Motors, Ford and Chrysler—visited Washington to announce that their ability to continue producing cars in the U.S. was in doubt and to plead for help. Unemployment, inflation and interest rates were near postwar highs. Any hope of passing Reagan's 1981 budget in the Democratic-controlled House would require a near-unanimous Republican vote, which at the time was incredibly rare.
Politico
02-07-2025
- Business
- Politico
Trump's Political Realignment Is Missing in the Megabill
In the service of pushing his tax-and-spending megabill over the finish line, Donald Trump has spent recent days cajoling, threatening and meeting with lawmakers. His message to them was simple. 'It's a great bill,' the president explained at a Florida event Tuesday. 'There is something for everyone.' Perhaps there is, but the so-called Big, Beautiful Bill is still missing one key element — an overarching plan to create and lock in a durable Republican coalition. It's an astonishing oversight. Over the past decade, Trump has unleashed the tectonic forces of political realignment. He has torn his party down to the studs and then remade it in his image. He has splintered the Obama coalition and accelerated a class-based political reordering that stands to upend nearly a century of convention. His most recent win was marked by a more racially and ethnically diverse voter coalition than in his two prior campaigns. These are accomplishments most presidents have only dreamed of. Yet the centerpiece of Trump's legislative agenda does almost nothing to harness any of it in the service of a permanent MAGA governing majority. He is spending every last cent of his political capital on a bill marked by its lack of ambition and vision. It suggests real limits to the MAGA revolution, either because the coalition is inherently brittle or because of the stiff challenges Trump still faces in transforming the GOP, even as he utterly dominates it. This was the moment to announce the arrival of what could be a multi-ethnic working-class coalition. The time to deal a crowning blow to a feckless opposition party that remains convinced the only thing holding it back is ineffective messaging. Instead, the White House produced a domestic policy bill that could have just as easily been produced by any generic Republican administration. There's no Nixon-goes-to-China policy surprise, no dramatic break from the familiar. Nothing bold to suggest the unique populist coalition he has assembled or to cement it in the decades ahead. Its signature idea, tax relief, is meaningful — and shouldn't be minimized — but that's always been a core GOP tenet. So has a generalized commitment to growth and prosperity. Spending on border security addresses a critical need, but isn't inherently additive. Much of the bill smacks of a reassertion of decades-old Republican policies and an embrace of party orthodoxy. It is easily caricatured as a giveaway to the wealthy that also slashes health care, a pinata for Democrats to bash and ride back to a House majority. One astute conservative student of the realignment likened the legislation 'to a death march through a series of choices that nobody really wanted to be making.' '[It's] not something that has an especially coherent logic to it or much prospect of actually accomplishing the things that I think people want,' Oren Cass, founder of the think tank American Compass and a leading advocate of conservative economic populism, told POLITICO Magazine recently. The failure to imbue the legislation with more of a Trumpist ideological throughline may be due to a few factors; perhaps it's Trump's well-known aversion to wonky policy details, or the fact that most Republican lawmakers are still loyal to the Reaganite economic policy they came up with even as they now publicly bow to Trump. But whether the sprawling bill is ultimately judged a policy success or failure, it lacks an original vision to hold together the constituencies Trump has improbably knitted together — tax relief, border spending, safety net cuts and Biden policy rollbacks aren't a theory of the case. Sure, it has a few Trumpian frills that nod to the president's populist campaign pledges, but they are largely small-bore and were scaled back by senators anyway. 'No tax on tips' became a temporary tax deduction on tips, for instance. The brief musings about a tax hike on upper-income earners quickly were extinguished by opposition from Republicans on Capitol Hill. Decades from now, no one will point to this legislation as a key building block of a lasting Republican coalition. It's more likely to be remembered for the estimated $3.3 trillion it is set to add to the national debt. The legislation isn't just a missed opportunity. It's also a striking departure from the more disciplined efforts to reshape and reckon with an evolving party that happened in the last Republican administration before Trump. When George W. Bush occupied the White House, Karl Rove, his political architect, pursued a master plan to lock in the party's newly emerging coalition and ensure its viability over the long haul. The creation of Medicare Part D, the program's new prescription drug benefit, was designed to blunt the Democratic advantage on health care issues. Immigration reform, which failed, was a nod toward consolidating Bush's gains with Latino voters. The Iraq debacle made the efforts moot, but some of the residual effects of Rove's work remain visible today: the GOP's edge in the exurbs, its dominant position among evangelicals, the party's gains with Catholics. If anything, the megabill threatens to peel off some of the new constituencies of the ascendant Republican coalition or give them cause for concern. The Medicaid spending cuts stand to hit working class people of color and in rural America hard, from the Trump Belt of Appalachia to the Southwest. The income tax cuts and expanded childcare tax credit will be warmly welcomed, but wealthier Americans will benefit more. It's revealing that there is no quarter of the new coalition that is wildly enthusiastic about the package. Polling suggests Americans largely disapprove of the megabill, though there is support for some of its individual provisions. More important, from the standpoint of the future of the MAGA coalition, are findings like this one: According to a June Washington Post-Ipsos poll on the bill, non-white, non-college graduates — an important part of the new coalition — oppose it by a 41 percent to 18 percent margin. Without voters like them, it isn't really much of a realignment. Trump and his allies in GOP leadership are still working to nail down the final votes, but passage seems likely sooner or later. In the unlikely event that the whole thing collapses and Republicans have to start from scratch, it would obviously be a humiliation for the party. But it would also be an opportunity — a rare second chance for Trump to design legislation in a way that actually moves the realignment forward.
Straits Times
25-06-2025
- Business
- Straits Times
US will not sanction Russia yet, Rubio tells Politico
FILE PHOTO: U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks at the American Compass fifth anniversary gala at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 3, 2025. REUTERS/Nathan Howard/File Photo U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Politico that the United States will not impose further sanctions on Russia yet, and still wants room to negotiate a peace deal. "If we did what everybody here wants us to do, and that is come in and crush them with more sanctions, we probably lose our ability to talk to them about the ceasefire and then who's talking to them?," Rubio told Politico in an interview on the sidelines of the NATO summit. Rubio added that President Donald Trump will "know the right time and place" for new economic measures against Russia, and that the administration is working with Congress to make sure they allow Trump the appropriate flexibility, Politico reported. "If there's an opportunity for us to make a difference and get them (Russia) to the table, we're going to take it," Rubio said. REUTERS Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.
The Star
25-06-2025
- Business
- The Star
US will not sanction Russia yet, Rubio tells Politico
FILE PHOTO: U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks at the American Compass fifth anniversary gala at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 3, 2025. REUTERS/Nathan Howard/File Photo (Reuters) -U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Politico that the United States will not impose further sanctions on Russia yet, and still wants room to negotiate a peace deal. "If we did what everybody here wants us to do, and that is come in and crush them with more sanctions, we probably lose our ability to talk to them about the ceasefire and then who's talking to them?," Rubio told Politico in an interview on the sidelines of the NATO summit. Rubio added that President Donald Trump will "know the right time and place" for new economic measures against Russia, and that the administration is working with Congress to make sure they allow Trump the appropriate flexibility, Politico reported. "If there's an opportunity for us to make a difference and get them (Russia) to the table, we're going to take it," Rubio said. (Reporting by Rishabh Jaiswal in Bengaluru; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
