Consumers Absolutely HATE Trump's Economy

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Bulwark Takes – "Consumers Absolutely HATE Trump's Economy"

Host: Sarah Longwell
Guest: Katherine Rampel
Date: November 9, 2025

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Overview

In this episode, Sarah Longwell welcomes Katherine Rampel, The Bulwark’s new economics reporter, for her first “official take” on the podcast. The discussion is focused on the state of consumer sentiment in the Trump economy — why Americans are feeling so negatively, the effects of government policy (especially tariffs), and how the Supreme Court may shift Trump's economic legacy. The episode also explores business reactions, fears around presidential power, and whether recent Republican election losses might embolden businesses and institutions to push back.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Consumer Sentiment Hits Historic Lows

[01:14 – 01:43]

• Backdrop: The University of Michigan’s latest survey finds consumer sentiment at its lowest in over three years, nearly matching the worst levels ever.
• Katherine’s Take:
  • Sentiment has been deteriorating for years, not always reflecting true economic conditions.
  • This time, concerns are justified: government shutdowns, persistent tariffs, and ongoing affordability crises.
  • "People are upset and, and worried about prices, about losing their jobs." (01:41 – Rampel)
  • Only the wealthiest, especially major stockholders, are feeling optimistic.

2. Disconnect Between Economic Data and Public Mood

[02:43 – 04:04]

• Recent Job Losses: 1.1 million jobs lost since January.
• Despite data sometimes showing a “quite good” economy (inflation down, job growth solid), most Americans feel it is terrible.
• Partisanship's Role: There’s a clear partisan split; however, the present discontent is widespread.
• "I do not think that this economy is anywhere near as bad as that in 2008." (03:35 – Rampel)

3. Uncertainty Under Trump: Policy by Whim

[04:17 – 06:16]

• Data Blackout:
  • Government shutdowns have stopped the flow of reliable economic data, causing a "fog" for both businesses and consumers.
  • "It's really hard to tell what is going on in the present, and it's going to be even harder to tell what's happening in the next few months..." (04:58 – Rampel)
• Unpredictability:
  • Much economic uncertainty is “driven by government policy,” especially with Trump’s impulsive approach (notably tariffs issued via Truth Social posts).

4. Supreme Court and the Future of Tariffs

[07:03 – 10:56]

• The Case: The Supreme Court is deciding whether presidents can unilaterally impose tariffs under the National Emergencies Act (AIPA).
• Likely Outcome:
  • The Court appears poised to strike down Trump’s tariffs:
    • “It looks likely that they will strike down the tariffs.” (08:42 – Rampel)
    • Should that happen, $200 billion in already-collected tariffs may be rebated to companies — a de facto "Trump rebate" or tax cut.
• Marketplace Implications:
  • Lifting tariffs could free businesses from costly, time-wasting logistics and negotiation.
  • "It would free up companies to just like do their thing, which is what they were doing before he came into office when again the economy was actually pretty strong." (09:54 – Rampel)

5. Will Trump Accept the “Win”?

[10:56 – 12:27]

• Political Paradox:
  • The Supreme Court’s decision could be a blessing in disguise for Trump, removing one of his self-inflicted economic wounds.
  • But there’s skepticism about whether he’ll take this as a win, since he likes dispensing special favors.

6. How Businesses React Under Trump’s Tariffs

[15:04 – 19:30]

• Fear, Not Protest:
  • Business pushback is rare and muted; the risk of incurring Trump’s wrath is high, so most prefer quiet back-channels.
  • "Everybody's afraid of him 100%." (15:58 – Rampel)
• Crony Capitalism:
  • CEOs, even at enormous companies, expend time courting Trump (sometimes literally with made-up awards) to win exemptions.
  • “When, like, your profit center becomes the people at the company who are trying to figure out how to most please or least piss off this president, that's not a good thing. Like, that's not how capitalism is supposed to work.” (18:10 – Rampel)

7. A Climate of Retribution and Compliance

[19:30 – 21:13]

• Weaponization of Government:
  • Rampel cites reports about Trump’s interest in using agencies like the IRS and DOJ for political retribution.
  • Even powerful companies and institutions shrink from challenging the administration, signaling to smaller players to fall in line.
  • “If the institutions that are better situated to fight back don't fight back, then all of the ones that aren't, like, they just fall into line and Trump doesn't need to threaten them.” (20:59 – Rampel)

8. Will Election Results Change Anything?

[21:23 – 24:49]

• Recent Elections:
  • Republicans suffered major losses, but Rampel doesn’t expect this to shift business attitudes as long as Trump remains in power.
  • "Not until he's gone… as long as he's still in the White House, it doesn't matter who's winning the statewide office in Georgia..." (22:14 – Rampel)
• Long-Term Structural Fears:
  • The precedent set by Trump’s expansive use of emergency powers is worrying, both for Republicans and for what a future Democratic president could do.
  • “If, for example, this president can declare a national emergency over, you know, trade deficits… what’s to keep a future Democratic president from saying climate change is a national emergency…?” (23:36 – Rampel)
  • Congress’s abdication of its powers raises further dangers for future governance.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “People have been getting, like, progressively more bummed out about the economy over the years in ways that don't always reflect what's actually going on in the economy. But I think this grimness is pretty much grounded in actual concerns…” — Katherine Rampel [01:43]
• “It's not only moving goods around, it's also bullshit like this... your profit center becomes the people at the company who are trying to figure out how to most please or least piss off this president…” — Katherine Rampel [18:10]
• “That’s not capitalism. This is a kleptocracy of Trump enriching his friends and wanting to wield tariffs so that he can punish countries that he gets mad at over a commercial or have the country countries come begging for special pleading.” — Sarah Longwell [18:39]
• “Everybody's afraid of him 100%.” – Katherine Rampel [15:58]

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Segment Timestamps

• Main Topic Introduction: 01:14
• Consumer Sentiment & Job Loss: 01:43 – 03:48
• Economic Uncertainty & Data Blackout: 04:17 – 06:16
• The Supreme Court and Tariffs: 07:03 – 10:56
• Trump’s Political Incentives: 10:56 – 12:27
• Business Response & Crony Capitalism: 15:04 – 19:30
• Retribution & Institutional Fear: 19:30 – 21:13
• Elections & Future Business Behavior: 21:23 – 24:49

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Tone and Takeaways

The conversation is frank, incisive, and laced with wry humor — especially as Rampel and Longwell dissect the “kleptocracy” and performative aspects of the Trump administration’s economic approach. Both highlight how a blend of policy chaos, fear, and self-interest have produced an “icky and scary” business environment — a sharp contrast to the market efficiency and competitive dynamism that many Americans expect.

Final Thought:
Until Trump leaves office, businesses and institutions are likely to remain cautious, adaptive, and mostly silent — leaving America’s economic mood in a rut even as uncertainty and partisanship cloud the true economic picture.

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Transcript

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[Sarah Longwell]

Hello, everyone. I'm Sarah Longwell and I am here with Katherine Rampel, our new economics reporter and newsletter writer. Katherine, what's up? It's great to see you.

[Katherine Rampel]

Great to be here.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is this your first take?

[Katherine Rampel]

I think it is, maybe.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah.

[Katherine Rampel]

Yeah. I mean, I've done some other stuff with you all, like, even before I joined the Bulwark, but I think this is my first official take.

[Sarah Longwell]

All right, well, let's get our take on. Okay, so consumer sentiment. That's what I want to talk about. I'm just going to read a little bit from CNBC here. Worries over the government shutdown surged in the early part of November, pushing consumer sentiment to its lowest in more than three years and just off its worst level ever, according to the University of Michigan survey that was released on Friday. So Catherine set the scene here. This month's consumer sentiment saying it's the lowest in years. How scared should we be about that? What's it mean?

[Katherine Rampel]

To be fair, people have been getting, like, progressively more bummed out about the economy over the years in ways that don't always reflect what's actually going on in the economy. But I think this grimness is pretty much grounded in, like, actual concerns about what's going on. It's the government shutdown, it's tariffs, it's the fact that affordability issues are not going away, as we've already seen happen in an election quite recently. So, you know, people are upset and, and worried about prices, about losing their jobs. The only thing that seems to be doing well in the economy, potentially propping it up, is the AI world. And if you look at those same consumer sentiment numbers, there is one outlier group which is people who own a lot of stocks, like the top Tercel. I think it is the top third of people in terms of stock ownership. They're pretty happy. They actually got happier in the past month, but everybody else is pretty bummed out.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I mean, I saw we lost JBL and I did a take earlier this week. 1.1 million jobs lost since January. And I keep trying to figure out, because when you say, well, people were, like, overreacting, and maybe that was us. Maybe it was us during. When the, when the tariffs hit the first time and the market dropped.

[Katherine Rampel]

Oh, I mean, even before this year, like, if you look at how people felt about the economy in the last couple of years, in hard numbers, the economy was quite good. Like, in terms of inflation was coming down and job growth was pretty strong, and people still thought the economy sucked. And some of that's about, like, partisanship. You know, Republicans in particular don't like it, like, think the economy sucks more when a Democrat is in office and vice versa. But right now, like, you're seeing everybody pretty upset about economic conditions. And the only reason I say, like, some of it could be overstated is just like, given that these numbers are among the worst ever, I do not think that this economy is anywhere near as bad as that in 2008.

[Sarah Longwell]

This is what I'm trying to figure out is, is where are we headed? When you take consumer sentiment plus the job loss, plus the tariffs, plus core inflation, like, what is that level up to? Is it stagflation?

[Katherine Rampel]

Is it.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is it. Are we heading into a recession? Is the economy. Because I also see people saying, like, well, the economy is actually still kind of strong, weirdly. And I know it's being propped up by AI and some of the tech stuff, like you said, but where does it feel like we're headed in the next year?

[Katherine Rampel]

Well, it is particularly hard to tell now because we are in a data blackout, effectively a government data blackout, because we're in this shutdown. So we're not getting GDP growth and certain measures of inflation. We're not getting the jobs numbers, etc. The numbers that you and I have been talking about, things like consumer sentiment or the layoff data, those are actually private sector assessments. And that doesn't necessarily mean that they're bad, but, like, they're just not. Not as robust much of the time as the government data. And the government data is, like, usually what really moves markets. So we, we have like, we're in like a fog right now, to be clear. And so it's really hard to tell what is going on in the present, and it's going to be even harder to tell what's happening in the next few months because Donald Trump changes his mind from minute to minute. And so much of the uncertainty about this economy, that sort of, like, unease about what's happening with prices and what's happening with jobs, is being driven by government policy. It's funny, because I'm old enough to remember when all of that economic policy uncertainty under Obama was supposed to be, like, deadly for capitalism. And there was a fair amount of economic uncertainty, policy uncertainty about what was going to happen with Obamacare and what was going to happen with, like, the sequester, if you really want to go way, way back. But now it's just like an entire universe worse, you know, like a light years worse in the sense that, like, things change from. From moment to moment based on Trump's truth. Social posts. Right. It's not just about, like, will Congress pass this, this law? When will they reopen the government? It's this, this paralysis that comes from the fact that there's one guy in the White House that, who can instantaneously levy taxes across the economy with few checks on his power, at least for now. You know, we can get into the Supreme Court case and all of that, but that's the. That's the world that businesses and to some extent consumers and workers are living in right now.

[Sarah Longwell]

Actually, I do want to talk about that, if you're willing to get into it, because you wrote the new newsletter about it and it was really good. Or your inaugural newsletter called Receipts, which is a good name. We had to. It was like a. There was like a. Did you choose it or was it.

[Katherine Rampel]

I did not know that that was. Stein came up with that. My contribution, don't make fun of me, was Ramparts.

[Sarah Longwell]

I liked Ramparts.

[Katherine Rampel]

I thought that was good because, you know, if you look at the dictionary definition of rampart, it means bulwark.

[Sarah Longwell]

I know.

[Katherine Rampel]

That is what Merriam Webster says. And I love a good pun.

[Sarah Longwell]

But I also love a good pun. I was for that.

[Katherine Rampel]

You are. Okay, well, I have to acknowledge Receipts is the superior name, so kudos to Sam. Very well done. I'm. I'm super happy with that name.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, in, in your first one, you wrote about tariffs and the court case. That's. It's currently in front of the Supreme Court. I'll admit I didn't listen to the arguments. Maybe you did, but does it look like JBL and I were also talking about this? Does it look like the Supreme Court's going to save Trump from himself on these tariffs.

[Katherine Rampel]

Yes, but that means that they are temporarily going to humiliate him, but in the long run offer him a huge blessing. And by humiliate him, I mean, if you listen to the questions from the justices, they were somewhere between skeptical and outright hostile to the government's arguments that basically the President can A, declare a national emergency whenever he wants and B, use this particular law known as aipa to, to impose tariffs which are supposed. Tariffs are taxes. They're supposed to be the purview of Congress. Congress has power of the purse. So the question was like, can trump Congress?

[Sarah Longwell]

I forgot about them.

[Katherine Rampel]

I know they forgot about themselves. So just you. So, so the idea is that like, can Trump just sort of like yoink that power of the purse whenever he feels like to impose these tariffs when the law doesn't seem to give him that power? The law doesn't actually mention the word tariffs anywhere. And again, under whatever pretext he wants, because the law is about national emergencies. What's a national emergency? Is it when the trade deficit looks high? Is it when people in Brazil are being mean to Trump's buddy Bolsonaro because that was a justification for some of these tariffs? Is it because the Canadians had the gall to run an ad from noted rabble rouser Ronald Reagan pro trade? That's part of the reason why we have these tariffs on Canada. Trump cut off tariff negotiations with Canada tariffs that are part of this national emergency because of that ad. So this would give Trump a lot of power. Now normally you would think Supreme Court like, they seem pretty cool with giving Trump more of a Runway. In this particular case they seem not maybe in part because it's about a separation of powers issue. I'm not a lawyer. You have to talk to a lawyer about all that. But the upshot is that it looks likely that they will strike down the tariffs. And if you look at betting markets like polymarket, people overwhelmingly seem to think that tariffs will be struck down. So again, seems bad, seems pretty humiliating for Trump. But if he is smart, big if I realize if he is smart, he will take the win because getting rid of these tariffs would create a lot more certainty for businesses. It frees them up to not spend all of their time doing frankly like bullshit about canceling and uncanceling orders and scheduling and rescheduling shipments and finding new warehouse activity and like having the, the truck circle the warehouse and like all sorts of stuff that they're wasting their time doing rather than Like, I don't know, building new products or finding new customers. It would free up companies to just like do their thing, which is what they were doing before he came into office when again the economy was actually pretty strong. And also it means that all of the tariffs that have been collected so far under these authorities would be due back to those companies. So that's likely to be about $200 billion by the end of this year alone. $200 billion. It's like not a small chunk of change. It means that you're going to get effectively a sudden $200 billion tax cut, stimulus program, whatever you want to call it, the Trump rebate if you will. And, and that would be good for the economy and you know, like just to be fair, because markets are already anticipating that this is the likely outcome. Like some of this little boomlet is probably already being priced in. So it's not like, you know, the Supreme Court's going to decide and then it's like this big unanticipated stimulus to some extent. Like people are already acting on this expectation, but it would still be good for the economy if he took the win, which I don't think he will.

[Sarah Longwell]

And when you say took the win, it's like basically like take the loss, take, turn it into a win because it protects him from its himself. And I think to the extent that the ME and JBL and Tim talk a lot about stove touching and how for people to really understand the damage Trump is doing, so they have to feel the real pain. And like one of the ways that Trump constantly gets lucky is that other people protect Trump from himself. And so voters never know the idiotic things he's doing because somebody comes in and stops them. Now that was much truer in the first term than it's been in the second term. But your point was like the Supreme Court, if they knock down these tariffs, it like one of the things that Trump is doing sort of single handedly to hurt people gets taken off the balance sheet. Now here's my one question about that though, doesn't he if that happens, could either ignore, ignore the Supreme Court, which would be like the really bad one. But the other option seems like he bullies Congress into doing some version of of them or is, or do you think Congress, if they had to do it would just be like, no, say.

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[Katherine Rampel]

Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. Now I don't know if you've heard, but Mint's Premium Wireless is $15 a month. But I'd like to offer one other perk. We have no stores. That means no small talk, crazy weather we're having. No, it's not. It's just weather. It is an introvert's dream. Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment of 45 for 3 month plan, 15 per month equivalent required. New customer offer first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. Seamen mobile.com I think there's actually an option three here which is, which they've already talked about pretty publicly. They would use different tariffs. So again like there are a lot of different tariffs that Trump has put in place. Most of them are these national emergency tariffs. But there are other, which go on entire countries. There are other tariff authorities that are like sectoral tariffs. Like there are tariffs on steel. Those are global. They're not about one particular country that we're mad at. So he could use more of those and there's some other like obscure tariff authorities that I don't even remember what they are. So he has signaled his, the administration has signaled that they will cobble together something to replace them. The good news is that those kinds of tariffs like can't just be like issued by a fat fingered tweet. Like there's more of a process involved. Effectively Commerce has to do an investigation. And you know, there's, for some of them there are hearings. Like there's just, it's, it's a longer run thing and so businesses would hopefully have more time to adjust. And they're also vulnerable to legal challenges too. So they're not as bad as like Trump sneezes and accidentally like presses publish on a truth social post and suddenly we're tariffing Madagascar or whatever. So you know, it's not as bad, but it's still not good. It still creates uncertainty. And that's what I mean when I say like I don't think he's going to take the win. Or maybe he'll do both. Maybe he'll be like Trump rebate yay. Like stimulus checks for everyone or at least for all the companies and then still simultaneously try to Put in place all of these other tariffs that would not be helpful. And just to clarify, like, when the tariff rebate comes and it's, you know, assuming it comes, I should say, like, we don't know for sure that the Supreme Court is going to do this, and we don't know exactly, like, how the rebates would be manifested. But most likely they're not going to go to consumers, they're going to go to businesses. And businesses can decide what to do with them as they like. Like, they could pass it along to their customers, which they may or may not do. But really, it's going to be a boom for. For businesses. Hmm.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay. And does that repair their relationship with Trump businesses? Yeah. Like, do they suddenly be like, look, Trump's giving us a rebate, or do they know the score? Like, this is Trump tacoing, and we're just benefiting from it.

[Katherine Rampel]

I think it's been interesting how little pushback, little public pushback there has been from. From businesses for this administration on tariffs, on immigration, on a whole bunch of other policies that have not been helpful for their bottom lines. Like, I think there are different ways to interpret what's going on. One is that it's a collective action problem. Like, nobody wants to be the one in this case. Like, there's a toy company that literally sued the government over these tariffs. If I were that toy company or the CEO, I'd be watching my back all the time. Right. Because there may be some retribution exacted upon that. The company that stands up. I don't know. And I'm not suggesting that it's actually happened, but I would be worried about it if I were those guys. A lot of businesses are acting that way, and many of them are trying to, like, use personal relationships to have backdoor peace talks with the administration and talk to people at the Council of Economic Advisors or the Commerce Secretary or. Or wherever they can get an in, or maybe President Trump himself and say, hey, could you please, like, take off these tariffs, for example? And there's been a bunch of reporting on that that, like, there's been some mysterious exemptions for certain kinds of products, you know, tariffs for certain kinds of products, probably where there's, like, a personal connection with somebody in the administration. So there. So to some extent, like, there's not a lot of overt hostility from the business community. And even the Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable have been relatively muted in their criticism of this administration, I think, because everybody's afraid of him 100%.

[Sarah Longwell]

There's no I mean, there's no two ways about this. The business community, just along with everybody else, is very afraid of being. If Trump sort of turning his eye of Sauron on them and getting in the crossroads and they're all doing special pleading. And Donald Trump clearly believes in tariffs as an economic tool and mechanism, but it also seems pretty obvious to me that part of what he likes about the tariffs are that then everybody comes to him for special pleading and he gets to do dispensations. And that's why you've got, you know, Tim, Apple showing up and giving Trump, like, an award that they've made up. Like, in a Please don't make us have to move to America to do the Little screws or the.

[Katherine Rampel]

What was it? The inaugural presidential Diet Coke Award.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, exactly.

[Katherine Rampel]

That's my favorite one.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah.

[Katherine Rampel]

It's like they're all finding new ways to grovel. And again, when I was talking about, like, all of the bullshit that companies are doing because of these stupid tariff policies, it's not only moving goods around, it's also bullshit like this. Like, how many meetings at Apple went into figuring out what this gold plaque was going to look like and was it going to match, you know, the right trimmings at Mar a Lago or whatever? Like, this is such a waste of time. However much time they did spend on it probably still wasn't enough, given that it's like hundreds of billions of dollars on the line. And that's what I mean. When, like, your profit center becomes the people at the company who are trying to figure out how to most please or least piss off this president, that's not a good thing. Like, that's not how capitalism is supposed to work.

[Sarah Longwell]

Not capitalism. That's why this is not capitalism. No, I can't. If I have to have one more fight with JBL where he's like, sarah, you ready to give up on capitalism? I'm like, that's not what this is. This is a kleptocracy of Trump enriching his friends and. And wanting to wield tariffs so that he can punish countries that he gets mad at over a commercial or have the country countries come begging for special pleading from him. Like, that's all this is. And I tell you, if this was a Democratic president, they would be just, like, screaming, I know holy hell about this stuff. But they are genuinely afraid. Like, afraid. Not just profit center afraid, but, like, kind of afraid. Like, this. This guy is icky and scary and could do not, like, push out of a window Putin scary. But like erratic and can be awful. And with one tweet can, like take us down. Kind of scary.

[Katherine Rampel]

One tweet or one order to an underling to who knows how he's weaponizing government. There have been a bunch of reports about how he's trying to weaponize the irs, which historically has had this great firewall, like impermeable firewall between the political people and the people who actually do tax audits and things like that. And there was reporting in Trump's first administration that he ordered people to go audit his enemies and they refused. I don't know what's going on this time. The same thing with DOJ investigations or indictments. He has a lot of powers at play beyond, you know, what he can tweet or true social posts. And I understand it is rational for businesses, among others, to be freaked out by all of that. The problem is if everybody is freaked out simultaneously and nobody stands up, obviously you end up with like an even more empowered president. And what's especially troubling, I think, is that even the companies and institutions that have more resources to fight back are often not fighting back. And that sends signals to everybody else, like all the smaller guys, all the smaller fish that like, well, if whatever, Harvard or somebody, you know, or some big white shoe law firm doesn't think that they can win this battle, what are the chances that I can do it? So it's like they're kind of, in a way doing the dirty work for him. It's much more efficient anyway if, if the institutions that are better situated to fight back, don't fight back, then all of the ones that aren't, like, they just fall into line and Trump doesn't need to threaten them.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, that's exactly right. That's exactly how this is working. Okay, last question. Because it is Saturday morning, I obviously haven't brushed my hair and you know, we've got all got.

[Katherine Rampel]

Well, you look lovely. You look lovely.

[Sarah Longwell]

Sure as my sleepy head. The elections that we just had, where the Republicans got their asses kicked, does that start to change this exact dynamic that we're talking about? Because one thing that I've sort of wondered is for businesses that are good at risk management, at being forward looking about things, it is. There seems to have been a weird inability to be like, someday Trump will be gone and Democrats will be in charge again. So, like, I just feels like everybody changing their businesses to fit the whims of this guy, you know, so are people going to start looking forward or even feel like, hey, this guy doesn't have the mandate we thought. He doesn't have the American people at his back the way we thought. As he becomes less and less popular, do people start to get, you know, I don't know, find their spines again, be less scared of him?

[Katherine Rampel]

I don't think so. Not until he's gone, I think. I mean, as long as he's still in the White House, it doesn't matter who's winning the statewide office in Georgia or whatever, or it doesn't really matter who's the mayor of New York City. I think that people are still going to be freaked out by him. Now, what happens when he's out of office? I don't know. And I think that businesses will adapt to those circumstances. And we've seen this in the past, like there was a rash of ESG and DEI and other things that were more of the political moment, not necessarily because Democrats were in power, but that was in response to cultural and political movements. And now those things are being withdrawn in response to cultural and political movements as well as threats from the president. I think you'll see similar malleability and adaptation going forward. But I also wonder, like, what happens to the powers of the person who's in the White House in the future? And this is one of the things that, in fact, the Supreme Court also sounded concerned about, at least in this particular case, right. That if, for example, like there was questioning about this in the oral argument, if, for example, this president can declare a national emergency over, you know, trade deficits or fentanyl or being mean to Bolsonaro, what's to keep a future Democratic president from saying climate change is a national emergency and therefore there should be tariffs on fossil fuels. This was literally something that came up. And now some of us who like carbon taxes might say that's not such a bad thing. But for a lot of Americans, that's a very scary proposition. Like, what could a president AOC or Bernie Sanders or whoever do with the same set of authorities that Trump is claiming now? And one would hope, maybe fruitlessly one would hope that whatever principles are being applied to a Republican president and whatever powers are being bestowed upon that person would also be transferred to whoever succeeds him. And I think those are questions that the court has to grapple with, and Congress, frankly, has to grapple with that. If, if they are basically willful, willingly giving up their constitutional duties of power of the purse and ability to declare war and all sorts of other things under this administration, what does that bestow upon his successor?

[Sarah Longwell]

Katherine, I'm so glad you're here because I have a million more questions about economics that obviously the rest of us talk about, but you're just way smarter about it than the rest of us, so this is great.

[Katherine Rampel]

Well, I try to a lot of experts, so that helps.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, and then we'll talk to you. All right, everybody, that's it for us. I'm Sarah Longwell, publisher of the Bulwark. This is Katherine Rampel. She's new and great and we're so glad to have her on the team.

[Katherine Rampel]

What do you think makes the perfect snack?

[Sarah Longwell]

Hmm. It's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient.

[Wix/Mint Mobile Advertiser]

Could you be more specific?

[Sarah Longwell]

When it's cravenient. Okay, Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at a.m. p. M. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at a.m. p.m.

[Katherine Rampel]

I'm seeing a pattern here.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, yeah, we're talking about what I.

[Katherine Rampel]

Crave, which is anything from AM PM.

[Sarah Longwell]

What more could you want? Stop by AM PM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience AM PM Too much good stuff.