Loading summary
Odoo Sponsor
This show is supported by Odoo. When you buy business software from lots of vendors, the costs add up and it gets complicated and confusing. Odoo solves this. It's a single company that sells a suite of enterprise apps that handles everything from accounting to inventory to sales. Odoo is all connected on a single platform in a simple and affordable way. You can save money without missing out on the features you need. Check out Odoo at o d o o.com that's o d o o.com as.
Mint Mobile Sponsor
Summer draws to a close and the kids go back to school, I know I'm going to want to keep in touch with my kids at a price I can afford. Back to school Shopping can be a hassle, but your phone plan shouldn't be. That's why I made the switch to Mint Mobile. For a limited time, Mint mobile is offering three months of unlimited premium wireless service for 15 bucks a month. So while other parents are sweating overage charges, I have a little bit more room in my budget for cool back to school threads. Say bye bye to your overpriced wireless plan's jaw dropping monthly bills and unexpected overages. Mint Mobile is here to rescue you. All plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk and text delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. Use your own phone with any Mint Mobile plan and bring your phone number along with all your existing contacts. Dish overpriced wireless and get three months of premium wireless service from Mint Mobile for 15 bucks a month. This year, skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your three month unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com newyorker that's that's mintmobile.com New Yorker upfront payment of $45 required equivalent to $15 a month limited time new customer offer for first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details.
Tyler Foggatt
Hi Senator. Thanks so much for being here.
Sherrod Brown
Glad to be here. Thank you.
Tyler Foggatt
Tyler, Would you say that tariffs as a general concept are beneficial for the American working class?
Sherrod Brown
I think it's clear that there are more than two choices, either sort of the nafta, permanent normal trade relations with China, or one choice, the other being sort of reckless scatterbrained tariffs. There is another way to have a trade policy that works for workers. So the goal of trade policy, fundamentally the goal of trade policy, is to level the playing field for American workers. And we really have never done that.
Tyler Foggatt
That's former U.S. senator Sherrod Brown. He was able to hold on to his Senate seat in Ohio for almost 20 years, a Democrat in a Republican stronghold, in part because he often broke with the rest of his party on the issue of free trade. And that's exactly why I wanted to talk to him this week. President Donald Trump's tariffs plan, which is currently on pause, has been wildly controversial. But we all know what the pro free trade arguments against this plan look like. Brown, a progressive who has supported a version of tariffs in the past, talked to me about the problems he sees with Trump's plan, the ways in which certain tariffs might actually be used to protect American workers, and his new project, the Dignity of Work Institute, a think tank dedicated to advocacy for the working class. You're listening to the political scene. I'm Tyler Foggatt and I'm a senior editor at the New Yorker. So it's Tuesday morning and the stock market actually seems to be rallying today, which is a bit of a surprise. But more generally, we have seen the global economy spiral in the wake of Trump implementing tariffs on some 90 countries worldwide. Senator, you have long been anti NAFTA, and during your time as a Democratic senator from Ohio, you talked about how Democratic support for free trade has hurt workers in the Rust Belt and has eroded trust with working class voters. So what do you make of Trump's tariffs program so far and its implementation? What would you say is wrong with it? Is there anything, are there any silver linings?
Sherrod Brown
There are. There are not two choices in trade policy. There is not the sort of neoliberal, whatever corporate America gets as it lobbies Congress, the sort of Wall street way of doing trade, one or second, the Trump way, which has been erratic and nonsensical and scatterbrained. There is a third choice, and I don't want to see the. This debate about tariffs is all the serious people in Washington and the Wall street people in New York and the chambers of commerce. I don't want to see that choice be either that or Trump's policy, because in the end, workers are never considered. The goal of trade policy is to level the playing field for American workers. I want a policy where American workers actually win and American workers win. Our economy wins, our country wins, and corporations ultimately win. Maybe Wall street even wins when American workers are the top pr. But there are more than two choices, and I don't want to see progressives in their fervor to oppose Trump's erratic tariff policy going back to this neoliberal ally with Wall street progressives are making a great mistake if we're doing that. I've heard economists talk about these terrorists upending the global order on trade. Well, to a lot of workers anything's better than the global order on trade. It's our policy problem as a country. And it's a political problem for Democrats because in the end they encountered us in Youngstown, Ohio and Dayton, Ohio. When I was campaigning last fall, the word NAFTA came up with some frequency. Not from reporters because they've forgotten if they ever if the younger reporters even knew what NAFTA was, but to workers. They just had an intuitive feeling, understanding that NAFT is what put them out of jobs. Let me illustrate this way. I went to junior high in Mansfield, Ohio. It's an industrial city. And in those days I went to school. The sons and daughters of steel workers that worked at Empire Detroit, rubber workers that worked at Mansfield, entire IUE members that worked at Westinghouse, Auto workers that worked at gm. And I went to school with the sons and daughters of the car, the millwrights and the pipe fitters and the electricians and the bricklayers who service those plants and kept them going. By the time I was in my mid-20s, many of those companies had moved to the non union, more precisely anti union South Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia and South Carolina. And then Congress passed a bunch of trade, trade agreements that made sure those companies went overseas. And those trade agreements didn't just happen by themselves. They happened because of corporate lobbying and compliant politicians of both parties and workers in Youngstown or Mansfield expected Democrats because we had support from labor and we're really the working class party. They expected us to protect them. They knew Republicans would sell them out because they're the party of corporate interests. But they thought Democrats would stand with them and most of us did. But unfortun, presidents and too many leaders of our party didn't stand with workers and those jobs began to move and always looking for cheap labor. I remember during some of these debates during nafta, during what they called in those days most favored nation status for China, they changed that name when they realized how bad it sounded. They changed it to permanent normal trade relations with China. But I remember during those debates people told me that there were more corporate jets at National Airport than any time they'd ever remembered. And a major national Democratic leader campaigning for me with me in Ohio said that I was on the wrong side of history during all this. Well, that's what happened. Too many politicians sold them out. Corporate interests said these are best for our country. I went to the same school you did, Tyler, to Yale. And I remember, I only say that because I remember a business person in Cleveland who probably didn't like me anyway, but she said, I can't believe the way you talk about trade, that you actually went to Yale. I mean, that's the sort of East Coast, west coast elite that got us into this with corporate lobbying and compliant politicians. And that's what we need to address, not reckless tariffs with no thought put into them. We've lost most of those workers. We've lost them in the middle class, and we've lost them politically. And that's really why the Midwest industrial states have had such problems for Democrats, but more importantly, have had such problems with not having a vibrant, undermining a vibrant economy.
Tyler Foggatt
So, as you say, I mean, it doesn't have to be a dichotomy between free trade and the Trump plan, but what is the other option?
Sherrod Brown
You start with a clear goal to create a level playing field for American workers and end this race to the bottom on wages. So you have an economic policy which Trump has undermined in every way. He's undermined it on the National Labor Relations Board. He's undermined it in niosh, National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health in Cincinnati, Ohio. In my. He's undermined it by appointing judges who decide for corporate America over workers every time. And I'll give you an example. Last fall, in November, December, after the election, a single judge in East Texas made a decision, a single judge making one decision costing 4 million American workers or overtime. 4 million people making 35, 40, 50,000 a year were classified by their companies as management. And like that, they lost their overtime. So we've got to fight for them more. And we know why corporations outsource jobs, not just manufacturing, including customer service to data processing. And those jobs have mostly gone overseas. So in the end, we need a focus on how do you provide good jobs for good wages with good benefits. And we don't have any real focus on that. Certainly the Trump administration doesn't. The second thing is you use tariffs to go after countries like China that pay workers dramatically less that are cheating. And a couple of examples. Tyler, quickly, when I was in the Senate, in the House, I probably four times a year went to the International Trade Commission on behalf of, always thinking about workers, but on behalf of an industry, behalf of the executives and the workers in industry. When China was cheating or another country was cheating on wages or on subsidies or on policies like the environment, I would go to the International Trade Commission, we'd win more than we lose. But that's, that's the kind of tariffs that work because they are specific. They bring certainty to, to companies. In the end, the problem with these tariffs in part is there's no certainty. People don't know how long they're going to last. They don't know what they're going to do. They don't know is the percentage going to change. They don't know if they can come to America, come back to America and rebuild their supply chains. They don't really know any of that because of, because this is so errat. But to enforce trade policy, Right, you need that kind of focus on certainty, which we have none of right now.
Mint Mobile Sponsor
Yeah.
Tyler Foggatt
I mean, would you say that the uncertainty is maybe the worst part of Trump's implementation? I just keep thinking about how if I owned a business with a bunch of manufacturing overseas, I wouldn't necessarily move to move my manufacturing facilities to the US because it seems like everything could change at any moment.
Sherrod Brown
Well, pick, pick what you want, but uncertainty is certainly part of it. But however he came to these conclus, all that injects more uncertainty into corporate decisions. The kind of certainty I want in corporate decisions is putting workers at the center of this. You'll see workers then be able to buy more products. I mean, you, when you lift up workers, you lift the economy up. Some politicians have talked about, instead of trickle down economics, you kind of start with workers and build the economy from there. And we haven't seen that in a while.
Tyler Foggatt
I mean, on one hand, Trump has received just like a ton of criticism from Democrats, from Republicans, over the tariffs plan. But then on the other hand, you do have, you know, you were talking about the emphasis here not being on workers, but, you know, I also saw that Sean Fain, the president of the United Auto Workers, recently came out in support of the Trump tariffs. I mean, you've worked extensively with the UAW in the past. What do you make of their support?
Sherrod Brown
Well, I think that Sean Fain, and I know him pretty well, I think Sean Fain is gonna fight for his workers. He knows his workers have talked about tariffs. He knows that, that tariffs are one part of the, one part of this equation. I heard part of that interview. I heard it kind of came in sort of halfway through. My wife was listening to it and that morning. And he makes a lot of sense in advocating for the industry. But if you listen carefully, he said it's much more than tariffs. He said these companies, these workers both at the auto assembly plants like the Chrysler Stellantis plant in Toledo or the, or an engine plant in, or plant in Sharonvill, a plant in Parma, or the suppliers that aren't even gm, they're the second or third tier. He understands that it's much more than just terrorists. And he is very, I won't speak for him, but from reading somewhat between the lines, he knows that it's much more than tariffs. He was called on to talk about tariffs. He wants to support using tariffs, but he is in no way a friend of the policies he sees coming out of Washington. So the Trump tariffs are way bigger than just auto tariffs and what Trump is doing because they're, they're scatterbrained, they're not thought through. Sean, Sean understands that. The head of the UAW understands that. He, if he had done these terrorists, they would have been done in a very different, more concerted, more focused way.
Tyler Foggatt
One of the things he said during that interview that I found interesting was, I'll quote him, 60% of Americans have no retirement savings. So when I hear all the crying about the stock market, this is just Wall Street. And something similar was said by Jared Golden, a Democratic representative from Maine, which was basically that, you know, people are freaking out about the stock market, but few Americans actually own stocks or have retirement plans. And so we shouldn't care so much about what the market is doing. What do you make of that argument that we shouldn't really focus so much?
Sherrod Brown
Well, the market's only, market's only part of this when it comes to tariffs. It's potential lost jobs, it's potential price going up. Sean in that interview was essentially presented with two options. Either you want the tariffs or you want Wall street economics, trickle down, sort of neoliberal economics. He didn't really get time in that interview to talk about how we really should do trade policy. And I've talked to him about that and he totally understands that you need a different policy. He doesn't want to go back. The serious people in Washington, the economists from this isn't an anti east coast thing, but the serious economists in Boston and New York and Washington and the west coast, they are presenting two options here. These erratic terrorists are going back to neoliberal trickle down, bad trade policy. There is another option and that's where what we should be focusing on. And Sean Fain knows that the questions he was asked, it was sort of are you for this? Are you for going back to the old way? He surely is not going back to the old way.
Tyler Foggatt
Just to clarify, because you Were talking earlier about how the right way forward is, like specific tariffs targeting China. I mean, do you have more thoughts on exactly what that would look like? What, you know, what number, how long? I guess I'm just trying to get like a more concrete vision of what the plan should be, if not this?
Sherrod Brown
Well, the plan should be focusing on workers. It means helping workers in overtime. It means enforcing labor law. It means a higher minimum wage. It means working on, you know, don't weaken worker safety standards. It's really clear and obvious what we should do. And that's been lost in this discussion by the media, by the serious people in Washington, by all the people that go on the talk shows, liberal or conservative talk shows. There's always that serious economist that talks about the global world order or whatever they talk about. But that's where we should go. And that discussion has not even been had during all this.
Tyler Foggatt
We're going to take a quick break. You'll hear more of the political scene from the New Yorker in just a moment. America is changing and so is the world.
Sherrod Brown
But what's happening in America isn't just a cause of global upheaval. It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere.
Tyler Foggatt
I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C. i'm.
Sherrod Brown
Tristan Redman in London, and this is the Global Story.
Tyler Foggatt
Every weekday, we'll bring you a story from this intersection where the world and America meet.
Sherrod Brown
Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tyler Foggatt
Senator, back in a New Yorker profile from 2018, you suggested that Trump may be an ally to workers on trade issues. You've clearly had many conversations with him in the past about tariffs and about your desire to protect American manufacturing jobs. I'm wondering how you came away from these discussions. Like, what do you think his goals are? I mean, you've said a few times that you don't think that he is very focused on workers, but do you think it's all about punishing China or what is going on here? And how much does he actually understand tariffs?
Sherrod Brown
I don't know what's in his mind. I don't talk to him regularly. My last conversation with him was in 2018 at the beginning of the tax bill. And he invited probably 8 or 10 because he wanted equal number of both parties in the Cabinet Room, people that sit on the Finance Committee, like Senator Wyden, who was about to become chair then. And I presented him with something we called the Patriot Corporation act, where companies that paid their workers decent wages provided decent benefits. Companies that paid their workers such that they didn't need food stamps or didn't need Medicaid or didn't need the child tax credit or didn't meet really the earned income tax credit, that if they paid adequately for that, they get lower taxes. He looked at it after I explained it. He gave it to his aide, and that was the end of it. I don't think I've talked to him since. So Trump never really showed he cares about workers. I, I pushed him hard. When the renegotiation of NAFTA took place, they improved it. We stopped the bill until they improved it. But he had no sophisticated view of how to do trade policy. He had no real interest in lifting workers up. He talked about it, and it's probably why he was elected in 2024. But nobody really knows the goals of his terrorists. They're too erratic. They change constantly. The administration gives different reasons for them. But I have seen him do nothing other than talk about helping workers. I mean, there really is nothing here. He's opposed the protecting the right to organize, forming unions. He's undermined osha. So there's no sentimen that he really has for workers other than talking a good game.
Tyler Foggatt
So there are industries that both pro labor Democrats and Republicans seem to agree that we should try to protect or in some cases revive. Like I'm thinking about steel, for instance, where there's like a lot of bipartisan support for that. But I feel like part of the issue with these tariffs, in addition to everything we've talked about, is that they're just so wide ranging. And so you also see Trump placing tariffs on, like, subsistence economies like Sri Lanka and Cambodia. You know, when we talk about reviving American manufacturing, how much of that should be focused on specific industries as opposed to the idea that the United States really needs to be making its own T shirts?
Sherrod Brown
It's a mix of everything. Understand some industries aren't coming back, but understand that when we put sanctions on Canada, I mean, Canada workers make comparable wages. We see little outsourcing to Canada, and that hurts manufacturing by interrupting the supply chain and driving up prices with countries like Canada and France. I wear suits that were made by union workers in Cleveland and Chicago. The Cleveland plant closed. Chicago plant's still there. That's a hard industry for American workers to compete. There are ways of doing it. Biden used tariffs to keep Chinese electric vehicles out of the United States. We also saw an effort that I pushed the White House on because electric vehicles are Chinese made. Electric vehicles are a can do damage to our national security because they have such an ability and they have an ability to be able to collect data when they drive nearby defense installations and collect personal data on American, American people. So there are good reasons to use, to either ban them or to use tariffs. There it's you, you have to go industry by industry. And much of the time I spent at the International Trade Commission was to, to was on behalf of the steel industry because that's important for national security, it's important for our supply chain, it's important for good union wage jobs.
Tyler Foggatt
You just mentioned Biden and I'm curious what your thoughts are on the Biden administration and what it did for American manufacturing, whether you think it did enough, whether it was, you know, at least a step in the right direction.
Sherrod Brown
Nobody did enough. But I'll answer it this way, that the Dignity Work Institute, we surveyed 1100 workers around the country. It wasn't a political poll, my name wasn't in it. It surveyed workers about their jobs and their place in society. And one of the we found was that whether it was Biden or whether it was Trump talks a lot about getting inflation down. Biden talked about Biden nomics. Neither could understand why the public quit listening to them about those issues. And the reason is this, that we measure the economy by talking about inflation rate and by talking about unemployment. But if you talk to workers, they still, even if Donald Trump says inflation's down, workers will say our biggest problem is there's more money going out the door than coming in. We found that something like 40% of Americans have given up hope that they'll ever own a home. We found that almost 50% of Americans in the last three years have had to work at least two jobs. We found out that 40% of 45%, I think of Americans could not, if they were presented with an unexpected thousand dollar expense, it would cause a lot of hardship. On figuring out how to pay that, we found out that the measurement of economy is a lot more than talking about unemployment, talking about inflation. And that's what politicians of both parties miss. That that's why this Dignity of Work Institute that we just started a month ago is so important. So the American public and policymakers begin to hear that this economy and its problems are much deeper. And that that's why we saw people want, they kind of want to, they think the system's rigged. That's why the voters changed parties in 16 and changed parties in 20 and changed parties in 24 because they see that is rigged, that nobody's really listening to them that they really, as this polling showed, they really do want this economy upended. But not upended on behalf of billionaires that surrounded Trump at the inauguration, but upended on behalf of workers. And that's not where we're going, unfortunately.
Tyler Foggatt
One question that I've been turning over in my head is just how much room even is there for manufacturing to grow or return to the US I've been thinking about how, you know, for example, like Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has been kind of making the rounds on the morning shows saying that we're going to reshore a bunch of manufacturing facilities from China, but that a lot of these jobs are going to be automated.
Unidentified Guest (possibly a manufacturing expert or commentator)
And now there are robots who can do it. You're going to see robotic production of iPhones and the jobs that are going to be created, people who build those factories, the mechanics who work on those robots, these jobs are going to be millions and millions of those jobs. These are great high paying jobs and you don't need a college education to do it.
Tyler Foggatt
And so even if we were to bring manufacturing back to the US either through the Trump tariffs or through a much better plan, how much of that actually will result in more jobs? Like has the AI revolution changed the logic for trade policy at all?
Sherrod Brown
When I was in the Senate for the last 10 or 12 years, we started, we founded something called manufacturing camps and I'd go to local businesses. We did probably 150 of these. I went to call local businesses, talk to local leaders of chambers of commerce or government or whatever. And we aimed at 5th to 8th grade and these kids would come in for a week or two in the summer, were exposed to manufacturing. And I talked to parents who said this is pretty cool. My daughter didn't care much about school, but she really learned about bricklaying or she learned about data processing. These are, they're not all blue collar, they're not all white collar potential jobs. We have so dismissed as a nation that manufacturing matters. One White House official told me one day, you know, everybody wants to be more manufacturing in this country, but nobody wants to do it. Well, I wanted to prove him wrong in part and we're seeing that. And there's a lot of sort of mid level jobs. There's, you know, be a union electrician, start at 20 in the, in the apprentice program. By the time you're 25, you're carrying a journeyman's card, you're making 60, 70, 80,000 a year with benefits. You got no college debt. We can do a little less so, but do the same with some white collar jobs too. Whether it's occupational therapy, which pays really good, really well, or whether it's some kind of dental technician which pays a little. I mean, there are a lot of these jobs and we're not going to be, be, we're not going to be 1950s, 60s, 70s, manufacturer, but we're seeing outsourcing about lots of, in lots of different industries. And manufacturing jobs are the only, not the only one vulnerable to bad trade policy. I mentioned earlier, call centers. Call centers don't, you know, they don't pay, they don't pay a lot, but they pay a middle class wage if they're unionized, if they're in this country without the dragon of we pay you more, you're going to, we're going to move to China, we're going to move to India. But it's just the fact that we don't again, workers aren't at the table in these decisions. Politicians don't spend much time talking or more importantly, listening to workers. That's one thing the Denier Work Institute is going to do. It's going to be a lot of listening sessions. It's going to be patterned in part on Suds Terkel's book Working, where he went out to maybe 200, I don't know how many 200 workers of all kinds of workers and talk to them. And we should be integrating those conversations into journalism classes and tech schools and all where people begin to actually. And political people begin to actually listen to workers.
Tyler Foggatt
Absolutely. I'm glad you mentioned Working. I read that in a journalism class at Yale.
Sherrod Brown
At Yale, they teach the book Working. Oh, my God. Really? Yeah. Wow, I am shocked.
Tyler Foggatt
We're going to take another quick break. More from the political scene in just a moment.
David Remnick
Right now, we are living through some of the most tumultuous political times our country has ever known. I'm David Remnick, and each week on the New Yorker Radio Hour, I'll try to make sense of what's happening alongside politicians and thinkers like Cory Booker, Nancy Pelosi, Liz Cheney, Tim Waltz, Ketanji Brown Jackson, Newt Gingrich, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Charlamagne, tha God, and so many more. That's all in the New Yorker Radio Hour wherever you listen to podcasts.
Tyler Foggatt
So, Senator, I want to go back to something you mentioned earlier, which is that I feel like tariffs and especially Trump's version of them have become so politically toxic that, you know, there's a fear of, I mean, I definitely have seen a lot of like kind of anti tariff absolutism from Democrats. And just in general, I think I'm more worried about Democrats kind of leaving behind economic populism because Trump has given it a sort of, you know, bad brand. What do you think is kind of the way forward for Democrats here? Like, is there still a way that they can craft a protectionist trade policy that resonates with working class voters while also distancing themselves from the Trump version of this?
Sherrod Brown
I go back to emphasizing that the word protection is not a bad word. The corporate elite and the serious people in Washington made it a bad word. But I like the idea of protecting jobs, protecting my family, protecting our country. Start with that. As I've been saying, though, there are not two choices there. There's not sort of the reckless tariff phony populism where you turn people against one another, where you use race, where you use anti immigrant language, where you talk about, in Springfield, Ohio, Haitians eating animals. That kind of appeal to race and turning people against others. So it's not just Trump demagoguery on trade or going back to the neoliberal Wall street driven, think tank driven trade policy. There is another way, and that's what we're talking about. Too often progressives have gotten sucked into settling for less, aiming too low, helping people get by. And I, I mean, I was the author of the child tax credit. I worked on that with Rosa Delor and Michael Bennett for 10 years until we got it. It made a huge difference, only for a year in the lives of a lot of people. So I want to help people in this rigged economy. But, but I don't want a rigged economy where workers need things so much like the child Tax credit. I want an economy where workers actually can get ahead. Neither party is the make workers the winner's party. That's why the Digging Work Institute's work matters. It's why it's what progressives should begin to focus on, not just compensating those who have lost from bad trade policy. We used to never fund well enough, but we used to have something called trade adjustment Assistance. You lose your job, job at a steel and steel plant in Struthers, Ohio, or you use your job at an auto supplier outside Toledo. We give you a few dollars, more than a few to make up for it, but that compensates. That's not what workers want. They don't want a little compensation after they lost their jobs. They want the dignity of work. They want the dignity of actually holding a job. They don't want welfare. They don't want government assistance. They want a level playing field. That's what we've forgotten. So there's clearly a major path, path for progressives not just to serve the country better, but to actually to do good politics. Because work unites us all. One of the things in this survey for the Dignity of Work Institute, we found was work only unites us all. Most people, overwhelming number of people that are able, want to go to work every day and want to get a decent paycheck. I remember I was in Cincinnati a few years ago and this always sticks in my mind. There was a group of women I was talking to, middle aged women. They told me that they were in their middle age. They told me they got, they had got their first union contract. I said, with whom you represent? And they said, we represent 1200 custodial workers in downtown Cincinnati that work all night, essentially in clean offices for people that dress up and go to work the next day. She said, we signed her first contract. I said, what does that mean? She said, I'm 51 years old. The first time in my life I'll have a paid one week vacation. These are. You think anybody works harder than people working all night cleaning offices? Do you work that hard? Do I work that hard? I mean, we give them almost nothing from this society. We need to speak to people like that and lift them up. You know, I didn't talk to all 1200 of them. I talked to the five or six there, but probably a lot of them didn't vote. Probably a lot of them don't see anybody in politics that's their friend. Whether they voted or not, they didn't think they had much of a choice. And in the end, and we've got to do better with them. Most people get their income from paychecks, not from a stock portfolio. We've got to show we're working hard for those families.
Tyler Foggatt
Senator, thank you so much for your time.
Sherrod Brown
Sure. Thank you. Thank you. Tyler.
Tyler Foggatt
Sherrod Brown is a former US Senator from the state of Ohio. You can find information about his latest project, the Dignity of work institute@dignityofworkinstitute.org this has been the political scene from the New Yorker. I'm Tyler Foggatt. This episode was produced by Sam Egan with mixing by Mike Kutchman and engineering by Pran Bandy. Our executive producer is Steven Valentino. Chris Bannon is Connie Nass, head of Global Audio. Our theme music is by Allison Leighton Brown. Enjoy your week and see you next Wednesday. Katie.
Katie Drummond
I'm Katie Drummond. I'm Wired's Global Editorial Director. I'm Michael Kollory, Wired's Director of Consumer, Tech and Culture.
Tyler Foggatt
And I'm Lauren Good. I'm a senior correspondent at Wired.
Katie Drummond
And our show, Uncanny Valley is about.
Tyler Foggatt
The people, power, and influence of Silicon Valley.
Katie Drummond
And right now, Silicon Valley and Washington have never been more intertwined. So each week we get together to talk about a big story, often at the intersection of tech and politics.
Sherrod Brown
Right.
Katie Drummond
So whether we're talking about Trump, Coin Doge, or Elon Musk, we will always explain how these Silicon Valley forces are affecting Washington and how they affect you. Make sure you're following Uncanny Valley in your podcast app of choice so you don't miss an episode.
Sherrod Brown
From prx.
Episode: Sherrod Brown on Trump’s Tariffs and the Future of Economic Populism
Host: Tyler Foggatt
Guest: Former Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio)
Date: April 9, 2025
This episode features an in-depth conversation between Tyler Foggatt and Sherrod Brown, the long-serving Democratic Senator from Ohio, renowned for his populist economic stance and skepticism toward free trade policies. Brown discusses the current landscape around Trump’s broad tariffs on dozens of countries, critiques both neoliberal free trade and Trump’s “scatterbrained” protectionism, argues for a “third path” trade policy focused on American workers, and introduces his new think tank, the Dignity of Work Institute. The conversation explores the effects of tariffs, the future of economic populism, the impact of automation, and the urgent need for Democrats to recenter working-class concerns.
“There are not two choices in trade policy... There is a third choice.”
(Sherrod Brown, 03:55)
“To a lot of workers anything’s better than the global order on trade.”
(Sherrod Brown, 03:55)
“He (Trump) had no sophisticated view of how to do trade policy. He had no real interest in lifting workers up. He talked about it, and it’s probably why he was elected in 2024. But nobody really knows the goals of his tariffs. They’re too erratic.”
(Sherrod Brown, 17:33)
“Protection is not a bad word. The corporate elite and the serious people in Washington made it a bad word. But I like the idea of protecting jobs, protecting my family, protecting our country.”
(Sherrod Brown, 28:51)
“Most people get their income from paychecks, not from a stock portfolio. We’ve got to show we’re working hard for those families.”
(Sherrod Brown, 32:21)