Trump announces 10% tariff on all imports | The Excerpt
On Thursday’s episode of The Excerpt podcast: Paste BN White House Correspondent Francesca Chambers takes a look at President Donald Trump's Wednesday tariff announcement. 51 senators voted to end Trump's tariff on Canadian goods in a bipartisan rebuke of the administration's trade policy. A federal judge on Wednesday dismissed the corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams. Paste BN Supreme Court Correspondent Maureen Groppe breaks down the high court's decision against makers of flavored vapes that are popular with teenagers. Police who started a cold case podcast found a woman's remains after 42 years.
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Taylor Wilson:
Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Thursday, April 3rd, 2025. This is the Excerpt. Today, a look at Trump's long-anticipated tariff announcement. Plus, the Supreme Court weighs in on flavored vapes that are popular with teenagers. And police who started a cold case podcast have found a woman's remains after 42 years.
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President Donald Trump yesterday announced sweeping 10% tariffs on imports from all countries, and additional duties targeting around 16 nations, fulfilling a pledge to retaliate against countries he said have treated the US unfairly.
President Donald Trump:
April 2nd, 2025 will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn, the day America's destiny was reclaimed and the day that we began to make America wealthy again.
Taylor Wilson:
I caught up with Paste BN White House correspondent, Francesca Chambers, to help put the moves in context. Hello, Francesca.
Francesca Chambers:
Hey Taylor. Thanks for having me.
Taylor Wilson:
Thanks for hopping on Big Day. So this date was circled for weeks. Did these tariff moves yesterday play out as expected? What did President Donald Trump formally announce?
Francesca Chambers:
For weeks, Taylor, there's been speculation about what would eventually be in President Donald Trump's reciprocal tariffs, and in the end, he decided to go with a 10% baseline tariff on pretty much every nation as well as a reciprocal tariff on certain nations. Now, what does that actually mean? There are certain nations where he said that the trade barriers and the non-tariff barriers were so high on the United States that he felt that he needed to put additional duties on those countries. They include Cambodia, China, Venezuela. They all ended up with tariffs that were above that 10% rate.
Taylor Wilson:
As for how this has landed stateside this week, Francesca, what have we been seeing?
Francesca Chambers:
Taylor markets were up slightly on Wednesday ahead of President Donald Trump's announcement after a tumultuous march after President Donald Trump and his advisers publicly discussed what would be in these tariffs with them, varying from time to time as to what he would eventually impose. It's notable, Taylor, that he made the announcement after 4:00 P.M. so that trading hours had already concluded. And so the markets have a little bit of time to react before they reopen.
Taylor Wilson:
Yeah, all eyes are on the markets today, Francesca. As for foreign entities impacted by these tariffs, I mean, how have these moves landed overseas this week?
Francesca Chambers:
Well, Taylor, many countries were in a wait-and-see mode to see what it was that the White House ended up announcing on tariffs, including Mexico. Mexico's president, Claudia Scheinbaum, said that she didn't want to get into a tit-for-tat with the United States that she wanted to see what Trump eventually announced. And by the way, as it pertains to Mexico, he ended up leaving the tariff the same as it already had been, the 25%, except for on goods that are part of the USMCA, the free trade agreement between the United States, Mexico, and Canada. But then you have other blocks such as the European Union that had been waiting but are signaling now that they're planning to take more aggressive action in response to Trump's tariffs.
Taylor Wilson:
All right, lots still to come this week and beyond. Francesca Chambers covers the White House for Paste BN. Thanks, Francesca.
Francesca Chambers:
Thanks, Taylor.
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Taylor Wilson:
Stock markets earlier today in Beijing and Tokyo sank to multi-month lows as US and European stock futures also pointed to sharp losses. China vowed countermeasures as did the European Union. EU Chief Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement, "The consequences will be dire for millions of people around the globe." She added the bloc was preparing to hit back if talks with Washington failed. Stateside, 51 senators, including four Republicans, voted yesterday to end Trump's tariff on Canadian goods and a bipartisan rebuke of the administration's trade policy. The vote marks the first substantive bipartisan pushback to Trump's policies since he took office just over two months ago. The resolution put forward by Democratic Senator Tim Kaine would end an emergency order Trump declared in February over concerns about fentanyl crossing the northern border with Canada. That order has been used as the basis for 25% tariffs on Canadian goods.
It would need to be approved by the Republican controlled house and be signed by the president in order to have an effect. So it has almost no chance of actually changing US policy. But the bipartisan statement reflects widespread discomfort even among some Republicans with a trade policy that economists say will raise prices for consumers.
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A federal judge has dismissed the corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams and US District Judge Dale Ho dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning the charges cannot be refiled at a later date. The Department of Justice request for a dismissal without prejudice could have left the Democratic Mayor beholden to President Donald Trump's administration, which considers Adams an ally in its immigration crackdown.
Adams pleaded not guilty in September to charges of accepting free travel and political donations from Turkish officials to take actions that benefited their country. He has maintained his innocence.
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When the Surgeon General in 2018 declared teen vaping an epidemic, one in five high school students reported having used E-cigarettes. Use was increasing faster than for any other substance. Now the Supreme Court has sided against makers of flavored vaping products that are popular with teenagers. I spoke with Paste BN's Supreme Court correspondent, Maureen Groppe, to learn more. Thanks for joining me today.
Maureen Groppe:
Hey, happy to be here.
Taylor Wilson:
So what did the Supreme Court here yesterday as it pertains to vapes?
Maureen Groppe:
Well, the court said that the Food and Drug Administration did not improperly change the rules on what it takes to get approval to sell flavored vapes. Lower court had said that the FDA imposed new requirements without notice after E-cigarette makers had spent millions of dollars trying to comply.
Taylor Wilson:
All right, so what led up to this moment? Early in the lower court's, Maureen?
Maureen Groppe:
Under the Biden administration, the FDA had rejected more than a million products with flavors like Jimmy, the Juice man, Peachy Strawberry and Suicide Bunny Mother's Milk and Cookies. And the E-cigarette industry complained that the FDA was unfairly blocking all these products that had a de facto ban and they brought these lawsuits around the country. Most courts, in fact, seven federal appeals courts rejected their claim, but one appeals court on the fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals, which is arguably the most conservative federal appeals court in the country, they sided with two companies, Triton Distribution and Vapetasia, which were the two companies whose case was before the Supreme Court.
Taylor Wilson:
Yeah. And the court has directed that fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider the case under this different legal standard. Can you just help us understand what that means, Maureen?
Maureen Groppe:
Yeah, that's just one part of the issue. So one of the complaints was how the FDA had assessed these companies strategies to keep their products away from minors. The agency said that such efforts haven't proven effective, so they didn't need to keep reviewing these plans. And the Supreme Court said that the appeals court hadn't used the right test to evaluate how the FDA handled that part of the decision so they asked the appeals court to take another look at that part of it.
Taylor Wilson:
And I mean, how many young people actually use these vaping products? I think some numbers might be useful on this.
Maureen Groppe:
Sure. So E-cigarettes are the most commonly used tobacco product among US youth. And according to the CDC, in 2024, 1.63 million middle and high school students used E-cigarettes, that's about 6% of middle and high school students.
Taylor Wilson:
Maureen, who is this decision really a win for?
Maureen Groppe:
This is a win for the FDA and for public health groups who have long been concerned about the appeal of these sweet flavored vape products to teens. But the vaping companies hope that they might get a friendly regulatory environment under the Trump administration during the campaign, then candidate Trump promised to, "Save flavored vaping." So we have to see what happens if these companies apply again to sell these products under the new administration.
Taylor Wilson:
Maureen Groppe covers the Supreme Court for Paste BN. Thanks as always, Maureen.
Maureen Groppe:
Thanks for having me.
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Taylor Wilson:
Remains found in an Illinois body of water have been positively identified as a woman who went missing more than four decades ago. 23-year-old Karen Shepard's was last seen around 1:00 A.M. on April 16th, 1983. Elgin, Illinois Police said the Kane County Coroner's Office identified the remains using a forensic dentist and dental records. Earlier this year, the Elgin Police Department began airing its podcast called Somebody Knows Something and highlighted Shepard's case to generate leads. Detectives thought it would be a good idea to search an area along the route she may have taken home in 1983. They also found that at the time she disappeared, the river had flooded and was unusually high.
Chaos Divers, a non-profit group of volunteer searchers join the effort and used sonar technology to locate sites of interest. The team found a potential vehicle and when they searched the area, they found a license plate that matched Shepard's missing car. Investigators later found skeletal remains inside the car, which turned out to be a match for the missing woman according to police. You could read more with a link in today's show notes.
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Climate change isn't just affecting the Earth's surface, it's having an impact on the upper atmosphere too, and that could be a problem.
Will Parker:
We used to live in this world where we had a mentality that space is big and we didn't have to be sustainable in the way that we acted in space because we didn't have to worry about collisions between satellites or debris objects.
Taylor Wilson:
That was Will Parker, the lead author of a new MIT study that looked at how global warming is impacting objects in space. He sat down with my colleague Dana Taylor to discuss the problems that could soon be causing those of us on Earth. You can hear that conversation right here beginning at 4:00 P.M. Eastern Time today.
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And thanks for listening to The Excerpt. You can get the podcast wherever you get your audio. If you're on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. I'm Taylor Wilson and I'll be back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from Paste BN.