Just last month a Kansas farmer wrote an open letter to his friends in the industry, telling them they were “played” by President Donald Trump and “failed to do their homework” before they voted for him.
Now, it’s a GOP lawmaker who is sounding the alarm over U.S. farmers thanks to Trump’s trade wars.
“What’s also indisputable is the markets are down about 8% in just two days, and I’m getting all kinds of reactions from businesses, farmers in Wisconsin that are highly concerned about what’s happening,” Sen. Ron Johnson, of Wisconsin, said on Fox Business.
“Those are the facts. All I can do is report the reality to the administration and let them know how these actions are impacting my constituents and it’ll be pretty much up to President Trump and his administration to determine how long they’re going to go down this road. When they can start negotiating with our trading partners,” he said. “I just can’t predict how this is going to turn out here. It’s a bold, risky move.”
Stock markets worldwide are careening even lower Friday after China matched Trump’s big raise in tariffs in an escalating trade war. Not even a better-than-expected report on the U.S. job market, which is usually the economic highlight of each month, was enough to stop the slide.
The S&P 500 was down 5% in morning trading, coming off its worst day since COVID wrecked the global economy in 2020. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 1,656 points, or 4.2%, as of 10:50 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 5.5% lower.
So far there are few, if any winners, in financial markets from the trade war. European stocks saw some of the day’s biggest losses, with indexes sinking roughly 5%. The price of crude oil tumbled to its lowest level since 2021. Other basic building blocks for economic growth, such as copper, also saw prices slide on worries the trade war will weaken the global economy.
The central question is: Will the trade war cause a global recession? If it does, stock prices will likely need to come down even more than they have already. The S&P 500 is down roughly 16% from its record set in February.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
