For months, President Donald Trump has dismissed weak economic indicators as remnants of the “Biden economy.” Yet Americans are increasingly holding him responsible for lingering inflation, a stagnant labor market, and a manufacturing downturn, an awkward trend for a president who campaigned on promises of an industrial renaissance. (To be fair, revised 2024 employment data suggests the economy he inherited was weaker than once thought, and the impact of his trade and immigration policies has been less immediate and dramatic.)
Over half of voters say Trump has made the economy worse rather than better (52% to 30%). Perceptions of his economic management remain deeply negative: Seven-in-ten disapprove of his handling of the economy overall, roughly where things stood when he took office, and 67% disapprove of his handling of the cost of living. Views of his tariffs are also negative, with net support at -27 percentage points, largely unchanged from two months ago, as many companies have held off on passing higher import costs on to consumers. Seventy-one percent of U.S. adults describe the economy as fair or poor, and 54% believe conditions are worsening. Two-thirds expect prices to rise over the next year, including 37% who think they will rise “a lot” — another difficult trend for a president who vowed to bring prices down on day one.
With more than a year until the midterms, the White House is in full campaign mode. Some Republicans worry inflation could jeopardizetheir narrow House majority, and Trump has only months to improve his standing on this issue. His signature domestic legislation, which extends the 2017 tax cuts while reducing social safety net programs, is unpopular. Nonpartisan analysts expect economic growth to remain flat through the rest of his term, with negative effects from tariffs and deportations offsetting gains from the tax cuts.
Nevertheless, efforts to shift the narrative — including high-profile immigration raids (such as one at Hyundai’s Georgia plant, which cast a pall over Trump’s efforts to attract foreign investment) and deploying troops to Washington, DC to crack down on crime — are resonating with Republican voters, who prioritize border security and public safety, and whose approval of Trump has been rising modestly. The White House is betting that an interest rate cut Trump has long pushed for will spur growth and investment, creating space to rebrand his signature law as a boon for working families — even as nonpartisan economists dispute that framing.
The Trump administration’s global tariff regime suffered a major setback when a federal appeals court ruled that the president exceeded his authority by invoking the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose tariffs on dozens of countries. The White House argued that persistent trade surpluses constituted a national emergency, but plaintiffs countered that the Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to levy tariffs. The Supreme Court will hear arguments in November, but for now, the tariffs remain in place. Other duties, such as Section 232 tariffs on steel, aluminum, and autos and Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports, are unaffected.
Since President Trump’s reelection, the Supreme Court has generally ruled in his favor. In this case, legal analysts suggest the conservative majority could partially uphold the tariffs while limiting their scope or duration. But Trump has warned that losing would “literally destroy” America, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said the U.S. could owe more than $70 billion in refunds —nearly half of all tariff revenue collected through August. Officials are exploring alternatives, including expanding Section 232 and 301 tariffs and invoking a 1930 law permitting short-term duties of up to 50% on imports from countries deemed to discriminate against U.S. commerce. Each option, however, faces legal and practical obstacles and would take longer than IEEPA to show results.
Tariffs remain a centerpiece of Trump’s foreign policy, deployed to pressure trading partners, renegotiate agreements, and claim leverage in diplomacy. He has argued that unilateral tariff authority strengthens America’s role as both an economic power and a peacemaker — part of his case for a Nobel Peace Prize. The record is mixed: He has hesitated to impose secondary tariffs on Russian oil, citing hopes of reviving Ukraine peace talks while prioritizing trade negotiations with Beijing and other concerns. Until the Supreme Court rules, we expect uncertainty to continue clouding trade diplomacy, making major commitments in talks with China and others less likely (but not impossible; see below) while the legality of Trump’s tariff strategy hangs in the balance.
After months of stalled bilateral talks, a tentative agreement with China on American ownership of TikTok marks a major milestone — significant enough that it may serve as a precondition for a possible meeting between President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping later this fall. Under the emerging terms, TikTok’s U.S. operations would be spun off into a separate company. An investor consortium including Oracle, Silver Lake, Andreessen Horowitz, and KKR is expected to hold about 80% of the shares, while Chinese shareholders would retain the rest. The new entity would license TikTok’s content-recommendation algorithm from its parent company ByteDance, while Oracle, already a key TikTok partner, would manage U.S. user data. The deal may take weeks to finalize, and the app will continue to operate in the U.S. during negotiations.
Trump, who tried to ban TikTok in 2020, now embraces the platform, where he maintains a personal account with roughly 15 million followers, in addition to the official White House account. TikTok’s 170 million U.S. users make it a powerful political tool with bipartisan reach, and it is expected to be influential in the 2026 midterms. The recent assassination of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk has heightened scrutiny of TikTok and other social media platforms, which many lawmakers from both parties blame for inflaming political divisions.
Members of Congress also remain deeply concerned about the potential for Chinese government access to Americans’ data and influence over TikTok’s content, pledging close scrutiny of any future deal to ensure compliance with a 2024 U.S. law that requires a “qualified divestiture” to guarantee TikTok is no longer “controlled” by a foreign adversary. Some of their demands — such as a full decoupling of TikTok’s algorithm from Chinese systems or explicit guarantees blocking any Chinese Communist Party access to U.S. user data — go beyond the statute’s text, potentially complicating negotiations and adding friction to broader U.S.-China trade talks ahead of a possible Trump-Xi summit.
