Welcome to the beat. I'm Ari Melbert, and we have a lot coming up for you tonight. Some of it

interesting, some of it fun, but we begin with the brutal headwinds facing Donald Trump's

economic agenda and what bankers and financial experts call a man-made problem, that man being

the president, who has doubled down on this self-inflicted trade war and also going forward on these

cuts and firings. And I have breakdowns on these issues tonight. But let's start with the latest

on what some see as a Trump slump. The president threatening even more tariffs and that's against

warnings about a Trump recession. We have seen the retaliation continue. That's why it's

called a trade war. And these are countries that we usually do not approach anything like an

economic war with, let alone real wars. We are talking about longstanding American allies. Today,

the news from Canada and the EU, billions of dollars of new tariffs,

ranging from textiles, water eaters, beef, bourbon, many key American products. The impacts are

immediate. The stock market continues a volatility that is driven by partly, at least,

these Trump moves. We've seen that as almost a

uniform opinion, and I'm going to show you some Wall Street Journal and other reporting on that

in a moment. But today in the last few hours, stocks are mostly flat. That comes, though, after a 10%

slide, which the markets have not regained. Business leaders say that even if you were open-minded to

some of what Trump wants to do, what the goals may be, this has been confusing, incompetent,

and at times downright chaotic. And at top Trump aide who's been running point on this stuff,

the Commerce Secretary, when asked about whether we could be heading into a recession and whether

all of this would be worth it, he gave an answer that was as astounding for its economic claim

as it is for its political tone-deaf positioning. Take a look. Will these policies be worth it if they

lead to a recession, even a short-term recession?

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