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United States Government Is Very Afraid Of BRICS And Dedollarization

July 15, 2025 Ben Norton, Geopolitical Economy. , , ,
Western corporate media coverage of the Global South-led organization BRICS is frequently dismissive and condescending. Bloomberg published an article claiming that BRICS is “little more than a meaningless acronym”. It appears that a lot of this criticism, nevertheless, is actually a coping mechanism, because evidence is piling up showing that the US government is very afraid of the rapid growth of BRICS. Donald Trump, in particular, is terrified of the possibility of BRICS challenging the global dominance of the US dollar. BRICS held a successful summit in Brazil in July, featuring for the first time the participation of 10 members and 10 partner countries. Trump responded with furious denunciation, threatening to hit all BRICS countries with 10% tariffs.

Trump Threatens Additional Tariffs On BRICS-Linked Countries

July 7, 2025 News Desk, The Cradle. , , ,
US President Donald Trump has threatened to impose additional tariffs on any country affiliated with the BRICS+ group of emerging economies. Trump made the threat early on 7 July in a post on his Truth Social platform. “Any Country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of BRICS, will be charged an ADDITIONAL 10 percent Tariff,” the US president said. “There will be no exceptions to this policy. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” he added. Trump’s statement coincided with an ongoing BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. On Sunday, the bloc made a declaration condemning the rise in US tariffs in an indirect swipe at Washington, expressing “serious concerns.”

The United States Drive To War On China

June 7, 2025 Carlos Martinez, Friends of Socialist China. , , , ,
The US-led ‘cold’ war against China is manifestly failing in its objectives of suppressing China’s rise and weakening its global influence. China’s economy continues to grow steadily. In purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, it is by now the largest in the world. Its mobilisation of extraordinary resources to break out of underdevelopment and become a science and technology superpower appears to be paying substantial dividends, with the country establishing a clear lead globally in renewable energy, electric vehicles, telecommunications, advanced manufacturing, infrastructure construction and more.

The Economic ‘Protracted War’ Between The US And China

June 5, 2025 John Ross, Geopolitical Economy. , , , ,
China and the U.S. have come to a 90-day trade agreement. This was a clear victory in the first battle of the “trade war” for China — as was admitted even in the U.S. media. As Bloomberg, a fiercely anti-China source, summarised the analysis of the overwhelming majority of Western media: “Xi Jinping’s decision to stand his ground against Donald Trump could hardly have gone any better for the Chinese leader.” But it would be an error to mistake this decisive victory for China in the first battle with a belief that the U.S. will abandon the economic struggle against China – it will not. This is in economic terms a “protracted war”, not a single battle.

How The GOP Is Saving The Fossil Fuel Industry From Trump

May 16, 2025 Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
On April 2, so-called Liberation Day, President Trump announced a suite of sweeping tariffs on virtually every country in the world, including some entirely populated by penguins . Of all the nations Trump picked a trade war with, China was set to be hit with the most aggressive tariffs at a rate of 145% for Chinese goods set to be sold in the United States. The announcement of these tariffs, essentially a tax on goods and supplies sold domestically, sent shockwaves through the global economy forcing corporations to scramble to find expedient answers to cope with rising prices and dim economic forecasts.

Trump’s Tariffs And The New Cold War On China

May 13, 2025 Carlos Martinez, Friends of Socialist China. , , , ,
The first thing to say about the Trump administration’s tariff war is that it is primarily designed to weaken, undermine and isolate the People’s Republic of China. It’s part of a broader program of “decoupling” from China and a broader New Cold War on China – a system of hybrid warfare incorporating economic measures, diplomatic measures and propaganda measures, along with a significant military component: the deployment of hundreds of thousands of troops to the Pacific region; the US military bases in the Philippines, Guam, Okinawa, Japan, South Korea, Australia; the deployment of sophisticated weapons systems to the region; and the various attempts to create some sort of Asian NATO.

Trump’s Tariffs Are Uniting China, Europe, Japan, South Korea, And ASEAN

May 10, 2025 Ben Norton, Geopolitical Economy. , , , , , , ,
Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent revealed that the US government has what he called a “grand encirclement” strategy aimed at isolating and weakening China. Trump hit China with tariffs of 145%, imposing what is essentially a trade embargo. The Trump administration wanted to pressure Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, and India to follow the US and “approach China as a group”, Bessent said, according to Bloomberg. This strategy is clearly failing. The finance ministers and central bank governors of China, Japan, South Korea, and members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) met in Italy on May 4 and published a joint statement pledging “to further strengthen regional financial cooperation”.

President Trump’s Proposal To Eliminate Income Taxes: Can It Be Done?

May 9, 2025 Ellen Brown, Scheer Post. , , , ,
In February, President Trump said that tariffs would generate so much income that Americans would no longer need to pay income taxes. The latest plan, according to U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, is to abolish income taxes for people who earn less than $150,000 yearly. That move would affect roughly 75% of workers, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. On its face, this could narrow the wealth gap by boosting disposable income for low- and middle-income households without raising taxes on the wealthy — a politically clever alternative to progressive tax hikes.

Trump’s Tariffs Turbocharge De-Dollarization

May 6, 2025 Ben Norton, Geopolitical Economy. , , , , ,
Donald Trump has made it clear that one of his top goals is to maintain the dominance of the US dollar as the global reserve currency. When he was running for president in 2024, Trump promised he would punish any country that sought alternatives to the US currency by hitting them with sky-high tariffs. “Many countries are leaving the dollar. They’re not going to leave the dollar with me!”, Trump vowed at a campaign rally. “I’ll say, ‘You leave the dollar, you’re not doing business with the United States, because we’re going to put 100% tariff on your goods'”. Since Trump has returned for his second term as US president, however, his tariffs and trade war have actually accelerated the decline of the dominance of the US dollar, not slowed it.

Waiting For The Supply Shock

May 2, 2025 David Dayen, Portside. , , ,
Two milestones converged this week that seem important in the moment but in retrospect will be minor blips historically: yesterday’s reaching of the first hundred days of Donald Trump’s second term, and today’s announcement of first-quarter gross domestic product showing the economy contracted by 0.3 percent on an annualized basis. The former is just a news hook to overlay “what it all means” stories that are as light as air. The second covers the period before the April 2 Liberation Day, though it was influenced by it.

If International Trade Reverts To The ‘Law Of Jungle,’ All Will Be Victims

April 27, 2025 Abdul Rahman, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
Speaking in an informal meeting of the UN Security Council on Wednesday, April 23 China’s permanent representative Fu Cong questioned the unilateralism pursued by the US in international trade claiming it “severely infringes upon the legitimate rights and interests of all countries” and violates the rule based multilateral trading system. Cong claimed a multilateral approach remains the only option for the advancement of all countries and affirmed “no country has the right to put itself above international law” and dictate terms to others. He offered Chinese cooperation in dealing with the situation to the countries which are willing to stand for free and fair international trade.

Unifor, UAW Now At Odds Over Trump’s Auto Tariffs

April 27, 2025 Jackie Charniga and Eric D. Lawrence, Portside. , , , , ,
Unifor National President Lana Payne no longer sees eye to eye with UAW leader Shawn Fain. In a split with its Canadian sibling, the UAW endorsed President Donald Trump’s 25% tariffs on foreign-made vehicles and parts — the same tariffs Payne called “reckless and dangerous” for the entire integrated auto industry. Payne told the Free Press on Thursday, the day a new round of tariffs took effect, that she hasn't met with Fain in “some time," adding that she isn't sure where he's getting his labor figures to support the pro-tariff stance. “I don’t know that I would say we have common goals here. Unifor is opposed to these tariffs that the president of the United States is placing on the Canadian auto industry,” she said.

Bonds Away!

April 24, 2025 Les Leopold, Scheer Post. , , ,
I recently wrote about a somewhat mysterious group of financial traders known as the bond vigilantes. Their actions caused Donald Trump to abort many of his Liberation Day tariffs, but that does not make them the good-guy defenders of democracy. In fact, they are quite the opposite. Many understood that point, thankfully, but others wondered about the government bond market, how it worked, and why the value of something fully backed by the faith of the U.S. government might be mutable in value. Readers had questions and the answers will help us understand why Trump flinched when the bond vigilantes drove up the interest rates on government bonds.

Indian Farmers Protest Visit Of Vice President JD Vance

April 24, 2025 Abdul Rahman, People's Dispatch. , , , , , ,
Thousands of farmers and working-class people in cities and villages across India took to the streets on Monday, April 21 to protest the visit of US Vice President JD Vance. They claim he has come to finalize an agreement which will be a disaster for India’s agriculture and small industries. Vance arrived in New Delhi on Monday on a four-day tour in the country. As per the reports, the primary agenda of his visit is to finalize a trade agreement between the two countries. The talks over the agreement have been ongoing since the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US in February. The protesters gathered in villages and district headquarters across India.

War By Other Means: Trump’s Tariffs And The Empire’s Final Gamble

April 23, 2025 Thomas Fazi, Orinoco Tribune. , , , , , ,
Over the past two weeks, Trump has taken a wrecking ball to the global economy by announcing sweeping tariffs on dozens of countries. This abrupt move sent stock markets in the US and abroad into a tailspin, forcing the administration to quickly backpedal. In a hasty retreat, Trump revised the policy to impose a lower, across-the-board 10% tariff (25% for aluminium and steel), while simultaneously singling out China with a staggering 145% tariff on all imports from the country, one of the most extreme trade measures in modern history—though some categories were subsequently exempted.
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