Lord Stanley is 4 games from going home to Canada.
One of the most perplexing issues flowing from the Trump administration is the cancellation of funding for a wide variety of research projects which, again, appears to be indiscriminate and meant to punish institutions that Mr. Trump does not like at the expense of all of us. The research done at NIH, the FDA and various universities around the country has been incredibly important both in terms of medical, but also other scientific research for the military, computer science, etc. In effect, this makes no sense, although I don’t know why I would be surprised about that in terms of Mr. Trump’s first 5 months in office. It appears purely punitive based upon the institutions he has gone after, but otherwise has no substantive point as I can’t believe that his administration doesn’t want research being done on cancer, heart disease, etc. Maybe Mr. Trump and Mr. Kennedy are far more venal than even I could contemplate.
Another area that Mr. Trump has wildly claimed credit for are gas and oil prices, as well as gas production. We have essentially been at maximum production capacity since December of 2024, after four years of the Biden administration’s policies, and then in early 2025 the OPEC nations increased production. This leaves you with a glut and when you have supply that outpaces demand you get reductions in price. This logic seems to escape the Trump administration, or they simply choose to ignore it.
One of the other conundrums from my perspective is the fact that so much has been done by Executive Order that it can be undone by the next president who disagrees, with very little effort on his or her part. Obviously, the situation is such that it may take several years of another administration before the level of research and employees are reestablished to a rational working number. I am saying, in effect, that there was a need for a reduction in the size of the federal government, now whether that was 5%, 10%, 20% is less clear to me, but no one has produced an analysis which tells us at what level of employment can services be delivered to the American public. I am awaiting that analysis.
There are enumerable wrinkles in the Big Beautiful Bill, one that was pointed out in the Wall Street Journal recently increases the tax on college endowments about 1.25% to upwards of 21%. Obviously, this is just a way to fill the gap in terms of the cuts needed or revenue needed to support the huge tax cuts. This goes along with Mr. Trump’s general attack mode against education and scientific research. None of which makes any sense, as I am sure most of our family members want research to save the lives faced with life threatening diseases.
The media has been reporting that Mr. Thune can only lose three votes. Unfortunately, that is not accurate, even under reconciliation the Vice President can break a tie. In other words, there really needs to be four No votes on the Republican side. It appears that Mr. Hawley, Mr. Johnson and Mr. Paul are likely opposed, which means they need one or more votes to kill this bill. It will be interesting to see if Mr. Thune caves to these three and sends back a bill which may make it impossible for Mr. Johnson to again pass it in the House. Mr. Hawley is the surprise in the group because he is taking a relatively liberal stand on the Medicaid issue, while Mr. Johnson and Mr. Paul have more traditional Republican themes which is the need to cut spending. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out.
The Big Beautiful Bill has all kinds of Republican friendly provisions. Tax breaks for silencers, tax breaks on foreign investors, a list that goes on and on, but may get booted in the Senate. Steel and aluminum tariffs to go to 50% to protect the US Steel Deal.
Weekly jobless claims rose more than expected as the labor market seems to be easing, and yet another negative sign for the economy but it is very inconsistent. The US Court of International Trade issued a decision blocking the vast majority of Mr. Trump’s tariffs basing their decision on the fact that his declaration of an emergency was overly broad and outside of the scope of the authority granted by Congress. The DC circuit paused the ruling and put the case on an expedited schedule. It will be interesting to see how the Supreme Court handles it. The Internation Court of Trade is of particular interest because it only deals with questions of international trade, so it has a far higher level of expertise in this arena than the average District Court or Court of Appeals panel. I am reasonably familiar with the Court because I am licensed to practice before it and have done several cases.
Inflation has declined to between 2.5 and 2.7%, excluding food and fuel. Personal consumption rose .2% down from .7% in March. All of this decent economic news is overshadowed by revoking Chinese student visas and curtailing exports to China of technology. China’s response is to slow walk the sale of rare earth metals, another form of retaliation against Mr. Trump.
One of the other interesting aspects of moving the Big Beautiful Bill to the Senate is that under reconciliation items that are not specifically addressing the budget are subject to being stripped from the bill. The process that the Senate goes through is that any Senator can challenge a provision and then it goes to the Senate Parliamentarian to make a decision as to whether or not that item comes out. I think a good example is the tax credit for silencers, as that is likely to be stricken. The question is how much will be stricken by the Parliamentarian and how much will be stricken by Senators? And I noted above, 4 votes kills the bill.
Bill Owens is a former member of Congress representing the New York 21st, a partner in Stafford, Owens, Piller, Murnane, Kelleher and Trombley in Plattsburgh, NY and a Strategic Advisor at Dentons to Washington, DC.
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