Trump's grocery tariff rollback is an admission of faulty policy

It’s a response to political trends but was misguided to begin with

- JONATHAN LEVIN

Earlier this year, US President Donald Trump rolled out a carpet bombing approach to global trade: Tariff every country and every product, and don't worry about collateral damage.

The administration launched the policy under the aegis of a ‘national security’ emergency, but it cast a net so wide that it encompassed coffee, Christmas toys and running shoes. What could go wrong?

Now, you may be shocked to learn, Trump has been forced to revisit his original strategy—but only after he realized that Republicans were starting to pay a political price for his recklessness. In an order last Friday, Trump cut tariffs on agricultural products such as beef, tomatoes and java beans. Predictably, the move came shortly after an election that showed Democrats handily beating Republicans in gubernatorial elections that revolved, in part, around voters’ affordability concerns.

Rolling back agriculture levies is a sensible first step towards acknowledging that the tariff policy was flawed from the outset, but it’s woefully insufficient.