Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley, a Republican U.S. Senate candidate, recently had an opportunity to demonstrate the independence and courage needed for that post — to show that, when presented with a choice, he will stand up for the interests of his constituents even if means standing against the policies of President Donald Trump.
Instead, he sided with Trump, sending exactly the wrong message to people he claims to be fighting for. The good news is, Hawley still has time to remedy that.
Trump’s tariff war against America’s trading partners has driven up the cost of imported steel from Mexico by 25 percent. Mid Continent Nail Corp. of Poplar Bluff, Mo., is owned by Mexican company Deacero, which provides its steel. With the tariffs pushing up the price of its nails, the company has lost market share, requiring it to lay off about 100 of its 500-employee workforce; the rest might follow.
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Hawley stepped in to offer a solution, which is the right thing for a Senate candidate, or incumbent, to do. But his approach was decidedly un-senatorial: Instead of calling for the administration to rethink these counterproductive tariffs, Hawley pressed the company to just tough it out.
In a recent letter that he released publicly, Hawley told Deacero chief executive Raul Gutierrez Muguerza that the tariffs “should not be an excuse for you to kill American jobs.”
“I have told the Trump administration that Mid Continent makes a strong case for an exemption” from the tariffs, Hawley wrote, “but the fact remains that your company also has a critical role to play.” Hawley told Deacero it “can afford to keep the factory open” as the government decides whether it has to keep paying the tariffs.
So much for the core GOP principles that companies should make their own clear-eyed business decisions, and that free trade is a good thing. But the greater irony is what the whole episode says about these Trump tariffs that Hawley refuses to criticize.
Mid Continent is among more than 20,000 companies seeking administration exemptions from the tariffs. The administration plans to spend $12 billion to help farmers hurt by Chinese tariffs that came in retaliation for Trump’s tariffs. Meanwhile, U.S. motorcycle manufacturer Harley-Davidson is moving some of its operations overseas to avoid retaliatory tariffs abroad, prompting Trump to call for a boycott of its products.
A trade policy that immediately triggers mass exemption requests, billions in bailouts and a presidential declaration of war against an iconic American company is a failed trade policy.
The people of Poplar Bluff know firsthand what a disaster this policy has been. If Hawley wants to show he has the stuff to be a senator, he should side with them and against this unnecessary trade war.