Trump dismisses China tariff retaliation and implores Fed to cut interest rates as stock market dives: Live updates – UK Times

Katie Hawkinson is tracking the market.

President Donald Trump has implored Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to cut interest rates and “STOP PLAYING POLITICS.”

The president, who is at his golf club in West Palm Beach, wrote on Truth Social:

This would be a PERFECT time for Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to cut Interest Rates. He is always “late,” but he could now change his image, and quickly. Energy prices are down, Interest Rates are down, Inflation is down, even Eggs are down 69%, and Jobs are UP, all within two months – A BIG WIN for America. CUT INTEREST RATES, JEROME, AND STOP PLAYING POLITICS!

The White House continues to insist Trump’s tariffs are not about negotiation.

Someone should tell President Donald Trump, who appears to be negotiating with Vietnam.

He just posted this on Truth Social:

Just had a very productive call with To Lam, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam, who told me that Vietnam wants to cut their Tariffs down to ZERO if they are able to make an agreement with the U.S. I thanked him on behalf of our Country, and said I look forward to a meeting in the near future.

On Thursday, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said: “This is not a negotiation.”

Later that evening, Trump said it was…

“Every country is calling us. That’s the beauty of what we do,” the president said. “We put ourselves in the driver’s seat. If we would have asked these countries to do us a favor, they would have said no. Now they will do anything for us.”

Trump added: “The tariffs give us great power to negotiate. They always have.”

As of 6:30pm Eastern time, Meta stock was down 8.96 percent, Amazon was down 8.98 percent, Google had fallen 3.92 percent, while Apple had plunged over 9 percent.

White House adviser Elon Musk’s marquee companies also felt the pain, with Tesla sliding 5.47 percent and X down 8.14 percent.

Josh Marcus reports from San Francisco.

Friday’s stock markets are set to continue their drop in the wake of President Donald Trump’s tariff announcement – with Dow Jones futures down 1,400 points in overnight trading.

On Thursday, Wall Street saw a historically bad day with the Dow Jones having a point drop that ranked in the top 5 worst of all time. The NASDAQ saw its largest one-day point drop in that market’s history.

Investors appeared to be spooked by the impacts of Trump’s tariff and China’s retaliatory 34 percent tariffs on U.S. goods in response.

Katie Hawkinson and Alex Lang report from DC and New York City respectively.

15 state attorneys have filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for canceling National Institute of Health research grants.

Already, the ACLU and researchers have filed lawsuits against the administration for this.

The NIH is the largest public funder of medical research. Its work helped pioneer the rubella vaccine, led to the discovery of the BRCA gene, and funded research for HIV/AIDS treatment (just to name a few.)

Millie Cooke reports from London:

Chinese retaliatory tariffs will have a significant impact on Trump’s core political base, an economist has warned, pointing out that agriculture is a key export from the US to China.

Dr Xin Sun, a senior lecturer in Chinese and East Asian business at King’s College London, argued that China “hopes to cause political pains for Trump and force him to back down”.

“Given the imbalance in trade between China and US, the damage caused by China’s retaliation to US is due to be smaller than the impact of US tariff on China, which is not only the highest among all countries but also affects a wider range of sectors”, he told The Independent.

“Since agriculture constitutes a lion share of US export to China, China’s retaliation has a bigger impact on some of Trump’s core political base. By targeting this population, China hopes to cause political pains for Trump and force him to back down somewhat.

“China’s rapid response and retaliation, the first among all countries, is driven by the political imperative of showcasing the resolve of standing up against US ‘bullying’ and guarding Chinese interests, which is vital to domestic political stability. The retaliation also aims to generate a deterrence effect on China’s other trade partners, such as EU, in case they would pursue similar anti-China measures in trade, in part to appease Trump.”