Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.
In today’s edition, we dive into President Donald Trump’s sweeping new tariffs and the fallout from Tuesday’s elections in Wisconsin and Florida. Plus, Andrea Mitchell previews Secret of State Marco Rubio’s trip to NATO headquarters.
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— Adam Wollner
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Trump ramps up his trade war
President Donald Trump unveiled expansive tariffs on the United States’ largest trading partners as he pledged to embark on the biggest reorganization of the global economy since World War II, Rob Wile reports.
Importers seeking to bring goods into the U.S. from other countries will now face tariffs as high as 54% based on how the White House is calculating duties on U.S. exports, as well as “nonmonet” trade barriers based on countries’ doing things like manipulating their currencies or serving as “pollution havens.”
The result was a list of tariffs that are set to impose major duties on billions — if not trillions — of dollars in trade. China, one of the United States’ largest trading partners, would be hit with a 54% tariff, the European Union with 20%, India with 26% and Japan with 24%, among many others.
It was not immediately clear how Trump or the White House had calculated those numbers; a handout listing the tariffs said it included “currency manipulation and trade barriers.”
U.S. stock markets sharply reversed earlier gains as Trump made his remarks. In after-hours trading, S&P 500 futures fell 1.5%.
America has been “looted, pillaged, raped and plundered,” Trump said in announcing the latest iteration of his tariff regime set to begin this week. He said from the White House Rose Garden that American industry “will be reborn” and touted a new “golden age of America.”
The context: The announcement is an effort to impose sweeping changes on decades-old trading arrangements under which the United States increasingly outsource some labor-intensive manufacturing to foreign countries in return for cheaper goods — at the cost, critics have said, of America’s industrial base.
The tariffs are expected to take a toll on many companies whose products rely on global supply chains, which could be forced to raise prices or endure thinner profit margins. The White House and its surrogates have tried to communicate a message of patience and endurance, warning that some pain will be ahead but that the trade-off would be worthwhile eventually.
It’s unclear how that will play with the American public, especially after Trump came into office with promises of stable or even lower prices after an inflation-heavy recovery under President Joe Biden following the vast economic disruptions of the pandemic.
Zooming out on the stock market: Rob also notes that after an initial burst in the wake of Trump’s victory in November, stocks have shifted downward as investors began to digest that Trump was planning to make good on significantly increasing trade duties.
How Congress is responding: Four Senate Republicans — Susan Collins of Maine; Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky; and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — are expected to vote for a Democratic resolution to block Trump’s Canadian tariffs, Frank Thorp V, Scott Wong and Sahil Kapur report.
If all 47 Senate Democrats also support it, the measure would have enough votes to pass through the upper chamber, though it wouldn’t go anywhere in the House. Trump called out those four GOP senators by name on Truth Social.
Follow live tariffs coverage →
Republicans aren’t panicking about Trump or Elon Musk after Tuesday’s elections
By Bridget Bowman and Adam Edelman
Republicans say they’re not panicking as they gear up for major races this year and a fierce battle for control of Congress next year, despite getting shellacked in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race — and seeing their margins decrease notably in a pair of House special election wins in deep-red Florida districts.
Democrats have largely cast the 10-point win by the liberal candidate in Wisconsin’s Supreme Court race Tuesday as a rejection by voters of Elon Musk, the billionaire White House adviser who took on a starring role in the campaign. And while the two wins by GOP candidates in Florida gave the party some breathing room with its narrow House majority, the sizes of their victories paled in comparison which what Republicans enjoyed in those districts five months ago.
Republicans, however, downplayed the results as expected outcomes — criticizing some of the GOP candidates, discounting the prospect of any broader fallout from the heavy-handed role Musk played in Wisconsin and suggesting that their candidates do a better job doubling down on explaining to voters Trump’s accomplishments, including divisive ones like his Department of Government Efficiency.
Democrats found some early success demonizing Musk in the Wisconsin race and believe they can expand that strategy. But while Musk will “continue to be active” in GOP campaigns, his prominent role in the party may be about to change: Trump told members of his Cabinet on March 24, more than a week before Tuesday’s elections, that Musk would leave his government role in the coming months.
Read more →
Steve Kornacki: How Democratic voter intensity powered Susan Crawford to a win in Wisconsin
Rubio prepares to confront an anxious NATO
Analysis by Andrea Mitchell
Secret of State Marco Rubio arrives at NATO headquarters in Brussels on Thursday morning for the first time since he became the country’s top diplomat. He will find European leaders who are increasingly anxious about continued support from the milit alliance’s most dominant member and resentful of the Trump White House.
Several episodes in recent weeks underscore the challenges Rubio will face. Vice President JD Vance’s and Defense Secret Pete Hegseth’s recent criticisms revealed in a leaked Signal chat immediately reverberated around European capitals. Western diplomats have told me they are further aggrieved by what they see as Trump and Vance’s ambush of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last month in the Oval Office. And there are concerns over the recent negotiations to end the Russia-Ukraine war, notably including the latest U.S. draft of an agreement that would require Ukraine to sign over not only its minerals but also its oil and gas rights to a Delaware-based fund that the United States would control — limiting Ukraine’s access to other financing for reconstruction after the war.
Ukraine’s foreign minister will be in Brussels meeting with NATO ministers and the secret general but is not scheduled to meet with Rubio as negotiations with the United States are on hold pending an anticipated call Trump has said he will soon have with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
While the U.S. goal at NATO is to further press allies to contribute more to mutual defense, European ministers are focusing on how to go it alone without the United States if necess by creating a European security force for Ukraine. Poland and Germany have suggested trying to obtain nuclear weapons should Trump withdraw from NATO entirely.
Those tensions will only be exacerbated by Trump’s new tariffs. And then there’s Canada’s furor over Trump’s insistence that it become America’s 51st state, even though that will never happen.
Finally, in the category of “manifest destiny,” Trump refused to rule out taking Greenland — a territory owned by Denmark, a NATO ally — by force in his comments to Kristen Welker last Sunday.
Welcome to NATO headquarters, Mr. Secret. It’s going to be an interesting debut visit.
Today’s other top stories
Deportation fallout: Two women the Trump administration tried to send to an El Salvador prison spoke out after the country refused to take them, saying they were “lied to.” Read more → 
A boost from Booker: Sen. Cory Booker’s record-breaking speech is giving Democrats a jolt of enthusiasm amid their calls for a fighter to take on Trump. Read more → 
A new blueprint: Senate Republicans have released their revised budget resolution to advance Trump’s agenda, which includes a new $1.5 trillion tax cut and a $5 trillion debt limit hike. Read more → 
Hey Alexa, buy TikTok? Amazon is making a late bid to purchase TikTok ahead of the impending deadline for the Chinese-owned social media app to sell or divest to avoid being banned in the United States. Read more → 
In the courts: The Supreme Court wrestled with South Carolina’s attempt to defund Planned Parenthood, with some conservative justices expressing skepticism that individual Medicaid patients can sue to enforce their rights to pick medical providers. Read more → 
2026 watch: Michigan Democraticstate Sen. Mallory McMorrow became the first high-profile candidate to jump into the state’s open U.S. Senate race. Read more → - 2026 watch, cont.: Former Health and Human Services Secret Xavier Becerra announced he is running for governor of California, the Los Angeles Times reports. Read more →
A Texas showdown: Democrats are threatening to sue Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott if he doesn’t call a special election for a vacant blue House seat. Read more → 
Making it official: A judge permanently dismissed federal corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams. Read more →
That’s all From the Politics Desk for now. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner and Ben Kamisar.
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