President Donald Trump declared Wednesday, April 2, 2025, “Liberation Day.” The president announced additional tariffs on almost all U.S. trading partners, nearly ensuring an increase in cost for all goods and services within the United States.
While the president claims he is attempting to move manufacturing jobs back to the United States, serious economists question his tactics. Trump’s tariffs will most assuredly set off a trade war with U.S. partners, friends and foes alike. The move risks sending the U.S. and global economies into a recession.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said it was a “major blow to the world economy.” She continued with even worse news for the world’s marginalized: “The consequences will be dire for millions of people around the globe … in particular, the most vulnerable citizens.”
Global markets responded immediately, plunging downward.
Republican leaders are asking the public to give the tariffs a chance, saying the economy may worsen before it gets better. Republican Senator from Oklahoma James Lankford equated the president’s policy to a “kitchen remodel.”
His conservative colleague, Senator Tim Sheehy from Montana, continued the “remodeling” metaphor, saying it would be “really annoying” in the short term but worth it in the end. Others are not so certain.
CNN reported, “Four Senate Republicans joined with Democrats on Wednesday to deliver a rare bipartisan rebuke to President Donald Trump over trade policy.” Democratic Senator from Virginia, Tim Kaine, responded, “There’s never been a one-sided trade war, and they always retaliate when it’s agriculture. It hits ag(ricuture) states very, very hard.”
Republican Senator from Maine, Susan Collins, said: “The Maine economy is integrated with Canada, our most important trading partner. From home heating oil, gasoline, jet fuel, and other refined petroleum products, to Maine’s paper mills, forest products businesses, agricultural producers, and lobstermen, the tariffs on Canada would be detrimental to many Maine families and our local economies.”
While politicians and economists argue about trade wars and the economy, I recall the ancient African proverb, “When elephants fight, it’s the grass that suffers.” Anytime I hear politicians saying, “This is going to be uncomfortable,” I recall my proctologist right before he snapped the glove. I did not believe him, and I don’t believe politicians.
The truth is that the president’s latest trade war will not affect him or the other oligarchs running the country right now. The New York Times reported, “The U.S. economy remains deeply unequal, with vast gaps in wealth and financial security persisting even as inflation has ebbed and incomes have risen.”
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office concluded, “The share of wealth held by families in the top 10 percent has reached 69 percent, while the share held by families in the bottom 50 percent is only 3 percent.”
Independent Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont pointed out the dangers of an economic downturn. The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Sanders is the ranking member on found that “Americans in the wealthiest 1% of counties live an average of 84.3 years, while those in the bottom 50% of counties live only 77.4 years. The disparities are even worse in rural areas, where people in low-income counties face a 10-year life expectancy gap compared to wealthier urban and suburban areas.”
Therefore, when politicians and oligarchs tell you it will get worse before it gets better, remember who will bear the burden: the working poor. While they enjoy economic security, the rest are left to tread water in the deep waves of a financial collapse.
The latest economic actions by the wealthy and powerful contradict the Gospel. As Jesus said long ago: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18-19).
Liberating the captives never meant selling them out to wealthy oligarchs. Bringing good news did not have the precursor of “preparing for pain before help arrives.” And “proclaiming the year of the Lord” is a reminder of economic relief as a spiritual truth and practice.
In the book of Leviticus, the Lord declared: “And you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall return, every one of you, to your property and every one of you to your family. That fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall not sow or reap the aftergrowth or harvest the unpruned vines. For it is a Jubilee; it shall be holy to you: you shall eat only what the field itself produces.”
The system sought to provide a safety net. The poor were reprieved from life’s hard economic realities. Debts were forgiven, and lands were restored.
The wealthy remained wealthy, but the system sought to prevent an ever-widening chasm between haves and have-nots. In other words, the working poor were given an opportunity to recover and break away from economic oppression.
In today’s unbridled capitalistic system, the playing field always tips towards the wealthy. These tariffs and policies will burden the working and poor classes, leaving them to decide between mortgages, food, and medicine. The time for outrage has long passed, but the opportunity for change lies before us.
People of good faith need to rise and speak out, demanding good news be brought to the working and poor. When the wealthy ask the rest of the world to endure the pain, they are not bearing it themselves.
They have food and shelter. They have health care and transportation. The lives of the wealthy change very little during economic downturns while the rest of the world is left scurrying for resources.
The time is now to demand the end of oligarchy and to create a more just economic system that allows everyone to live with dignity and happiness. The time is now to hear Jesus’ financial advice and bring true “liberation” to a world suffering at the hands of the wealthy. The time is now to follow Jesus’ words, “On earth as it is in heaven.”
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