[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 44 (Monday, March 10, 2025)]
[House]
[Page H1063]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   AMERICANS ARE IN FOR A ROUGH RIDE

  (Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2025, Ms. Kaptur 
of Ohio was recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority 
leader.)
  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, today is the fourth worst day on U.S. 
financial markets since 2022. It appears the American people are in for 
a rough ride. Buckle your seatbelts.
  Prices are rising already, and our financial markets are turbulent in 
the wrong direction. Economic recession looms ahead. Unemployment is 
increasing and so is inflation. It wasn't supposed to be this way.
  The economic repercussions of the Trump administration's tariffs are 
far-reaching, and they are biting down already. They threaten to raise 
prices on everything, including automobiles. I come from an automobile 
manufacturing center. Increases per car may be $9,000 to $12,000 per 
car. That is unaffordable. Housing is unaffordable now. Now cars, now 
other commodities like items that everybody uses--gasoline, lumber, 
road salt, potash, oil, energy.
  The U.S. and Canadian economies are interlinked. They are 
interlinked. These tariffs are propelling prices upwards. We don't want 
them to go that way. We want to stop the rising prices.
  High tariffs impose undue strain across the board, and they make 
American consumers and businesses alike miserable. The cost of living 
is climbing already, and the economic stability many workers have 
worked so hard to achieve is being undermined, as I speak.
  Now, today's news that the stock market took a major nosedive across 
the board is serious. The Dow is down 900 points, the worst market 
outcome of this year. But it isn't just this year. If you look back, 
the plummet that happened today is not pretty. Perhaps the President 
thinks that putting a pause on tariffs will halt this market crash. I 
mean, his proposals have been like this, but I urge this administration 
to realize it is uncertainty that the market does not like.
  Manufacturers cannot reinvent supply chains one month at a time. This 
stop-start, stop-start tariffs and tariffing are producing no benefits 
for America while already-rising prices and crashing workers' 401(k)s. 
Look what is happening to people's collective wealth in this country.
  Close to home where I live, these policies are severely impacting all 
of the people I represent across the Great Lakes region, the industrial 
and agricultural heartland.

  Trade policy must be targeted carefully, and it should never cause 
chaos. That is exactly what it is doing, causing chaos. Let me state 
plainly: Tariffs on our Canadian allies are foolish. The businesses and 
people of northwest Ohio and all of Ohio and the industrial 
agricultural Midwest overwhelmingly oppose this careless 
administration's ill-conceived trade war with Canada.
  Canada is our Nation's most fair trading partner. Our accounts 
balance when you look over a 10-year period of time. Our Nation should 
stand for free trade among free people, and that is what our trade with 
Canada does. Imposing tariffs on North American companies already 
struggling to compete with penny-wage labor abroad will drive our 
economy backwards off a cliff. Why would anybody want to do that? It 
makes no sense.
  Tariffs will hurt jobs across our region's manufacturing belt, in the 
automotive industry, in the energy sectors. The significant harm to our 
economy cannot be undone overnight, and it is happening right now as I 
speak.
  The regions' economies are intertwined across the Great Lakes, with 
iron ore and steel, auto parts and finished vehicles, crude oil and 
refined gasoline crisscrossing our northern border numerous times 
before getting to its final customer. To put it simply, don't hurt 
North America.
  The American people cannot stand idly by while we throw out all the 
hard-fought gains we have made in American manufacturing since the 
1980s; and, boy, believe me, they have been hard fought. Our region 
lost so many jobs abroad to NAFTA and CAFTA and China PNTR. We fought 
against those. We knew they wouldn't work, and they didn't. Now, we 
have had about 10 years where we tried to rebuild our region, and now 
this just as we are making progress. It is really disgusting.
  Who would even think about changing tariff laws through a tweet that 
the President did at 2 a.m. in the middle of the night? That sounds 
kind of peculiar to me.
  Tariffs and trade policy have to be carefully calibrated. Where is 
``The Art of the Deal''? This looks more like collapse an economy in 50 
days.
  Well, we don't want any of it. The American consumers are poised to 
be in recession. That is where we are headed. I urge, in the strongest 
possible words, the Trump administration to go back to the drawing 
board, get some of the most experienced people--we can recommend some 
to you--to figure out ways to solve the problem you want to solve, but 
don't put our people out of work. Don't stop reinvestment in our 
region. Don't drill down into people's 401(k)s. Don't harm the 
industries that are producing the real wealth of this country. The 
train on tariffs at the border is going backwards.
  Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, we need to redo this Trump tariff regimen 
and produce a system that creates wealth, doesn't destroy it, that 
doesn't throw our financial markets into chaos, and allows regions like 
my own that have struggled so hard for decades to rebuild what was 
taken away from us.
  Make us sound again. Don't do more harm to us.
  We have just reached a point where we have to speak out against these 
dangerous tariffs. They are destroying our livelihoods. People can't 
afford groceries. Our food banks are crowded with people. These tariffs 
are already biting down. America needs growth, not recession.
  Please, please, folks who hear my voice, urge the administration to 
redo its tariffs and take off this tourniquet around the whole northern 
border of our country that we share with Canada so that we can have 
robust growth again. We have worked so hard for it.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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