Trade Beef

Trump has announced beef tariffs on all U.S. beef imports. These include Australia, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Uruguay, and New Zealand. Trump, according to Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, spent another weekend studying our trade relations and discovered more trade complexity in our economy. Trump posted the announcement on Truth Social early Sunday morning.

Trump appointed a Meat Czar following the announcement, 23 year old DOGE staffer and Texas native Dillon Thomas. Thomas graduated recently from Texas A&M with a degree in economics, and rose to fame on the right-wing blogosphere as a meat influencer. Some say that the idea for beef tariffs came originally from Mr. Thomas, making its way from him to Elon Musk to President Trump.

The Times reported that Thomas’s college-era Substack blog posts lay out both the rationale and the logistics for beef tariffs. In these posts, Thomas argues that America, already the world’s top beef producer, has no need to import from anyone. According to Thomas, America produces 24 billion pounds of beef, exports about 3 billion, and imports around 4 billion. Thomas’s solution? Stop exporting the 3 billion and ramp up production a bit.

When Newsmax reporter Tom Thorn asked about the plan’s origins being from Mr. Thomas, Trump responded that the plan was his own, but that he is happy to keep working with Mr. Thomas and that he “has a bright future” ahead of him.

Reactions to the beef tariff announcement have roiled markets, economists, and beef producers alike. Mike Johnson, managing partner at ATX Capital—the largest food investor in America—said they’re reassessing their exposure to American beef. He expects the shift will strain an already burdened industry by reducing profit per head of cattle and driving up production costs, especially for land and water, which are already in short supply.

Economists project tariffs will raise domestic ground beef prices by 25–30%, from $5.60 to over $7.00 per pound. Meanwhile, premium cuts that American producers currently export to countries like Japan at $415 per head would instead be ground into hamburger, creating what University of Michigan economist Jennifer Hasley calls "the world's most expensive Big Mac ingredients."

Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize winner and retired New York Times columnist, has been the most vocal opponent of beef tariffs. On Sunday night, Krugman appeared shirtless on Instagram Live from his kitchen, grinding USDA Prime ribeyes—about $60 a pound at the butcher—into ground beef.

Responding to viewer comments, Krugman said, “Trump is basically asking ranchers, butchers, and beef purveyors to grind up the top-quality beef we export at a premium to countries like Japan or Korea and instead use it for basic dishes like ground beef. Our farmers would lose about $400, or 20% per head of cattle, to these tariffs. I did the Instagram Live to help the younger generation visualize what tariffs are doing.”

Major beef associations have remained silent so far; the livestock growers’ associations of Montana and Texas did not respond to requests for comment. Some individual ranchers, however, did speak up. “I honestly don’t know how we’re supposed to magically increase production by 30% with no additional land or water,” said Chuck Benson, a fifth-generation Montana rancher. “And grinding up premium cuts we sell overseas for top dollar? That’s like selling your best horse for glue.” Meanwhile, the American Ranchers Federation released a carefully worded statement saying they “appreciate the President’s attention to the beef industry” while requesting “urgent clarification on implementation timelines.”

When reached for comment about Krugman’s demonstration, Trump called the economist a “washed-up loser” and claimed the video actually proved his point. “He’s just showing how easy it is to make American hamburger from American steaks. Beautiful process. Very simple. And now we’ll have more jobs—tremendous jobs—for grinding steaks. Many, many jobs.”

Meanwhile, fast food chains quietly began updating their pricing algorithms. McDonald’s executives declined to comment officially, but one regional supply chain manager, speaking anonymously, said the company was “running disaster scenarios” around potential beef shortages and price spikes. “We sell about a billion pounds of beef annually in the US alone. If prices jump 30% and supply becomes unstable, we’re looking at the McRib becoming our permanent solution.”

Beef futures traders reported taking the largest positions since the 2020 pandemic meat shortages. As one Wall Street analyst put it: “The only winners in a beef tariff war are chickens.”