This has to be one of the single funniest French retorts in the history of commerce.  If President Trump follows through on auto tariffs, France will strike back.  Let that sink in.
Oh noes,… your next Peugeot, Citroen or Renault purchase might cost more.  D’oh.

PARIS (Reuters) – Europe will hit back if U.S. President Donald Trump follows through with a threat to slap import tariffs on European-made cars, France’s finance minister said on Monday. Trump escalated already burning trade tensions on Friday by threatening to hit all imports of cars assembled in the European Union (EU) with a 20 percent tariff.   (more)

The EU is the most protectionist trade bloc in the world.  The German auto-sector is the most protected trade sector inside the EU.  The hypocrisy is silly.
The EU, Germany specifically, needs access to the U.S. market to survive.  Angela Merkel has already conceded this point in the EU concessionary position to abandon all auto tariffs; in exchange for removal of Steel and Aluminum tariffs.
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Earlier today President Trump and First Lady Melania welcomed King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein and Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan back to the White House.  This is the second official visit of King Abdullah and Queen Raina.
In the background it is likely much of the executive conversation surrounds the current issues with Iran, the state of Syria, Israel and the Palestinian Authority as it pertains to regional stability overall and Jordan specifically.   In the quiet distance, and entirely overlooked by Western -mostly U.S. media, President Trump has been positioning the EU via economic leverage against Iranian influence.

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[Transcript] PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you very much. It’s a great honor to have the King and Queen of Jordan with us. They’re friends. We’ve known each other now for quite a while. Long before this.
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Whoopsie – During a debriefing session between Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, Canadian politicians and business leaders, the chief NAFTA negotiator for Canada Steve Verheul accidentally told the group, while cameras were rolling, there were no actual NAFTA negotiations taking place.

When a seemingly shocked participant then asked a follow-up question about how could Steve Verheul reconcile that admission against earlier statements about an upcoming  Memo of Understanding (MOU), Ms. Freeland quickly shut down the discussion -in french- until the cameras left the meeting.  [Watch Video Segment Here]

Council Question: “Do you still meet your counterparts? Do you still have committees that are working?  What is the status of the negotiations?
Steve Verheul: “We don’t have any active negotiations. I haven’t talked to them in a little while.”
Council Question: “Since, …since?”
Steve Verheul: “Two or three weeks. Um, I’ll have the odd conversation, but no real engagement, no real negotiation session.”
Council Question: “And when we hear that you were close to a kind of MOU [Memo of Understanding] what was the basis of that?”
Chrystia Freeland: awkward interruption in French. (watch below)

What became evident within the exchange is the Canadian government trying to hide the lack of NAFTA progress from concerned citizens inside Canada.  In essence, the Canadian government is lying to their citizens about the possibility of a NAFTA agreement.
The Canadian economy contracting.  Last month the Canadian economy dropped 31,000 full-time jobs.  Amid an economy one-tenth the size of the U.S, that would be a comparative single-month job loss of 310,000 in the United States.
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Seek first to understand.  During an assembly of Canadian left-spectrum pundits the U.S. and Canada relationship is the topic; the backdrop is the economic consequences, trade and NAFTA.   In this group the high-minded Canadians express their views, their wounded sensibilities, and yet simultaneously highlight an important strategic flaw.
Within their political frame-of-reference, they cannot fathom the tenuous nature of their dependency.  They think they are more important than they are. Their inability to accept the weakness of their economic position is based on their feelings. Pride is very dangerous in negotiations amid apex predators. If you are prideful you provide a strategic advantage for the opposition.  In negotiations, President Trump doesn’t care about ‘feelings’ or opinions toward his approach.
The Canadian economic position is ‘not to lose‘, the Trump position is to win.  There is a huge strategic difference within those two perspectives.

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President Trump is hosting a roundtable MAGAnomic meeting in Las Vegas with business leaders and professionals.  The discussion centers around ongoing benefits from the tax reform initiative; the administration policy toward trade rebalancing; and the ongoing America-First investment and business development plans.
UPDATE: Video Added

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JSW Steel has announced an agreement to purchase Acero Junction facility in Mingo Junction, Ohio. Thanks specifically to the Trump administration economic plan, it is investing upwards of $500 million in the old Ohio steel plant that was built in 1929, instead of constructing a new facility in India.
The project is expected to generate an estimated 300 permanent jobs in a town of just 3,400 people.  “We are going to revitalize that facility and that entire community,” CEO John Hritz said:

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We’ve been sharing this intensely predictable issue since late 2017. Andrés Manuel López Obrador, or “AMLO”, is going to be the next President of Mexico.  The self-described “soft Marxist”, a Mexican Hugo Chavez, has been so far ahead of all other candidates – the outcome of the July 1st Mexican election is a foregone conclusion.
Interestingly, people are only now starting to take notice because AMLO is openly telling his fellow countrymen they must flood the U.S. border.

(From the Daily Caller) […] “And soon, very soon — after the victory of our movement — we will defend all the migrants in the American continent and all the migrants in the world,” Obrador said, adding that immigrants “must leave their towns and find a life in the United States.”  He then declared it as “a human right we will defend.”

Most political observers read this and think it sounds crazy. They make comparisons to a U.S. presidential candidate telling Americans to flee to Canada (Daily Wire example). That type of perspective shows a disconnect.  The paradigm, and frame of reference, is entirely wrong.
What AMLO is saying is not a surprise, nor is it an ideological proclamation; there is an actual strategic policy behind these statements.  This has been AMLO’s strategy for years, and no-one was paying attention.   Andrés Manuel López Obrador has long proposed a key economic plan for Mexico to become wealthy. However, his idea has only recently gained broad mainstream Mexican understanding.
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Earlier today President Trump held a working lunch with multiple governors and officials. The majority of the discussion focused on economic policies, job growth, vocational training, and the larger American economy.

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It has long been suspected; the footprints and fingerprints were always present; McCain repeatedly denied it…. now the evidence surfaces.
For those who remember the issues when the IRS, White House and DOJ organized the post 2010 election “shellacking” targeting of Tea Party groups, the latest discovery from Judicial watch is confirmation of a long-held opinion.  John McCain was instrumental in supporting the weaponization of the IRS to target tea party groups.

WASHINGTON DC – […]  In the full notes of an April 30, 2013, meeting, McCain’s high-ranking staffer [Henry] Kerner recommends harassing non-profit groups until they are unable to continue operating. Kerner tells Lerner, Steve Miller, then chief of staff to IRS commissioner, Nikole Flax, and other IRS officials, “Maybe the solution is to audit so many that it is financially ruinous.” In response, Lerner responded that “it is her job to oversee it all:”

Henry Kerner asked how to get to the abuse of organizations claiming section 501 (c)(4) but designed to be primarily political. Lois Lerner said the system works, but not in real time. Henry Kerner noted that these organizations don’t disclose donors. Lois Lerner said that if they don’t meet the requirements, we can come in and revoke, but it doesn’t happen timely. Nan Marks said if the concern is that organizations engaging in this activity don’t disclose donors, then the system doesn’t work. Henry Kerner said that maybe the solution is to audit so many that it is financially ruinous. Nikole noted that we have budget constraints. Elise Bean suggested using the list of organizations that made independent expenditures. Lois Lerner said that it is her job to oversee it all, not just political campaign activity.

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The CFPB was constructed by Elizabeth Warren and her progressive ideologues as an extra-constitutional government agency.  This was entirely by design.

The CFPB had two two primary, albeit unspoken, functions.  First, it was structured as a holding center for fines and assessments against any financial organizations opposed by progressives.  Second, it was a distribution hub for the received funds to be transferred to political allies and groups supportive of progressive causes.
To pull off this scheme Elizabeth Warren et al ensured it was structured to allow no congressional oversight; however, it was also structured to have no executive branch oversight – and the funding mechanism for the CFPB budget was directly through the federal reserve.  The lack of any legislative or executive branch oversight made the entire scheme unconstitutional according to an earlier court decision.
The CFPB defenders then appealed the decision to a select appellate court in Washington DC to continue the construct.  The Warren crew won the appeal; but today, in an unrelated jurisdictional ruling a New York judge affirmed the minority opinion setting up a possible supreme court pathway to get a final decision.

NEW YORK (AP) – The U.S. government’s beleaguered consumer finance watchdog agency is unconstitutionally structured, a judge said Thursday as she disqualified the agency from serving as a plaintiff in a lawsuit.

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