Trumpian sorts are unanimous: America needs factories. The president describes how staff have “watched in anguish as international leaders have stolen our jobs, international cheaters have ransacked our factories and international scavengers have torn aside our as soon as stunning American dream”. Peter Navarro, his commerce adviser, says that tariffs will “replenish all the half-empty factories”. Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, affords probably the most cartoonish pitch of all: “The military of hundreds of thousands and hundreds of thousands of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones—that sort of factor goes to return to America.”
