AMNA NAWAZ: Good evening.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

GEOFF BENNETT: And I'm Geoff Bennett.

On the "News Hour" tonight: Elon Musk expands his influence in the Trump administration, gutting parts of the government while gaining access to sensitive federal payment systems.

AMNA NAWAZ: The U.S. agency tasked with overseeing foreign aid is put on the chopping block, with potential risks for national security.

GEOFF BENNETT: And President Trump threatens, then pauses tariffs on major U.S. trading partners.

How the back-and-forth could affect American consumers.

DOUGLAS IRWIN, Dartmouth College: The tariff is a very regressive tax.

It hits lower-income households more than higher-income households.

GEOFF BENNETT: Welcome to the "News Hour."

Tonight, major tariffs against Mexico and Canada have been put on hold for one month, but others against China are set to go into effect tomorrow.

AMNA NAWAZ: This all comes as President Donald Trump pushes new boundaries, taking steps to shutter an entire government agency and giving his close adviser Elon Musk unprecedented leeway to cut costs in Washington and beyond.

Our report tonight from Laura Barron-Lopez.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Tonight, major tariffs against Mexico and Canada are on pause just hours before they were set to go into effect at the stroke of midnight tonight.

President Trump and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, after speaking by phone today, agreed to immediately pause the anticipated tariffs for a one-month period, Mexico pledging to put 10,000 of its troops along the U.S. southern border to help combat the flow of drugs.

And Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the same delay will be given to Canada.

But other tariffs are not off the table.

A 10 percent tariff will remain on China, one of the United States' largest trading partners as punishment, the White House says, for Chinese-made fentanyl flowing into the country.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: This is retaliatory.

This is retaliatory to a certain extent.

We have to stop people from pouring in and we have to stop fentanyl.

And that includes China.

Fentanyl has killed this year at least 200,000 people.

It's pouring in from China through Mexico and Canada, and they have got to stop it.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The now-delayed tariffs on everything from produce in the grocery aisle to lumber and building materials to automobiles and electronics.

The president admitted they would cost Americans.

DONALD TRUMP: We may have short term some little pain and people understand that, but long term the United States has been ripped off by virtually every country in the world.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The move follows backlash.

Canada threatened a 25 percent tariff this weekend on billions in U.S. goods.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU, Canadian Prime Minister: If President Trump wants to usher in a new golden age for the United States, the better path is to partner with Canada, not to punish us.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Meanwhile, the Trump administration is also sending shockwaves across its own federal government.

This morning, staff at the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, were told to work from home today because the agency's headquarters was closed.

Its Web site was also shut down, as multiple USAID officials have been placed on administrative leave.

DONALD TRUMP: I love the concept, but they turned out to be radical left lunatics.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The White House and billionaire Elon Musk have not provided evidence backing up claims of widespread corruption at USAID.

In a midnight conversation his platform X, Musk said the president wants the agency shut down altogether.

ELON MUSK, Owner, X: You have just got to basically get rid of the whole the .

It's beyond repair.

He agreed with that we should -- we should shut it down.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: This comes as Elon Musk's task force, known as the Department of Government Efficiency, has also gained unprecedented access to sensitive internal government systems, including a Treasury Department payment system, which holds private information millions of Americans, and classified spaces in USAID.

Musk's team has also accessed systems at the General Services Administration and personal records for federal employees through the Office of Personnel Management, essentially known as the government's H.R.

DONALD TRUMP: He's got access only to letting people go that he thinks are no good if we agree with him, and it's only if we agree with him.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Thousands of other government web pages have also been taken down since Friday afternoon, according to an analysis by The New York Times, all in order to satisfy President Trump's executive orders targeting diversity initiatives and gender ideology, and a shakeup at the FBI.

The acting FBI director was ordered by the acting attorney general to remove a number of senior FBI executives and to hand over the names of any FBI employee who worked on January 6 cases.

DONALD TRUMP: Thank you very much, everybody.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: All part of the unprecedented purge of anyone considered to be an enemy or disloyal to the president.

AMNA NAWAZ: And Laura joins us now.

So, Laura, the Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, exactly what is it and how much access do Musk and his team have?

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Well, that's the million-dollar question, Amna.

What is DOGE?

Is it a federal advisory committee?

How many people work for DOGE?

Is it being run by newly appointed government officials?

And have they gone through background and security clearance checks?

And those are all questions that I ask the White House and have not received an answer on.

But White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said today that Elon Musk is a special government employee and claimed that he's abiding by all applicable federal laws.

But she did not answer if Elon Musk has gone through necessary security clearances.

And as far as the scope of this, Amna, it's expansive.

In addition to access to the Treasury payment system that we reported, "News Hour" obtained an e-mail today that was sent to the Small Business Administration employees, stating that the agency needed to provide - - quote -- "access to all SBA systems."

They needed to provide access to Edward Coristine.

He's a member of Musk's DOGE team who reportedly recently graduated from high school and worked for a Musk tech company previously.

And in a call with agency staff, Coristine said he needed access to the H.R.

system, to the contract system, and to payment systems.

AMNA NAWAZ: We know that DOGE and the Trump administration are already facing some lawsuits because of DOGE's actions so far.

Just walk us through those.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Multiple lawsuits, as you said, Amna.

There's one from the State Democracy Defenders Fund and other groups that are aimed at nailing down exactly what is DOGE and is it in violation of that Federal Advisory Committee Act, which requires a lot of transparency.

There's another lawsuit, though, that's been brought by federal employees against the Office of Personnel Management, which we know that DOGE and Musk must got access to.

And the lawsuit is over an e-mail system that allows the agency to send e-mails to all civilian federal employees at once, which our sources and other outlets have reported was a specific project of DOGE and Musk.

And I spoke to Kel McClanahan.

He's the executive director of the National Security Counselors, and he's a lawyer bringing that lawsuit, and he had this to say.

KEL MCCLANAHAN, Executive Director, National Security Counselors: They have decided that the things that worked for them there are a good idea to implement in the federal government.

The problem is that the federal government, or any government, for that matter, does not function like a business, and it literally cannot function like a business.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: And moments ago, another lawsuit, Amna.

The AFL-CIO, an advocacy group, sued the Treasury Department for giving Elon Musk and DOGE access to that federal payment system.

AMNA NAWAZ: Laura, when you talk to legal experts, what are they telling you about the legality of all of this?

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: So whether Elon Musk is a special government employee, as the White House has said, or he's a full-time federal government employee, the criminal conflict of interest statute applies to him.

And that's according to legal experts I spoke to, including Richard Painter, who served as White House ethics lawyer to George W. Bush.

RICHARD PAINTER, Former Associate Counsel to President George W. Bush: It is a crime for federal officers to participate in a government matter that has a direct and predictable effect on their own financial holdings.

The president and the vice president are exempt from that statute, but no one else is.

And so if Elon Musk is a federal officer, he will have to divest, but he simply cannot start bossing around the agencies, telling people in the agencies what to do.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: So Musk has two options, essentially, according to Richard Painter and other lawyers I spoke to.

He can sell off, as Painter said, his interests, his holdings, his businesses, or he can recuse himself from government matters that could affect his businesses.

And so that means potentially anything involving cryptocurrency, electric vehicles, SpaceX, or the social media company X.

Now, today, President Trump said that Musk is tasked with shrinking the government and that, if there's a conflict or a problem, that he will make sure that Musk and DOGE don't go near it.

But there's a pattern here, Amna, that suggests that there's little to no guardrails around Elon Musk and DOGE, and that's what we're hearing from a number of sources across the federal government.

And Musk could ultimately be vulnerable to lawsuits even five years from now, according to the lawyers we spoke to.

AMNA NAWAZ: Laura Barron-Lopez, thanks for your reporting.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: And let's bring in Lisa correspondent -- excuse me -- correspondent Lisa Desjardins -- Lisa, my apologies -- for more on the mass layoffs within the U.S. foreign aid agency and the possible effects here and abroad.

So, Lisa, break down precisely what's happening within the agency and what it all means.

LISA DESJARDINS: This agency, which is an independent agency of the United States, as I speak to you now, is essentially shut down.

Today, the administration announced that Secretary of State Marco Rubio will be -- is the acting administrator of USAID.

And they also told our Laura Barron-Lopez that Pete Marocco, a known Trump ally, will be appointed essentially to oversee USAID as a deputy there.

Now, programs around the world right now are frozen.

Workers are cut off from both their staff as well as their own e-mail.

Some workers have been fired.

I'm in touch with dozens around the world.

They are communicating with each other through encrypted groups right now.

This agency Web site itself conveys basically the clarity, I think, and state of things well.If you take a look, this is what comes up, when you look at USAID.gov, nothing.

Now, also want to point out that there has been no notice to staff before this happened.

Today, Laura received from the White House indication that in fact it has notified Congress that it is considering a reorganization, that it has taken these steps.

But that's a week after some of these layoffs came in place.

So let's take a look at what this means.

It's a great deal.

First of all, this is an agency with 13,000 or more staff.

We know of at least 1,000 contractors.

The White House puts that number out a little bit less.

My sources say it's more.

There are estimates for 3,000 U.S. layoffs so far.

That includes all the contracting agencies.

I want to talk about USAID and what they do.

They affect millions of people annually around the world in key areas of U.S. interest, Africa, Asia.

Now, these programs, initially when they were founded in the '60s, the wheat program is an example, pivotal in Asia and India in giving the U.S. a sphere of influence there.

Now this is a program that counters China influence around the world.

It's a small agency, just half of 1 percent or a little bit more than that.

But talking around the world, this is an idea about U.S. soft power, health, democracy, all of that.

GEOFF BENNETT: And what's the knock-on effect of that, the loss of U.S. soft power overseas?

LISA DESJARDINS: This is part of the problems reporting this story.

It's not yet known because staffers overseeing these programs have been disconnected from the programs.

But what I was able to piece together from dozens of conversations around the world, we know malaria vaccines in Africa,some of those programs have stopped.

There's concern in Africa also as an Ebola outbreak is beginning there.

We also know the international system to monitor famine, which is called the Famine Early Warning System, let's look at that Web site, what that looks like right now, also down.

So those trying to monitor the famine around the world on this U.S. program cannot access it, hunger, fighting hunger, a major part of what -- USAID does it.

Now, I spoke to one worker in Africa who confirmed also some HIV/AIDS drugs are not being given out.

And some of these workers are cut off in dangerous places like Mogadishu, for example.

GEOFF BENNETT: USAID, an independent agency, does Donald Trump, President Trump, have the authority to do this?

How are lawmakers responding?

LISA DESJARDINS: Yes, this is also a great question for Laura.

To be honest, this is an independent agency.

It was first founded by President Kennedy under executive order, but then Congress put this into code.

So this will be a legal battle.

It is not clear what Democrats are going to do long term.

They argue this is a constitutional crisis, however.

Now, Trump and Musk say the U.S. is overspending, and that's what they're dealing with here, but that's really not the debate.

They also say this is an agency in need of reform, but that's also not what they're doing here.

Instead, I talked to one global organization official who said, disruption is one thing, and we're open to reform, but this feels more like destruction.

GEOFF BENNETT: Lisa Desjardins, our thanks to you, as always.

LISA DESJARDINS: You're welcome.

AMNA NAWAZ: Well, to discuss more about the fallout over USAID's future, I spoke earlier with Democratic Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, who serves on both the Senate Foreign Relations and Judiciary committees.

Senator, welcome back.

Thanks for joining us.

SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE): Thank you, Amna.

It's great to be on with you.

AMNA NAWAZ: So we saw it took just a few days here for Elon Musk, who's tasked by the president to cut spending, to essentially take control of USAID, have security people who stood in his way put on leave, and now threatening to shut down the agency.

If this is illegal, as many of your Democratic colleagues have said it is, then what can be done about it?

SEN. CHRIS COONS: Well, first, I think a legal challenge to exactly how and why and when this happened could well be coming in the coming days.

Second, we are working, a group of us, to press the administration, Secretary Rubio, and our colleagues to recognize the incredible and important work that's done around the world that makes us more safe, that keeps Americans safe, secure, and prosperous, and that this work needs to continue, whether it's countering human trafficking in Mexico, preserving wild spaces in Mozambique that push back on hunger and extremism, intercepting viruses like Ebola in Uganda before they get to the United States or before they break out and cause harm throughout that region.

The men and women of USAID, and the nonprofits from around our country who serve around the world in response to humanitarian disasters and crises and who help promote democracy, security, and stability do great and valuable work, work that needs to continue.

And I will keep fighting to support and sustain their valuable work.

AMNA NAWAZ: Senator, I should point out, we reached out to every Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

We got either a no or no response all day from nearly all 12.

Only Senator Curtis sent a short statement, basically saying that he's open to retooling USAID if it helps us better use our limited dollars, as he put it.

I assume, when you say you're working with your colleagues, you mean your Republican colleagues.

What have you heard from them?

Do they share your concerns about USAID funding?

And are they concerned about just ceding this congressional authority to Elon Musk and the president?

SEN. CHRIS COONS: So there's three issues here.

That first one I think should be shared by every member of Congress.

We have a fundamental constitutional role, the power of the purse, and the funding that's been shut down abruptly is funding that was already appropriated by Congress, already signed into law by the former president, and was already being spent by nonprofits around the world.

That should unite Congress in saying, you can't do this and cut off funding this abruptly.

The second question, and you referenced Senator Curtis, is whether the things that AID does around the world help make us safer and stronger and more secure.

I heard a quote from Secretary Rubio in El Salvador today supporting that concept, that, with some reforms, a majority of what is done today in humanitarian relief, in promoting security and stability, in promoting our global public health is worth continuing.

Then there's others who are saying it should all be shut down.

I think that creates a huge opening for China and other adversaries of ours around the world.

The United States has been present in 100 countries for decades since President Kennedy created this agency doing good work, helping promote democracy, delivering on stability.

And that has built great relationships for the United States.

That opening will be filled by China and by extremists and terrorists.

We should not give them that opportunity.

AMNA NAWAZ: Senator, if I may, both those messages are coming from the same administration, though.

Secretary Rubio, who's now acting administrator of USAID, says a review is under way.

Some funding may continue.

Elon Musk is saying, shut it down.

What's going to happen next?

SEN. CHRIS COONS: Well, this goes to the core question of, what role does Elon Musk have in this administration?

He's not elected.

He doesn't run an official agency.

And yet his role in this particular fight and in taking on other federal agencies and roles is central.

So, is Donald Trump president?

Is Secretary Rubio secretary or is Elon Musk?

That's a disagreement within the administration that's going to play out here in the next couple of days.

AMNA NAWAZ: Senator, you also, of course, serve, as we mentioned, on the Judiciary Committee.

Last week, you questioned Kash Patel and his confirmation hearing to lead the FBI.

Also last week, we saw the White House fire multiple top FBI officials, push out those who worked on January 6 and Mar-a-Lago investigations.

Our team have been hearing widespread concerns about mass firings at the FBI.

Are you hearing similar concerns?

And how does all this impact your vote to confirm or not confirm Kash Patel?

SEN. CHRIS COONS: Well, all of this confirms my profound anxiety about Kash Patel and his record of alarming public statements before his confirmation hearing, suggesting that he would use the resources of the FBI to go after those who are political opponents of the president, and, in particular, that there would be retribution within the FBI against career agents who are simply following lawful orders to carry out investigations.

The investigations into those who assaulted police officers on January 6 were completely appropriate investigations for FBI agents to participate in and to carry out.

And that some have been called in and disciplined and even fired for just doing their jobs, without any connection to a political agenda by those FBI agents, is truly chilling.

I will vote against Kash Patel for FBI director.

AMNA NAWAZ: That's Democratic Senator Chris Coons of Delaware joining us tonight.

Senator, thank you for your time.

We appreciate it.

SEN. CHRIS COONS: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: The U.S., Canada and Mexico all agree to delay the start of President Trump's tariffs and hold off, at least for now, on the possibility of a trade war among allies.

But the delay is only for a few weeks, and, as of now, there will be new tariffs taking effect tomorrow, 10 percent on goods from China.

That's already on top of tariffs on Chinese products and materials dating back to President Trump's first term.

AMNA NAWAZ: President Trump also called the new tariffs on China a -- quote -- "opening salvo."

And he spoke this weekend about his plans to issue new punitive tariffs against another ally, the European Union.

These threats and the prospects of a trade war lead to a number of questions about how tariffs have been used in the past, what effect they have had, and their potential impacts now.

Economics correspondent Paul Solman takes a closer look.

PAUL SOLMAN: Tariffs, taxes on imports to the U.S. collected at 328 ports of entry across the country.

Here's a look at some of the reasons President Trump gives to hike them.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens.

PAUL SOLMAN: Reason one, to raise money from foreigners, instead of taxing Americans.

President Trump insists tariffs were once the great revenue source for the United States, and it's true.

DOUGLAS IRWIN, Dartmouth College: Right up until the Civil War, tariffs raised 90 percent of the revenue for the federal government.

But the federal government was very small.

Spending was like 2 to 3 percent of GDP.

So there wasn't much to fund, except for the debt and the current expenditures, and the tariff did it.

PAUL SOLMAN: Today, government spending is almost a quarter of GDP.

How much do tariffs bring in?

DOUGLAS IRWIN: Today, it's only about 2 percent of federal revenue comes from the tariff.

It's just been swamped by corporate taxes, income taxes, Social Security taxes and things of that sort.

PAUL SOLMAN: But the point is to replace those taxes.

So how much more money can hire tariffs raise?

KIMBERLY CLAUSING, UCLA School of Law: If you look at total federal revenues in a typical year, they're over $4 trillion.

Almost $3 trillion of that is a combination of the individual income tax and the corporate income tax, whereas we think the maximum you could get out of tariffs, if you really pushed them to the highest level you could go, would be in the neighborhood of $800 billion, right?

So that's not going to come anywhere near what you need to even replace the individual income tax, let alone the corporate tax, payroll taxes and other types of tax on income.

PAUL SOLMAN: A second reason, tariffs to protect American industry from foreign competition, a la the future 25th president of the United States, William McKinley.

DOUGLAS IRWIN: So, William McKinley, as chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, ushered through a piece of legislation that became known as the McKinley tariff.

It was passed in 1890.

And it had revenue effects.

It was designed to protect domestic industry from foreign competition.

And, in particular, he, as representing the state of Ohio, was interested in helping out the steel industry, which was located in his district.

PAUL SOLMAN: President Trump has promised to help out various industries nowadays, citing McKinley.

DONALD TRUMP: President McKinley made our country very rich through tariffs and through talent.

PAUL SOLMAN: However, when McKinley became president in 1897: DOUGLAS IRWIN: The wasn't this massive boom.

We had, like, sort of a mini-depression in 1893 that lasted for several years.

And as president now, McKinley said, gee, if we could export manufactured goods and farm goods to the world, we could pull out of this recession and do much better.

And he changed tack.

In fact, he said the age of exclusion is past.

He also said commercial wars weren't productive.

And so he was a much more outward-oriented president than he was as a member of Congress.

PAUL SOLMAN: Plus, there's a problem with tariffs, countertariffs, which both Mexico and Canada threatened before today's delay.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU, Canadian Prime Minister: Canada will be responding to the U.S. trade action with 25 percent tariffs against $155 billion worth of American goods, such as American beer, wine, and bourbon, fruits and fruit juices, including orange juice, along with vegetables, perfume, clothing, and shoes.

It will include major consumer products like household appliances, furniture, and sports equipment, and materials like lumber and plastics, along with much, much more.

PAUL SOLMAN: Which would make our goods more expensive and thus hurt our exports.

And that raises the question, who pays for tariffs anyway?

According to research on the last Trump tariffs: AMIT KHANDELWAL, Yale University: So what we found in the 2018-2019 tariffs is that, when the U.S. imposed tariffs on predominantly Chinese goods, the U.S. economy and U.S. importers bore the full incidence of those tariffs.

And some of those costs would then trickle down and come back to consumers.

PAUL SOLMAN: Prices went up less than half-a-percent.

But the first Trump tariffs were just 15 percent on about 15 percent of U.S. imports, not much.

And, of course, the more and higher the tariffs, the more expensive for importers and consumers.

Moreover, they don't hit everyone equally.

DOUGLAS IRWIN: The tariff is a very regressive tax.

It hits lower-income households more than higher-income households.

So if we were to attempt to try to cut the income tax or replace the income tax with a tariff, we'd be going from a fairly progressive tax system to a very regressive tax system.

PAUL SOLMAN: Muscling other countries may be working, as Colombia's about-face on accepting deportees suggests when Trump threatened tariffs on Colombia.

As to protecting American manufacturing: DOUGLAS IRWIN: Well, here, it's a double-edged sword.

We'd help some industries, but we'd hurt others.

Economists see trade-offs, rather than sort of net creation of jobs and expansion of manufacturing, as a result of tariffs.

PAUL SOLMAN: What impact will the new tariffs actually have?

We will soon find out.

For the "PBS News Hour," Paul Solman.

GEOFF BENNETT: And for additional perspective, we're joined tonight by Mary Lovely, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Thanks for coming in.

MARY LOVELY, Peterson Institute for International Economics: Oh, you're so welcome.

GEOFF BENNETT: So we have got this 30-day pause on tariffs for Canada and Mexico.

The 10 percent tariff on goods from China is still on the table for tomorrow.

How much of this is actually about addressing a trade imbalance?

And I raise the question because Donald Trump negotiated a new trade deal with Canada and Mexico in his first term.

Is there an actual problem that these tariffs aim to solve?

MARY LOVELY: Well, the president has identified two problems at the border, migration and the flow of fentanyl.

So he has on occasion talked about the trade deficit that we have with our trading partners, but it's hard to know exactly what weight he places on these various factors.

So, for today's announcement, it looks like it was on the border issues.

GEOFF BENNETT: When he talks about Canada, he so often complains about the trade imbalance, which has existed for decades.

Canada sells more goods and services to the U.S. than it buys from us.

On that point, does that justify tariffs?

MARY LOVELY: No.

No.

There's no reason that we should have balance bilaterally.

So there's no reason, for example, that the grocery store should buy as much for me as I buy from it.

So there's no reason why Canada, which is rich in natural resources, shouldn't sell to us, and our companies then use those resources to produce things to sell to the rest of the world.

So there's really no reason, no welfare implication of us having a trade deficit with Canada or with any other country, for that matter.

GEOFF BENNETT: President Trump is also acknowledging now that, if these tariffs take effect, that it will hurt American consumers, at least in the short term.

He said, it's a little bit of pain, but people understand that.

Obviously, so much depends on when, if or how these tariffs are implemented.

But how much pain are we talking about generally?

MARY LOVELY: Well, Kimberly Clausing and I have run the numbers on this latest round of tariff threats.

And we find that, for the average household, it would be about $1,200 more per year, or a consumer loss of $1,200.

So you can think about $100 a month.

Of course, that would -- that number would rise if President Trump then goes ahead with other threats that he has made to raise tariffs, for example, on the European Union.

GEOFF BENNETT: I imagine China sees a lot of upside in all of this.

I mean, what's the overall effect of other countries seeing the U.S. as an unreliable or mercurial trade partner?

MARY LOVELY: Yes, I think, while we may be celebrating the fact that we may have marginally more resources spent on the border, and these policies are addressing very important problems that Americans care a lot about, there is this long-term cost to doing this.

And that is that basically the U.S. signaled that the trade agreement that it had signed under the first Trump administration wasn't really worth the paper it was written on.

So that's a problem as we look forward.

And it's particularly important in terms of the context of building economic resilience and de-risking our supply chains, including, and perhaps most importantly, reducing our dependence on China.

To do that, we have to create pathways for companies who actually do the creation of supply chains, pathways for them to have confidence that they -- if they invest in a particular country, they won't then face new tariffs when trying to come into the U.S.

I mean, some people will say, well, why not just make everything in the U.S.?

Well, that's -- it's clear that we can't, that we have to have room to export the things that we're really good at making and import other things from other countries that are used in those products.

So it's not really the answer.

I think that it also is important to recognize that doing so will actually make us poorer, not richer.

Many of the things that we import are quite labor-intensive.

And they would be prohibitively expensive if they were made with workers in the U.S. who were to receive a living wage.

GEOFF BENNETT: How damaging is this atmosphere of confusion and chaos, especially if we get locked in the cycle of tariff threat followed by delay or walk-back?

MARY LOVELY: I think that, even if we're caught in a cycle where it's a threat and a tariff levy, the damage is profound.

Again, companies are making long-term bets on where to place supply chains, where to do production.

The rest of the world is not sitting still.

It is forming agreements that are working around the U.S. And China is sitting out there, and it's providing funds for infrastructure and other development.

And it has really changed its tune in response and is welcoming countries to sell into its market, and we have seen over the last 10 years some of our key allies and friends actually increasing their integration with China.

So I think that this really strikes a blow at our long-term plans to really increase the diversity of where we sell and where we buy and to enhance economic resilience here in the U.S. GEOFF BENNETT: Mary Lovely, thank you for sharing your expertise with us.

We appreciate it.

MARY LOVELY: You're welcome.

GEOFF BENNETT: We start the day's other headlines with a salvage operation in the nation's capital.

Crews spent the day recovering several parts of the passenger jet that collided midair with a military helicopter last week at Reagan National Airport.

Video from the scene showed a crane lifting pieces of the regional American Airlines plane out of the water.

Officials say they removed parts of the engine, fuselage, and wing.

Crews also found additional human remains today; 55 of the 67 people killed have been identified.

In Ohio, a lawsuit was filed today alleging for the first time that people died because of the 2023 train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.

The filing contains the first seven wrongful death claims against Norfolk Southern Railroad.

It also alleges the railroad and contractors botched the cleanup of the toxic crash and that federal officials failed to warn people about lingering health risks.

It comes as Vice President J.D.

Vance visited the site today on the second anniversary of the disaster.

Vance said the Trump administration would prioritize the community's recovery even, as the administration cuts federal agencies.

J.D.

VANCE, Vice President of the United States: You do now have a government that cares about you, that's going to work on these problems.

President Trump's desire to bring some efficiency back to the federal government, that's not going to be bad for the people of East Palestine.

It's actually going to ensure that the resources we spend on health actually go to people on the ground, rather than bureaucrats.

GEOFF BENNETT: Norfolk Southern agreed to a $600 million class action settlement with residents, plus a separate settlement with the government to clean up the mess.

The company also set up funds for medical exams and water monitoring, but did not admit any wrongdoing.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said today that he welcomes Panama's decision to let its participation in China's global infrastructure plan expire.

Rubio said any move by Panama to distance itself from China's Belt and Road Initiative is a great step forward for U.S.-Panama relations.

Speaking from El Salvador -- that's the next stop on Rubio's trip through the region -- he addressed China's role in the flow of trade through the Panama Canal.

MARCO RUBIO, U.S. Secretary of State: When we turned over the canal, we turned it over to Panama.

We didn't turn it over to China.

So, you get there, and the Chinese control both entries to the port, both entries to the port.

We don't want to have a hostile or negative relationship with Panama.

I don't believe we do.

And -- but we had a frank and respectful conversation, and I hope it'll yield fruits and results in the days to come.

GEOFF BENNETT: Also today, Rubio viewed a deportation flight carrying dozens of migrants from Panama back to Colombia.

The State Department says such actions send a message of deterrence to those trying to cross Panama en route to the U.S.

The Trump administration is ending deportation protections for nearly 350,000 Venezuelans living in the U.S.

The order from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem affects more than half of the Venezuelans covered by temporary protected status, or TPS.

That means they could lose their work permits or be deported starting in April.

Today's order signaled that the administration believes conditions in Venezuela no longer merit such protections against deportation.

Republican critics of TPS say it's been used to allow migrants to stay much longer than intended.

The official termination notice will be published Wednesday and go into effect 60 days after that.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwandan-backed M23 rebels have declared a unilateral cease-fire starting tomorrow.

In a statement, a spokesperson said the group has no intention of claiming more territory in the region.

But he added that it remains committed "to protecting and defending the civilian population and our positions."

The announcement comes as morgues in the Eastern city of Goma are overcrowded with bodies, forcing health workers there to bury the dead in mass graves.

The U.N.'s health agency said at least 900 people died in last week's fighting for the city.

On Wall Street today, stocks slumped on worries about President Trump's tariffs.

The Dow Jones industrial average recovered from steep losses earlier in the day, ending about 120 points lower.

The Nasdaq fell 235 points on the day.

The S&P 500 also ended in negative territory.

And Beyonce took home the top prize of the 2025 Grammy Awards after four prior efforts came up short.

BEYONCE, Musician: I just feel very full and very honored.

It's been many, many years.

GEOFF BENNETT: The most decorated artist in Grammy history secured her first album of the year award for "Cowboy Carter," her country music album.

She's the first Black woman to win the award since Lauryn Hill 26 years ago.

Rapper Kendrick Lamar swept both the record and song of the year categories for his track "Not Like Us."

And Chappell Roan won for best new artist in what was a competitive field.

The ceremony also paid tribute to the city of Los Angeles, which has been ravaged by wildfires.

Still to come on the "News Hour": Tamara Keith and Amy Walter break down the latest political headlines; and costume designer Paul Tazewell discusses his Academy Award-nominated work on the musical "Wicked."

AMNA NAWAZ: From the potential impact of trade tariffs, to the confirmation votes for President Trump's Cabinet, let's take a look at the political stakes now with Amy Walter of The Cook Political Report With Amy Walter, who's in New Orleans tonight, and Tamara Keith of NPR.

Welcome to you both.

Great to see you.

And, Tam, let's start with you, because we saw over the weekend confusion at USAID, as Elon Musk essentially took over the agency, threatened to shut it down, confusion and concerns about the number of firings at the FBI and DOJ.

Markets today unsteady after confusion about whether or not tariffs were going into place.

Is all of this what Trump supporters voted for?

Is this what they wanted to see?

TAMARA KEITH, National Public Radio: I think it depends on which Trump supporters you're talking about, because some people voted for Donald Trump because they were concerned about the price of eggs and the price of everything else, and mad at President Biden for allowing that to happen.

There are other people who voted for President Trump because they were frustrated with President Biden refusing to step aside and then having Vice President Harris come in this way that just made it seem kind of rigged.

There were people who were upset about what was happening in Gaza.

And then there are people who really wanted to just blow up the boxes, wanted to shake things up, felt like government wasn't working for them.

And they are looking at this and saying, look at that.

They are shaking things up.

This is a hostile takeover of the United States government.

And that's what some share of Trump's voters signed up for.

What I will say is that, when a president takes office, they are never more popular and never more powerful than they are in the first couple of weeks.

And then, as they continue to do more things, people who voted for them get upset about it.

And so their popularity almost inevitably declines.

AMNA NAWAZ: Amy, as we have spoken about a number of times over the last couple of years, the economy was a driving issue in the last election why people backed President Trump.

When you talk about potential for these tariffs to go into place and what people will feel, here's what President Trump had to say when he posted online.

He said: "Will there be some pain?

Yes, maybe."

He went on to say: "Will all be worth the price that must be paid."

We know, Amy, the prices for fruits and vegetables and alcohol and lumber and electronics could likely all go up if the tariffs go into effect.

How much will President Trump's supporters be willing to stomach on that front?

AMY WALTER, The Cook Political Report: Yes, I think Tam made a very good point about the frustration with the status quo.

And I think a big reason that Trump not only was successful in the election, but why he actually starts off in decent shape in terms of his overall approval rating is that people are ready to see the status quo disrupted.

And they see the Democratic Party as basically one -- as one Democratic pollster told me, they see the Democratic Party as avatars for the status quo.

At the same time, they don't want to see their own lives necessarily disrupted.

And what has been really interesting to watch, Donald Trump has come in and very quickly put a lot of things in place that are disruptive, whether it is on the DEI front or immigration, talking about ending birthright citizenship, those sorts of things.

On the issues that really could impact the day-to-day lives of Americans, one was shutting down government funding, putting a pause or a freeze on government funding, which was quickly rolled back.

Or this issue of tariffs, which was basically a 24-hour event, the impact of it will not be felt, at least at this point, by regular Americans.

And so you have to wonder, at some point, either, one, these tariffs go actually into place and people do feel it, or that this now becomes something that we don't hear from for a while or it gets solved, and, instead, that the president spends more of his time on the issues that will impact some people, but don't have the broad impact on the economy.

AMNA NAWAZ: Meanwhile, we know selections to join his Cabinet continue to move through their confirmation processes.

Tam, we saw and we have seen among the more tenuous nominees is Tulsi Gabbard to occupy that top intelligence post as DNI.

We saw Republicans express concerns about her in the confirmation hearings.

Just today, Senator Susan Collins said she will vote to confirm Tulsi Gabbard.

And we know that the Senate Intelligence Committee vote is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon.

Gabbard cannot afford to lose a single vote.

What do you see happening here?

TAMARA KEITH: Right.

It looks like she is in a increasingly good position.

She certainly looks to be in a stronger position than she did during her hearing, which did not go particularly well for her.

She was frequently asked whether Edward Snowden was a traitor and she could not answer that or would not answer that question directly.

But the reality is that we haven't seen a lot of senators really willing to put their necks out, Republican senators, willing to put their necks out and go up against Trump on his nominees.

They are repeatedly saying he wants these people.

We're going to give them to him.

And we should remember that he also had threatened to appoint them through recess appointments and to sort of force them in there if the Senate didn't go along with it.

So I don't know where we're going to see the pushback.

We might see it with RFK Jr. We might not.

I -- we haven't at this point seen a lot of pushback, for instance, on the president's -- the administration's actions to pause funding.

We haven't really seen Republican House members or senators stand up and say, well, we're the Article I branch of the government and we have the power of the purse.

You aren't seeing a lot of that.

AMNA NAWAZ: Amy, how do you look at all this?

And we should also point out that three senators did vote against Pete Hegseth on his confirmation for secretary of defense.

He was later confirmed.

But how do you look at this issue?

AMY WALTER: Right, including Susan Collins being one of those votes against Pete Hegseth.

I look at it similarly, which is, at this point, Republicans are treating the president as somebody who is not just the leader of the party, but one who has a mandate, a mandate that is even stronger than their own individual mandates, let's say, from their voters.

In many cases, you have Republican senators who and members of the House who got actually fewer votes than Donald Trump did in their district, so they are giving him a whole lot of runway.

Now, where it really hits the road, again, comes down to the actual consequences hitting voters.

You started to hear a little bit of it today even among some of Trump's strongest supporters in Congress, questioning just what kinds of damage these tariffs could do to people in their communities and to the industries in their communities.

But, for now, they have learned that it is not worth it to get out over their skis, wait a little bit, and see what the impact is, and giving him, as I said, that runway to do what we talked about at this very beginning, do the disrupting and the moving of all these different programs in the way that they see voters endorsing.

AMNA NAWAZ: Amy, before I let you go, in the 30 seconds or so I have left, we know the Dems now have their new DNC chair in the form of Ken Martin, the former Minnesota party chair.

What do you take away from his election?

AMY WALTER: It didn't really have a whole lot of intensity or ideology around it.

I do think Democrats are still trying to find their way, and this becomes really important, Amna, that, as I just said earlier, what -- the question of the consequences on average Americans.

I think that's what Democrats are counting on as helping them find some success, find their footing, find their way going forward.

Until that happens, the goal of the DNC chair right now is simply raising money and keeping the infrastructure, keeping the employees, keeping all the folks who do the work on the ground engaged and focused.

AMNA NAWAZ: Amy Walter, Tamara Keith, always great to see you both.

Thank you.

TAMARA KEITH: Good to see you.

AMY WALTER: You're welcome.

GEOFF BENNETT: The movie version of the hit musical "Wicked" soared at the box office this winter, and among its 10 nominations, one is for costume designer Paul Tazewell.

Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown starts our coverage of Oscar nominees this year with this report.

It's part of our arts and culture series, Canvas.

JEFFREY BROWN: It's a visually spectacular world, intended to feel both familiar and fresh.

ARIANA GRANDE, Actress: The Wicked Witch of the West is dead.

JEFFREY BROWN: For costume designer Paul Tazewell, "Wicked" is an enormous canvas of characters and colors, materials in motion, and it's the biggest thing he's ever been involved in.

PAUL TAZEWELL, Costume Designer: It's a blast, one, and it is my life.

It is the way that I communicate, I mean, as a painter would.

It is my language, and it is my means of being creative.

JEFFREY BROWN: We met recently at Steiner Studios, a film production complex in Brooklyn, New York.

And he told us that, for all the huge scale, the key is still through his designs and working with director Jon Chu and actors, most of all Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda, to help create characters, not only their outer clothing, but their inner emotional life.

PAUL TAZEWELL: My focus is who these characters are and how they dress themselves and how to create a world that makes sense within itself and provides a magical environment for this story to exist within.

I mean, so I'm stepping into their shoes.

If I'm working adjacent to... JEFFREY BROWN: Actually, they're stepping into your shoes.

PAUL TAZEWELL: Well, there is that.

Both.

JEFFREY BROWN: When it comes to American cultural history, these are very big shoes to fill, beginning with the books, the first in 1900 by L. Frank Baum.

JUDY GARLAND, Actress: But, if you please, what are Munchkins?

JEFFREY BROWN: The classic 1939 film that's taken generations over the rainbow.

ACTRESS: OK, Dorothy and Toto, it seems like we're going to have to find our own Yellow Brick Robe.

JEFFREY BROWN: And "The Wiz," a 1970s retelling on stage and film through the contemporary Black experience.

Starting in 1995, a new series of books by Gregory Maguire conjured a kind of backstory and revisionist history.

It turns out we didn't really know the Wicked Witch, or Elphaba, after all.

That spawned the amazingly successful Broadway musical running 21 years and counting and now the new film.

PAUL TAZEWELL: I acknowledge all of those as I'm designing it, but with the intent of creating new images, new icons, new ways of seeing who these characters are, and a new way of telling the story.

And I delight in it.

JEFFREY BROWN: In fact, "The Wiz" was the first show Tazewell designed.

He also acted in it as a high school student in Akron, Ohio, where his mother taught him to sew.

He went on to a hugely successful career in theater design, notably including "Hamilton," for which he won a Tony and, most recently, "Suffs," which brought another Tony nomination.

He won a television Emmy for NBC's 2015 "The Wiz Live" and the first Oscar nomination for Steven Spielberg's 2021 film version of "West Side Story."

So, you're grabbing images just on the Internet, whatever?

PAUL TAZEWELL: That's right, that viscerally speak to me.

They could be abstract.

They could be random.

But, collectively, they start to create a world.

JEFFREY BROWN: For "Wicked," Tazewell has taken past icons, the witch's hat, for example, and made them his own.

He created a mash-up of old and new fashions, looked to the art of one of history's greatest graphic artists, M.C.

Escher, and incorporated patterns in nature, including the swirl of the tornado or twister so indelible in the 1939 film.

He showed me an early plastic 3-D model of a crystal slipper made for one of the characters, the swirl pattern appearing throughout.

It's a detail that required weeks for Tazewell and his team to experiment with, design, and make.

I, as the viewer, seeing the film, I wouldn't know all that, right?

PAUL TAZEWELL: Right.

And my hope is that -- and that was for all of the details of Oz and what we were creating for "Wicked," was that it becomes immersive, that you believe it so much that you're drawn into this world.

And there's a suspension of disbelief.

JEFFREY BROWN: Tazewell says he's always bringing his own personal connections to the story and characters he's working on.

He brought up the example of Elphaba, an outsider in Munchkinland, a different color from the rest, uncertain of her own place, and shunned by others.

PAUL TAZEWELL: What I bring to the event is my own life experience and how I walk through life as well.

I have a direct emotional relationship to that, being a Black man walking through life in America.

So, decisions... JEFFREY BROWN: So, you connect in that sense.

PAUL TAZEWELL: Absolutely.

So, decisions around how she emotionally presents herself, what her intention is, I have to build some kind of connection in order to have an honest take on what a character might wear.

JEFFREY BROWN: There's also another kind of history at stake in Tazewell's Oscar nomination.

In 2019, Ruth Carter became the first Black costume designer to win an Oscar for her work in "Black Panther."

Tazewell would be the first Black man to win.

PAUL TAZEWELL: The number of people of color that I experienced coming up in this business, there were just... JEFFREY BROWN: Was minimal.

PAUL TAZEWELL: There were just very few, and which is why it's so important for me to be a face that is visible and out there for other people to see me doing it.

JEFFREY BROWN: Tazewell is also seeking to make a case for the role of the costume designer more broadly, something he says is often not well understood and has implications for such things as pay equity within his industry.

PAUL TAZEWELL: What has become more of a priority is to be expansive in a way that is not only identified as a costume designer, but is identified as a creative artist.

And I have tried to turn up the volume on indeed what it is that we do, and the power that we have as costume designers to create character.

Our contribution is huge towards that.

JEFFREY BROWN: Paul Tazewell vies for an Oscar, one of 10 nominations overall for "Wicked," on March 2.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Jeffrey Brown in Brooklyn, New York.

GEOFF BENNETT: And Paul Tazewell is paying it forward.

He established a scholarship at his alma mater for design students, the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

AMNA NAWAZ: It's amazing, amazing work, and we wish him well at the Oscars.

GEOFF BENNETT: That's right.

AMNA NAWAZ: And that is the "News Hour" for tonight.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

GEOFF BENNETT: And I'm Geoff Bennett.

For all of us here at the "PBS News Hour," thanks for spending part of your evening with us.