'I'm not even sure it's legal': New York farmer in disbelief at Trump tariffs imposed on critical cow feed

[UpInArms]

Nicholas Gilbert, a dairy farmer who operates Adon Farms in upstate New York, experienced tariff sticker shock when a routine shipment of cow feed from Ontario cost him $2,200 more than expected.

“I’m not even sure it’s legal! We contracted for the price on delivery,” he told The Atlantic. “If your price of fuel goes up or your truck breaks down, that’s not my problem! That’s what the contract’s for.”

Unfortunately for Gilbert, the tariff is very much legal. Like many American business owners, he mistakenly believed that tariffs on imported goods would be paid by the foreign exporter.

In reality, the charge was imposed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and passed directly to him.

… snip…

"How can an adult believe that the president of one country could force an exporter in another country to pay a tax on his or her behalf? How would that even work?" says one user.

More at:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/im-not-even-sure-legal-010000861.html

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Well Farmer Dude, call your republican representative and tell

him/her to take back the original congressional right to revoke the tariffs.

No problem!

[yardwork]

2. The news media did a poor job reporting the election campaign.

Trump told blatant lies about tariffs and people believed him.

The so-called news media did their usual job of smirking and dissembling and generally not being serious and never bothered to explain tariffs.

We have a country full of people who are too lazy to read an explanation of how tariffs work, and too cynical and smug to do their jobs of explaining things.

That's how criminals like Donny get elected.

[emulatorloo]

6. Poor job? They lied about Biden and propped up Trump.

[yardwork]

9. Well, when you put it that way... yeah.

[Johnny2X2X]

7. The media did exactly what they're paid to do

They’re owned by the oligarchy and the oligarchy used the media to get Trump elected.

[yardwork]

8. I think that's true.

Biden's policies were actually turning around Reaganomics. Harris was calling for higher taxes on billionaires.

Can't have that.

[Blue Full Moon]

14. tRump said he was going to do this

I would put about the tariffs and muskrat gleefully wanting pain and suffering for the American people in replies to social media posts, usually with link. They absolutely would still insist that he wasn't going to do it. MAGA is a cult. When talking to someone in person about it they would call me a liar.

[Wicked Blue]

30. Most of the news media is owned by right-wing billionaires

[c-rational]

32. Bingo.

[Ponietz]

33. 54% of Americans read below a 6th grade level

for the record.

[dalton99a]

3. Cry me a river

[tanyev]

4. Mafia Donny doesn't care if it's legal or not, Farmer Gilbert.

Last edited Sat Apr 19, 2025, 11:51 AM - Edit history (1)

And neither does his consigliere Attorney General, the Republican majority in Congress, or the Republican majority on the Supreme Court.

[sop]

5. We'll call this "schadenfreude blowback."

A lot of these folks voted for Trump because they derive pleasure from another person's misfortune.

[BoRaGard]

10. "You're just another sucker and loser. Ha ha." - Krasnov (R-Felon) and the KGOP

[Joinfortmill]

11. You can't make this shit up.

[UpInArms]

13. George Carlin summed it up

“Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.”
—George Carlin

[AZLD4Candidate]

22. "no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public" - PT Barnum and/or HL Mencken.

[TommieMommy]

26. Exactly 👍Loved George Carlin. He was so amazing.

[Aristus]

12. Sometimes, I get Muskrat's obsession with Mars.

I, too am tired of sharing a planet with these fuckbrained chuzzlewits.

[lonely bird]

24. Chuzzlewits?

Thanks for the laugh. I needed it. And I am stealing it.

It isn’t simply that they are stupid. It is that they want to be stupid. They desperately need their belief structure validated. They are “real ‘Muricans” (if I ever find out where the fuck that came from…) as opposed to city dwellers. They won’t be completely happy until everyone is dragged down to them.

[Aristus]

28. Fair enough. I stole it from Charles Dickens.

His character Martin Chuzzlewit.

[mgardener]

15. I bet he

Voted for Elise Stefanik, too.

She will not do anything for him, she is too busy defending Trump's every action.

[Raftergirl]

16. Yep. Her district is chock full of dairy farms.

That these people still don’t understand who pays the tariff is mind blowing to me.

[Prof. Toru Tanaka]

35. And I don't think Stefanik would have done anything

to explain to her constituents about how tariffs work. If she had told the truth about them, many farmers would have likely been against them. Especially if upstate NY dairy farms shipped dairy products to Ontario and Quebec.

Oh well, FAFO

[IronLionZion]

20. She has to stay in Congress to defend her House seat.

So she can't join the Trump administration. I guess they're worried we'll flip that seat.

[Irish_Dem]

17. Farmers knew Trump was a criminal when they voted for him.

We saw the crimes on TV, we saw the trials.

Now they pretend to be shocked when they are the ones getting screwed.

[bronxiteforever]

18. Well

[IronLionZion]

19. our side said all of this during the campaign

Trump is explicitly raising the prices of everything with tariffs, paid for by the buyers here in the US. American buy a lot of imported stuff and it costs a lot more. Tariffs are a major tax increase.

[AZLD4Candidate]

21. I grew up in New York farm country. My neighbors would always go to the local post office and bitch daily

about ghetto in Monticello, how "those people" get everything, how their money is supporting "those" people, and how they would never welcome one of those people into our community.

But on the day their farm subsidy check was supposed to arrive and it didn't, they would scream at the post master for "taking food out of their children's mouths," like it was the post master's responsibility.

[orleans]

23. did nicholas gilbert vote for kamala? if he did then i'm sorry this is happening to him

if nick voted for trump then big fucking WOMP WOMP

[Mblaze]

25. So many Americans

Are very slow on the uptake.

[NoMoreRepugs]

27. All boats in the harbor are sinking at the moment - the luxury yachts

offshore are just FABULOUS. We will all have to suffer enough that even some of the MAGATS turn our way.

[Warpy]

29. It's not legal!

That fucking idiot is usurping the tole of Congress to levy taxes--which is what tariffs are---because he knows Johnson is a little whipped puppy and the rest of them are afraid of his money.

Most of what he and Musk are doing is illegal but the doormat Congress is so petrified with fear they will not act.

[whopis01]

36. You are right - but

what the farmer was claiming was illegal was having a contract for one price and having to pay another to get the goods.

He is under the impression that the tariff is an additional cost to the foreign supplier that is being passed on to him. He doesn’t understand that this is a tax on the importer, himself in this case.

I agree with you about the illegality of Trump instating the tariffs. This idiot doesn’t have an issue with that. He just thinks the problem is that he is the one having to pay it.

[Prairie Gates]

31. Nicholas Gilbert, didn't you hear your President? He said "Only the weak will fail."

[Ol Janx Spirit]

34. So let's make sure we have this right: your business uses cow feed imported from Ontario...

...which we will assume you know is in Canada, and you heard about the "big beautiful" tariffs many many times during the campaign--but you never bothered to do even the slightest investigation into what that might mean for your business?

That's just malfeasance on your part, and I'm sure that everyone working for you and all of your customers--who will now face increased prices of their own--will be happy to find this out.

Adon Farms also looks to be a pretty large operation that surely has ongoing relationships with lawyers and accountants. How could any of this be a shock to you?

[Norrrm]

37. "believed that tariffs on imported goods would be paid by the foreign exporter"

Trump and Fox pushed that falsehood,

while Trump was collecting those higher billion$ of taxes paid by Americans.

[allegorical oracle]

38. That's how this regime declines: One MAGAt voter who got suckered at a time. nt