TARIFFED AND TERRIFIED

Listen this week as we discuss Trump's tarrifs, Rodney Hinton Jr. and my job search.

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Transcript

[00:06] Suggah Na: You already know who it is. It's your girl, Sugar. Now blessing you once again with the what Need Some sugar podcast,

[00:17] episode 30.

[00:19] So today's episode is going to be pretty chill.

[00:22] We don't have a lot of topics. I am going to cover the tariffs and how it's been impacting us. And also I have an opinion about it that I don't think a lot of people will agree with.

[00:31] But just hear me out, you know what I mean? Next, we're going to be talking about the Rodney Hinton Jr. Case and what's going on with that. And lastly, I'm going to just talk a little bit about my business, let y' all know how my job search has been going.

[00:42] What's going on with me personally. I know I talk about a lot of different topics, but also, but also this is my podcast, so why not talk about, you know, how I'm feeling and what's going on with me majority of the time.

[00:51] So without further ado, y' all hear me in politics this week, we're strictly going to be talking about tariffs because they've somewhat official,

[00:58] because they've somewhat officially gone into effect.

[01:01] So a tariff or important tax is a duty imposed by a national government,

[01:05] customs, territory or supernatural union on imports of goods and is paid by the importer.

[01:12] Exceptionally, an export tax may be levied on exports of goods or raw materials and is paid by the exporter. The people who really have to pay the tax is the consumer because the business is most likely not going to absorb this cost.

[01:25] So under Trump's tariffs, I know you guys have heard about, you know, him going back and forth with the tariffs, putting ridiculous numbers on certain countries and not others, making exceptions for certain items and not others.

[01:37] So China's imports to the US go from iPhones, other electrical goods, children's clothes, everything.

[01:43] Trump unveiled a 10% tariff on goods from China on February 4, which doubled to 20% a month later. On April 9, he increased tariffs to 145% for most Chinese goods, with certain products facing a 245% tax.

[01:59] An exception for Chinese goods worth less than $800 ended on May 2.

[02:04] Shipments now face 90% duty, or $75 per item, increasing to $150 per item after June 1.

[02:14] In response to Trump, China has introduced 125% tariffs on US imported goods.

[02:20] Trump also imposed significant tariffs on China during his first presidential term. These were expanded by his successor, Joe Biden, which which cut the amount America imports from Beijing. But the US still buys much more from China than it sells to China for Canada and Mexico.

[02:36] Canada and Mexico were also targeted by Trump in February, which he introduced a 25% tax on imports from both countries and a 10% levy on Canadian energy.

[02:45] There have been a number of delays and exceptions to these tariffs. That's because Mexico and Canada and China is like, *****, you want to do stuff to us, we going to do stuff back to y' all.

[02:54] And it's, remember the episode where I told y' all China said the luxury goods are being made by them over there for $5 and being sold to us for 5,000?

[03:01] So that was just a little taste of the retaliation that these countries have been given to Trump because they're like, you're not about to just play with us and we not about to play back.

[03:09] In response, Canada introduced a 25% tax on some vehicles imported from the U.S. on April 9.

[03:16] Also for steel and aluminum, a 25% import tax on all steel and aluminum entering the U.S. including products made from these metals took effect on March 12. For cars, since April 2, foreign made cars have faced a 25% levy.

[03:31] This extended to cover imported vehicles and other car parts on May 3rd.

[03:35] On April 29th, Trump softened the rules to reduce the effect on US car companies.

[03:41] Now, y' all, Trump keeps making these exceptions and saying, oh, no, we're not going to tax this, we're not going to tax that. I need people to realize that the tariff affects everything when it goes into making something,

[03:51] not just that, something,

[03:53] if y' all understand what I'm saying.

[03:55] Moving along, on April 5, Trump announced most countries, including the U.K. would face a 10% baseline tariff on all goods sent to the U.S. on April 9, he unveiled a range of much higher tariffs for about 60 countries,

[04:08] described as the worst offenders among American trading partners. Hours later, he announced a 90 day pause during which the 10% baseline rate will be paid by all named countries apart from China.

[04:20] In response, many countries are working on retaliatory measures. See, I told y' all, a lot of countries say you're not about to put these tariffs on us and then think that we're not going to put tariffs back on your country.

[04:31] If you giving us hell, we're going to give you hell back. And honestly, even though it affects.

[04:35] And honestly, even though it affects me as a consumer, rightfully ******* so. Trump just be doing **** because he thinks he could do ****. And honestly, we're starting to see that people are not scared of us and people are starting to retaliate back to us and people are starting to show us that we don't give a **** about America.

[04:51] Stop playing with us.

[04:52] And if it means that somebody is standing up for themselves, I wholeheartedly agree, and I wholeheartedly understand.

[04:58] And lastly, some exceptions have been made for electronic devices from China and elsewhere,

[05:03] including smartphones and computers,

[05:05] and that was announced on April 12.

[05:07] See, Trump keeps saying stuff and then he'll backpedal and ***** pop. Shout out to Alex Rogers on YouTube.

[05:13] Now for the unpopular opinion I have on tariffs, right?

[05:16] So I watched a documentary on Netflix called Buy Now.

[05:19] They talk about the waste that we produce, not only as a country in the US but just worldwide.

[05:25] And that documentary really opened my eyes, and I'm like, wow, we produce so much waste and trash,

[05:32] and a lot of it is just cheaply made products that we only use for a short amount of time, and then we throw it out. It also covered the fact that companies purposely make products that break easily and cannot be repaired.

[05:44] So then we're forced as a consumer to, you know, go buy the product again or look for an upgrade, but just regardless, we're going back to spend money with said company.

[05:53] I'm low key, a little happy about the tariffs because it might stop people from buying so much ****.

[05:58] And in turn, that might stop so much waste being produced by us. Part of the documentary covered the clothing waste that's donated to Ghana, and I put that in air quotes because it's just waste that we don't want.

[06:10] So then it ends up on Ghana's beaches and, you know, it gets into the water and a lot of these clothes are made from polyester, which is plastic. So but it looks good on our end because we're donating, and I put that in air quotes, these clothes to another country,

[06:23] when really all we're doing is dumping it on another country to make it their problem,

[06:27] we're literally shipping container ships full of waste to other countries so that they can deal with it and they can dispose of it. There was one country that took like broken electronics or whatever, I don't know the exact country, and I apologize for that.

[06:42] But if you go watch the documentary, all this is in that documentary.

[06:46] But the country took smartphones, computers, all types of electronics, broke it down into pieces,

[06:52] recycle what they could recycle, and then threw everything else away. But they. But in the documentary, it was expressed how hazardous it is for these people to work with these products.

[07:02] So it's like, do you actually think of the life cycle of your trash or of your disposed item once you Dispose of it or do you just out of sight, out of mind.

[07:10] Once it's in the trash, it doesn't be.

[07:12] Once it's in the trash, it's not your problem anymore. But as soon as I seen that the tariffs were going to make things expensive, yes, I'm like sucking my teeth saying, ****, why would you do this to us?

[07:21] Because we're the ones that are going to absorb that cost.

[07:24] These companies are going to increase their prices.

[07:26] But then I started thinking, the **** that we don't need. I'm actually glad it's more expensive because it'll deter people from buying bullshit. And it also may decrease the amount of waste that we produce.

[07:37] So I might see the silver lining when it comes to the tariffs. Even though Trump is doing this for strictly his own gain. I doubt Trump really thought like, oh, it'll reduce waste and stuff like that.

[07:48] No, that's just me analyzing the situation. Trump is doing this for money purposes.

[07:53] But I do hope eventually we figure something out with the tariffs because this is not sustainable as a country at all.

[08:00] And once again, that documentary on Netflix is called Buy Now. That's B u y now.

[08:05] And if you would like, check out my review on that page on TikTok under my it's sugar na TikTok I t S S u g G A H N a.

[08:14] I made a video about that back in November, I think, and it has over 700,000 views.

[08:19] That video really opened a lot of people's eyes. I put a lot of people onto that documentary. And of course it.

[08:25] And of course I want to put my podcast audience onto that documentary. So please, if you have not, go on Netflix and check out the Buy now documentary. It's about consumerism, recycling, trash,

[08:36] things that happen with the items that we buy once we throw it away. And it's kind of encouraging us to stop and think of our purchases before we make them.

[08:45] But once again, the documentary is called Buy now on Netflix.

[08:49] In our While that really happens segment, we're going to be talking about Rodney Hinton Jr. If you have not been hearing about this story,

[08:55] this is the story about the father who lost his son due to police gun violence, and then he retaliated by allegedly running over and killing the sheriff that killed his son.

[09:05] So this news article,

[09:06] the more I read it, I'm like, okay, you could clearly tell that they're on the side of the police because the way they worded it and the way they described the deputy and the way they described the officer versus the way they described Rodney and his son really is a little off putting because it's not a neutral article.

[09:22] You can clearly see what side they took. But this is what the article says, right? On Thursday, city police fatally shot an armed 18 year old as he ran from them.

[09:31] And the next day, long serving sheriff's deputy Larry Henderson was hit and killed in Cincinnati by a car that authorities say was driven by the young man's grieving father. But as more information comes out about this case, the cops say that they saw a gun and that's why they shot the little boy.

[09:46] But on their body cam footage, you cannot see the little boy pointing a gun at any of the deputies. You see him running away. Yes, but you do not see him pointing a gun at the police to justify them shooting him and feeling like their lives were in danger.

[09:59] Like I said, he was running away.

[10:02] And too many times cops feel like their life is in danger and the person is running away.

[10:07] Y' all know that y' all can yell gun and that justifies y' all killing the child. Whether the child is white, black, no matter their age, a cop could say, oh, we saw a gun and that justifies them killing him.

[10:19] And also the ****** up part is they didn't place the officer on administrative leave. They didn't even bother to start an investigation. For real.

[10:26] Now they're doing an investigation after Rodney Hinton allegedly ran the deputy over in retaliation.

[10:32] But it's like, no, the cops should have been put on leave. You know, they don't fire them. They always put them on paid administrative leave. But regardless, this issue should have been investigated thoroughly.

[10:42] And from what we seen, even though it was a little blurry, you can clearly tell that that little boy did not have a gun pointed at the cops to justify them shooting and killing him.

[10:52] And it was alleged, slash rumored that after the family seen the video, the dad didn't say anything. He just left the room. And then an hour later, he. He allegedly ran over the cop.

[11:02] And if I was his lawyer, I would plead temporary insanity because I can only imagine the hurt and pain he was feeling from losing his son. The father, 38 year old Rodney Hinton Jr.

[11:12] Is charged with aggravated murder. But neither police nor attorney representing his family have disclosed any motivation behind his alleged targeting of the deputy. And once again, y' all see how that sentence reads.

[11:23] I don't even know why I picked this article, but it just ****** me off reading it again, hate. Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey announced on Sunday that Henderson, who had been with the Sheriff's office for 33 years, was struck by the car and passed away a short time later.

[11:38] They give the person's accolades and years of service, and they tell you how many kids they had and oh, he's a family man.

[11:45] See, they do this a lot for white people or they do this a lot for cops accused of killing black people for no reason. But when it comes to the black person in the situation or just any person of color, they don't mention the person's family or background or unless it helps with making that person look worse.

[12:01] Regardless,

[12:02] Rodney Hinton Jr. I wish you the best. I hope he gets the best counsel. I didn't really look into if they set up a GoFundMe for him, but if they have, please donate so he can get some good legal representation.

[12:14] Because the one video I seen where they had all the cops in the courtroom with him, I guess the cops were there to intimidate him, but he walked out that courtroom.

[12:21] He walked in and out that courtroom with his head held high and look most of them cops in the eyes. But his public defender or lawyer just looks skittish and looks scared.

[12:31] His voice was shaking a little bit and it's just like, nah. When you in there and you really defending your client, you better stand 10 toes with that *****. For real, for real.

[12:40] Don't be in there scared, don't be in there timid, because he's not scared and he's not timid and he's the one that's facing the charges.

[12:46] So you walk in there with your head held high too, because what the **** are the cops gonna do to you? What, you scared they're going to retaliate against you?

[12:53] I would document all that **** because I wish y' all will retaliate against me for defending my client. We'll see about that.

[12:59] Regardless, I'm gonna keep y' all updated on this Rodney Hinton Jr. Case because this is something I'm definitely interested in keeping track of. I don't want them to do wrong by this man.

[13:09] Condolences, peace, love and blessings to the Hinton family. I know y' all needed many, many prayers being sent y' all way because not only did y' all lose the 18 year old, y' all also lost his father to the jail system.

[13:22] So I'm sending many prayers to that family and I'll keep y' all updated.

[13:25] As most of y' all know, I've been unemployed since June 2024.

[13:29] I just recently got a job and they said the start date will be May 5th. I'm like, okay. They said, it's tentative, so that means May 5th was a possible start date.

[13:38] They sent a text message about a week ago and said, hey, the company is pushing back the start date to the 12th because they don't have enough equipment or they're waiting for equipment to come in, right?

[13:48] So I'm like, okay. I guess I then get another text message this week saying they're pushing the date back to the 19th because they're still waiting for said equipment. Then I found out they hired a total of 25 people to do this task or do this work.

[14:02] It was wire investigations for a bank. And I'm like, okay, so if y' all knew that y' all were hiring 25 people, why the **** didn't y' all already have this equipment ready?

[14:11] Basically, why weren't y' all prepared for this? Like, you're really playing with people's time,

[14:16] pushing the start date back continuously because you're not ready and you're not prepared. Although you hired 25 people, did you already know that you were going to hire 25 people, or did you keep adding people as time went on?

[14:28] And now because you added more people you weren't prepared for, you're making everybody wait to start?

[14:33] Regardless. I text them and I said, thank you for the opportunity, but this will no longer work for me. I hope to be considered for other positions in the future.

[14:41] I said, this is worrisome and indicative of an unorganized process on the bank's end. I say, you know what? You're six months pregnant. You might as well ride the rest of your pregnancy out at home, just growing and nurturing your baby, taking care of your body, focusing on yourself,

[14:55] getting your home ready for a new baby. I'm like, you know what? I'll continue my job search seriously,

[15:01] once I have my baby. In the meantime, I'll probably take some online courses because, y' all, I'm not proud to say this, but I am in a way.

[15:09] I am literally like, 10 credits away from having my bachelor's degree, and I don't know why I haven't finished. I know, but I don't know if that makes sense. It's like, girl, you only have, like, 10 credits to go.

[15:21] Why don't you just hurry up and knock them out then? The other part of me is like, I know, but I don't have time. I need to focus. Like, I'm really a nerd when it comes to school, y' all.

[15:30] I'm very serious about my grades. I don't like just passing. I like to get good grades. I like to get A's. I like for my GPA to be **** near 4.0, 3.8, 3.9.

[15:41] Like, I was like that in high school and everything. I'm really an overachiever when it comes to this ****. So it's like. So it's like I tell myself, if you're going to go back to school, you better go back when you're able to get the good grades that we expect from ourselves.

[15:54] We're not going back just to say, **** it, I'll get a C. **** it, I'll get a B. We're going back when we know we could sit down, focus, and get those straight A's, like we always have.

[16:04] Because I have an expectation for myself, right?

[16:07] So if I can't meet that expectation, it's like, all right, I'm a hold off until I know I can meet my own expectation. Because I don't want to disappoint myself.

[16:15] And that's why I said, on one hand, it's like, *****, you don't have that many credits left. Just go back. It's like, yeah, I'm a go back, but I'm a go back when I know I can get straight A still because I got a track record to keep up with.

[16:27] *****, we not about to just play around.

[16:29] I've also been heavily, heavily considering going to law school.

[16:33] That will be such a big life decision for me. Because just thinking about the type of person I am and how I grew up, and me being an attorney, I feel like I would be the best defense attorney anybody could ******* get.

[16:46] Because I like to argue, I don't like to be wrong, and also I think outside the box. So I know defense wise, I'll really come in handy for a lot of clients.

[16:54] And I know I'll make a lot of money. But also I'm like, my conscience might not let me defend people because I'm like, *****, if you wrong, you wrong.

[17:02] I was thinking in my head like, *****, the moment I feel like you lying to me, the moment I feel like you might actually did this ****, I'm refunding your ******* money and I'm not defending you.

[17:10] So. So on one hand I'm like, I think I will be the best out of the box attorney there is out there. On the other hand, I'm like, is that really something I want to commit my life to is being an attorney?

[17:22] And that's just something sitting heavy on my spirit and it's something I'M probably going to have to pray on, sleep on, think about.

[17:28] But for now, I just want to hurry up and finish my bachelor's degree and then see where we go from there. Because I don't have to just be a defense attorney.

[17:35] I could be, you know, an entertainment attorney, a family law attorney, a medical malpractice attorney, which is really close to home because y' all already know everything I've been through with Nayana,

[17:46] so it's like there's other avenues I can go down. But it's been calling my name for quite some time. But I'm like, I don't know. Because I'm also a very outgoing, entertaining person.

[17:56] So I'm like, do I want to get stuck in a profession like being an attorney when I want to be an entertainer as well?

[18:02] That's why I said I got to pray and I got to sleep on that. That's something where I need God to just give me the sign.

[18:07] All right, and that is a wrap for episode 30. I really hope you enjoyed this week's episode. I wish y' all could see how I'm recording this, as a matter of fact, on my Sugar Nah TikTok S u g G A h Or on my Facebook Sugar Nah.

[18:19] You can see my May I vlog series where I vlog every day in the month of May. Today will be day nine. You're gonna see clips of me recording my vlog and y' all are gonna see exactly how I'm sitting right now holding this mic.

[18:30] Usually I sit the mic up on my desk and I sit up and talk to the mic y' all. I'm sitting back with this mic held up to my mouth and I'm just chilling because my back hurt, my feet are kicked up on my chair cuz I got one of them gaming chairs that let you kick your feet up.

[18:44] But as always, please leave fan mail. Let us know how you're feeling about the podcast and you can support the podcast for as low as $3 a month. No commitment.

[18:52] Cancel anytime. It's just going towards the laptop fund. You can also send a cash app donation at Dollar sign Sugar and I. That's dollar sign S u g G A H N A and just in the four or two line put laptop fun.

[19:04] Or you could put in that line here you broke *** *****. I don't care what it say as long as I hear that cash app ding. Okay, but thank you guys so much for listening.

[19:12] And what do I always say? It's good but it needs some sugar.

[19:28] You already know who it is. It's your girl, Sugar. Not blessing you once again with the what need some Sugar? Podcast.