Alsobrooks introducing legislation to exempt school supplies from Trump tariffs

Angela Alsobrooks wants to exempt backpacks and notebooks from tariffs. Fine. But notice what the bill doesn't do: it doesn't touch the tariffs themselves, doesn't propose a broader fix, doesn't ask why school supplies got caught up in a trade fight with China in the first place. It just carves out one politically sympathetic category, right before the cameras show up for back-to-school shopping season. That's not policy, that's timing.

We're not against cheaper backpacks. Parents feel every dollar right now and anyone claiming otherwise hasn't bought a pack of glue sticks lately. But a bill that exempts school supplies while leaving tariffs on everything else intact is a press release with a bill number attached. If tariffs are hurting working families, the honest move is to make that argument across the board, not cherry-pick the one product category that photographs well next to a kid with a lunchbox.

There's also the small matter of what tariffs are actually for. Trump's trade policy is aimed at forcing manufacturing back onto American soil and ending decades of dependence on countries that don't have our interests at heart. That's a real tradeoff, and it's worth debating honestly. Alsobrooks isn't debating it. She's found the one line item that lets her vote against tariffs without ever saying so.

If Democrats think the tariff strategy is wrong, they should make that case plainly and put forward something that actually reworks the policy. Slicing out backpacks for a September news cycle isn't courage, it's stagecraft, and voters can tell the difference.