Lori Wallach was into tariffs before they were cool, and she was still into them when they became uncool again. She cut her teeth fighting alongside labor unions and environmental groups against NAFTA in the 1990s. For more than 30 years, she has been trying to convince Democrats to be more skeptical of free trade. She spent most of that time in the political wilderness, waging one losing battle after another against a powerful bipartisan free-trade consensus. Then the winds began to shift. Donald Trump was elected president after railing against free-trade agreements. Congressional Democrats helped defeat Barack Obama’s signature trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The Biden administration embraced such taboo ideas as industrial policy and targeted tariffs, with near-universal support from fellow Democrats. The moment that Wallach had been working for her entire career seemed to have finally arrived.
