The Chaos Continues with President Trump and Elon Musk
Good morning. It’s Monday. Are you ready for a long week? It’s been a crazy weekend. Talk about chaos! As I keep saying, chaos creates political instability, which creates financial instability. If you don’t believe me, just watch the news this week as President Trump allows DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) to run wild as the Treasury Department is taken over by Elon Musk and employees barely out of high school.
Welcome to my third episode of Morning Coffee with me, Professor Alex. What happened over the weekend? What didn’t happen over the weekend is probably a better question. It has just been one thing after another.
So let’s discuss the latest political and financial chaos courtesy of Elon Musk, DOGE, and the hostile takeover of the Treasury Department.
Listen to this blog post.
The Fake DOGE Department of Elon Musk Takes Over the Treasury Department
Elon Musk allegedly obtained personal information through the Treasury Department and the Social Security Administration. His people went in there, and now they have access to our information.
To be clear, DOGE is a made-up entity. It’s not a government agency; it’s just a private citizen who happens to own a social media company. But now, Musk has your personal information. Information is power, right? And information on everybody. How much is that worth?
Note- As an update to this post, on four separate occasions, members of Congress have tried to gain access to the Treasury Department and have been denied access.
President Trump Expands the Immigration Crackdown
Also, President Trump has announced he will remove what’s called TPS (Temporary Protected Status) for 300,000 Venezuelans. Now, I’m from Miami. When I graduated from law school, I was working at Lennar, handling closings as a closing agent. A substantial percentage of the closings I did were for Venezuelan home buyers.
This was in Doral, a city within Miami-Dade, where President Trump owns his golf course and adjoining hotel. There used to be five golf courses, but now there are four. One of them was made by Greg Norman, but President Trump converted it into condos, of course. That’s where the infamous Blue Monster is. I played there a couple of times for all you people who love golf. It’s a fun course to play if you have the opportunity.
Doral has continued to grow since 1999, and a lot of Venezuelans reside in Doral. I even taught at an up-and-coming college there. Guess where the students were from? Venezuela. When things were getting hot politically in Venezuela, they continued to move into the Doral area. So this school has predominantly Venezuelan students.
If you remove 300,000 people, let’s say half of them live with one other person. That’s 150,000 apartments or homes that now have to be rented. That’s 150,000 cars that they maybe bought that will be repossessed. That’s 150,000 bank accounts that will be closed. That’s 150,000 students who will no longer be attending local schools and spending money locally. This is why I keep referring to this as the snowball effect.
This will also affect local businesses. For example, if there was a bakery that the Venezuelans frequented for a particular pastry, they won’t be going anymore, which will impact the bakery’s business. So, it’s a snowball effect, and I fail to see the positive.
Updated on July 3, 2025: Of course, it took a while, more than five months, but finally, a story covered by MSNBC focused on Doral and Venezuelans. Here’s the video that discusses not only Doral, but also takes place in a bakery, like I mentioned.
Now, at some point, it seems we’ve made immigrants out to be the boogeyman, and I’ve been trying to figure out why for a long time. This is what I came up with yesterday.
Update May 20, 2025. The Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration can remove the TPS status of Venezuelans. Here’s my Facebook post on this issue and the likely effect it would have.
The U.S. is Chasing Its Tail
In the 80s, especially in Miami, people were going to jail for long periods for having small amounts of cocaine on them. The guy who partied on the weekend with cocaine or was maybe addicted to cocaine, is he really a criminal? Seriously, is this the guy that keeps you up at night? Is he going to break into your house? No. Who does? The drug dealer, right?
So at some point, they realized this and created the drug court system. One of my law professors, a federal magistrate, was integral in that, and the judge who ran it for decades down in Miami, Judge Rosnick, did great with that program.
The drug court program was a second chance. You wouldn’t be thrown in jail and have the key thrown away for 20 years. You’d go through the program, succeed, be clean, and have random drug testing. Do well, and all the charges will be dropped. That makes sense, right? Destroying someone’s life because they had small amounts of cocaine on them doesn’t make sense.
So the drug court program, which is now probably used in every state, was very successful. Who is the bad guy in all this? The drug dealer. That’s the one we have to pursue because they have what people need. I look at illegal immigration in a similar way.
So the immigrants are the bad guys, the boogeymen? They’re only coming here because they know they can get a job. If there are no jobs, they won’t come. Deportations have always taken place, and clearly that hasn’t stopped anyone from coming over. They’ll get caught, put back on a plane, sent back, and the process repeats itself because there are jobs here.
Updated:
Note: Please do some research. It will only take a minute or two. I say this for those who continue to spread lies, misinformation, and disinformation. If you are not in the United States legally, you don’t receive benefits. It’s not a hard concept to understand. It’s simple, first you need a Social Security number. If you don’t have one, then there are no benefits.
You are now likely to make the argument that there’s fraud involved based on more lies from Elon Musk claiming that Social Security is the largest Ponzi scheme and there’s 40% fraud, but facts are facts. Musk and DOGE found two potential incidents of fraud and slowed down processing claims by 25%.
I found the source where I got this information because I knew there would be civil and criminal penalties attached to this issue. However, it seems that on average, only 15 employers get nailed when it comes to this issue. It’s very rare that they pay fines or go to jail.
The E-Verify system is voluntary unless it’s related to a federal government contract. But I argue to make it free of charge and mandatory. If an employer used the system and it turns out someone was hired who is undocumented, the employer isn’t liable.
By the way, remember when President Trump had a couple of illegal immigrants at his New Jersey golf course. Go figure, huh?
Employers Hiring Undocumented Workers Go Unscathed
If there’s a crackdown on business owners and not just impose a few hundred-dollar fines (which can go up to $22,000), why not start at $10,000? Just go after the business owners. If they get hit hard to the point of being pushed towards bankruptcy and not being able to feed their families, wouldn’t that stop the problem? Versus the current average of targeting only 15 businesses every year, wouldn’t that send a clear message? It’s risk versus reward, and the risk far exceeds the reward.
Immigrants would realize there’s no work available because nobody is willing to hire them. Wouldn’t that take care of the problem instead of spending $88 billion to try to deport undocumented immigrants?
This method would also avoid triggering economic effects, such as trade wars. At the end of the day, wouldn’t that be a better system? Isn’t that the best way to stop illegal immigration if that is truly the concern?
I think of it like the drug dealer and Drug Court: we’re going after the individuals instead of addressing the root cause, which is that jobs are available here. I believe that targeting business owners would solve these issues. If they knew the risk was too high, they would stop hiring illegal workers, especially if there’s no excuse, because they can use the E-Verify system.
If we do this, we might reduce illegal immigration if it’s truly such a big issue. Personally, I think we’ll only learn our lesson when we start paying exorbitant prices, like $80 for a salad. And I think that time is coming very soon.
Canada Fights Back Against the Tariffs
Of course, the last 24 hours have been crazy. Canada has responded by pulling bourbon from Kentucky off their shelves due to the Trump tariffs.
Canada is reacting to the tariffs by targeting American products. If the U.S. imposes tariffs, Canada will start taxing more on products from Republican states. The Canadians have stood up to President Trump. What have we done?
This is the time for Congress to react, and I’m not just talking about Democrats but also Republicans. Of course, Republicans like Senator Mitch McConnell are now backtracking. Why? Because he’s near the end of his career. He bashes President Trump, but like always, they do it when they’re walking out the door. They don’t do it while they’re in office and have the opportunity to make changes. Of course, politicians like Senator Mitch McConnell try to change history, but this is their chance to actually get something done.
The fact that Canada is now reacting that way towards the U.S., and Mexico has done the same, only proves that this trade war benefits no one. And again, why are we attacking Canada? President Trump has repeatedly mentioned the issue of fentanyl, insisting that Canada needs to stop fentanyl from crossing the border.
Here’s a scenario that puts it in perspective: I play golf, and yesterday I played nine holes. My golf bag weighs around 40 lbs, and that’s about the same amount of fentanyl that came across the border from Canada last year—43 lbs to be precise. We’re fighting a tariff war over 43 lbs of fentanyl!
I posted about this long ago when President Trump kept bringing up fentanyl. Since when are Canadians known as drug dealers? It’s not in their history. And I guess I was right.
But those few pounds of fentanyl that President Trump is fixated on are going to cost us dearly. I’ve got plenty of blogs and videos discussing the issue of tariffs. Tariffs are essentially a tax, and everything will get more expensive, even Fox News acknowledged this, showing that everything from cooking oil to cars to avocados will cost more.
You’re going to pay more out of your pocket, and that’s always been my concern. Our expenses go up, but our income doesn’t. And it’s hard to make more money, right? You have your income, whatever it is. The next option is to cut your expenses, but cutting expenses isn’t easy either. That’s why you have a budget.
If your expenses don’t go down and your income doesn’t go up, what happens? Your debt increases. That’s what I’ve been talking about all along with these tariffs. This could result in all of us getting into more debt for something we didn’t ask for and don’t want. We didn’t ask for a trade war. It’s not why President Trump was put in office. We didn’t ask for Elon Musk to go inside the Treasury Department and create the chaos he is creating while accessing our private data simultaneously.
Firing all those people, forcing them to quit, how do you replace them quickly enough with competent individuals? The answer is that those people have to learn the system, whether they’re already within the federal government or coming in as civilians. Assuming anyone is hired, and then the government is short-staffed.
What happens to the personal finances of the federal government employees who are fired? This increases the foreclosures in the neighborhood, and property values go down. It’s a snowball effect, and where all this is going is anyone’s guess. Unfortunately, I think we’re looking at inflation levels we haven’t experienced in a while.
A lot of it is based on common sense and my experiences, but also on everything I read, except for what maybe Peter Navarro believes. I’m guessing he probably has some weird theory on why this is a good idea, but he’s a convicted felon, so I really don’t care what he has to say. It’s just another Trump loyalist. But other than him, where is the benefit to you?
Are You Prepared?
So the question remains: how are you going to be prepared if chaos causes political instability? We’re already seeing that it’s only been two weeks, and we’re starting week three. Political instability creates financial instability. These people are already rich; we’re not. So what are you going to do? I don’t know, but you have to do something. You have to be prepared financially.
What is the worst-case scenario? Let’s say I’m wrong, but you saved up some money. That’s the worst thing that happens. Not a bad thing at all. You can use that money for whatever you want. You can take a nice cruise, go to Miami, and cruise to the Bahamas for a few days. That’ll be fun. Or you can save it, invest it, put it in your 401K or IRA, or remodel your bathroom. Whatever you want to do.
That’s the worst-case scenario if I’m wrong. But if I’m right, then it’s going to get nasty. So be prepared.
It’s Monday, and one final thing I want to say about Mondays: I’ve always taken Mondays as an opportunity to hit the reset button or not. If last week was bad or chaotic, hit that reset button and start all over again. It’s your opportunity to do whatever you need to do, whether it’s to go to the gym more, save more, or whatever you have to do.
If it was a good week, you don’t have to hit the reset button. Keep pushing that momentum forward, so it’s going to be positive no matter what.
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