Stop trying to predict and appraise President Trump's tariff policies based on economic theories or market realities. Tariffs are pure psychology for the president, fused into his brain like no other topic, Axios' Marc Caputo reports.

• Why it matters: Trump's tariff brain is unpredictable to the outside (and to market analysts) but wholly knowable to those who know how his mind works.

"There'll be trial and error. There'll be pushing the envelope. There'll be all of that Trumpian stuff," said a top adviser involved in trade discussions.

🔭 The big picture: Trump approaches tariffs, the remaking of the U.S. economy and the reshaping of global trade as a continuation of his presidential campaign.

• He ignored experts and assembled a team dedicated to executing his will and shrugging off the consequences of his unpredictability. He's not changing now — rocky rollout and chaotic financial markets be damned.
• "Donald Trump works at his own tempo, and he doesn't change the subject until he's sure he's clubbed people into seeing it as he does," said a top adviser involved in trade discussions.

Between the lines: In Trump's first term, free traders such as then-National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn controlled Trump's impulses to impose tariffs the way he has now. Trump's current NEC chief, Kevin Hassett, is pro-tariff.

• So is the rest of the economic team: Vice President Vance, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, Council of Economic Advisers chair Steven Miran, and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.

⏳ The backstory: Trump's tariff-based chip-on-the-shoulder "America First" mindset has been part of his political DNA since his first presidential-style campaign visit to New Hampshire in 1987 — 38 years ago.

• "We should have these countries that are ripping us off pay off the $200 billion deficit," he told the Portsmouth (N.H.) Chamber of Commerce then.
• Today, the annual deficit is nearly $2 trillion. And the U.S. trade deficit is just over $1 trillion. In 1987, Trump's trade obsession was Japan. Today, it's China.

💰 Reality check: Trump's mammoth imposition of tariffs and his on-again-off-again implementation of them has shaken the global financial order, caused consumer sentiment to drop, spread recession fears and damaged Trump's poll numbers.

Many traditional economists (and other critics) think Trump's ideas are crazed, and that his advisers are too scared to say it.

• Fed Chair Jerome Powell, arguably the most powerful voice in the U.S. economy, warned Wednesday that Trump's tariffs will ignite inflation. That led an angry Trump to suggest he might try to fire Powell.

One outside adviser to the White House, who calls himself a "plan-truster," said there's a plan and "a method to the madness" — but that Trump's "grenades-first approach will also be bumpy."

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A Trump official frantically told Harvard that a three-page demand letter — which provoked a tectonic battle between the administration and the university — shouldn't have been sent and was "unauthorized," the N.Y. Times' Mike Schmidt and Michael Bender report (gift link).

• Three sources tell The Times the letter's contents were authentic, "but there were differing accounts inside the administration of how it had been mishandled."
• "Some people at the White House believed it had been sent prematurely," The Times says. "Others in the administration thought it had been meant to be circulated among [antisemitism] task force members rather than sent to Harvard."

🤯 In a statement to Axios, a Harvard spokesperson pointed out that the letter "was signed by three federal officials, placed on official letterhead, was sent from the e-mail inbox of a senior federal official, and was sent on April 11 as promised. Recipients of such correspondence from the U.S. government — even when it contains sweeping demands that are astonishing in their overreach — do not question its authenticity or seriousness."

• "More importantly," the statement adds, "since then, the Administration has frozen $2.2 billion in funding, issued stop-work orders on contracts, begun considering revocation of Harvard's 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status, and initiated numerous investigations of Harvard's operations. Even assuming the Administration now wishes to take back its litany of breathtakingly intrusive demands, it appears to have doubled down on those demands through its deeds in recent days. Actions speak louder than words."
• "It remains unclear to us exactly what, among the government's recent words and deeds," the statement continues, "were mistakes or what the government actually meant to do and say. But even if the letter was a mistake, the actions the government took this week have real-life consequences on students, patients, employees, and the standing of American higher education in the world."

A senior White House official told The Times that the administration stands by the April 11 letter. "It was malpractice on the side of Harvard's lawyers not to pick up the phone and call the members of the antisemitism task force who they had been talking to for weeks," said May Mailman, the White House senior policy strategist. "Instead, Harvard went on a victimhood campaign."

• Mailman said there's a potential pathway to resume discussions if, among other measures, Harvard apologizes to students for past antisemitism on campus.

Read the article ... Read the administration letter ... Harvard public response ... Harvard legal response.

Less than an hour after the NYT bombshell, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers — Harvard president from 2001-2006, and president emeritus — tweeted about the Trump administration: "Who is in charge?"

• Summers' tweet points to yesterday's revelation that the IRS now has its fourth leader since President Trump took office. (Today is Day 90.)
• Summers also notes yesterday's report by The Wall Street Journal that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick got Trump to agree to a tariff pause by racing into the Oval Office while Peter Navarro — Trump's tariff-loving trade adviser, "who was constantly hovering around the Oval Office" — was meeting with economic adviser Kevin Hassett in a different part of the White House.

Gift link to Wall Street Journal story, "Trump Advisers Took Advantage of Navarro's Absence to Push for Tariff Pause."

It's not your imagination: Here's just two hours in Trump yesterday, via The New York Times.

ROME — A second round of U.S.-Iran nuclear talks are underway with President Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi leading the delegations, Axios' Barak Ravid reports from Italy.

• Why it matters: The talks are taking place with debate still raging within the Trump administration — and between the U.S. and Israel — over whether diplomacy or military strikes are more likely to prevent Tehran from obtaining a bomb.

👀 For now, Trump is holding back the hawks, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and focusing on getting a deal.

• "I want Iran to be great and prosperous and terrific. But they can't have a nuclear weapon. And if they have a nuclear weapon, you'll all be very unhappy because your life will be in great danger," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office yesterday.

⚡ Being there: The talks started shortly before noon local time at the residence of the Omani ambassador in Rome's quiet diplomatic quarter.

• Dozens of reporters gathered in the narrow street in front of the Omani diplomatic compound.

Keep reading.

Vice President Vance — who's in Italy for tariff talks, and is a Catholic convert — stopped by the Vatican for Good Friday services.

• "I'm grateful every day for this job, but particularly today where my official duties have brought me to Rome on Good Friday," the VP posted on X.

Vance in January defended America First precepts by citing a concept from medieval Catholic theology known in Latin as ordo amoris, delineating a hierarchy of care — to family first, followed by neighbor, community, fellow citizens and lastly those elsewhere. Keep reading.

Getting hitched could soon get even more expensive, Axios' Sami Sparber writes.

• Why it matters: Engaged couples are bracing for price hikes on flowers, dresses, cakes, invitations and more because of tariffs. Some say they've already stocked up on foreign wine, champagne or decor made overseas.

🚢 The big picture: America imports many of its wedding staples.

• Roughly 80% of flowers, most chocolate and vanilla and a lot of booze come from other countries.

Case in point: Ahna Han, a New York City florist, says she's seeing suppliers charging at least 10% more, with prices for imported flowers fluctuating.

• "Get those bridesmaid dresses ordered," one user posted in a Reddit community for wedding planning.

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The U.S. will shrink its military footprint in Syria over the coming months, bringing troop levels below 1,000.

• Why it matters: President Trump tried to pull all American forces from the country during his first term, Axios' Colin Demarest writes.

The VP and his family — along with Turkey, Iran and Russia — is one of several foreign powers with a foothold in Syria as the country rebuilds after the fall of dictator Bashar al-Assad.

• The Pentagon's Sean Parnell announced the reduction yesterday, citing "the significant steps we have made toward degrading ISIS' appeal and operational capability regionally and globally."

Keep reading.

There's a new description appearing on dating app bios, D.C. singles tell Axios: "Laid off by DOGE."

• It's not news that dating has become highly partisan, especially in a town as politically obsessed as Washington.

🗳️ D.C. residents overwhelmingly vote Democratic, and Trump staffers and those on the right have found it difficult to find a date among the city's more liberal permanent dwellers since the first administration.

• It's not just a vote for Trump that's a dealbreaker for these left-leaning D.C. singles. "Four years ago, five years ago, I was hearing, 'Oh, I couldn't date a Trump supporter,'" says Kat Markiewicz, a D.C.-based matchmaker. "Now it's like, 'I cannot date someone if they drive a Tesla.'"

🐘 The other side: More Washingtonians are openly expressing their conservative views on dating apps, users tell Axios — a departure from Trump's first term, when some conservatives listed their political affiliation as "moderate" in their bios.

• D.C. resident Samantha White says she's seen several photos on dating app profiles of people posing with Trump or in his Oval Office.

Keep reading.

This morning marks 250 years since the first shot of the American Revolution was fired in Lexington, Ma.

• "[H]istorians have argued over who fired first at the Battle of Lexington, when Massachusetts militiamen faced British soldiers about 11 miles west of Boston. A musket blast caused red-coated regulars to shoot at colonists, officially marking the beginning of the Revolutionary War," The Washington Post reports (gift link).

Go deeper: 250 years after America went to war for independence, a divided nation battles over its legacy.