Tariffs Vs. Small Business: Mike Musheinish

A tariff isn’t a headline. It’s a line item that can turn a $100 auto part into $172.50 before you even add shipping, labor, boxes, marketplace fees, insurance, or a modest profit. We sit down with Mike Musheinish of Detroit Axle to translate trade policy into the day-to-day reality of running a U.S. small business in the auto parts industry, where margins are thin and pricing errors get punished fast.

From there, we go deeper than sticker shock. We talk through how import tariffs actually land on American companies and consumers, why the “other country pays” claim falls apart, and how constant changes create planning chaos across supply chains. We also unpack the legal and constitutional questions around tariff authority, including the power of the purse, the Court of International Trade, and the different frameworks policymakers reach for such as IEEPA emergency tariffs, Section 301, and Section 232. Along the way, we debate trade deficits, de minimis shipments, and how exemptions and workarounds can turn policy into a game rigged for insiders.

The conversation ends by connecting tariffs to bigger macro risks: war-driven energy prices, disruptions in oil, LNG, and fertilizer, and the possibility of a wider inflation shock that feels worse than recent supply chain crises. If you care about investing, inflation, small business economics, U.S. manufacturing, and the future of free trade, this one brings receipts and hard questions. Subscribe, share this with a friend who argues about tariffs, and leave a review with your take: what should the U.S. do next?

https://themetrodetroitnews.com/dearborn-man-once-a-palestinian-refugee-now-owns-600-million-company-featured-in-ny-times/

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Transcript

Welcome And Guest Background

Clem Miller 0:26

Hello everybody and welcome to Skeptic's Guide to Investing. I'm here with Steve Davenport and with Mike Mushanish, who is from Detroit Axel, from my hometown of Detroit, Michigan. Uh and actually his his factory is is not too far away, half a mile from where I grew up. So that's that's pretty close. Detroit Axel is a company , as you can imagine, that that man makes axles, remanufactures them, , remanufactures a bunch of other parts as well for the automobile industry. Uh those of you who may not have been to Detroit, you have to imagine that you know you drive down roads in Detroit and you see on either side, you see lots of businesses that are associated with the automobile industry, right, Mike? You got Nine Mile Road and you got you know other other roads with lots of businesses on either side. Uh so it's it's a a real industrial area where you have many companies like like Detroit Axel that that manufacture stuff. So so Mike is here today to talk about you know, from his perspective, from his industry's perspective, the automobile industry, the auto parts industry, you know, what you know, the perspective that he has about what's going on more on that sort of macro policy level. So what's going on with tariffs, how tariffs are impacting him on a day-to-day basis, , what's going on with things like inflation, obviously related to the tariffs, what what his expectations might be regarding you know oil prices, energy prices, the effect of that, you know, coming out of the Gulf on the industry. Uh and we'll take this wherever, Mike, you want to take it. But that's my tee up. So, Mike, why don't you tell us tell us more?

Mike Musheinish 2:35

Well, thank you for having me. Uh since we're both from Detroit, I guess you're gonna take it easy on me on the questions, right?

Speaker 3 2:43

Yeah, yeah.

Mike Musheinish 2:44

All right.

Steve Davenport 2:45

So that's what I'm here for. I'm gonna make it difficult, Mike. I'm from Boston, so I don't know if any Midwestern blood and money at all.

Mike Musheinish 2:53

All right, so you guys play good cop, bad cop with your guests. I see.

Clem Miller 2:58

I'm actually usually the bad cop. So reverse it.

The Real Cost Of Tariffs

Mike Musheinish 3:03

We got you on my team now. Well, thank you. Thank you for having me. And the this issue of tariffs is near and dear to my heart because not only does it affect our company, but it affects our customers, it affects our nation, right? Our our country has gotten stronger and more wealthier because of the free trade and everything associated with free trade. We got the greatest market on earth, and everybody's trying to trying to enter our our great market here to sell their merchandise, and , you know, that's what happens when you're the greatest power on earth. And there's a lot of there's a lot of study to that when it, you know, throughout the ages of every great nation, everybody, you know, everybody wants to be here and sell in its market. But these tariffs, , like we said, they just just came out of nowhere. Uh I'd like to probably put it into perspective for your for your audience here. Uh once upon a time, I I used to import, and I still do, I import a million dollars worth of product, and I would pay the federal government twenty-five hundred dollars in tariffs. Now for that same million dollars in product, I pay the federal government seven hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, and this just dropped almost like that. So I got now, let's go to how should I say this on a micro level, right? Um I have a product here that I purchased for a hundred dollars, and so before Trump, pre-Trump, you would pay the government two two dollars and fifty cents in tariffs. So now our total cost on this product is ten dollars or a hundred and two dollars and fifty cents. Now, with post-Trump and what he's done, I have to pay the federal government $72.50 in tariffs. So now this product is worth $172.50, and that's your starting point as a business owner, as a company. How are you going to price it to the end user? Now you have your $172.5, then you gotta factor in your shipping, you factor in your labor, you gotta factor in your corrugated boxes, you factor in other things, perhaps marketplace fees such as eBay and Amazon, whatnot, and factor in your insurance, whatever, and then then at the end of all that, you factor in your minimal profit, which is you know, in our case, somewhere between five and seven or nine to percent, depending on what the product line is, and you have a total cost for the consumer. So all of a sudden it went up, our cost went up 72 and a half percent, just out of nowhere. And you hear it on TV and the pundits saying how that person or or that person is paying for it or that country is paying for it. It's I mean, it's it's not only a lie, right? It it's almost criminal. Right? It's not , you know, a fib, a white lie, it's criminal. Why won't you want the population to know what this really means to them? It's like you're taking money from them and tell them no, I'm not the one that stole from you, he did, or or something to that nature. In our business, right, we're in the retail business, we don't supply the big three or anything. We're strictly retail. You know, everybody runs on small margins. The factory where we procure from runs on small margins. Most companies here, yeah. In our country in the retail business, all run on small margins. Right? I mean, unless you're Louis Vuitton buying purses from China and selling them for 10,000 bucks, maybe you don't live on small margins, but all of us do. So when her when I almost called him Herbert Hoover, who would have been a godsend right now compared to this president, just comes out of nowhere, not knowing the economic effects it's gonna have. Just come slap these tariffs. It's just been it's been like you're living through a nightmare. Uh I remember right after his inaugural address, he literally went to the White House that same day and raised up tariffs by 10%. Right? That same day. And I was telling everybody before he got elected, I'm telling them, you're gonna we're gonna be in the world's a hurt if he gets elected. Nobody heeded the call, nobody heeded the warning. So yeah, as soon as he walked in, he started raising tariffs, and the American consumer has been paying for it ever since.

Who Has Tariff Power

Clem Miller 8:57

Wow, that's that's a really great opinion. I think you you're gonna find that Steve and I agree with that. Although we don't have the same lived experience that you do in dealing with this every day. Uh you know, certainly Steve and I know that you know that what you're hearing out of the White House about this is you know a myth, essentially, that the foreign countries are paying for this.

Mike Musheinish 9:28

Uh I mean Zeus and Apollo are a myth. This ain't a what they're saying is a flat-out lie. Right. Right? Yeah it's flat-out criminal lie. Yeah.

Clem Miller 9:39

It's more than a myth. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you got a point. Well, you're hearing a lot of lies, um, you know, a lot of things. So um right now, you know, with the war, for example, um, you know, what do you so staying on tariffs, we'll get to the war in a bit, right? But staying on tariffs, so the the Supreme Court ruled them unconstitutional, ruled the the Emergency Act, the IEEEPA tariffs, unconstitutional. Uh but then Trump implemented this 150-day set of tariffs. Uh but he's got a his U.S. Trade Representative's office has got a call for opinions regarding Section 301 tariffs. And my understanding of Section 301 is essentially that it can only be applied to circumstances where a foreign government is intentionally through policy means you know, something like a China, right? Uh intentionally through policy means creating structural surpluses, either production or production capacity. Uh and and so yeah, I I you know I'm sure there are circumstances like that. I'm sure there are circumstances that you deal with like that. But on the other hand, the the USTR call for comments that went out listed practically every country in the world, and it defined it defined surplus capacity in terms of trade deficits, which is the same old language that they use with the IEPA that trade deficits, you know, they call trade deficits an emergency. Here they're basically saying that trade deficits are evidenced on its face, right? Prima fascia evidence of of surplus capacity in production when in fact it could reflect all sorts of things, right? The you know, lower prices for goods could reflect all sorts of things, and not just you know, intentional subsidies by a government. So I think we're headed right back toward you know right back towards implementation of of tariffs that wouldn't be too dissimilar from what we had before. It's just on a different basis. But I do think that they will get challenged in the courts because the administration will not have done its homework to prove that there are these subsidies. What do you what do you think? That's my opinion. What do you think about all that?

De Minimis And Trade Deficit Logic

Mike Musheinish 12:29

The the power of the purse resides in Congress. Yeah. The executive, it's unconstitutional for him to be able to levy taxes or tariffs to be able to generate revenue. That's not that is not the way the system works, right? And and I see we talked section 301. He already does have 25 on steel aluminum on section 301. He's hitting us on section 232 auto parts, and this is for the entire country, and then he had a 20% IPA, which has been struck down. So now auto parts are at 52.5 percent, right? So again, we we said the power of the purse resides in Congress. He he comes around just throwing tariffs left and right. I mean, the history of this country you know dates back to us starting a revolution in 1776 over a two percent tariff on a breakfast beverage, right? And everybody wants and everybody wants bananas over the Texas. Right. And so here, I mean, everyone's mute. Nobody's saying a nobody's saying a word. So this this lawsuit that was done by this little toy company out in out in the west coast, and they sued, I think they were probably one week ahead of us. And we're suing for something similar but a little different under the de minimis exemption. Uh and the de minimis is you know something that's been on the books since the 30s. And this the stitch says that anything worth $800 or less was entering the country with no tariffs. Right. I mean, it was really a godsend for lower and middle class Americans. Nearly 1.5 billion packages a year used to enter with this under this statute that was voted in by Congress, and it can only be eliminated by Congress. The executive does not have the power to look into a statute of law and pick out line 372 and say, no, I don't like that one, so I'm just gonna erase it, executive order, and make it illegal, right? And he's talk about trade deficits and this and that. I mean, I got a trade deficit with the grocery store. I mean, I mean, this, you know, you give and take, right? So here you got, you know, you got 45% tariffs on Cambodia, and because we have a trade trade deficit with Cambodia, and I and I and I say to myself, what could we possibly sell to the populace of Cambodia when their average income is about $1,100 to $1,300 a year? Right? I mean, we export we export our ideas, our culture, and the dollar. Everybody wants the dollar.

Why Trade Always Connects Us

Clem Miller 15:48

We have a we have a services surplus with the rest of the world. We yeah, we've got a capital account surplus with the rest of the world. I mean, look at the trade deficit, is just looking at one part of the whole picture.

Mike Musheinish 16:03

Absolutely, absolutely, and you know, you try to, you know, recall what what part of history can we liking our times to, right? And since I'm a big history buff, right? And so I I see the way, you know, it was called the late Roman Republic before, you know, Rome was a republic just as we were, and as just as we are, right? Um, until it gets to a point where it morphs into an empire. But for 500 years it stayed as a as a republic with voting, and everybody was jocking and pushing each other over, trying to get on top of the hell. And that you know what it it's it's really incredible to see what this one president comes around and does to tarnish the constitution, the norms. He's crossing red lines when it comes to our civil liberties, and and everybody is everybody's mute about it. Yeah, so I took it as a responsibility. I know I'm even putting my neck out there doing this. You know, who knows? You might have some guys coming knocking on my door, dressed in black, you know. I mean, this is this is the times we live in. Yeah, it's unfortunate.

Clem Miller 17:32

You have to, you know, you have to do what you can do to you know to express your opinions about this. Um, you know, I put my opinions out there on some LinkedIn posts. That's the least I can do, right?

Steve Davenport 17:45

I wish I could do more, but you know. Yeah, I mean, Mike, what when do you think it it it lines up with history? I kind of think it's like when , you know, the the idea that Uncle Sam, you know, walks quietly but carries a big stick the way we're going around to Venezuela and Iran and Cuba and saying that we want things to be different. And I I kind of remember that that time was also very much um a little bit difficult for businesses in the late, you know, the late 1800s and and early 1900s, because I don't think America um I don't know understood how good it was relative to the rest of the world, and therefore it didn't, you know, it didn't behave in ways that were normal. It it started to behave a little bit um like the imperial empires of of Europe because we wanted to get treated with more respect. Do you do you think that we're in that kind of time where we're just gonna keep going around to countries with a big stick and and trying to you know rattle them or you know I I will tell you that that the what philosophers and teachers throughout the ages warned us about hubris, right?

Mike Musheinish 19:12

Hubris is um you you would think of it as a very you know slap on the wrist kind of word, but there's this great professor from from Oklahoma, a history professor named Rufus Fears, right? And he talks about it, and the the the meaning of of hubris is outrageous arrogance.

unknown 19:37

Right.

Mike Musheinish 19:38

I mean, how can you sum it up any better? Right?

Steve Davenport 19:42

I agree, it's nice to have confidence, but once you go over the line where you don't respect the other partners or the other countries or the other people, I mean, I think that people matter in this industry, but I used to work in the auto industry with door switches, and I just felt that pride every time I saw a vehicle, and I knew that I had one little piece in that vehicle. And I think that you know, we've lost our way by doing too much outside the country, and I don't think this is the way to get us back. I think it has more to do with you know supporting businesses in the U.S., not harming businesses in the U.S.

Mike Musheinish 20:25

Well, we they are harming businesses in the U.S. I mean, you should see how it is in Canada or in Mexico. We got operations there. Um, you know, we're he made us unliked and unwelcome in many places throughout the world. Uh look, , you know, his made perhaps the intentions, and I don't fault anybody with this nostalgia of bringing everything back into the US and producing everything here at home, right? And shutting out the outside world. And this is really resonates with the people that have been hurt by you know the shenanigans that are going on in business and in Washington. So I I totally understand the the heartache that rural and you know rural America is facing in the I mean even even the inner city, but you know, you can't just just wipe out trade and say you don't have to trade with the rest of the world. I mean, you you think about it. When we're hunters and gatherers, we still traded, right? During the bronze age, we was it was essential for for societies to trade with one another. Um, I was watching this Milton Friedman, who's the godfather of conservatives and the Republicans. He had a show back in the 80s called free to choose. And in their program, he he he he wrote he lifted up a pen, a pencil. Sorry, this ain't a pencil, if you could tell. And he said that there's not one human being on earth that can build this pencil. And then he went on to say that the graphite made and imported from mines in Bolivia, the wood comes from forests in Canada, the erasers, chemicals coming out of Central Asia, the machine to put that pencil together came from Japan, the bearing within the machine came from Germany, the trucks to haul it came from Detroit. The gas the oil came from Saudi Arabia. We've always been interconnected as a species. You know, we live off, you know, you know, we grew by learning from others and trading with others. Maybe if you're in the real estate business, you don't think you need the rest of the world, but all of society and industries need to be connected with the rest of the world. It's do or die.

Clem Miller 23:11

Wow. Wow. That's very insightful about the history of of trade. You should write a book. Yeah.

Mike Musheinish 23:23

I dropped out in 10th grade, so I'm not a good writer. I'm an immigrant, right? We immigrated to this country. I was about six years old when we made it to this country. We lived on top of a party store in Southwest Detroit. But I mean, just to tell you, I mean, I'm , you know, irrelevant. My company is insignificant, but what really matters is the is really the constitution and the rule of law that this country provides everyone that makes it to a chores, right? Again, um anywhere else in the world, I would have grew up as a who know what, you know, but this country has this aura that and the freedom that it gives you, along with the free market, and that helps bring up all of society together. You know, if I was, you know, a Turkish living in Germany, I can live there for a thousand years, I'll always be Turkish. Right? If I was Algerian living in France, 700 years later, I'll still be Algerian. Here, when you come to this country, within one or two generations, you've already assimilated and you become American. Where else can you find that in the world? You know, yes, I hear how people want to say that we're racist and this and that. Yeah, there's always, of course, there's the ills of society are always there, but there's no other society that also encompasses in people from throughout the world as easily as the United States does.

Clem Miller 25:07

So, I mean, that's yeah. Historically, that may be changing, of course.

Mike Musheinish 25:14

Uh well, I mean, every immigrant gets to get a kick in the ass when they come in here. I mean, it it's you know, look at what they were doing to the Irish and the Italians and the Jews that landed in New York, you know, it's probably kind of like initiation.

unknown 25:27

Right.

Clem Miller 25:29

Right. It shouldn't be the way I think about it is that it shouldn't be easy necessarily to come here. Like you shouldn't give people plane tickets to come to the US, right? Right. But but you know, you it shouldn't be so hard that you're turning around turning away people who can contribute to the economy and society. So there's a balance.

Mike Musheinish 25:51

Absolutely, there's a great balance, right? And the ones that have the oomph to come and and participate and be a productive member of society, yes, but what the Biden administration was doing was just you know, it was just complete reckless, right? And it's on us as the citizenry and the voters to put these politicians in check. Yeah, and which we don't.

Steve Davenport 26:19

Yes. How do you feel right now that after a year of the Trump administration, do you think that the voters of Michigan are gonna be of a different ilk? Like, do you think everyone is feeling what you're feeling, or is it only business owners who are feeling what you're feeling?

Mike Musheinish 26:39

Well, unlike other business owners, most business owners voted for this present administration. I did it. I was kind of sounding the alarm before the election. Um, I I like it when Eisenhower once said, which is a great saying, it says he said, hindsight is more accurate than foresight, but a lot less valuable. So okay, so now here in Michigan or in most places, the first people that were impacted and affected and really punished by these policies were in rural and suburban America. I mean the farmers were devastated by these trade policies, right? They were the number one exporters to China and the rest of the world, right? And so now you got countries such as Argentina and Brazil that took up all the all the once business they had, right? I mean, the cutting on you know on the the assistance living and yeah the you know the the welfare checks and the health care, you just came slash and burned. I mean, yeah, there there's some there's some responsibility for the government for the needy, and that's been that's been wiped away with this administration. And all he did was stop his gas prices, and you see what they are today.

Steve Davenport 28:25

Yeah. Do you feel that we're getting to a point where the actions of ICE in Minnesota or other places? Do you find your workforce is worried about their existence in this country? Or do you how do you look at how this affects businesses' ability to find workers? And is it is it affecting you?

War Risks For Oil And Supply

Mike Musheinish 28:54

Most of my staff here is from you know from the city, from the inner city. Many of my employees here are actually a lot of them are returning citizens from incarceration, who also are being you know mistreated by the system. A man you know serves this time and he can't find a job because as a young man or as a child, he committed a sin that he paid for. And so and so they can't find work. And yes, I see a lot of people out there with the different trades that can't find employees. I mean, there's certain work that we don't want to do, or we don't know how to do, or have the temperament to do. I mean, most people try to go to school and go to college, you know, to get a degree and and work for , but now you're asking them to be a carpenter. Well, the this young man that came from Honduras was a great carpenter, and now he's taken out and he's put in this, I'm sorry to say, this gulag. I mean, that's not who we are as a society, we've never been like that, right? I mean, the the Statue of Liberty was meant for to welcome well, I mean, I I I see people living in fear out there, right? This is not who we are, and what this president has done has really hurt this country in more ways, and what I fear is that this this you know this firebrand style of politics is the new norm, right? And so 20, 30 years from now, there is more demagogues coming down the pipeline who are gonna make Trump look like a moderate because precedents have been set, and the only way to get attention is to up the guy before you. So I I worry for the for the for the future. But i I mean, it's on us to bring some decency back to this government and elect the right people, and and I do see that there's gonna be a big revolt on the present administration's policies come the midterm. H ? Only time will tell. Yeah.

Steve Davenport 31:28

Do you think that Michigan has turned from pro-Trump to pro anyone else?

Fixes, Price Controls, And Corruption

Mike Musheinish 31:33

Or well, as you see, this conflict in the Middle East right now with the rare rising gas prices, you know, the fertilizer, the third of the world's fertilizers coming from there, and all the other nitrates and everything that's coming out of the Middle East, is gonna start affecting not just, I mean, it's gonna affect the humanity at large. I mean, every every human being is gonna be affected by this war. Uh, Southeast Asia, where we where most of the companies procure their products, right, are rationing their oil supplies and increasing prices like crazy, right? I mean, India or Bangladesh for textiles or you know, Korean pen South Korea or Japan or Indonesia or I mean, I just the list goes on and on. Everybody is in critical, you know, state right now. And so they're reducing their work hours, they're shutting down factory operations, they're gonna be rationing power. That's gonna affect us with higher prices and less supply available. So if something might have taken a month to produce, , might take four or five months, so you'll have less on the shelves. So this is gonna affect supply chains. Like we've this is gonna be a bigger shock than COVID. If this continues. Oh, and I'm sorry for this on this this terrible prediction, but if this doesn't wrap up soon, I'm saying within a week or so, there's a there's the cliff and the hole can get deeper. So we're gonna run into run into a time where where we're gonna look back and wish for the days of COVID. Because if the infrastructure over there, forget the Straits of Hormuz or whatever you want to call them. Now, if the infrastructure over there gets destroyed, well, you're talking about three to five to seven years to put it back together. Yeah, what are we gonna do in the meantime? Yeah, these are very expensive facilities, the LNG plants, the the oil refineries, the fertilizer, the steel. There's some very expensive facilities over there that'll are gonna take a long time to rebuild. Yeah, I mean, it's I can only imagine , you know, we have a group of omnish residents up the road. And now if I pass by them, they're gonna be looking at me, they're gonna be laughing at me. They're like, we're gonna teach you how to ride a horse pretty soon, brother. I don't want that, you know. So yeah, we we we hope that this gets wrapped up for for all of our sakes.

Clem Miller 34:46

Yeah, I hope so.

Steve Davenport 34:48

If we could go, could we go to the other side and say, Mike, if we could do one thing as a government to help the businesses that have been harmed by tariffs, what would it be? Just get rid of the tariffs and that's enough, or is there a way for us to really help businesses in a way that's going to be good long term, besides lowering the tariffs?

Speaker 2 35:12

Well, I mean, Biden never raised the tariffs. Biden didn't declare any national emergency and sign into law tariffs. I mean, I I tell you, in 2014, we paid as a company about $12.8 million in tariffs. In 2025, from June to December of 2025, we paid over 60 million dollars in tariffs. I mean, this is the kind of joke. I mean, you're asking a guy that's pinned underneath a car. You're asking him, you go over his head, is like, is there anything we can do for you besides getting that car off your chest? Yeah. So that's, I mean, you know, I think they're gonna be really forced to remove it unwillingly, right? Kicking and screaming. The only way to try to hedge this common inflation is by removing tariffs. Yeah, I don't think he's he's he'll ever want to remove the tariffs, but I think what's going on overseas and the rise in oil prices, right, they're gonna force them to what is the one quick method I can sign into law right now that's gonna try to help stem prices from increasing tariffs, right? But that still might not be enough for what's what's in the pipelines for us.

Clem Miller 36:46

You know what I'm concerned about? I'm concerned about Nixon Ford style price controls. He could try that next. Right, but that would that wouldn't work.

Mike Musheinish 36:59

Listen, the government here, okay, when tariffs come come around, right? Uh, I mean, just liken it to Prohibition. When prohibition was enacted, it that gave rise to the mobster. Right? Yes, there's there's a lot of money to be made. Okay, and that was just booze. Right? Here you got a tariff on every single thing entering the country. You can imagine how much money for shenanigans that could be made. So unbeknownst to awesome, we don't know now, but soon we'll know that the the birth of the tariff mobsters probably already born, right? Where I know I hear people that are trying to skid the the the tariff, right? By by bypassing, you know, sending products from one country to another country to get to. I mean, there's a lot of shenanigans going on. You can only imagine when there's so much money to be made, what what's gonna happen, right? And so and then there's the people that get exempt from the tariff. So the government has no role in picking and choosing who the winners are. I I agree with that. Uh that's the market's responsibility. Yep. So they're picking and choosing who the winners are right now, what by what it looks to be. So it won't be it won't be far-fetched that they start tossing some price controls, which won't work. How are you gonna enforce that?

Clem Miller 38:34

There'll be exemptions to that too, if they if they put that on, right? Yeah, you know, wherever government gets involved in trying to control the economy, , there's always the potential for for corruption.

Mike Musheinish 38:51

Well, everything in our economy is going by the whims and dictates of one person, yeah. That's the president, and I think back to the borough of the Soviet Union. Well, they had like 40, 50 people thinking this stuff up. Here we got one guy. I mean, there's nothing like the free market, right? But here we have whatever this one individual chooses is the way 335 million Americans go.

Clem Miller 39:26

And the Supreme Court allowed him to um get rid of all these independent agencies or take out their heads, and that they provided some kind of a check on him.

Mike Musheinish 39:39

Right. I mean, you know, I'd like to give kudos to the the Court of International Trade. Yes, right, okay, and and there you got you got these three judges, right, unanimously found what the Trump administration's AIPA tariffs were unconstitutional. But what they did it again, you should think think back to the climate of when they voted against the AIPA. He was in the heights of his power. He was untouchable. Nobody could say anything. Everything he wanted, he was getting. Now he's a little more on the defensive, he's a wounded lion, right? But whatever, right? Because of his policies, now they're starting to pay, you know, the fruits of his of the of the of these decisions are clear in in Americans' faces and in their pockets. But back then, you know, the this court of international trade stood up and said, no, based on the reading of the constitution, what you've done is inconstitutional. And they got a lot of pushback, right? But they stood their grounds, then it went to you know the Court of the Appeals, Federal Appeal Court that went, I think it was I don't know, seven or four or something, and then the Supreme Court, and it should have been unanimous, yeah. It should have been. I mean, what are you there for? Right? I mean, , yes, you are. The Supreme Court is I don't know, government lawyers really at the core of it. They once were government lawyers and now they become the arbitrators of our freedoms. I don't think the constitution was, you know, was meant like these good old folks wearing these black robes decide what our freedoms are. I think it was enshrined in the constitution, right? Again, constitution is what made this country great. It's what made America great. And we need to do everything in our powers to protect the Constitution and the way it's supposed to operate.

unknown 41:50

Yeah.

Steve Davenport 41:51

Mike, I think you're making some great points. And I I hope that a lot of our listeners will realize that your views and you know your ideas are at the heart of why people believe that you know free markets now influenced by government is the ideal way for capitalism to work. Um we understand there needs to be some regulation, we understand there needs to be some you know controls and that avoids abuse of labor and abuse of um the environment, but I think you're getting to the heart of the issue there. Um if you had just one minute, and you know, we could put this out on our podcast or we can put it out on the market in general. Tell us what you know you think a path forward to a better environment would look like. I know you said getting the car off you would be taking the carrots away. I mean, is there you know, is that it? Take them away. I I think there's enough other things to do with the way the government treats businesses like yours. But right.

Mike Musheinish 43:05

Listen, I like here in our facilities over here in Michigan, , once once a month we lose power, right? Because the infrastructure is degraded here, right? I just had to throw them under the bus. Uh instead of wasting our money here or there, we can be , you know, we want to compete with the rest of the world, and we don't want to be left behind, right? Yeah, we see Asia growing at rapid speed, right? And our way of of combating that is by building walls and hunkering down inside. No, I think we meet the challenge head-on, right? And not hide behind walls or whatnot. Well, I mean, these regulations, listen, when they they've taught us that regulations, the word regulations means that there's a barrel of toxic waste right next to a pristine river, right? And if regulation wasn't there, people will be pouring this toxic waste in into the river, right? There, there's listen, there's very important regulation, but there's a lot of regulation written by corporate America to exclude competition, to make it harder for smaller and medium sized operations to ever challenge their supremacy in their respective markets. So, and this is laws written in by Congress on behalf of corporate. America. So this kind of regulation is really detriment to our economy and prosperity. Yeah, there's regulations that that's supposed to tame the wild beasts, right? That's not there. But there's regulations to subdue any growing compot competition against these these these powerful corporations, which is which is wrong. It should be again a level playing field. Uh the tax structures is just so complicated and and just you know, you don't even know what the hell's going on here. You just pay it and be like, you know, you you'd be like, I I really didn't make that much money, but how the hell am I paying all those taxes? But you know, it it is what it is. So well, I might like to say one thing. My sister told me after they they launched all these tariffs on us and just crippled us. She told me, well, at least you don't have to pay that much income tax anymore. And I'm like, well, thanks, sister. There's no more, he took all the profit left, so there's nothing we should.

Steve Davenport 46:04

What do you think, Clem? How would you wrap like to wrap it up? I mean, do you have final questions for Mike or do you want to I'm gonna give Mike the last word, but what do you what would you like to do?

Clem Miller 46:16

I think we've we've covered a lot of territory here. I think there's a lot that a lot of damage has been done, Mike, to this economy and to industry, to companies like yours. Uh I think you've been very clear about that. I really don't have any more questions. I just want to emphasize how valuable I think this discussion has been and how our um our listeners are um likely to benefit a lot from this. So Mike, thank you so much. And and I know you wanna um, Steve, you want to have Mike sort of conclude it, but I'll just take this opportunity to say thank you very much and very useful discussion today. Thank you.

Final Thoughts On Integrity

Steve Davenport 47:06

Yeah, Mike, I I've really enjoyed having you. I mean, I I had a chance to go to you know University of Washington in St. Louis, and I got to know the mid, you know, the middle of the country a bit when I went for a class there for a while. And I think that those Midwestern values are a key part of who America is. And I think that, you know, unfortunately, we've become the East Coast and the West Coast and the South and the, you know, each part of this country has a different character. And I love the, you know, the basic, honest approach that you're given this. Um I mean, I think that what you're trying to do in and bringing up these issues and talking about the average small business is a key because small business is a key to this country. Most people are employed in the businesses of 20 or less employees, and it is a piece of this country that has led to greatness and wealth for a lot of people, but also employment for a lot of people. So, I mean, I'm gonna give you the last the last word here, but I just want you to know that you know, we appreciate you and we appreciate what you're trying to do. And I would love to you know stay in touch with you and tell us, you know, if , you know, how how would you like to end this in terms of your message to the public and your message to our listeners and investors?

Mike Musheinish 48:34

Right. Um and I appreciate you guys for having me, and I and I really appreciate this this this very casual conversation that we're having. Most podcasts that I visit, it's more, you know, it's one question after another question. It's like rapid fire, you know, one gives and takes here. So I really appreciate that. Thank you for giving me the leeway to speak my mind. Maybe it might be a little detrimental to me to speak my mind in these current climates that we're living in. But I just like to end it by telling you that the resilience of of our country is second to none. I mean, we will endure as we've endured in the past, right? What what this present administration has done has hurt the country, but there is no death blow that's that's that's happened here, right? And and I see most of the American population seeing the the wrongs that that's been done. And we'll we'll just chug chug along here. I I'm not worried about this country at all because we are the greatest country on earth, right? We you know, economically, culturally, we've we've we've dominated the world. I mean, I don't want to call it dominated because you can't do anything by force in this world. Everybody wanted to be like us, everybody dreamt of coming to America, right? And or being part of if they couldn't come to America, at least our popular culture, they would absorb our popular culture. So we have a really we've been put on a pedestal, and we should, you know, it would be great for us to to honor that and to show the best of our sides to the rest of the world, right? With our ingenuity, our perseverance, , and and our ethics. Because, like in business here, I tell you, you gotta have ethics, you gotta be honest. Nobody's a fool out there. Everyone, their their most important interest they have is it's what's in their pocket. And if you dishonor them by not providing a good product or or costing them money or not saving them the money that they've requested, they'll they might not leave a comment, but it's always going to be engraved in their in their minds. So honesty, integrity in business is is is up the utmost. Uh the the ones that you know skid around the lines never really make it in business. And they eventually will find that nobody wants them or their products or their services. So yeah. So thank you guys.

Steve Davenport 51:38

I I think you summed it up well, Mike. Um, thank you for joining us. And we're gonna do our best to get this um video out and this podcast out and shared um because I think investors are looking for trying to see where the opportunity exists for their portfolios, but also the opportunity, you know, starting a business or having a business and seeing how these things can change very quickly. I mean, I think that your your durability and your grit. I use that word only a few times, but I think grit of your business and the way you came here when you were six years old um is a great story. And I want to share that story with more people. And I want to give um all of the the people who are like you who are battling this um tariff a way to um give you your actions voice and allow you to you know spread the word. So I really appreciate it.

Mike Musheinish 52:43

Thank you guys. Thank you. God bless you guys. Thanks, Mike. Have a good day. See ya.