The reason there's no tariffs on Taylor Swift records
Plus: The DOD's "War" rebrand hasn't caught on
Taylor Swift sold 2.7 million copies of her new album The Life of a Showgirl on its release day last week, and luckily for Swifties buying up multiple copies to help their idol on the chart, they didn’t have to pay any tariffs on their purchases.
U.S. consumers now face a 18.6% overall average effective tariff rate, according to Yale’s Budget Lab, and one music professor estimated that if tariffs were applied to physical music, they could have hiked the price of a vinyl record to as much as $40 to $50 a pop.
They’re not, though, thanks to some recently relevant Reagan-era legislation. Instead, Swift fans have to cough up $35 for the Target-exclusive “Summertime Spritz Pink Shimmer Vinyl” version of the album, which is imported from Mexico, limited-edition, and comes with a poster (the standard version is $30).
President Donald Trump tariffs were imposed under emergency economic powers that the Brennan Center for Justice say constitute a misuse of power, and they’ve faced legal challenges. The Supreme Court is planning to take up the case, but already, media like books, movies, and physical music are exempt from the extra cost because of the Berman Amendment.
Named for Howard Berman, a California Democrat who represented a district in the Los Angeles area in the U.S. House from 1983 to 2013, the law revised the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the same law that Trump used as justification for his tariffs. Berman’s amendment prohibits the president from directly or indirectly regulating or prohibiting the importation of “informational materials,” including publications, films, posters, photographs, and records.
The Berman Amendment protects cross-border speech from presidential overreach, and it attracted new interest when Trump said in May he would impose 100% tariffs on movies and TV shows produced outside the U.S.
Passed in 1988, the Berman Amendment is welcome relief for companies that sell physical media across national borders, like book and magazine publishers, as well as the music industry, which saw vinyl sales grow from 13.1 million in 2016 to 49.6 million in 2023, according to Luminate Music Consumption Data.
Domestic vinyl record production in the U.S. is ramping up (in Tennessee, Nashville’s United Record Pressing, which is the nation’s oldest record maker, is busier than ever, and one local company that supplies vinyl makers announced a $10 million expansion in the state in January), but currently, supply can’t keep up with demand.
For Swifties whose fandom would otherwise be caught up in Trump’s trade war with the rest of the economy, the law protects their imported vinyl purchases from an extra fee courtesy the president.
This story first appeared in Fast Company.
The Amazon Melania Trump film is heading to theaters
“Melania” could arrive in a theater near you in January 2026.
First lady Melania Trump’s forthcoming film will debut theatrically next year before its streaming release on Prime Video, and there’s a three-episode series that will also land on the Amazon-owned streamer too.
Amazon MGM Studios, which announced in January it paid $40 million to license a film on the FLOTUS, said Thursday that Melania will premiere on Jan. 30, 2026 and it “offers unprecedented access to the 20 days leading up to the 2025 Presidential Inauguration — through the eyes of the First Lady-elect herself.”
The film is directed by Rush Hour director Brett Ratner, who was accused of sexual harassment and misconduct in 2017, which he denied. And the three-part series will follow Trump from New York City to Palm Beach, Fla., to Washington, D.C., per Variety.
The DOD’s “War” rebrand hasn’t caught on
A majority of Americans, including a majority of Republicans, still refer to it as the Department of Defense.
It’s been more than a month now since Trump gave the Department of Defense, or DOD, the “Department of War” as a secondary nickname, but 72% of respondents in a YouGov poll of U.S. adults released this week said they would still refer to the “part of the government that handles the military” as the Department of Defense.
According to the poll, just 18% said they would refer to the agency as the “Department of War,” and 10% said they were not sure. A 55% majority of Republicans call the DOD by its current name, as do 90% of Democrats and 72% of independents, according to the poll. Among women, 75% refer to it as the DOD compared to 68% of men.
The poll also found a 65% majority believe the U.S. should “keep the most experienced staff of generals, even if some disagree with current policies.”
Meta just banned political ads in Europe
Companies that once ran campaign ads in Europe are getting out of political advertising.
The European Union’s new political ad law, the Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising, or TTPA, went into effect on Friday, and rather than comply with the new regulations, platforms are getting out of the political ad game altogether.
The TTPA requires that digital political ads include information about who it’s paid for, for what election, and whether it’s targeted, and targeting is only allowed if the data for the targeted individual was collected from the individual themselves and they gave “explicit and separate consent for their use for political advertising.” Meta called the new rules “burdensome.”
“As of today, political, electoral and social issue adverts are no longer able to be delivered in the E.U.,” Meta said in a statement Monday, joining Google and Microsoft in no longer running political ads in Europe. Some politicians and political professionals are opposed to the new law and worry it could have unintended consequences.
Have you seen this?
This “Misery Map” shows the shutdown’s toll on air travel. Since the government shut down, thousands of flights have been delayed or cancelled. This map from FlightAware shows how bad your day at the airport will be. [Fast Company]
Tennessee’s Justin Pearson launches primary challenge to Rep. Steve Cohen. Pearson will challenge Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen for his Memphis-area seat, with a $1 million assist from David Hogg and an endorsement from the progressive group Justice Democrats. [Semafor]
Trump’s war on the left: Inside the plan to investigate liberal groups. The effort marks an escalation in the administration’s efforts to target domestic opponents, raising alarm among civil rights groups and Democratic leaders about the use of executive power. [Reuters]
