Four months after President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff hikes threw the global economy into chaos, we got a sequel — but there appears to be at least somewhat more of a method to Trump’s tariff madness this time around.

Trump is using the threat of steep tariffs to try to force dozens of countries to agree to make more concessions in bilateral trade agreements — and, specifically, to get them to make somewhat hazy commitments to buy more US goods or products.

If Trump likes your concessions, you get a deal in which you’d stomach a new tariff of 15 percent or so. Alternatively, if Trump isn’t satisfied with your concessions or is mad at you for some other reason, you get squeezed — slapped with tariffs of 30 percent or more, going into effect in a few days, to see if that will make you cave.

Yet, as Trump’s negotiating strategy has become somewhat more coherent than it first appeared, the legal and economic uncertainty around his tariffs has only deepened.

An appellate court hearing Thursday on Trump’s tariffs went poorly for the administration, renewing longstanding questions about whether these tariffs could all be struck down. And a weak jobs report Friday morning heightened concerns that the US economy was slowing — and that Trump’s tariffs were one reason why.

Trump’s tariff negotiating strategy has come into focus

Investors reacted to Liberation Day with such terror, because........

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