‘They specifically target viewpoints the government seems to disfavor’: Judge gives lengthy First Amendment lecture to Trump admin over failed effort to enforce anti-DEI orders

Donald Trump raises his right hand.

President Donald Trump speaks in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, Monday, March 3, 2025 (Pool via AP).

President Donald Trump‘s imposition of worldwide tariffs are neither fun nor games and are, in fact, a threat to independent toy sellers everywhere, the owners of a Minnesota toy store say.

Mischief Toy Store, a St. Paul-based retailer, is one of many plaintiffs in a lawsuit filed by several businesses against the Trump administration who are suing the stop the import duty regime announced in early April — but the 45th and 47th president’s recent comments about children’s access to toys has put Mischief’s participation in stark relief.

“Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls,” Trump said during a cabinet meeting on April 30. “And maybe the two dolls will cost a couple bucks more than they would normally.”

That estimate of the toll tariffs will have on the toy business is a severe underestimation, Mischief’s co-owner Dan Marshall says.

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“Something like 80-90% of toys are made in China,” Marshall told Minneapolis-based NBC affiliate KARE. “There are very few companies left making them in the U.S., and this is something that has been going on for 40-50 years. This is not something you can change overnight.”

While government messaging has been contradictory and there are prospects of exceptions, further delays, or a deal-based resolution, Trump instituted 145% tariffs on goods emanating from China — the highest of any import duty on businesses in any nation.

Such numbers equate to something not entirely unlike devastation for Mischief, according to the store’s co-owners and the 27-page lawsuit filed in the U.S. Court of International Trade on April 24.

“Approximately 95% of the products sold in its store are imported, with 85% of those products coming from China,” the lawsuit reads. “The tariffs levied pursuant to actions challenged herein will likely have a substantial negative impact on Mischief’s business as a result of price increases on those products.”

In comments to the TV station, Marshall predicted the prices for some toys would more than double and that in many other cases, the inventory would simply disappear altogether.

In the litigation, Mischief is teaming up with 10 other businesses across the country to try and stop the tariff regime — calling Trump’s controversial actions “unlawful and unconstitutional.”

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