Concerns about a possible Donald Trump-induced downturn are starting to creep up. Several key financial indicators were already flashing yellow when, following the Republican’s latest tariffs, Google searches for “recession” spiked. Several prominent Wall Street forecasters are now expecting the US economy (which had been exceptionally healthy in recent years) to shrink in the first three months of 2025.

Instead of the “Trump bump” we were talking about at the beginning of the year, a combination of mass terminations across the federal government (many of which may be illegal), sweeping tariffs and a whole lot of uncertainty could be leading to a Trump slump. Or is it, as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent reassured us this week, just a period of transition?

That’s the question we tackle on this episode of Trumponomics. Host Stephanie Flanders speaks with Evercore ISI’s Kathryn Holston, who served as a White House senior economist last year and before that in the office of the chief economist of the World Bank, and Anna Wong, chief US economist for Bloomberg Economics.