Rep. Don Bacon, a Nebraska Republican and retired Air Force brigadier general, said the president’s global tariffs were “brutal to the GOP in the Midwest” after Democrats won both chambers in the Nov. 3 midterms, and in a second Wednesday post listed tariffs alongside Putin among the traits he said Americans reject while urging Republicans back to “peace through strength.”
“The President’s global tariffs were brutal to the GOP in the Midwest,” Bacon wrote in a Wednesday post on X. “The GOP has opposed global tariffs since WW2. Trump liked them since the 1980s when he was a Dem. We should have never defended them. The Fed Reserve Bank says most of the current inflation is due tariffs.”
“Americans don’t like chaos, narcissism, tariffs, corruption, Putin, rudeness to our allies, arrogance & indecency,” he wrote minutes later in a follow-up post. “The GOP should embrace our roots: free markets, economic freedom, peace through strength, federalism, law and order, low taxes, pro-life… and we should act like leaders of the free world.”
The Associated Press projected that Democrats won both the House and the Senate. Bacon, who chairs the House Armed Services Cyber, Information Technologies and Innovation Subcommittee and said in a House retirement statement that he will leave Congress at the end of this term, has used those midterm posts to put Midwest tariff costs and a harder line on Russia and Iran in the same Republican critique.
Federal Reserve Board staff, in an April 8, 2026 FEDS Note on detecting tariff effects on consumer prices, estimated that 2025 tariffs raised core goods PCE prices by about 3.1 percent through February 2026 and added about 0.8 percentage point to core PCE inflation, with pass-through appearing largely complete in that window.
A St. Louis Fed analysis published Aug. 18, 2026, titled “Tariff Effects on Inflation Stabilize in Recent Months,” found that tariff pressure on inflation stabilized or eased after February and that other factors—especially energy—drove more of the excess inflation story since March, according to that St. Louis Fed analysis. Bacon’s wording that “most of the current inflation is due tariffs” goes beyond those staff papers’ more limited claims about core goods through early 2026; the St. Louis Fed piece points to other drivers after February, including energy prices.
Bacon has pressed the farm-state trade case for months. In a release headlined that farmers are “already seeing an impact from tariffs,” his office said Midwest growers face higher input costs and weaker export openings, according to the Bacon House farmers release. With Rep. Jimmy Panetta he introduced the Stop Global Tariffs Act to strike down the administration’s 10 percent Section 122 tariffs. “Across-the-board tariffs like these raise costs for families and create unnecessary economic uncertainty,” Bacon said in a Stop Global Tariffs Act release.
On national security, the same retiring Armed Services member has pushed legislation he frames around Reagan-style strength. With Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez he introduced the Ronald Reagan Peace Through Strength Act to nullify Treasury’s General License 135 on Russian diesel and protect intelligence support for Ukraine. “For years, President Trump criticized Europe for buying Russian energy and propping up Putin’s war economy,” Bacon said in that Peace Through Strength Act release. “Now, Trump wants to make it easier for Putin to sell diesel fuel. He is wrong.”
He also joined Reps. Michael McCaul and Steny Hoyer in introducing the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026, which would pressure purchasers of Russian oil and gas and extend sanctions affecting Iran’s energy and weapons sectors. “Putin’s illegal war is failing, but he will not choose peace until the cost becomes too high for Russia and those helping fund his brutality,” Bacon said in the sanctions bill release.
Inside the Pentagon, Bacon has opposed press rules issued under Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. With Rep. Sara Jacobs he introduced a bipartisan bill to restore reporter access he said Hegseth restricted. “A free press makes our country better, and the new Pentagon media restrictions are not wise,” Bacon said in a Pentagon press access release, noting he was stationed at the Pentagon twice.
The Iran war’s human cost sits in the Pentagon’s own tallies. The Defense Casualty Analysis System, as of Nov. 2, 2026, lists 15 U.S. military deaths in Operation Epic Fury and eight deaths in Overseas Contingency Operations, for 23 total in those Iran-related categories.
President Donald Trump has defended tariffs as a growth engine. At an Oct. 26 midterm rally in Corinth, Mississippi, he said tariffs “don’t cause inflation” and that “they cause growth” and “jobs.” “They’re keeping our companies here,” Trump said. “They’re not leaving, and they’re bringing everybody back because you don’t have any tariffs if you build your plant in Mississippi or in the United States.”
Vice President JD Vance, in a lengthy Wednesday post on X, said “the reason we lost is the war” and ranked “end the war” first among answers from Trump-Vance 2024 voters who told a pollster they planned to back Democrats in 2026, with “focus on cost of living/inflation” second, according to Vance’s full post on X.
Bacon’s Wednesday posts put Midwest tariff backlash and a “peace through strength” foreign-policy pitch in the same midterm critique, while his House releases on Russian diesel, Russia-Iran sanctions, and Pentagon press access extend that Armed Services record into the party’s post-election argument. Trump’s Corinth remarks reject the inflation charge; Vance puts the war first among switcher complaints and cost of living second.
What is verified is Bacon’s posts calling global tariffs “brutal to the GOP in the Midwest,” listing tariffs and Putin among traits he said Americans reject, and urging “peace through strength”; the Federal Reserve Board’s April FEDS Note and the St. Louis Fed’s August finding on tariff pass-through; Bacon’s Stop Global Tariffs, Peace Through Strength, Russia-Iran sanctions, and Pentagon press releases; DCAS totals of 15 Epic Fury and eight Overseas Contingency Operations deaths as of Nov. 2; Trump’s Corinth defense of tariffs; Vance’s ranking of the war and cost of living among switchers; and the AP projection that Democrats won both chambers. Bacon’s claim that “most of the current inflation is due tariffs” is his reading of Fed research and sits above the more limited language in the staff notes themselves.