By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

In a White Center warehouse full of baby and kid gear from diapers to car seats, two elected officials and others gathered this morning to decry the president’s tariffs as “Trump’s Baby Tax.”

WestSide Baby‘s warehouse hub was the setting for U.S. Senator Patty Murray and King County Executive Shannon Braddock (a former WS Baby board member) to warn about the bite tariffs will take out of young families’ budgets, among others.

“The baby tax is not just expensive, it’s dangerous,” warned Sen. Murray, first elected 33 years ago as a “mom in tennis shoes” (and sporting that type of footwear for the occasion, as was Braddock).

She urged anyone and everyone concerned to urge Congress to take back its power over tariffs, which she said are not supposed to be something presidentially decreed.

Braddock noted the recent presidential comment that tariff costs might just mean a kid gets “2 dolls instead of 30,” and observed that many families can’t afford any gifts. “Working families should not be collateral damage in a trade war … we need a federal government that works for us, not against us.” Here’s the entirety of how she and Sen. Murray opened the briefing:

Allie Lindsay Johnson, starting her second year as WS Baby’s executive director, said the nonprofit that assists tens of thousands of families has already noticed many baby-item brands raising their prices. But “car seats, strollers, cribs are not luxuries, they are absolute necessities.”

But, Sen. Murray observed in her opening remarks, most of them are made in China, currently facing a 145% tariff as ordered by the president. Lindsay Johnson suggested at least “tariff exemptions” should be considered for items like these.

Speakers also included a Ballard store owner who said her suppliers were trying to hold off major prices as long as they could but can’t hold off much longer, and a mom of four, ages 1 through 14, holding her youngest, saying she wanted to speak out “because if not me, who?”

In Q&A, we asked Lindsay Johnson for more specifics on what WestSide Baby has noticed so far. She named several manufacturers/suppliers. We and another reporter also asked Sen. Murray for specifics on what Congress could do and what people could do to express their opinions:

Afterward, we also asked Lindsay Johnson about any other financial hardships they had faced or expected to face as a result of changes in D.C. She said that half of WS Baby’s bulk diaper purchases are federally funded and the grant covering that for a few more months is not likely to be renewed.

Meantime, this is the bipartisan bill to which Sen. Murray referred, co-sponsored by Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa.