“Trump 2.0” has everything you want in a superfluous sequel: Same main character but with hyperbolized defining traits; same basic plot, only stupider; contrived callbacks to the original; cameos from the old cast; and a handful of new characters who reflect the incremental burlesquing of the franchise.

If this were a random Tuesday in 2019, Donald Trump might’ve used Twitter to threaten China with economic ruin on the way to instructing Wilbur Ross to turn the screws on Chinese telecoms out of concern for US national security.

But this is a random Tuesday in 2025, so instead, Trump used TruthSocial to threaten Canada with annexation on the way to instructing Howard Lutnick to double steel tariffs and ready measures aimed at destroying, forever, the nation’s auto sector.

In 2018, Trump was at war with the sordid legacy of China’s WTO accession. In 2025, he’s at war with Ontario’s power grid operator. In 2018, Trump was tossing around a soccer ball with Vladimir Putin in Helsinki. In 2025, he’s voting with Belarus and North Korea to absolve Russia of responsibility for invading Ukraine. I can’t wait to see what a random Tuesday in 2029, during Trump’s third term, looks like.

By the end of yet another wholly bizarre day, Ontario premier Doug Ford agreed to pause a planned 25% hike on electricity exports to three US states pending a meeting with Lutnick later this week. “The temperature needs to come down,” Ford said, describing the back-and-forth with Trump as “heated,” an understatement considering Trump all but threatened to invade.

In light of Ford’s concession, Trump suggested he’d suspend the extra 25% tariff he announced on Tuesday morning, and which was scheduled to go into effect on Wednesday, but The White House reiterated that he’ll go ahead with the originally-planned 25% steel and aluminum tariff at midnight, as scheduled. (If you’ve lost track of that schedule already, you’re not alone.)

There was no word from Trump on whether he still intends to make good on his other Tuesday threat: “Permanently shut[ting] down the automobile manufacturing business in Canada.”

Outside the context of “Trump 2.0,” this would all be (far) too stupid to believe. There are no synonyms for “stupid” strong enough to convey the sheer scope of the imbecility on display here. As Bloomberg dryly noted, “several of the Ontario-based auto plants Trump is threatening to shut down are owned by US automakers.”

Meanwhile, in Jeddah, Marco Rubio convinced a delegation from Ukraine to go along with Trump’s proposal for an “interim” 30-day ceasefire, the terms of which will now be presented to Putin, who may or may not sign off. Earlier, Kyiv launched dozens of drones at Moscow in what was variously described as the largest such UAV attack on the Russian capital since the beginning of the war.

Asked again on Tuesday afternoon if he’s worried about the stock market, Trump said, “Nope, doesn’t concern me.” He then repeated the administration’s claim that this is all part of a strategy to create “a real economy, not a fake economy.”