These are the sort of things the poor and middle class voted for. To make the rich, richer. And then turn around and complain that rich are getting richer and they are getting poorer.
> The communication intent is often to distract from the content of a topic (red herring). The goal may also be to question the justification for criticism and the legitimacy, integrity, and fairness of the critic, which can take on the character of discrediting the criticism, which may or may not be justified.
Whataboutism would be something like someone from the US arguing that China’s treatment of Uyghurs is bad, and someone from China countering with “well, what about America’s treatment of Native Americans?” The Native American argument isn’t a counter example of the Uyghur argument. Both positions can be true. It’s unrelated. That’s not the case here. You can’t be anti-tariff purely because it’s a regressive tax and also be pro-cigarette tax.
Expecting people to be consistent, and treat similar situations similarly, is not a "gotcha". Challenges like this are raised exactly to hold people to their own standards and question whether they are really okay with the consequences of what they just said.
The topic described is not at all "entirely unrelated". There is a clear natural category which encompasses both tariffs and cigarette taxes.