Peter Navarro, a Trump advisor and former professor emeritus at UC Irvine, has faced backlash for creating a fictional economics expert named Ron Vara, an anagram of his name, to lend credibility to his controversial views on trade and tariffs. Commentators express concern over Navarro's influence on trade policy, particularly highlighting the negative impacts of proposed tariffs on small shipments from overseas. There is skepticism regarding the validity and seriousness of economics as a discipline at the doctoral level, as well as the potential long-term repercussions of Navarro's ideas on the U.S. economy.