Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he intends to impose car tariffs “in the vicinity of 25 percent”, with similar obligations on semiconductors and pharmaceutical imports. This is the latest in a series of funds threatening to increase international trade by the US president.
On Friday, Trump said that cars will come on April 2, the day after his office members are to provide him with reports presenting the options for a number of import duties, because he is trying to transform global trade.
Trump has long referred to what he calls the unfair treatment of American automotive exports on foreign markets.
For example, the European Union collects a 10 % obligation to import vehicles, four times than the US tariff rate in the US in the amount of 2.5 percent. However, the United States collects a 25 -month pickup tariff from countries other than Mexico and Canada, a tax that makes vehicles highly profitable for Detroit producers.
Maros Sefcovic, head of EU trade, will meet with American counterparts – the secretary of trade Howard Lutnick, nominated for Trump, who is a representative of US trade Jamieson Greer and director of the National Economic Council Kevin Hassett – in Washington on Wednesday to discuss various tariffs threatened by Trump.
Asked if the EU could avoid mutual tariffs, which he proposed last week, Trump repeated his claim that the EU has already signaled, that he would lower the tariffs for American cars to the US rate, although EU legislators denied this.
He said he was pressing EU officials to increase the import of American cars and other products.
Pharmaceutical and semiconductor responsibilities
On Tuesday, Trump told journalists in his MAR-A-LAGO estate in Florida that sectoral tariffs about pharmaceuticals and semiconductor chips will also start with “25 percent or more”, increasing significantly during the year.
He did not provide the date of announcement of these duties and said that he wanted to provide some time for drug and chip producers to establish American factories so that they could avoid tariffs.
Trump said that he expected some of the largest companies in the world to announce new investments in the United States over the next few weeks. He did not provide any further details.
Since its inauguration, four weeks ago, Trump has imposed a 10 % tariff on all imports from China, in addition to existing fees, due to China's absence in the arrest of pornanyle trade. He also announced and then delayed by a month, 25 percent of tariffs for goods from Mexico and non -energy imports from Canada.
He also set the date of starting March 12 to 25 % of the tariffs for all imported steel and aluminum, eliminating exemptions for Canada, Mexico, the European Union and other trade partners. Trump also announced that these tariffs will apply to hundreds of imported products below steel and aluminum, from electric pipes to bulldozer blades.
Last week, he ordered his economic team to develop plans to apply mutual tariffs that match the tariff rates of each product in every country.
Car tariffs on the shelf
The 25 % import tariff would be a breakthrough of the global automotive industry, which will already shrink with uncertainty caused by Trump's tariff drama.
He played a similar drama in 2018 and 2019 during the first term of Trump, when the Trade Department conducted an investigation into national security on car imports and stated that they weakened the national industrial base.
Trump at that time threatened car tariffs of 25 percent, but ultimately did not take any action, enabling the expiry of the tariff body from this probe.
But some tests that have conducted in the investigation in 2018 may be reused or updated as part of the new automotive tariff effort.