Washington: US President Donald Trump has said that his administration has made a decision to impose 25 per cent tariffs on products from the European Union (EU), including cars and claimed that the EU — a 27-country bloc — was “formed to screw the US”.
“We have made a decision. We’ll be announcing it very soon, and it’ll be 25 per cent generally speaking, and that’ll be on cars and all other things,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday at a White House Cabinet meeting.
The EU is the US’s third largest trading partner alongside China. Trump has said he will impose 25 per cent tariffs on the US’s two largest trading partners, Canada and Mexico, next week.
Trump claimed that the European Union has “taken advantage of” the United States.
“They don’t accept our cars, they don’t accept, essentially, our farm products. They use all sorts of reasons why not. And we accept everything of them, and we have about a $300 billion deficit with the European Union,” he said.
Politico previously reported that the $300-billion deficit is overstated.
“In 2023, the US goods trade deficit with the bloc was 155.8 billion euros, according to EU data. In services, however, the US had a surplus of 104 billion euros, bringing the overall trade balance to 51.8 billion euros (roughly $56 billion),” according to the report.
When asked by a reporter whether he would continue to delay tariffs on Mexico and Canada due to progress on border control, Trump said he would not prevent the tariffs from taking effect and claimed that the influx of fentanyl had caused “millions of deaths”.
“I’m not stopping the tariffs. No,” Trump said.
US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick explained two key deadlines related to the tariffs. Previously, the tariffs on Mexico and Canada had been delayed for one month and is set to take effect on March 4, and the two countries needed to prove to the President before the deadline that they had taken satisfactory actions in controlling the entry of fentanyl.
Trump said that “it will be hard to satisfy”.
Lutnick also noted that the overall tariff actions against more countries would be implemented on April 2.
On February 1, Trump signed an executive order to impose a 25 per cent tariff on goods imported from Mexico and Canada, with a 10 per cent tariff increase specifically for Canadian energy products.
On February 3, Trump announced that the additional tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada would be deferred for one month, allowing more time for negotiations.
On Monday, Trump said that tariffs on Mexico and Canada will “go forward”.
(IANS)
