“This is the beginning of Liberation Day in America,” Pres. Trump said, of April 2, the day his administration announced sweeping tariffs.
“We’re going to charge countries for doing business in our country and taking our jobs, taking our wealth, taking a lot of things that they’ve been taking over the years,” Trump said. “They’ve taken so much out of our country, friend and foe. And, frankly, friend has been often times much worse than foe.”
A universal 10% tariff was implemented on all imported goods as well as further tariffs on specific countries on April 9. Few exemptions have been made, including additional tariffs on Canada and Mexico not immediately going into effect, tariffs on pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, lumber and copper being assessed separately and sectoral tariffs on aluminum, autos and steel.
But on April 9, the president announced a 90-day pause on most tariffs, and then announced he would reimpose the tariffs if countries don’t reach out to negotiate.
Sources such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) were quick to draw a connection between the tariffs and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act from 1930, a law that is infamous for creating a global trade war and worsening the Great Depression.
The Trump administration claims that the sweeping tariffs are meant to correct years of foreign tariffs they see as unfair, and aggressive retaliation is the only way to rectify the situation, bring manufacturing back to the U.S. and force other countries to lower their trade barriers on U.S. companies. They also hope to use the tariffs to raise revenue and fund sweeping tax cuts the administration is set to announce later this year.
Before the pause, the tariffs that would have gone into effect would have included a 104% tariff on China, 20% on the EU, 32% on Taiwan, 24% on Japan, 25% on South Korea and 46% on Vietnam. China was hit with much heavier tariffs after responding to Trump’s tariffs with reciprocal tariffs of their own, creating a vicious cycle that will negatively affect consumers in both countries.
Trump explained his reasoning behind some of the tariffs, claiming China was originally additionally taxed for its role in fentanyl production, a drug linked to roughly two-thirds of all fatal drug overdoses in the U.S., and Mexico and Canada were originally taxed for their role in illegal immigration and drug smuggling into the U.S. through their borders.
Economists warned that the import taxes implemented could cause multiple unintended consequences, including reigniting high inflation, mass job loss, raising the cost of living and sending the U.S. economy into a downward spiral. Mayor Andrew Ginther of Columbus, Ohio, voiced his prediction, saying that tariffs would increase the median cost of a home by $21,000 by raising the cost of materials and making homeownership even less affordable than it already is.
Art Laffer, an economist, claims that auto tariffs could raise per vehicle costs by $4,711, though he said he believes Trump is a good negotiator, implying that he will negotiate better trade deals with foreign countries and thus lower tariffs.
White House trade advisor Peter Navarro sings a different tune than Ginther and Laffer, telling Fox News Sunday that general tariffs could bring in $600 billion per year and auto tariffs alone could raise $100 billion annually. Trump claims that multiple countries have begun negotiating deals, but none were fully worked through before the deadline.
