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Saturday, March 15, 2025

EU slaps tariffs on produce from Republican states

by

3 days ago
20250312
Steel on coil cars ahead of transport at the main factory of struggling steel producer thyssenkrupp in Duisburg, Germany, Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)

Steel on coil cars ahead of transport at the main factory of struggling steel producer thyssenkrupp in Duisburg, Germany, Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)

The Eu­ro­pean Union on Wednes­day an­nounced re­tal­ia­to­ry trade ac­tion with new du­ties on U.S. in­dus­tri­al and farm prod­ucts, re­spond­ing with­in hours to the Trump ad­min­is­tra­tion’s in­crease in tar­iffs on all steel and alu­mini­um im­ports to 25%.

The world’s biggest trad­ing bloc was ex­pect­ing the U.S. tar­iffs and pre­pared in ad­vance, but the mea­sures still place great strain on al­ready tense transat­lantic re­la­tions. On­ly last month, Wash­ing­ton warned Eu­rope that it would have to take care of its own se­cu­ri­ty in the fu­ture.

The EU mea­sures will cov­er goods from the Unit­ed States worth some 26 bil­lion eu­ros ($28 bil­lion), and not just steel and alu­mini­um prod­ucts, but al­so tex­tiles, home ap­pli­ances and agri­cul­tur­al goods. Mo­tor­cy­cles, bour­bon, peanut but­ter and jeans will be hit, as they were dur­ing Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s first term.

The EU du­ties aim for pres­sure points in the U.S. while min­i­miz­ing ad­di­tion­al dam­age to Eu­rope. The tar­iffs — tax­es on im­ports — pri­mar­i­ly tar­get Re­pub­li­can-held states, hit­ting soy­beans in House speak­er Mike John­son’s Louisiana, but al­so beef and poul­try in Kansas and Ne­bras­ka. Pro­duce in Al­aba­ma, Geor­gia and Vir­ginia is al­so on the list.

The EU moves to pro­tect it­self

Eu­ro­pean Com­mis­sion Pres­i­dent Ur­su­la von der Leyen said in a state­ment that the bloc “will al­ways re­main open to ne­go­ti­a­tion.”

“As the U.S. are ap­ply­ing tar­iffs worth 28 bil­lion dol­lars, we are re­spond­ing with coun­ter­mea­sures worth 26 bil­lion eu­ros,” she said. The com­mis­sion man­ages trade and com­mer­cial con­flicts on be­half of the 27 mem­ber EU coun­tries.

“We firm­ly be­lieve that in a world fraught with geopo­lit­i­cal and eco­nom­ic un­cer­tain­ties, it is not in our com­mon in­ter­est to bur­den our economies with tar­iffs,” von der Leyen said.

Trump said his tax­es would help cre­ate U.S. fac­to­ry jobs, but von der Leyen said: “Jobs are at stake. Prices will go up. In Eu­rope and in the Unit­ed States.”

“We deeply re­gret this mea­sure. Tar­iffs are tax­es. They are bad for busi­ness, and even worse for con­sumers. These tar­iffs are dis­rupt­ing sup­ply chains. They bring un­cer­tain­ty for the econ­o­my,” she said.

Amer­i­can busi­ness group urges talks

The Amer­i­can Cham­ber of Com­merce to the EU said the U.S. tar­iffs and EU coun­ter­mea­sures “will on­ly harm jobs, pros­per­i­ty and se­cu­ri­ty on both sides of the At­lantic.”

“The two sides must de-es­ca­late and find a ne­go­ti­at­ed out­come ur­gent­ly,” the cham­ber said Wednes­day.

What will ac­tu­al­ly hap­pen?

Trump slapped sim­i­lar tar­iffs on EU steel and alu­mini­um dur­ing his first term in of­fice, which en­raged Eu­rope and oth­er al­lies. The EU al­so im­posed coun­ter­mea­sures in re­tal­i­a­tion at the time, rais­ing tar­iffs on U.S.-made mo­tor­cy­cles, bour­bon, peanut but­ter and jeans, among oth­er items.

This time, the EU ac­tion will in­volve two steps. First, on April 1, the com­mis­sion will rein­tro­duce what it calls “re­bal­anc­ing mea­sures,” which the EU had from 2018 and 2020 but which were sus­pend­ed un­der the Biden ad­min­is­tra­tion. Then on April 13 come the ad­di­tion­al du­ties tar­get­ing 18 bil­lion eu­ros ($19.6 bil­lion) in U.S. ex­ports to the bloc.

EU Trade Com­mis­sion­er Maroš Še­fčovič trav­elled to Wash­ing­ton last month in an ef­fort to head off the tar­iffs, meet­ing with U.S. Com­merce Sec­re­tary Howard Lut­nick and oth­er top trade of­fi­cials.

He said on Wednes­day that it be­came clear dur­ing the trip “that the EU is not the prob­lem.”

“I ar­gued to avoid the un­nec­es­sary bur­den of mea­sures and coun­ter­mea­sures, but you need a part­ner for that. You need both hands to clap,” Še­fčovič told re­porters at the Eu­ro­pean Par­lia­ment in Stras­bourg, France.

Eu­ro­pean steel com­pa­nies brace for loss­es

The EU could lose up to 3.7 mil­lion tons of steel ex­ports, ac­cord­ing to the Eu­ro­pean steel as­so­ci­a­tion Eu­ro­fer. The U.S. is the sec­ond biggest ex­port mar­ket for EU steel pro­duc­ers, rep­re­sent­ing 16% of the to­tal EU steel ex­ports.

The EU es­ti­mates that an­nu­al trade vol­ume be­tween both sides stands at about $1.5 tril­lion, rep­re­sent­ing some 30% of glob­al trade. While the bloc has a sub­stan­tial ex­port sur­plus in goods, it says that is part­ly off­set by the U.S. sur­plus in the trade of ser­vices.

Britain, which isn’t part of the EU, mean­while said it won’t im­pose re­tal­ia­to­ry mea­sures of its own on the U.S. British Busi­ness Sec­re­tary Jonathan Reynolds said Wednes­day he would “con­tin­ue to en­gage close­ly and pro­duc­tive­ly with the U.S. to press the case for U.K. busi­ness in­ter­ests.”

He did not rule out fu­ture tar­iffs on U.S. im­ports, say­ing “we will keep all op­tions on the ta­ble and won’t hes­i­tate to re­spond in the na­tion­al in­ter­est.”

McHugh re­port­ed from Frank­furt. As­so­ci­at­ed Press writer Jill Law­less in Lon­don con­tributed to this re­port.

This sto­ry cor­rects Maroš Še­fčovič's ti­tle to EU trade com­mis­sion­er, not Eu­ro­pean Com­mis­sion vice pres­i­dent.

BRUS­SELS (AP) —

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