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President Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs on U.S. trading partners throughout the world Wednesday, saying the U.S. would add a 10% minimum baseline tax on all products coming in.
The Trump administration has identified what it has called the “Dirty 15” as the 15 nations with the largest trade deficit with the U.S., meaning the trade partnerships by which Washington imports more from countries than those nations import from the U.S.
But the White House has also flagged what it describes as other “unfair” trading practices, chiefly implemented through tariffs on U.S. goods.
The White House has also taken aim at Canada, which is expected to see more tariffs fired at it Wednesday and said it has a 300% tariff on American butter and cheese.
Hale explained that while this is technically true, it is a tariff rate-quota that was negotiated during the first Trump administration under the revised NAFTA agreement, which became the United States Mexico Canada (USMCA), and one which has never been implemented.
The massive tariff would only be used if U.S. exports exceed negotiated tariff rate quotas. Otherwise, daily sales to Canada face no tariffs under the USMCA.
Canada and the U.S. in recent weeks have entered into a tariff war after Trump announced a blanket 25% tariff on 25% on Canadian goods and 10% on its energy.
Ottawa, in return, imposed 25% reciprocal tariffs on $30 billion in U.S. goods, mostly targeting the agriculture sector.
It has threatened to hit the U.S. with tariffs on $95 billion in U.S. imports if Trump imposes more taxes on the country’s northern neighbor.
HOW IT ENDS
“Everyone needs to do what Israel has just done, bring down zero tariffs against the U.S. And then we can have absolute free trade,” Hale said. “That’s fair, and we can all have market access.
“When you have stupid tariffs, like tariffing stuff you don’t grow and make, that’s just basically being unfair.”
