WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump is once again wielding tariffs as his preferred diplomatic tool, this time to pressure Iran into halting its violent suppression of widespread protests.

In a social media announcement on Monday, Trump declared his intention to levy a 25% tariff on imports from nations conducting business with Iran. These sanctions are designed to hit the Islamic Republic hard by limiting its access to foreign goods and driving up prices, further straining an economy grappling with inflation above 40%.

However, these tariffs could backfire on the United States, potentially increasing the cost of imports from countries that trade with Iran, such as Turkish textiles and Indian gemstones. There’s also a risk of unsettling a delicate trade agreement Trump forged with China last year.

As of Wednesday, activists reported that the death toll from the recent Iranian protests has exceeded 2,500. The protests are a response to the government’s severe economic measures and political repression.

The Trump administration has released few specifics since announcing these tariffs aimed at Iran. Questions remain unanswered, such as whether these new taxes will be added to the existing tariffs imposed on nearly every country last year, or if there will be exemptions for energy imports as seen previously.

It’s also unclear what legal authority the president is relying on to impose the import taxes. He invoked the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act to justify his most sweeping tariffs last year. But businesses and several states have gone to court arguing that Trump overstepped his authority in doing so. The Supreme Court is hearing the case and could throw out Trump’s tariffs and force him to send refunds to the U.S. importers that paid them.

Years of sanctions aimed at stopping Iran’s nuclear program have left the country isolated. But it still did nearly $125 billion in international trade in 2024, including $32 billion with China, $28 billion with the United Arab Emirates and $17 billion with Turkey, according to the World Trade Organization.

Iran bought more than $6 billion worth of imports from the European Union that year. Russia and India also do considerable business with Iran. Energy dominates Iran’s exports. Its top imports include gold, grain and smartphones.

Trump’s attempt to pressure Iran is likely to cause collateral damage. Most prominently, his tariffs could upend his attempts to maintain a trade peace with China.

Last spring, the United States and China hammered each other with triple-digit tariffs, threatening to end trade between the world’s two biggest economies and briefly panicking global financial markets. The two countries spent the rest of year trying to deescalate their trade conflict, reaching a truce in October that reined in tariffs, ended China’s boycott of American soybeans and eased its restrictions on exports of rare-earth minerals and technologies critical for fighter jets, robots and other products.

The new tariffs, aimed at punishing Iran, would hit China because of its trade ties with Tehran. “President Trump’s threat to increase tariffs by 25% against China and other trading partners due to developments in Iran underscores just how fragile the U.S.-China trade truce is,” said former U.S. trade negotiator Wendy Cutler, now senior vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute. “Even if he does not actually implement the tariff hike, damage has already been done. This threat erodes trust between the U.S. and China which is already at a low level.”

Adnan Mazarei, a nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, doubts that the tariffs would persuade the Iranian government to ease its crackdown on protesters.

“I do not think this is going to be very successful,” said Mazarei, a former deputy director of the International Monetary Fund with crisis-fighting experience in the Middle East. ”They will not for this alone change their views or their practices. It is a repressive regime, and it is willing to pay a high cost in terms of people’s blood to stay in power.”