President Donald Trump announced extraordinary new tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China — signing the long-promised economic policy at his Mar-a-Lago club on Saturday. The Trump administration said tariffs are aimed at curbing the flow of drugs and undocumented immigrants into America, but they risk potentially substantial price increases for American consumers across a wide array of common goods.
The new policy represents a reversal of virtually duty-free trade between the three North American nations that’s existed for several years – and an expansion of a frosty trade war between China and the United States that has escalated over the course of the past two administrations.
As Trump has repeatedly promised over the past several months, the tariffs will amount to a 25% duty on all imports from Mexico and most goods from Canada and a 10% tariff on Chinese goods imported into the United States. Although Trump administration officials said Saturday the tariffs were designed to stop the flow of fentanyl and undocumented immigrants, they gave no specific benchmark for the new import taxes to be lifted – other than the cessation of the drugs and undocumented immigrants coming into the country.
Notably, the tariffs included an important carve-out – the tariff on Canadian energy products will be 10%. Many Americans rely on Canadian energy products, including oil, for gasoline and home heating. The cost of those items could rise when the tariffs are put in place.
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Saturday’s tariffs amount to a starting gun on what could escalate into a global trade war, with the potential for higher costs, disrupted supply chains and the loss of jobs. Even Trump acknowledged the potential for adverse consequences on American consumers.
“There could be some temporary, short-term disruption, and people will understand that,” Trump said Friday when pressed by reporters on the cost of tariffs being passed on to importers, and, by extension, consumers. “But the tariffs are going to make us very rich and very strong — and we’re going to treat other countries very fairly.”
Tariffs are one of the few policies Trump has consistently supported for decades, a rare through-line from his days as a New York developer to his time in public office (another is immigration). As a candidate, he swore he’d use tariffs — “the most beautiful word in the dictionary” — to wield US leverage abroad.
Source: CNN
