The clock is ticking down on Donald Trump’s August 1 tariff deadline, as the president elevated last-minute talks with India and and slapped new levies on products from Brazil.
Trump announced he had reached an agreement with South Korea, claiming to having scored $350 billion in U.S. investments ‘selected by myself,’ as well as with Pakistan.
Treasury Secretary Howard Lutnick added late Wednesday that the U.S. had secured deals with Cambodia and Thailand as well. And on Thursday, Trump said he had hatched a deal with Mexico for 25 percent tariffs on cars and a 50 percent levy on steel, aluminum and copper for 90 days.
But it looks like rough straits for the U.S. neighbor to the north, with Canada’s recognition of Palestine statehood triggering the ire of the president.
‘That will make it very hard for us to make a trade deal with them. Oh Canada,’ he posted.
That put the total number of deals announced at a dozen, with a mix between formal signed agreements and announced frameworks. It was still far short of the ’90 deals in 90 days’ touted by Trump trade advisor Peter Navarro back in April.
‘We are very busy in the White House today working on Trade Deals,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday evening. ‘I have spoken to the Leaders of many Countries, all of whom want to make the United States ‘extremely happy.”
Once again, there were signs that the store was open for deals, ‘frameworks,’ and new investment commitments, along with presidential threats of massive tariffs.
The president repeated his typical take-it-or-leave it posture, leaving India’s fate to twist in the wind. ‘We’ll see what happens,’ he said Wednesday with his trademark ambiguity.
The latest trade drama comes after Trump announced a new deal with the European Union on his trip to Scotland.
‘We’ll see what happens,’ President Donald Trump said of a trade deal with India, as South Korean negotiators met with top trade and economy officials here in Washington
He reassured markets that the EU would follow through with grand pledges of more than $600 billion in new U.S. investments.
Trump has been using the deadline – and the threats of high U.S. tariffs he has announced publicly – to try to leverage the opening of foreign markets while bringing down the tariffs paid on imports.
To sell the push to Americans, he has been touting new tariff revenues, with $150 billion collected in July, while floating new rebate checks.
The president said he was meeting with a delegation from South Korea, which has sought to lower the threatened 25 percent tariff on cars, semiconductors, and household products.
Trump has been hammering Brazil, a member of the BRICS block that he said exists to battle the U.S. dollar.
On Wednesday, the administration hiked the tariff on Brazil to 50 percent by citing an ‘unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.’
Since Brazil supplies more than a third of U.S. coffee, analysts forecast the 50 percent tariff could add roughly 25 cents more per cup within the coming months.
If deals with auto-exporting countries fail, U.S. tariffs could add $4,700 to a vehicle’s price tag.
The 20 percent tariff negotiated on EU wines mean bottles could spike by $4 each if the full hike is passed on to the consumer, according to hicork.com.
Trump has been mixing trade and politics and blasting the country’s handling of the prosecution of ousted conservative leader Jair Bolsonaro, a Trump ally.
But a new White House fact sheet carves out a list of exceptions – signaling a wariness of a sweeping policy that could disrupt U.S. markets.
Earning exceptions are silicon metal, which is used in solar cells, as well as civilian aircraft, pig iron, wood pulp, tin ore, metallurgical grade alumina, precious metals, energy, and fertilizers.
The status of India, the world’s fourth-largest economy and a strategic partner to counter a rising China, was murky.
South Korea was in 11th hour talks with Washington to try to reach a deal, after Japan reached one
Brazilian coffee is among the products that could get hit with high U.S. tariffs
Trump posted on Truth Social Wednesday that India is ‘our friend’ yet its tariffs are ‘far too high,’ while chiding the country for the most strenuous and obnoxious non-monetary trade barriers of any country.’
‘Also, they have always bought a vast majority of their military equipment from Russia, and are Russia’s largest buyer of energy, along with China, at a time when everyone wants Russia to stop the killing in Ukraine.’
That led him to say India would pay a 25 percent tariff, plus a ‘penalty’ beginning August 1.
At the same time, the Trump administration announced a deal with India’s longtime rival, Pakistan, rooted in developing Pakistan’s oil reserves.
‘Who knows, maybe they’ll be selling oil to India some day!,’ he quipped.
It was the most concrete demonstration of the ‘secondary tariffs’ he threatened to impose on Russia for its brutal war on its neighbor, after spending months repositioning away from continuous support for Ukraine in his push to bring an end to the war.
He criticized so-called BRICS countries, which include India, as ‘anti the United States. ‘They sell a lot to us, but we don’t buy from them.’
Japan’s deal with Trump to open markets and have the country pay 15 percent tariffs on exports to the U.S. intensified the pressure on the South Koreans to make a deal.
Officials in Europe indicated that alcohol and wine were left out of Trump’s 15 percent tariff agreement with the EU, creating uncertainty for a market with $1 billion in sales to the U.S.
The clock is ticking for those countries who haven’t been able to resolve differences and get to a framework.
On Thursday, the president is anticipated to sign executive orders setting higher tariffs for those who haven’t gotten a deal.
There’s always a chance that Trump will decide to extend the deadline as he has in the past, but White House officials have been adamant that Aug. 1 is a cold, hard and immovable cutoff.