The President of the United States (U.S.) Donald Trump has issued a statement that he is considering imposing a 25% import tariff on automobiles.
After already ordering tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico – which spelled trouble for carmakers conducting operations in those countries – Trump has gone one step further by considering additional tariffs directly on autos, from anywhere.
It’s not just cars that are being threatened with these add-ons, Trump has also hinted at imposing 25% onto pharmaceutical products and semi-conductor chips too.
The President also teased his next steps in ramping up tariffs, potentially adding to the escalation of a trade war.
“It’ll be 25 per cent and higher and it’ll go very substantially higher over the course of the year,” said Trump in reference to autos, chips and pharmaceuticals.
In a statement made at Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump said he will be disclosing final details of the tariffs on April 2.
He claimed this time period until April 2 will give companies “a little bit of a chance,” to set up factories in the U.S. before the tariffs are made official.
Amongst his influx of tariffs, Trump has imposed a 10% tariff on imports from China, 25% tariffs on all steel and aluminium imports, as well as the 25% tariffs placed on imports from Canada and Mexico.
However, Canada and Mexico’s tariffs have since been paused after an agreement was reached with the Canadian Prime Minister to secure the border from the flow of illegal drugs.
Trump also commented on U.S. trade relations with the European Union (EU) , commenting that the union has been “very unfair,” he said:
“The EU has been very unfair to us we have a deficit of $350 billion do they don’t take our cars…they don’t take almost anything they take very little and we’re going to have to straighten that out.”
Watch the full press conference below:
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