Trump Tariffs & Trade 15 April 2025-

Trump Tariffs & Trade 2024- 14 April 2025

26 April
How Peter Navarro went from Democrat to inmate to Trump’s tariff guru
The man behind the president’s tumultuous tariff policies has sought for decades to set off the ultimate trade war with China.
(WaPo) The president has implemented a range of his recommendations — only to partially or wholly reverse them under pressure, while also keeping Navarro and his drastic ideas within reach.
At the outset of Trump’s second term, most of Navarro’s prescriptions appeared to be readily adopted. Navarro was a driving force behind large tariffs on Canada and Mexico, which have drawn unusual rebukes from GOP lawmakers. He successfully pushed for the administration to close a loophole allowing Chinese products worth less than $800 to be imported duty free, overcoming objections from private carriers such as FedEx and UPS, two people familiar with the matter said.
Ahead of the announcement of tariffs on April 2, which Trump billed as “Liberation Day,” Navarro pushed for universal tariffs on all imports and strikingly aggressive tariffs on dozens of countries worldwide. That approach — which jettisoned far more modest measures proposed by White House economists, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and the Treasury Department — was also adopted.
Yet Trump has also been willing to reject Navarro’s advice. With financial markets going haywire the week after April 2, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent persuaded Trump to approve a 90-day pause of the tariffs on dozens of countries so a deal could be reached.
… While some of the tariffs have been paused, the U.S. is currently imposing tariffs of 145 percent on Chinese products, in an unprecedented financial escalation with Beijing that reflects Navarro’s influence. … An examination of Navarro’s memoirs, interviews and other documentation shows that it is a war he has sought for decades. The enemy is not only China, he has said, but also the Wall Street titans who benefited from Beijing’s policies and who, notably, are among the most powerful players in the Republican Party, including some now in Trump’s Cabinet.

25 April
Trump Blinks as US Signals China Tariff De-Escalation
(Bloomberg) At the start of the month, as the US and China’s tit-for-tat tariff war escalated to levels the US Treasury Secretary this week characterized as equivalent to a trade embargo. Cue President Donald Trump and his Tuesday about-face, where he said he’d be willing to “substantially” pare back his 145% tariffs on China. That was a day after his meeting with executives from big retailers like Walmart and Home Depot who said import taxes could disrupt supply chains and raise the prices of goods — and after weeks of market turmoil as investors unwound the Trump trade to “sell America.” …
Amid the back and forth, one government official of a Group of Seven economy said the balance of power seemed to have shifted. The US needs to deliver a successful trade negotiation to prove its strong-arm policy is working. As a result, there’s less immediate urgency to meet the US on its terms, the person told Bloomberg.

22 April
US Treasury secretary says trade war with China is not ‘sustainable’
(AP) — U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a Tuesday speech that the ongoing tariffs showdown against China is unsustainable and he expects a “de-escalation” in the trade war between the world’s two largest economies.
But in a private speech in Washington for JPMorgan Chase, Bessent also cautioned that talks between the United States and China had yet to formally start.

21 April
JD Vance flies into a giant trade storm in India
It is being wooed and squeezed by America and China
(The Economist)…America’s vice-president, J.D. Vance landed in Delhi as part of an American campaign to push other countries to isolate China economically in exchange for reductions in President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs. Those tariffs, which include a 26% levy on India, are paused for all countries except China until July 8th. So Indian officials are racing to strike trade deals with America, the EU and others.
Peter Navarro: the economist who has outsmarted Elon Musk and has the ear of Donald Trump
US president’s chief trade adviser is intellectual driving force behind global tariffs and trade war with China
The tumult in global trade shows that for now it is the 75-year-old economist, not Musk, who has Donald Trump’s ear in the Oval Office.
Navarro is the US president’s chief trade adviser and the intellectual driving force behind the global tariffs and trade war with China. The chaos and uncertainty have been too strong even for Musk, the great disrupter, but Navarro’s silky mien still assures the US all is well.

18 April
‘Make West great again’: Trump, Meloni optimistic on EU tariffs deal
The US president says prospect of a trade deal with the EU is ‘100 percent’, praising the Italian prime minister as ‘fantastic’.

16 April
The False Promise of Tariffs
Dambisa Moyo
Supporters of US President Donald Trump’s protectionist policies claim that tariffs will boost government revenue, fuel job creation, and revive American manufacturing after decades of globalization. In fact, Trump’s tariffs are more likely to raise consumer prices, weaken innovation, and undermine US competitiveness.
(Project Syndicate) In this era of growing protectionism, defending globalization can feel like a losing proposition. But rather than retreat from the debate, it is more urgent than ever to spell out the costs of a trade war, which threatens to accelerate the fragmentation of the global economy because it is really a war on trade itself. To challenge the logic behind the US administration’s protectionist agenda effectively, we must first understand it in clear and concrete terms.

Two “Guinea pigs” come to Washington
(GZERO media) As much of the world scrambles to figure out how to avoid Donald Trump’s expansive “reciprocal tariffs,” two big players are in Washington this week to try their hands at negotiating with the self-styled Deal Artist™ himself.
Japan is a top foreign investor in the US economy and a key East Asian ally amid Trump’s deepening confrontation with China. Japan’s Economic Revitalization Minister Ryosei Akazawa is looking to reduce tariffs to zero. Observers have already called his case a “guinea pig” for how countries with long-standing ties to the US can work deals with the America First president.
Late on Wednesday, Trump hailed “big progress” in the talks, which he attended personally, but neither he nor Akazawa gave further details. The two sides will meet again later this month
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni … shares Trump’s hard-line views on immigration and social issues, and even defended US Vice President JD Vance’s recent blistering attack on the EU’s approach to free speech.
But Meloni also leads a highly export-dependent economy that runs a $40bn surplus with the US. Trump’s “reciprocal tariffs” of 20% on the EU could therefore be a catastrophe for Italy.
Can Meloni parlay her good graces with Trump into a deal that avoids a wider transatlantic trade war? Or will her solo visit enable the US president to weaken the overall unity of the bloc?

15 April
‘I’d Fail Him as a Student’: Sachs Publicly Grades Trump’s Trade Illiteracy (YouTube)
Renowned economist Jeffrey Sachs tore into Donald Trump’s latest tariff threats, branding them “Mickey Mouse economics” and accusing the former president of unleashing chaos on global markets. In a scathing takedown, Sachs said Trump’s trade logic was so flawed that “he wouldn’t pass a basic econ class,” slamming the former president’s obsession with trade deficits as “childish and dangerous.” Sachs blamed Trump’s economic policies for triggering a $10 trillion loss in global wealth, warning that the U.S. is now flirting with authoritarianism under “one-man rule by emergency decree.” Dismissing Trump’s talk of foreign nations “cheating” the U.S., Sachs countered: “It’s not a trade issue—it’s a spending problem.” The blistering critique comes amid rising fears that Trump’s return to power could reignite economic instability worldwide.

Trump prepares to slap tariffs on semiconductors and pharma
…the Trump administration advanced a plan on Monday that could result in new levies on semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. The news came days after US President Donald Trump announced that smartphones would be exempt from the 145% duty that he had slapped on China.
Officially, the plan involves a first step of investigating the national security implications of importing pharma and semiconductors. The next step would be to invoke Section 232 of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act, which allows a president to impose tariffs in the interests of protecting national security. …
The United States relies heavily on Taiwan in particular for semiconductors — one plant there crafts 92% of the world’s advanced chips. As for pharmaceuticals, the US imports many from China, Ireland, and India.