The Daily 202: Trump's trade war is getting very real
By Rachel Van Dongen
July 3 at 8:10 AM
It may still be awhile before it becomes an official war, but there's no doubt President Trump has significantly turned up the heat on trade hostilities. What seemed to begin as a negotiating tactic for the author of “The Art of the Deal” is rapidly escalating into a full-blown standoff with all the world's major economies — and the possible ramifications could be very significant for the American economy, as well as Republican prospects in the midterm elections.
Trump's rhetoric regarding tariffs has become increasingly more barbed in recent days — see his confident interview with Fox News's Maria Bartiromo on Sunday and his Twitter takedown last week of Harley Davidson.
And other countries are fighting back in what is amounting to an all-fronts battle with America's supposed allies and frenemies alike. Canada over the weekend imposed $12.6 billion in tariffs on U.S. goods in retaliation for U.S. levies on steel and aluminum. On Friday, China is set to slap $34 billion in levies on American goods like soybeans in response to a symmetrical imposition of tariffs by the United States on Chinese goods. Also last week, the European Union sent a letter to the Commerce Department threatening to implement $290 billion in tariffs on American goods if Trump follows through with his desire to crack down on foreign autos.
“The European Union is possibly as bad as China just smaller, OK. It’s terrible what they did to us,” Trump told Bartiromo. “They send a Mercedes in; we can’t send our cars in. Look what they do to our farmers. They don’t want our farm products. Now in all fairness they have their farmers. So they want to protect their farmers. But we don’t protect ours and they protect theirs.”
Link to tweet
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2018/07/03/daily-202-trump-s-trade-war-is-getting-very-real/5b3aaab61b326b3348addcb2/