President Trump has informed roughly two dozen countries and the European Union that their exports will face tariffs of up to 50 percent starting in August unless they can broker new trade deals imminently with the United States.
The steep levies, communicated this week in letters to those nations’ leaders and posted on social media, marked a revival of Mr. Trump’s trade brinkmanship. The threats have targeted America’s largest trading partners as well as smaller countries with which the United States does relatively little trade.
The president delivered his latest missive on Saturday, when he said that imports on many goods from the European Union and Mexico would face 30 percent tariffs starting next month.
European officials had been hoping to negotiate an agreement with the United States over the past few months, and it remains unclear if the bloc intends to retaliate with tariffs of its own. Mr. Trump told European officials that he would raise U.S. rates if they raised theirs.
Mr. Trump’s threat to Mexico echoed his letter to Canada sent on Thursday. He said he would impose the duties out of a belief that both countries should do more to stem the flow of fentanyl across the U.S. border, but signaled that the United States could relax the tariff rate if Canadian and Mexican leaders took additional steps to combat the issue.
The newly threatened tariffs may not apply to all Mexican and Canadian products, some of which are governed by an existing trade agreement or subject to import taxes related to specific industries.
Together, the new tariffs that the president has threatened this week would essentially replace the original set of steep duties that he announced for dozens of countries in April. The administration soon suspended those duties until early July, as his administration looked to broker favorable trade agreements around the globe.
But the White House made minimal progress on what an official once described as a campaign to strike “90 deals in 90 days,” the deadline for which lapsed on Wednesday. That prompted Mr. Trump this week to sign a new executive order that extended his original pause to Aug. 1.
Now many countries again face the prospect that tariffs on their exports to the United States could rise considerably next month, though Mr. Trump has informed only a couple of dozen nations about the specific taxes soon to be imposed on their arriving goods. Many experts say the true cost of those levies will fall hardest on U.S. businesses and consumers buying foreign products.
The president’s initial battery of letters went to Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, South Africa, Kazakhstan, Laos, Myanmar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Tunisia and Thailand. By Wednesday, Mr. Trump had expanded that roster to include the Philippines, Brunei, Iraq and other countries.
For Brazil, Mr. Trump coupled his usual demands with a series of attacks on the country’s authorities, accusing them of engaging in a “Witch Hunt” against a political ally, former President Jair Bolsonaro, who is facing trial on charges of attempting a coup.
Mr. Trump also threatened to raise rates even higher if any of the countries sought to retaliate with import taxes of their own or tried to evade the U.S. duties by shipping through other nations.
Christine Zhang is a Times reporter specializing in graphics and data journalism.
Tony Romm is a reporter covering economic policy and the Trump administration for The Times, based in Washington.
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