Washington, Jan 31: US President Donald Trump has announced plans to impose on Saturday a 25 per cent tariff on Canada and Mexico, its two neighbouring countries, and is also in the process of considering a similar measure against China.
Trump said he would make a decision on Thursday night about whether to include oil in the list of tariffed items.
“We will be announcing the tariffs on Canada and Mexico for a number of reasons,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on Thursday.
He cited illegal immigration, smuggling of drugs and the massive subsidies that the US gives to Canada and Mexico in the form of deficits as the reasons for the tariffs.
“I will be putting the tariff of 25 per cent on Canada and, separately, 25 per cent on Mexico. We will really have to do that because we have very big deficits with those countries. Those tariffs may or may not rise with time,” said the president.
Responding to a question, Trump said he would decide Thursday night whether to include oil among the items subject to tariffs.
“We’re going to make that determination probably tonight on oil. Because they send us oil… It depends on what the price is. If the oil is properly priced, if they treat us properly, which they don’t,” he said.
“Mexico and Canada have never been good to us on trade,” Trump said, adding that the two countries have treated the US “very unfairly” on trade.
He asserted that the US will be able to make it up “very quickly” as it “does not need” the products that they have.
“We have all the oil you need. We have all the trees you need, meaning the lumber. We have more than almost anybody in those two categories. In oil, we have more than anybody,” he said.
“We don’t need anybody’s trees, we have great lumber in this country. We have to free them up environmentally, which I can do very quickly,” he said.
“We don’t need what they have. For us to be subsidising Canada to the tune of USD 175 billion a year, and subsidising Mexico to the tune of USD 250 billion-USD 300 billion a year,” he said.
Trump said he was also thinking about taking measures against China for sending fentanyl into the US.
“Because of that, they’re causing us hundreds of thousands of deaths. China is going to end up paying a tariff also for that. We are in the process of doing that. We’ll make that determination of what it’s going to be,” he said.
“China has to stop sending fentanyl into our country and killing our people,” Trump said.
Fentanyl is a highly addictive synthetic opioid, which, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), presents the deadliest drug threat in the country.
The 25 per cent tax that Trump plans to slap on imports from Canada and Mexico could drive up the price of everything from gasoline and pickup trucks, to Super Bowl party guacamole dip.
The tariffs would also invite retaliation. Doug Ford, the premier of Ontario, has already vowed to counterpunch by pulling American alcohol off store shelves in the Canadian province – no idle threat; Canada is the world’s No. 2 market for America’s distilled spirits (behind the 27-nation European Union).
Trump’s tariffs threaten to blow up the trade agreement he himself negotiated with America’s neighbours in his first term. His US-Mexico-Canada Agreement – “the fairest, most balanced, and beneficial trade agreement we have ever signed into law”, Trump once declared – was supposed to bring predictability to North American trade, giving businesses the confidence to make investments.
But when it comes to the self-proclaimed “Tariff Man”, Trump and his passion for plastering taxes on foreign goods, nothing is predictable, and nothing is ever really settled. (Agencies)
