Customs (Tariff)

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    As Courts Call Tariffs Into Question, Trump Again Turns to His Favorite Tool

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    The president is set to raise tariffs on steel and aluminum this week, even as the courts are challenging the legitimacy of other levies.The legitimacy of President Trump’s tariffs is being questioned by U.S. courts, but the president is showing no signs of backing off his favorite tool.On Wednesday, the tariffs that Mr. Trump imposed on foreign steel and aluminum are set to double to 50 percent, a move that the president has said will better protect domestic metal makers.In the coming days, the U.S. government is set to face off with states and businesses that have sued over the president’s tariffs, and both sides will be required to submit more information as judges work toward final decisions on the legality of Mr. Trump’s steepest tariffs.Last Wednesday, the Court of International Trade ruled that some of the steep tariffs that Mr. Trump had imposed were illegal, a significant setback for the president’s agenda.Less than 24 hours later, a separate court temporarily paused that decision. As judges weigh that appeal, the tariffs in question — which include the levies Mr. Trump imposed on Canada, Mexico and China for what he said was their role in the fentanyl trade, as well as the global tariffs Mr. Trump announced, and then quickly paused, in April — are expected to remain in effect at least until June 9.On Sunday, one of Mr. Trump’s top trade advisers insisted that the president would continue to find ways to hit other countries with tariffs even after the trade court ruled against the defining element of Mr. Trump’s strategy.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Accuses China of Violating Trade Agreement

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    President Trump said that Beijing was not honoring the terms of a temporary agreement and warned of further confrontation.President Trump and his advisers on Friday leveled sharp attacks against China over trade, reviving an economic dispute that led to steep tariffs and a confrontation over critical next-generation technologies.In a post on Truth Social, Mr. Trump accused Beijing of violating the terms of a fragile truce struck earlier this month between the two countries that included rolling back tariffs and other trade barriers. The agreement was intended to give both sides time to reach a larger deal that would avert an all-out trade war.Mr. Trump’s accusations alluded to China’s promise to reduce export restrictions around rare earth minerals that are key components in many technology and military products. The president suggested that China had continued to limit access to those goods, as he appeared to adopt a more confrontational posture on trade.“So much for being Mr. NICE GUY!” he proclaimed.Speaking to reporters later in the day, Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff for policy, stressed that the president prefers cooperation. But, he warned, China’s behavior “opens up all manner of action for the United States.”The standoff between the two nations has created significant concern for businesses and investors, and has raised fears of a global economic downturn in recent months. Stocks were down slightly on Friday.The new dispute arrives at a moment of great uncertainty for Mr. Trump’s ability to brandish steep tariffs to force other countries to make trade concessions. A federal trade court earlier this week declared many of the president’s duties to be illegal, including some that he imposed on China on emergency grounds. An appeals court later restored that power temporarily until a panel of judges can hear the government’s arguments fighting the original ruling.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Makes a New Push to ‘Decouple’ U.S. From China

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    Trump administration officials are getting a second chance to try to sever ties with China by starting a trade war, imposing export controls and revoking student visas.The Trump administration has threatened to revoke the visas of many of the 277,000 or so Chinese students in the United States and to subject future applicants from China, including Hong Kong, to extra scrutiny.Cargo ships laden with goods from China stopped coming into American ports earlier this spring as President Trump escalated his trade war against Beijing.And the Trump administration is suspending sales of some critical U.S. technologies to China, including those related to jet engines, semiconductors and certain chemicals and machinery. Taken together, the actions by the Trump administration amount to an aggressive campaign to “decouple” the United States from China, as it seeks to break the close commercial ties between the world’s two largest economies and toss away what had been the anchor of the relations between the nations for decades.Aggressive decoupling would bolster American security, from the perspective of Mr. Trump and his aides. And it would also accelerate a trend toward each power being entrenched in its own regional sphere of influence.Officials in the first Trump administration spoke of the need to decouple from China, with the view that economic and educational ties across many fields equated to a national security threat. But while the efforts reframed the relationship as one of competition rather than cooperation, the volume of trade remained high, even through the pandemic.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Tariff Ruling Gives Businesses Hope, but They’re Soon Unmoored Again

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    Companies welcomed a court decision striking down President Trump’s tariffs. Then a stay of that ruling left no one breathing easy.Emma Mcilroy’s apparel company, Wildfang, had been working overtime to move its production out of China in the months since President Trump launched his trade war. Finding another factory that could produce jumpsuits and button-downs — while every other U.S. importer was also jockeying for space — was a huge drain on the 11-person staff’s attention.But when Ms. Mcilroy saw on Wednesday night that a federal court had ruled most of Mr. Trump’s tariffs illegal, all of that work paused. Would the tariffs be gone when her next shipment arrived in August, or not?“I have absolutely no idea where it’s going. I am learning in real time how to run my business,” Ms. Mcilroy said Thursday. “Yesterday I would’ve told you, ‘Yes, absolutely, you’re going to see me manufacturing stuff in Vietnam.’ Today I’m not sure.”American businesses are rapidly digesting the latest twist in Mr. Trump’s roller-coaster trade war, which has made it impossible to plan more than a few weeks in advance. It’s particularly hard on industries that place their orders entire seasons ahead of time.The details of Wednesday’s decision seemed likely to bring relief. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled that the Trump administration had acted illegally in using an emergency powers law to impose 30 percent tariffs on goods from China, 25 percent tariffs on most goods from Mexico and Canada, and 10 percent on everyone else. The court gave the White House 10 days to halt the new duties.Hours later, a higher court stayed the decision.If the initial ruling sticks, it will preclude the return of steeper “reciprocal” tariffs that Mr. Trump paused for 90 days in early April. It might even allow companies that have paid the emergency tariffs over the past several months to claim refunds, already an established process at Customs and Border Protection.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Criticizes the Fed in a Private Meeting With Powell

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    Jerome H. Powell stressed in his first meeting since the president returned to the White House that policy decisions would be “based solely on careful, objective and nonpolitical analysis.”President Trump revived his criticism of the Federal Reserve in a private meeting with its chair, Jerome H. Powell, on Thursday, saying it was a mistake not to lower interest rates.The meeting, which was organized at Mr. Trump’s request, is the first since the president returned to the White House.Mr. Powell and Mr. Trump discussed how the economy was evolving with regards to inflation, the labor market and growth. The chair did not share his expectations for monetary policy, the Fed said in a statement.He told the president that such decisions would “depend entirely on incoming economic information and what that means for the outlook,” according to the statement, and would be “based solely on careful, objective and nonpolitical analysis.”Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, told reporters on Thursday that Mr. Trump expressed his belief to Mr. Powell that the Fed was making a mistake by not lowering interest rates.The meeting comes at a fraught moment for the economy, which now faces a variety of risks stemming from Mr. Trump’s policies. That has complicated the Fed’s job as it seeks to stamp out the remaining pressures on prices stemming from the pandemic and contain new ones that surface as a result of the tariffs, while also supporting a labor market that has begun to slow.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump’s Tariffs Drive a Rise in Trade Crime

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    As President Trump’s tariffs have ratcheted up in recent months, so have the mysterious solicitations some U.S. companies have received, offering them ways to avoid the taxes.Shipping companies, many of them based in China, have reached out to U.S. firms that import apparel, auto parts and jewelry, offering solutions that they say can make the tariffs go away.“We can avoid high duties from China, which we have already done many in the past,” read one email to a U.S. importer.“Beat U.S. Tariffs,” a second read, promising to cap the tariffs “at a flat 10%.” It added: “You ship worry free.”“Good News! The tariffs has been dropped finally!” another proclaimed.The proposals — which are circulating in emails, as well as in videos on TikTok and other platforms — reflect a new flood of fraudulent activity, according to company executives and government officials. As U.S. tariffs on foreign products have increased sharply in recent months, so have the incentives for companies to find ways around them.The Chinese firms advertising these services describe their methods as valid solutions. For a fee, they find ways to bring products to the United States with much lower tariffs. But experts say these practices are methods of customs fraud. The companies may be dodging tariffs by altering the information about the shipments that is given to the U.S. government to qualify for a lower tariff rate. Or they may move the goods to another country that is subject to a lower tariff before shipping them to the United States, a technique known as transshipment. More

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    Pivoting From Tax Cuts to Tariffs, Trump Ignores Economic Warning Signs

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    One day after House Republicans approved an expensive package of tax cuts that rattled financial markets, President Trump pivoted back to his other signature policy priority, unveiling a battery of tariff threats that further spooked investors and raised the prospects of higher prices on American consumers.For a president who has fashioned himself as a shrewd steward of the economy, the decision to escalate his global trade war on Friday appeared curious and costly. It capped off a week that saw Mr. Trump ignore repeated warnings that his agenda could worsen the nation’s debt, harm many of his own voters, hurt the finances of low-income families and contribute far less in growth than the White House contends.The tepid market response to the president’s economic policy approach did little to sway Mr. Trump, who chose on Friday to revive the uncertainty that has kept businesses and consumers on edge. The president threatened 50 percent tariffs on the European Union, and a 25 percent tariff on Apple. Other tech companies, he said, could face the same rate.Since taking office, Mr. Trump has raced to enact his economic vision, aiming to pair generous tax cuts with sweeping deregulation that he says will expand America’s economy. He has fashioned his steep, worldwide tariffs as a political cudgel that will raise money, encourage more domestic manufacturing and improve U.S. trade relationships.But for many of his signature policies to succeed, Mr. Trump will have to prove investors wrong, particularly those who lend money to the government by buying its debt.So far, bond markets are not buying his approach. Where Mr. Trump sees a “golden age” of growth, investors see an agenda that comes with more debt, higher borrowing costs, inflation and an economic slowdown. Investors who once viewed government debt as a relatively risk-free investment are now demanding that the United States pay much more to those who lend America money.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Global Economic Officials Gather Amid Headwinds From Trump’s Trade War

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    Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will meet his international counterparts at a G7 finance ministers meeting in Canada.Top finance officials from the world’s wealthiest economies will begin gathering in Canada on Tuesday for meetings that are expected to be consumed by renewed fears of a global downturn set off by President Trump’s trade war.The summit of the Group of 7 finance ministers, a traditionally friendly gathering, is likely to be more fraught this year. The tariffs that Mr. Trump has imposed on American allies and adversaries have threatened to blunt global growth and inflame inflation. Europe, Japan and Canada have all been bearing the brunt of the Trump administration’s “America first” economic agenda.The tenor of the discussions could also be complicated by recent tension between the United States and Canada, the country hosting this year’s meetings and one that Mr. Trump has said he wants to annex.“I think it’s going to be awkward,” said Charles Lichfield, deputy director of the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center.The three days of meetings will include many of the recent topics of discussion, including support for Ukraine, concerns about China’s economic practices and headwinds facing the global economy. However, Mr. Trump’s trade tactics, which many economists view as the biggest threat to global economic stability, will dominate the discussions between Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and his counterparts.Mr. Bessent, who skipped a gathering of the Group of 20 finance ministers in February, will appear at the international forum for the first time and at a particularly tenuous moment.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More