The response from the EU is exactly what we would expect to see from the end of the 80-year-old Marshal Plan.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyden has three big concerns with the new trade/tariff reset. I strongly suggest everyone to read the EU concerns slowly to fully absorb decades of hypocrisy now surfacing:
#1 The EU will not be able to compete for U.S. market share with 20% general tariffs and 25% auto tariffs.
#2 The EU must deploy countermeasures against the risk of losing industrial capacity and manufacturing to the United States.
And #3 The EU must defend itself against China dumping cheap products into the EU now rejected by the USA.
von der Leyen is concerned mostly about the extremely valuable U.S. consumer being leveraged by President Trump, essentially blocking exploitation from EU and Asia. The EU will not tolerate losing access to the most valuable customers in the world, Americans.
Here are the basic resources you need to dive into President Trump’s global trade and tariff reset. Topline opinion at the end of the document summaries.
♦ United States Trade Representative: 397-page detailed analysis of global trade relationships with the United States. The 2025 National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers (NTE) is the 40th report in an annual series that highlights significant foreign barriers to U.S. exports, U.S. foreign direct investment, and U.S. electronic commerce. This document is a companion piece to the President’s 2025 Trade Policy Agenda and 2024 Annual Report, published by the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) on February 28, 2025. SEE REPORT HERE
♦ President Trump Executive Order: Regulating Imports with a Reciprocal Tariff to Rectify Trade Practices that Contribute to Large and Persistent Annual United States Goods Trade Deficits. READ EXECUTIVE ORDER HERE:
♦ ANNEX #1 – Outlining the tariff rate per country as assigned. SEE HERE
♦ ANNEX #2: 37-pages outlining the products that are exempted from the globally specified tariffs. The tariffs generally target completed goods, finished durable goods, not necessarily the chemical components or compounds needed if we are to manufacture or build the product in the USA. Therefore Annex 2 provides the list of all products, chemicals, components and compounds that are exempt from the tariff program. [SEE EXEMPTIONS HERE]
President Trump delivers a speech at the White House outlining a global trade reset established on the principle of trade and tariff reciprocity. [Primary Executive Order Here] – [Executive Order Here]
“The post-war international economic system was based upon three incorrect assumptions: first, that if the United States led the world in liberalizing tariff and non-tariff barriers the rest of the world would follow; second, that such liberalization would ultimately result in more economic convergence and increased domestic consumption among U.S. trading partners converging towards the share in the United States; and third, that as a result, the United States would not accrue large and persistent goods trade deficits.”
“Put simply, while World Trade Organization (WTO) Members agreed to bind their tariff rates on a most-favored-nation (MFN) basis and thereby provide their best tariff rates to all WTO Members, they did not agree to bind their tariff rates at similarly low levels or to apply tariff rates on a reciprocal basis. Consequently, according to the WTO, the United States has among the lowest simple average MFN tariff rates in the world at 3.3 percent, while many of our key trading partners like Brazil (11.2 percent), China (7.5 percent), the European Union (EU) (5 percent), India (17 percent), and Vietnam (9.4 percent) have simple average MFN tariff rates that are significantly higher.”
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Country-specific ad valorem rates of duty as specified in Annex I to the main Executive Order.
The tariffs generally target completed goods, not the imported chemical or component materials needed to by industry to manufacture the products domestically. Annex II are the exemptions to the Executive Order.
I have been going through the details and will have much more soon.
President Trump and the White House posted the following message to begin “Liberation Day.”
President Donald Trump is scheduled to end the U.S Marshal Plan for Europe, eliminating one-way tariffs eighty years after the Marshal Plan began. President Trump is now planning to institute global reciprocal tariffs, by matching all tariff and non-tariff trade barriers and restrictions. WATCH:
Marine Le Pen in France, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, Imran Khan in Pakistan, Matteo Salvini in Italy, Donald Trump in America, Calin Georgescu in Romania. These are the latest populist candidates targeted by Lawfare in “democratic” nations and blocked from office. Amid the group, only President Trump defeated the globalist alignment against him.
Marine Le Pen and 24 other officials were accused to paying staff for the National Rally party with EU commission funds intended to pay European Union parliamentary aides, a claimed violation of the European Union regulations. Le Pen was a representative to the EU and is currently the leading candidate in France.
Marine Le Pen and her co-defendants were not accused of personally benefiting from the EU financial process and denied any wrongdoing as it related to paying staff and parliamentary aides. However, a French court ruled she did pay for party staff with the wrong funds and her punishment is 2 years of house arrest and a five-year ban from office.
REUTERS – […] The court sentenced Le Pen to two years’ imprisonment under house arrest, but it was the political ramifications of ineligibility that dealt the biggest blow to her foreseeable political future.
Le Pen and 24 other officials from the National Rally were accused of having used money intended for EU parliamentary aides to pay staff who worked for the party between 2004 and 2016, in violation of the 27-nation bloc’s regulations. Le Pen and her co-defendants denied wrongdoing.
President Donald Trump holds an impromptu presser aboard Air Force One en route back to Washington DC. Most of the conversation centers around the upcoming “Liberty Day” tariffs, and the Ukraine-Russia conflict.
According to National Economic Council Chairman Kevin Hassett, our President now has all the assembled data from the full review and analysis of the combined research of the MAGAnomic agencies within the White House. The analysis combines both tariff and non-tariff trade barriers to determine exactly what costs are put upon the U.S. export companies for goods that arrive in various countries.
All of those combined costs, by country, will determine the reciprocal amount of the tariff levied by President Trump. The announcement of tariff rates will likely come this week, with President Trump previously saying April 2nd and April 3rd being the beginning of the implementation dates.
President Trump also puts context on the headline quotes promoted by NBC news and Kirsten Welker about his consideration toward Vladimir Putin. A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT CONTEXT! President Trump simply noted that while President Putin doesn’t like Zelenskyy, and factually calls him illegitimate, Trump needs Putin to accept Zelenskyy in order to have the other chair at the peace table filled. That’s it. Pragmatic toward peace! WATCH:
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President Trump notes that after his warning of secondary tariffs against any nation who imports oil from Venezuela, Chinese ships pulled up anchor and left Venezuelan ports empty. Additionally, regarding Zelenskyy, President Trump notes the Ukraine President is going to face “a lot of trouble” if he backs out of the previously agreed minerals deal.
The atomic sledgehammer that President Trump just delivered to the German auto industry simply cannot be overemphasized. A 25% tariff on imported cars and car parts completely negates hundreds of billions in pre-positioned investment dollars by German auto companies in Mexico. [Executive Order Here]
To give scale to the impact on Germany, consider that German automakers currently have 330 automotive suppliers in Mexico according to information from VDA. Audi (a subsidiary of Volkswagen) has no U.S. production sites; every Audi sold in America will be subject to a 25% tariff. The Audi brand access to the U.S. market was/is 100% dependent on Mexico, including for manufacturing the Q5 SUV, its top-selling U.S. model.
According to prior reporting from Politico, “Volkswagen’s most popular model for American consumers is the Tiguan, an SUV that is entirely manufactured in Mexico. The German automaker sold over 30,000 of the vehicles in the final quarter of last year, a nearly 50 percent year-over-year increase.” But wait, it gets worse….
Wealthy nations will attempt to maintain exports against President Trump tariffs by subsidizing their industries. Corporations have deeper pockets, and the politicians are used to the bribes, we call it “lobbying.” Therefore, the government responds by subsidizing the corporations [ie. the WEF business model].
Canada will subsidize their export industries, Germany will subsidize their auto industry, the EU will provide subsidies to their manufacturing powerhouses, and China will once again start subsidizing their manufacturing industry. Each of these nations will in turn devalue their currency.
However, poorer nations will be faster to lower import tariffs on USA goods because they have lower lobbying (bribe) income from corporations to govt. That’s what we should expect to see.
VIETNAM – Vietnam said it plans to cut import duties on a range of goods including cars, liquified natural gas and agricultural products.
[…] The announcement on the finance ministry’s website late Tuesday came less than two weeks after Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said the country was reviewing duties in order to encourage increased imports from the United States.
Vietnam represents the United States’s third-highest trade deficit, behind China and Mexico.
According to the finance ministry statement, import duties on some cars will be cut by half and the tax rate for liquified natural gas will drop from five percent to just two percent. Duties will also be cut for a number of other products including frozen chicken thighs, almonds, sweet cherries, raisins and wood. (more)
During President Trump’s first term, many companies proactively moved manufacturing operations from China to other nations in Southeast Asia. Vietnam was a big benefactor of the manufacturing shift. It is smart for them to respond to the reciprocal tariffs coming April 2nd by lowering their tariff rate.
Following a cabinet meeting, President Donald Trump and the various cabinet members hold a public press availability to outline fraud discovered within the budgets and spending of the agencies they head. Several examples of demonstrable fraud were highlighted by DOGE team lead Elon Musk, the Small Business Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Dept of Energy, the Dept of Veterans Affairs and others.
President Trump explains that targeting the governmental spending “fraud” is critical as his administration focuses on growing the economy and bringing in major U.S. investment. Most of the spending being highlighted is fraud within the business model of U.S. politics. As noted by President Trump, it is not waste or abuse, it is simply fraud.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick outlines his expectations in advance of April 2nd, economic liberation day. HHS Secretary RFK Jr outlined how the DOGE team is helping to streamline the goals and objectives of the healthcare system. President Trump guides the MAGAnomic conversation around the various cabinet secretaries.
Dept of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem outlined how border patrol now has almost complete control over the U.S. border, and how the deportation operation is now removing record numbers of illegal aliens.
The Q&A session with media begins at 23:14 of the video above.
President Trump asks for Secretary Marco Rubio [24:57 of video] to review foreign policy and the Ukraine-Russia negotiations that are underway in Saudi Arabia. President Trump also notes the mid-east policy program is restarting the Abraham Accords to bring more nations into the alliance to stop regional hatred and create peace.
Around the 28:00 moment, President Trump notes the MAGAnomic policy initiatives that are starting to reduce prices. The price of energy input products is dropping rapidly along with gasoline and core food ingredients. Around 31:30 Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent outlines how Treasury is positioning policy to assist in economic growth.
At approximately the 34:00-minute mark, President Trump asks Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy about air safety and the goal of a new Air Traffic Control system. Secretary Duffy outlines the importance of DOGE to deliver solutions and assist with identifying problems.
Attorney General Pam Bondi who is primarily in position to keep the administration -and Trump himself- defended from Lawfare attacks, outlines how the DOJ is taking investigative referrals from the various cabinet members and will review identified instances of fraud for prosecution when warranted.
President Trump concludes the press availability by defending Elon Musk and his DOGE team from the attacks against him and his companies.
Tariffs simply work. This is no longer a debatable issue, and decades of Wall Street gaslighting collapses as the outcomes of tariffs generate visible economic benefits for all Americans.
South Korea-based Hyundai and President Donald Trump announced a $20 billion investment in US on-shoring on Monday, which includes a $5 billion steel plant in Louisiana,
The $5.8 billion Louisiana facility will be the car manufacturers’ first steel manufacturing facility in the US and will produce more than 2.7 million metric tons of steel a year and create more than 1,400 jobs. It will supply steel to auto plants in Alabama and Georgia, Trump said in remarks at the White House.
The announcement at the White House included President Trump, Hyundai Chairman Euisun Chung and Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry. WATCH:
The Hyundai announcement comes as the highly anticipated April 2nd “reciprocity tariffs” are scheduled to begin against all nations. For the EU this means an end to the 80-year-old Marshal plan of economic benefit.
Effective April 2, 2025, the U.S. will begin a process of reciprocal tariffs on imports from all nations with tariffs against U.S. products.
If a nation charges a 20% tariff on a U.S. good, in combination with a 20% non-tariff trade barrier, President Trump will calculate the financial impact and then reciprocate with a 40% tariff put on that nation’s goods being imported to the USA.
Globally, all nations are calculating how to deal with this issue. Hyundai’s best position calculations end up with this announcement.
