Washington – U.S. President Donald Trump has increased steel and aluminum tariffs to a flat 25% “without exceptions or exemptions.”
“That’s all countries, no matter where it comes from, all countries," Trump said.
The new regulation will come into effect on 4. March 2025.
According to Reuters, Trump later said he would give "great consideration" to Australia’s request for an exemption to the steel tariffs due to that country's trade deficit with the U.S.
The move has wiped pre-existing country exceptions, quota deals, as well as hundreds of thousands of product-specific tariff exclusions for both metals.
The tariffs will hit millions of tons of steel and aluminum imports from Canada, Brazil, Mexico, South Korea, and other countries that had been entering the U.S. duty-free under carve-outs.
The new proclamations are extensions of Trump's 2018 Section 232 tariffs to protect domestic steel and aluminum makers on national security grounds. As reported by Reuters, a White House official said the exemptions had eroded the effectiveness of these measures.
In addition, Trump will impose a new North American standard requiring steel imports to be "melted and poured" and aluminum to be "smelted and cast" within the region to curb U.S. imports of minimally processed Chinese and Russian metals that circumvent other tariffs.
“This is a big deal,” said the US President. This will make America rich again, Trump said according to Tagesschau. Trump also hinted that he was considering introducing additional tariffs on cars, pharmaceuticals, and computer chips.
Furthermore, the US president also announced plans to introduce counter-tariffs on other countries in the next two days. In an interview with Fox News, Trump said that other countries had been imposing tariffs on imports from the United States for years and that he will soon announce a very sophisticated plan for counter-tariffs.
