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Donald Trump says he will impose tariffs of 25 per cent on all steel and aluminium imports into the US, threatening to unleash turmoil in commodity markets and ignite trade wars across the globe.
Officials said the tariffs were a response to “foreign players” who were responsible for “surging exports” of the metals to the country and “undermining US producers” of steel and aluminium.
They said the tariffs would apply to all US imports and no exclusions would be granted for particular products. The tariffs would begin on March 4, said one person familiar with the plan.
Although the move is designed to protect domestic steelmakers, they will probably affect US allies — including Canada and Mexico — and could sharply raise costs for American manufacturers that import the metals.
“This is a big deal — making America rich again,” said Trump, as he signed off on the tariffs in the Oval Office on Monday evening.
The US president’s tariff announcement comes three weeks after his return to the White House and marks an escalation of his protectionist agenda. It follows his announcement of new levies on the US’s two closest trading partners, Mexico and Canada. Those are due to take effect at the start of March.
Trump also said he intended to impose reciprocal tariffs on countries that had levies on US goods within the coming days.
“President Trump is standing up for American steel and aluminium workers like no other leader has,” said Peter Navarro, a senior counsellor for trade and manufacturing in the White House.
The tariffs would “put an end to foreign dumping, boost domestic production and secure our . . . industries as the backbone and pillar industries of America’s economic and national security,” he added.
Trump imposed tariffs of 25 per cent on all steel imports and 10 per cent on aluminium imports in 2018, during his previous trade war, before negotiating carve-outs for some countries.
Joe Biden, who inherited Trump’s metals tariffs when he took office in 2021, struck deals with the EU, UK and Japan that allowed them to export a certain amount of their steel and aluminium to the US duty-free.
US officials on Monday said those agreements would in effect be nullified, and tariffs would be put on steel and aluminium imports from all countries, eliminating the product exclusion process, which an official called “loophole”.
“We had a product exclusion process that got completely out of control in the Biden years,” a White House official said. “And there have been literally hundreds of thousands of exclusions approved, and millions of metric tons of steel and aluminium as a result have not been properly tariffed.”
Domestic US steelmakers welcomed the tariffs. “The steel industry in America faces serious threats from foreign actors that seek to destroy domestic production,” said Philip Bell, president of the Steel Manufacturers Association.
The latest directive risks triggering immediate retaliation from the EU, which responded to Trump’s tariffs in 2018 by imposing levies of its own on €2.8bn worth of US goods, including bourbon and Harley-Davidson motorcycles.
The EU lifted those tariffs as part of the Biden-brokered agreement in 2021.
Canadian industry minister François-Philippe Champagne posted on X on Monday evening that the tariffs are “totally unjustified”, adding that Ottawa’s response would be “clear and calibrated”.
Candace Laing, chief executive of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said Trump’s fresh tariffs announcement made “clear” that “perpetual uncertainty is here to stay”.
Laing added: “If President Trump wants to win for Americans, he shouldn’t be taxing the steel and aluminium that the American defence, manufacturing, aerospace and energy industries rely on.”
Trump said that it would give “great consideration” to exempting Australian steel from the tariffs despite the hard line taken on other countries. “We actually have a surplus. It’s one of the only countries which we do,” he told reporters.
Trump and Anthony Albanese, Australia’s prime minister, on Tuesday discussed the surplus and the supply of Australian steel to the US defence and manufacturing industries. Albanese said Trump had agreed that a carve-out for Australian steel and aluminium was “in the interests of both countries” but that further discussions were needed.
Metals prices rose in the US on Monday ahead of Trump’s announcement as traders moved to secure supplies, with a closely watched contract for aluminium up about 10 per cent and the premium for US copper futures over those in London hitting their highest level since 2020.
Additional reporting by Nic Fildes in Melbourne and Ilya Gridneff in Toronto