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President Donald Trump launched the latest salvo in his trade wars Monday, sending a slew of letters to U.S. trading partners threatening to impose higher tariffs starting Aug. 1.
The letters, posted on social media, appeared to delay the implementation of at least some of the “Liberation Day” tariffs he announced in April, giving the targeted countries more time to negotiate. Those tariffs had been scheduled to go into effect on Wednesday.
The letters were mostly identical. They said that the U.S. was imposing the tariffs because of long-standing trade deficits with each country and offered to change the tariff rate if the nations lowered their own trade barriers to U.S. products. The new tariff rates were, in some cases, identical to the ones announced April 2, but some had been moved up or down by a few percentage points without explanation.
As of Monday afternoon, Trump had sent out letters setting the following tariff rates to begin Aug. 1:
Trump’s Latest Tariff Threats | ||
---|---|---|
Country | Tariff Rate Announced July 7 | Tariff Rate Announced April 2 |
Japan | 25% | 24% |
South Korea | 25% | 25% |
Malaysia | 25% | 24% |
Kazakhstan | 25% | 27% |
South Africa | 30% | 30% |
Laos | 40% | 48% |
Myanmar | 40% | 44% |
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