by Amanda Head
Order imposing tariffs at a rate of 25% are a likely cudgel for geopolitical deal making, like rebuilding post-war Ukraine or the Gaza Strip.
President Donald Trump’s orders to impose tariffs and close loopholes on metal imports not only delivered on a major campaign promise to American steel workers, they also set the stage for geopolitical dealmaking that could stretch as far and wide as Europe and the Gaza Strip.
Within hours of Trump affixing his signature on the tariffs orders that take effect globally next month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday floated the notion that American companies would play a major role in rebuilding his country post-war. It’s one of many potential big markets for U.S. steel and aluminum that could be negotiated by a Trump administration after years of Ukraine enjoying exemptions to prior U.S. tariffs.
Zelenskyy is set to meet later this week with Vice President JD Vance, and other Trump administration officials.
“Those who are helping us to save Ukraine will renovate it, with their businesses together with Ukrainian businesses. All these things we are ready to speak about in detail,” the Ukrainian leader said.
Similarly, Trump kept up pressure on Middle East leaders to come up with their own plan for displaced Palestinians by continuing to suggest the United States was willing to take over and rebuild the Gaza Strip into a luxury resort destination after decades of violence.
“We are going to take it,” Trump said of the Gaza Strip during an appearance with Jordan’s King Abdullah II, adding any U.S. rebuilding project would “cherish” the land Palestinians have long occupied.
While Arab leaders have been cool to Trump‘s idea, the president’s team has stressed the threat of a U.S. takeover opens the door for some extraordinary dealmaking that could also benefit American companies.
“Right now, the only one who’s stood up and said I’m willing to help do it is Donald Trump,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said during an radio interview Monday. “All these other leaders, they’re going to have to step up. If they’ve got a better idea, then now is the time.
“Now is the time for the other governments and other powers in the region, some of these very rich countries, to basically say, okay, we’ll do it,” he said.
Such talk is still aspirational since Trump and leaders in the two wars must first reach substantive peace deals. But it also exposes that Trump and his team are playing four-dimensional chess in which domestic and foreign interests are intertwined at almost every step.
That notion l is often lost in legacy media coverage that has focused mostly on the potential impact of tariffs on product costs, Trump’s defenders say.
“The media is in full meltdown mode after President Trump imposed duties and retaliatory tariffs this week on countries who have been ripping us off for decades,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., said. “Both aluminum and steel are critical to our national security — and we make some of the best in the world right here at home.
“President Trump’s strategic tariffs will strengthen and revitalize our nation’s economy by making sure our trade deals are fair to taxpayers and the American worker,” he added.
Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro said the president’s plan not only ends the dumping practices of foreign adversaries like China that exploited exemptions and harmed American steel and aluminum makers, it sets the stage for significant growth for the domestic metals industry.
The tariffs “will usher in a new Golden Age of prosperity for two key pillar industries,” Navarro wrote in a FoxNews oped.
Under steel and aluminum tariffs imposed during Trump's first administration, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, the European Union, Ukraine and the United Kingdom received exemptions which prevented the tariffs from being effective.
China and other nations used these exemptions to exploit trade through backdoor means of commerce, thus undermining the purpose of such exemptions. This time around Trump left no room for that and the tariffs-for-all will go into effect starting March 12, 2025.
Trump’s detractors have raised fire and fury over the potential imposition of tariffs with Senators Chris Coons , D- Del., and Tim Kaine D-Va., introducing the "Stopping Tariffs on Allies and Bolstering Legislative Exercise of Trade Policy Act" (STABLE).
“Congress gave the president the authority to impose tariffs so that he could combat our enemies in the event of a national security crisis, not so that he could pursue grudges against our allies and neighbors,” Coons said. “If this weekend's tariffs go into effect, they'll do catastrophic damage to our relationships with our allies and raise costs for working families by hundreds of dollars a year. Congress needs to stop this from happening again.
While tariffs can cost the imposing country’s citizens initially,
Trump has used the tool successfully, most recently with Canada and
Mexico to coerce security and assistance at our northern and southern
borders respectively.
And with markets reacting to the tariff proclamation, the price of steel only rose 1.7% under Trump’s last tariffs, according to a federal agency analysis
Tariffs could come with not only diplomatic and trade benefits, but revenue as well.
With a residual budget gap left by the Biden administration of $1.83 trillion, better trade deals could substantially fill the blinking red coffers resulting from overspending and budgets as balanced as a single-seat seesaw. This isn’t a new concept; between 1798 and 1913 tariffs accounted for some 50% to 90% of federal income.
The negotiation tool of tariffs on the European Union takes on a different shape, and it combines the matter of trade with geopolitics. Before the election in September, Trump told a Savannah, Georgia crowd that, “we’re stuck in that war unless I’m president. I’ll get it done, I’ll get it negotiated, I’ll get out. We gotta get out.”
Hinting at what could soon transpire through a peace deal, Trump said on Monday that he had spoken to Russian president Vladimir Putin and that “I hope it’s fast. Every day people are dying. This was is so bad in Ukraine. I want to end this damn thing.”
The tricky part will come when European nations decide concretely how to respond to the tariffs.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen on Tuesday said, “The EU will act to safeguard its economic interests. We will protect our workers, businesses and consumers.”
Amanda Head
Source: https://justthenews.com/government/diplomacy/americas-metal-industry-needs-hero-man-steel-has-plan
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