EU Halts Its Trade Deal With The U.S., A Good Move?

Of course it is. To reduce Trump’s ire, the EU should pretend to study the matter.

Trade Deal Halted

Bloomberg reports EU Halts US Trade Deal as Tariff Turmoil Creates Uncertainty

The European Union froze ratification of its US trade deal until President Donald Trump solidifies his upended tariff plans, injecting economic turbulence into an already strained relationship.
EU lawmakers on Monday suspended legislative work on approving the deal. The move came days after the US Supreme Court struck down Trump’s use of an emergency-powers law to impose his so-called reciprocal tariffs around the world.
“We want to have clarity about the situation,” European Parliament trade committee chair Bernd Lange said at a meeting on Monday. “We want to have clarity from the US that they are respecting the deal because that’s a crucial element.”
The fresh delay extends an already long road for the trade deal, which was reached last summer but has never been fully implemented. If the pact falls apart, it threatens to reopen a wound in a transatlantic relationship already suffering as Trump vacillates on Russia’s war in Ukraine, pushes to control Greenland and insults EU leaders.
“Any Country that wants to ‘play games’ with the ridiculous supreme court decision, especially those that have ‘Ripped Off’ the U.S.A. for years, and even decades, will be met with a much higher Tariff, and worse, than that which they just recently agreed to,” Trump wrote Monday afternoon on Truth Social. “BUYER BEWARE!!!”
Within hours of Friday’s court ruling, Trump said he would impose a 10% global tariff — which he then increased to 15% — leaving many questions unanswered for American trading partners.
Trump also said he would preserve existing duties imposed under Sections 301 and 232, and ordered the US trade representative to launch new Section 301 investigations on an accelerated timeline. Those probes require country-specific inquiries and findings of trade violations before tariffs can be imposed, and could eventually replace the baseline rate.
The remarks left it unclear how such efforts might intersect with existing trade deals.
“Full clarity on what these new developments mean for the EU-US trade relationship is the absolute minimum that is required for us as the EU to make a clear-eyed assessment to decide on the next steps,” Olof Gill, a commission spokesperson, told reporters on Monday. “More is required for us to understand the full picture here.”
The Group of Seven nations’ trade ministers also held a call Monday, where EU Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic said on X that he stressed “full respect” for the US trade deal “is paramount.” Later on Monday, EU ambassadors will meet to discuss the US trade relationship.
Even before Friday’s ruling, the US-EU trade deal had faced a rocky path to ratification.
Under the pact’s initial terms, the EU agreed to a 15% tariff rate on most of its exports to the US, while vowing to remove tariffs on American industrial goods heading into the bloc. The US also said it would keep a 50% tariff on European steel and aluminum imports.
The bloc stuck to the lopsided deal in the hopes of avoiding a full-blown trade war with Washington and retaining US security backing, particularly on Ukraine.

Seeking Full Clarity

Seeking full clarity is an excellent strategy.

There is never full clarity with Trump. So, the deal can take ages, until Trump is long gone.

Hoot of the Day

Section 122 Tariffs Are Illegal

The interterm 15 percent tariffs will soon bite the dust, deservingly so.

For discussion, please see Trump’s 15% Section 122 Tariff Retry Headed for a Supreme Court Loss Too