U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Jamieson Greer announced the imposition of tariffs between 10% and 12.5% on major trading partners under a new set of duties the Trump Administration says are intended to combat forced labor. The new duties replace a temporary 10% global tariff that the Administration put in place after the Supreme Court struck down President Trump’s global tariffs instituted under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.
The latest tariffs target 60 countries, applying a 10% tariff to countries with laws prohibiting forced labor imports and a 12.5% tariff to those without such statutes. The new tariffs are subject to broad exemptions that will be defined at the Administration’s discretion.
The exemptions cover: (1) raw materials that, if subject to the tariffs, could lead to the unavailability of domestic supply; (2) products that could cause economy-wide disruptions if subject to the tariffs; (3) products that cannot be grown or produced in sufficient quantities or at reasonable prices in the United States or obtained from other sources; (4) certain products from Argentina, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Ecuador, El Salvador, the European Union, Guatemala, Indonesia, Jordan, Malaysia, Switzerland, Taiwan, or the United Kingdom that would encourage those economies to fulfill commitments regarding forced labor import prohibitions or enact and effectively enforce such prohibitions; and (5) articles for which the tariffs may not contribute substantially to eliminating the acts, policies, and practices found to be actionable in the investigations. USTR issued a fact sheet on the new tariffs here.