Top Trade Officials Meet to Debate Tariffs, Fair Trade

By Mark Anderson

On Feb. 19, following the administration’s modest success stemming the invasion across the U.S. border by presumed asylum-seekers by threatening tariffs on Mexican goods, President Donald Trump’s focus shifted to Europe when the topic of products crossing borders was discussed by top U.S. and European Union (EU) trade officials.

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That day, European Union Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic and his Trump administration counterparts, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, and Jamieson Greer, Trump’s pick for U.S. Trade Representative, took part in this top-level gathering at the White House.

Before making an appearance, Sefcovic opted to rehearse his talking points at the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where an event took place during the morning hours of Feb. 19.

Sefcovic, who was spared any potentially embarrassing questions there, laid out facts and figures related to his pro-globalism, anti-tariff trade philosophy.

Sefcovic either doesn’t realize or is reluctant to admit that sparring with Trump’s team over tariffs may prove to be futile. That’s mainly because, rather than negotiating trade with the EU on conventional “rules-based world order” terms, the U.S. is going in a significantly different direction, meaning that the United States and EU are on divergent, not parallel, trade trajectories. The legacy media cartel is completely missing this fundamental point.

In other words, unless Trump changes course, the United States is heading toward relative economic self-sufficiency on a nationalistic basis. This involves higher tariffs and appears to be irreconcilable with the EU’s open-trade, near-zero tariffs model.

Still, Sefcovic appeared undaunted at the AEI event where he stated:

The EU is built on free trade among its members, and “opening up the world’s trade is deeply embedded in our DNA.

The EU is the world’s largest trading bloc, with free trade agreements with 76 countries; 72 of those leading trading countries account for 38% of global GDP. Sefcovic also remarked:

The EU-U.S. economic relationship is the largest in the world. We have a win-win partnership [e.g., Boeing and Airbus are made in the United States] but  with cutting-edge electronic power systems and fuselages from the EU [and] U.S. semi-conductor production depends on EU-made lithography machines.

He added that U.S. battle tanks and armored fighting vehicles rely on “EU-made drive trains and cannons.” Rather revealingly, he also noted that, “even the U.S. Mint uses EU-made hi-tech printing machines to print U.S. dollars and prevent counterfeiting.”

‘FAIR AND RECIPROCAL PLAN’

 The main thing that sparked the EU’s trade trip to Washington emerged on Feb. 13, when a White House news release announced:

President Donald J. Trump signed a presidential memorandum ordering the development of a comprehensive plan for restoring fairness in U.S. trade relationships and countering non-reciprocal trading arrangements. …

The Fair and Reciprocal Plan will seek to correct longstanding imbalances in international trade and ensure fairness across the board. Gone are the days of America being taken advantage of. This plan will put the American worker first, improve our competitiveness in every area of industry, reduce our trade deficit, and bolster our economic and national security.

 

WHITE HOUSE’S FIGURES

 Also, six days before Sefcovic’s arrival in D.C., the White House issued a related fact sheet, which noted:

The European Union can export all the shellfish it wants to America, but the EU bans shellfish exports from 48 of our states, despite committing in 2020 to expedite approvals for shellfish exports. As a result, in 2023, the U.S. imported $274 million in shellfish from the EU but exported only $38 million. The EU also imposes a 10% tariff on imported cars. Yet the U.S. only imposes a 2.5% tariff. …

A 2019 report found that across 132 countries and more than 600,000 product lines, United States exporters face higher tariffs more than two-thirds of the time.

PRESS CONFERENCE

 As AFP went to press, Feb. 27, the Commerce and Trade Representative departments had no detailed comments about the aftermath of their four-hour meeting with Sefcovic. On Feb. 20, Reuters noted:

Sefcovic, speaking to reporters after meetings … with Trump’s top trade officials, said he saw some willingness on the part of the U.S. side to mutually reduce tariffs.

Sefcovic, who has repeatedly said that U.S. tariffs will be answered by EU tariffs, was quoted as saying:

Our number one priority is (to) avoid this period of pain. … Because usually what happens, we have measures, we have counter measures and then usually … the same people have to sit at the same table and resolve the problem.

It remains to be seen whether Trump will keep moving toward his contemplated “external revenue service” to start supplanting the IRS, which would require long-term tariffs for purposes of industrial protectionism and steady revenue, rather than mere tariff threats that are dropped once a foreign nation agrees to certain U.S. trade conditions.

The “MarketWatch” website noted on Feb. 22:

The Trump administration [has] reportedly started to lay off nearly 7,000 new workers from the IRS … including many who work in enforcement. … Commerce Secretary Lutnick [explained] that Trump’s goal is to “abolish” the IRS and replace its tax revenue with tariff cash.

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