American consumers are the biggest losers in Trump’s Trade Wars | Donald Trump

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced a radically basic rate of 10 percent on almost all import to the United States, and claims that the move marks the “Liberation Day” of the US economy. However, the policy is just as pro-VS as the liberation army of the people of China. If maintained, the rates will be extremely harmful to the US economy, the American consumer and the status of the country in the world.

The rate of 10 percent is remarkable the basic line; Trump’s efforts to free the US economy include numerous much higher rates. An example is his 25 percent rate for all imports of cars that are in force on his “Liberation Day”. Trump claims that his policy is aimed at restoring the American production basis, but there is no time to rebuild this capacity with a slight war speed. Trump naturally pays such worries little attention. An identical rate of 25 percent on car parts is only delayed for a month and will take effect in May. Automotive prices will worry and the supply chains will be discussed.

The US is the most auto-dependent large economy-one larger part of the voters will be hit directly by the move than in any other Western country. The March rates of Trump on Canada and Mexico – the two countries with whom most American automotive production are integrated – have already caused a disturbance. There is an almost universal expectation Those prices will rise.

But this trend will also take place for various other supply chains. Many of the nearest allies of the US are confronted with higher rates – goods from the European Union will be confronted with a blanket rate of 20 percent. Japanese exports to the US will be taxed at 24 percent. Those from Taiwan, whose stock chips is so crucial for the American technology industry, will be taxed at 32 percent. India and Vietnam, two of the countries on which American supply chains were the most routed since the first administration of Trump started with a much sharper focus on the US-Chinese trade balance, confronted with a rate of 26 percent and 46 percent respectively.

The US is poorly prepared for an inflatoid shock. It still fights the last inflation shock caused by the “Bullwip” effect of recording worldwide supply chains during the COVID-19 Pandemie, and the international economic reverberation of Russian on full scale in 2022 Invasion of Ukraine. The inflationary impact of Trump’s rates will be felt more instead of later, even if a part of his team is hunting to claim that there will be negotiations about reducing some of the rates. This is because importers and distributors must re -assess the profitability of the goods they now order. Delivery chains can be properly disturbed by countermeasures from the affected countries.

Although there is no doubt that the era of the global free trade that Washington has done so much to usher in earlier presidents in the country’s production has seen, it is the American consumer who was perhaps the largest beneficiary of that agenda. They will be the most important losers of Trump’s policy.

Trump regrets the two -part consensus that was present before his turnout, which mocked the ‘globalists’ that supposedly driven this agenda and, according to him, the strong negative reaction of the stock market on his abolition of the idea of ​​always weaker trade. But the great irony is that it was his Republican party who did the most to help this agenda move forward.

In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan put the trade in the center of his message of prosperity, for both the US and those who would collaborate with it. Milton Friedman, traditionally an economist highly praised by conservatives and a Reagan adviser, written: “Our rates harm us and other countries. We would benefit from providing our rates, even if other countries not …

Reagan’s democratic opposition were late converts – when Bill Clinton brought the North -American free trade agreement for the congress in 1994, more Republican senators voted for it than Democrats. However, Trump is not going to have his last plans about his last plans – even when they seem to counteract against free trade agreements with affected countries.

However, the congress can still play its role.

Trump’s rates rely on relatively thin status. He claims that he carries them out of “national security grounds”. He formally justifies them under the international Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA). The half -century -old act is one of the most influential pieces of our legislation in history, because it makes a significant expansion of the power of the executive branch possible. It is the core of the authority to issue sanctions and for imposing restrictions on the export of American technology, as well as many of Trump’s earlier tariff acts.

For the president to use these powers, he must, however, declare and justify an underlying national emergency situation. Although it never did that, the congress has the authority to terminate a national emergency situation explained under Iepa via the National Emergencies Act of 1985.

A vote about the withdrawal has already been held in the US Senate. Hours after Trump announced his rate attack, four Republicans – Susan Collins van Maine, Lisa Murkowski from Alaska and both Kentucky Senator to vote For a resolution to revoke the ‘national emergency situation’ on Fentanyl that Trump has issued to justify his general rates on Canada, which passed it 51-48. But with this action, only the Canadian order, not the comparable order based on Trump’s rates, based on Mexico, was the target. This emphasizes how gloomy the political view is for the immediate reversal of Trump’s newest, much more expensive rates that were set on the back of another “national emergency situation” bound by trade shortages.

Any resolution to withdraw the national emergency situations of Trump and turn its rates can only come into force if it reflects its veto, which requires a two -thirds majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Republican leadership of the house is not expected to allow a voice, even about the resolution of the Senate Canada, let alone a future resolution that would influence Wednesday’s rates.

The congress did not start today to do what is needed to reverse Trump’s destructive plan.

Some Democrats started to leave the embrace of free trade under the Biden administration, and acknowledged that although it had its benefits, it also has its costs and that a recalculation is needed. The Republican Party, on the other hand, had no gradual change of orthodoxy. It has been completely transformed since Trump came about eight years ago to establish dominance. It is almost impossible for a two-thirds majority against Trump rates to be reached.

Nevertheless, everything must be done to open the eyes of those in the congress and convince them to do what is good.

The economic costs of Trump’s tariff actions will soon become clear. But if opposition sets outside the congress – whether it comes from the American consumer, the stock market or the courts – Trump will destroy more standards to try to protect his trade agenda.

April 2025 can still herald the American liberation, but only if the congress frees the country from the tyranny of rule through “national emergency situation”.

The views expressed in this article are the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial attitude of Al Jazeera.