United States customs agents on Saturday began enforcing a 10% baseline tariff on imports from various countries, with higher tariffs on goods from 57 major trading partners set to begin next week.
This action marked President Trump’s complete departure from the post-World War II system of agreed-upon tariff rates, opting instead for unilateral trade measures.
This marked the start of higher tariffs on goods from 57 larger trading partners, set to take effect next week. The move signaled Trump’s full rejection of the post-World War II system of mutually agreed tariff rates, opting for a more unilateral approach to trade policy.
“This is the single biggest trade action of our lifetime,” said Kelly Ann Shaw, a trade lawyer at Hogan Lovells and former White House trade adviser during Trump’s first term.
At a Brookings Institution event on Thursday, Shaw stated that she anticipated the tariffs would change over time as countries work to negotiate lower rates.
“But this is huge. This is a pretty seismic and significant shift in the way that we trade with every country on earth,” she added.
Trump’s tariff announcement on Wednesday sent shockwaves through global stock markets, erasing $5 trillion in value for S&P 500 companies by Friday’s close, marking the largest two-day decline in history.
Oil and commodity prices plummeted, while investors flocked to the safety of government bonds.
The 10% tariff initially impacted countries like Australia, Britain, Colombia, Argentina, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. A U.S. Customs and Border Protection bulletin clarified that there would be no grace period for cargoes already on the water at midnight Saturday.
However, it did grant a 51-day grace period for goods that had been loaded onto vessels or planes and were in transit to the U.S. before 12:01 a.m. ET Saturday.
