Global Trade & Foreign Policy Insights

On February 25, 2025, President Trump signed the “Addressing The Threat To National Security From Imports of Copper” Executive Order., which orders the Department of Commerce to investigate the effects of copper imports on national security, which could lead to tariffs on all copper imports. The United States currently imports just under half of the refined copper it consumes. More than 90% of the copper imported by the United States comes from Chile, Canada, and Peru.

On February 13, 2025, President Trump hosted the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, at the White House. Prime Minister Modi was the fourth head of state to meet with President Trump regarding the President’s threat that United States trading partners will face reciprocal tariffs.

On February 11, 2025, President Trump issued a proclamation implementing tariffs on aluminum and derivative steel articles. The Proclamation effectively eliminated exemptions from tariffs for countries and territories, including Canada, Mexico, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Japan, and South Korea.

On February 10, 2025, President Trump issued a proclamation implementing tariffs on steel and derivative steel articles. Effective March 12, 2025, previous proclamations that exempted or adjusted tariffs on steel imports from various countries, including South Korea, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Japan, the United Kingdom, Ukraine, and the European Union, will be rescinded.

As anticipated, on Saturday, February 1, 2025, President Trump signed three executive orders imposing a 25% ad valorem rate of duty on Canadian and Mexican products; and a 10% rate of duty on Chinese products. 

On January 27th, President Trump threatened to impose tariffs on U.S. imports of copper and aluminum (metals needed for U.S. military hardware production), as well as steel.

On January 26, 2025, a feud between the United States and Colombia began pertaining to U.S. military flights carrying deportees to Colombia. After initially providing approval for the two aircraft to land in Colombia, Colombian President Gustavo Petro blocked their landing. According to his multiple social media posts, he explained that he was objecting to the use of military planes as opposed to commercial airlines to deport the migrants. In response, President Trump posted on social media that his administration will institute a number of actions against Colombia.

Following his inauguration on Monday, January 20, 2025, President Donald Trump held off on issuing an executive order instituting additional tariffs of any form.

Since well before the November 6 election, President-elect Trump and his team have been discussing the imposition of tariffs on certain trade partners. The scope of possibilities range from all imports being subject to a 10% to 20% additional tariff, to the imposition of a 60% tariff on imports from China, to tariffs on vehicles from Mexico reaching as high as 100% to 200%.