Canada’s Retaliatory Tariffs on $20 Billion in U.S. Goods Take Effect

Canada’s retaliatory tariffs on about $20 billion worth of American goods took effect just after midnight Tuesday, deepening a trade fight between the United States and its biggest trading partner, NBC News and CBS News reported. The duties range from 15 percent to 50 percent and are described as dollar-for-dollar retaliation for the tariffs the Trump administration imposed on Canadian products after negotiations collapsed in August.

According to CBS News, American milk, perfume, video game consoles, golf clubs, fishing rods, steel, aluminum, jackets and T-shirts face the highest rate, 50 percent. Cheese, carpets and certain household appliances such as stoves and air conditioners face 25 percent, and forklifts and industrial molds 15 percent. CBS reported that tariffs on some American seafood, initially planned at 25 percent, were dropped after the lobster industry pushed back.

The American tariffs that prompted the response hit Canadian milk, honey, hockey sticks, alcoholic beverages, plywood, jewelry and other goods, CBS News reported. NBC News said they cover about $20 billion, or 5 percent, of Canadian exports to the United States, and were imposed under a Depression-era law that does not allow Canada to use exemptions in the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement. About 80 percent of Canada’s exports to the United States have moved duty-free under that pact, NBC reported, and President Donald Trump declined to extend the agreement another decade, so it now faces annual reviews.

Prime Minister Mark Carney told reporters, according to CBS News, that the Trump administration “asked too much and offered too little.” Trump wrote that Canada has “been ripping us off for decades, and it’s going to stop,” CBS reported. NBC News reported that Trump has threatened to raise tariffs on Canadian cars, trucks and auto parts to 50 percent starting Jan. 1.

The two countries are not currently negotiating. NBC News, citing a government source, reported that there are no talks between ministers or officials, although Carney said last week that Canada was ready to sign a deal benefiting both countries.

CBS News reported that two-way trade topped $700 billion last year, according to U.S. government figures, and that economists it cited expect manufacturers in Michigan and Indiana and dairy producers in Wisconsin and Vermont to be hit. Michael Harvey of the Canadian Agri-Food Trade Alliance told NBC News his group is worried about “an escalatory spiral.”

NBC News cited a Reuters/Ipsos poll finding that only 20 percent of Americans approve of the tariffs on Canadian goods.