Tariff Liberation Day Has Arrived

Cue the mass hysteria. Donald Trump’s Liberation Day has arrived, as the decades of foreign nations tariffing our goods without reciprocal tariffs ends.

The tariff war between the United States and dozens of other nations just took a major escalation, as the president imposed reciprocal tariffs on a number of goods from a lengthy list of countries. (The tariffs are reciprocal in that if a nation tariffs 10% on U.S. goods, so will we on that nation's products.) The president aims to bring manufacturing back to America and to cow hostile nations. While many economists and media figures are prophesying economic disaster, it is worth noting that tariffs during both Ronald Reagan’s presidency and Donald Trump’s first term boosted economic growth and wage increases here in America.

Trump declared in an executive order that he finds “underlying conditions, including a lack of reciprocity in our bilateral trade relationships, disparate tariff rates and non-tariff barriers, and U.S. trading partners' economic policies that suppress domestic wages and consumption, as indicated by large and persistent annual U.S. goods trade deficits, constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and economy of the United States.“

He labels the source “in whole or substantial part outside the United States in the domestic economic policies of key trading partners and structural imbalances in the global trading system.” Thus, on April 2, he declared a national emergency. Trump cited “non-reciprocal trading practices” and inhibitions on supply chains and “advanced domestic manufacturing capacity.” He cited historical precedent for the United States negotiating reciprocal trade deals but explained that these fairer deals no longer exist.

In fact, the lack of reciprocity has even prevented America from having equivalent access to other markets, Trump claimed. The “large and persistent annual U.S. goods trade deficit” has been a result, along with a decline in manufacturing.

"The United States Trade Representative, in consultation with the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, the Senior Counselor for Trade and Manufacturing, and the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, is hereby authorized to submit recurring and final reports to the Congress on the national emergency," the press release notes.

Among the countries affected by the new tariffs are China, India, Vietnam, Malaysia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the European Union, Ecuador, Algeria, Nigeria, Haiti, Venezuela, Iraq, Cameroon, Syria, Chad, Gambia, Eritrea, and South Sudan.

Details on Trump’s reciprocal tariffs part 1 pic.twitter.com/7KV39gjSbS

— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) April 2, 2025

Read Also: RFK Calls HHS Layoffs a ‘Win-Win for Taxpayers’

Details on Trump’s reciprocal tariffs part 2 pic.twitter.com/rWowtZdWoo

— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) April 2, 2025

While other countries have been allowed to impose extortionate tariffs on American goods for decades, America has often not imposed reciprocal tariffs, leading to a very unbalanced and unfair system that often drives manufacturing and jobs out of the U.S. It remains to be seen if Trump’s new tariffs can successfully bring home jobs and boost our economy.

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