U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer signaled tariffs could rise for some countries early Wednesday, telling FOX Business they may increase to 15% or higher as President Trump continues his push for economic leverage.
“Even right now, we have the 10% tariff, it’ll go up to 15 for some, and then it may go higher for others,” Greer said on “Mornings with Maria.”
“I think it will be in line with the types of tariffs we’ve been seeing. We want to have continuity in this program,” he added.
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The comments come as U.S. trading partners, including the European Union, have sought clarity on how the administration plans to implement its revised tariff strategy following a recent Supreme Court setback.
Greer said the administration is preparing to launch a series of investigations under existing trade authorities in the coming days and weeks, including Section 301 probes targeting what he described as unfair trading practices.
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“These include things like people who use forced labor in their supply chains,” Greer explained, adding that the U.S. would also examine countries accused of building industrial excess capacity and flooding American markets.
Under the process, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative would issue a Federal Register notice, open a public comment period, and hold hearings, giving countries an opportunity to address those concerns before additional tariffs are imposed, he noted.
“We think that the deals that we’ve made with these folks actually tend to address, at least in part, some of the practices I’m talking about,” he said.
“With Indonesia, for example, we will run an investigation. We’ll look at industrial excess capacity. We’ll look at what they’re doing in fishing and that kind of thing, and we’ll run that investigation, and then we’ll bump it up against what they’ve agreed to do and what we think the problem is. Then, we make a determination on what kind of tariff should apply,” he said.
“We expect to have continuity in what we’re doing,” he said.
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